Hey Nostradamus! By Douglas Coupland

What has happened to me? I've gone crazy. I have. Allison isn't evil. She's just stupid. She probably
forgot to recharge her phone. Why all of a sudden do you accuse her of treachery when stupidity may be
her only failing? Wait a second - Allison is way too young a name for a woman aged sixty-ish. She ought
to be called Margaret or Judy or Pam. Allison? Only women my age are called Allison. Or Heather.
When we all start dying in another forty years, they'll look at the obituaries, see our names and say to
themselves, "Isn't it weird? All the Heathers are dying."
A bit later
Okay, there was one time when I suspected something dodgy with Jason, just one time, down in Park
Royal maybe two months before he disappeared. We were walking down the main atrium in the south
mall, returning a shirt, and in mid-conversation Jason froze. I looked at whatever it was he was seeing;
there was just this guy sitting there eating ice cream on a bench with a woman who looked to be his
mother. He was a big guy, kind of Eastern European looking, and his clothes - they were like what a
nightclub bouncer in Vladivostok might choose, thinking that this was how hip Americans dress. His
mother was like something from the tuberculosis ward on Ellis Island circa 1902.
"Jason?"
"Don't move."
"Huh."
"I said, don't - "
"Jason, you're scaring me."
The guy looked our way, and in slow motion put down his ice cream. He then rolled up his pants leg,
and I thought he was going to pull out a handgun, but instead I saw that he had a metal prosthesis. The
guy knocked on it, looked up at Jason and gave a creepy smile.
The next minute Jason had whisked me away and we were standing in front of the Bootlegger jeans
store. He was obviously stressed out, and when he saw that we were in front of the Bootlegger store, he
became even more so - he said, "Not this place." So we escalatored up to the next level. I looked down,
and the one-legged guy was looking up at us.
By then I was curious but also quite angry. "Jason, what was that all about?"
"A guy I used to work with."
"It doesn't look to me like you were friends with him."
"He burnt me on some money he owes me. He's a crazy Russian guy. Those people will do anything."
"That's racist."
"Whatever. That guy is bad news."
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