Welcome to Strangely

Jenny looks to where he is pointing and sees a proper wishing well with a pointed wooden roof. The circular bottom is made of pale stone, and it has an ornate wheel and pulley system attached to a wooden bucket.

“A wishing well? All the way out here?” Jenny cannot help frowning in confusion when she glances up at Jason.

Jason smiles as he steers her closer to the wishing well.

He explains, “Some people believe that the guardians of a wishing well would grant them their wish if they paid a price. After uttering their heart’s desire, they would usually drop coins in the well. Then, depending on how the coin lands at the bottom of the well, the guardian would make the decision whether to grant that wish or not. If the coin lands heads-up, the guardian of the well would grant the wish, but if the coin lands tails up, the wish will be ignored.”

“Is this true? We have no use for coins… Do we?”

“You’re right, we have no need for coins, and the coins are trivial. The wishing well is only a symbol on which they can focus. Sometimes people must perform an action before they can genuinely believe. This wishing well helps us to see into the world where wishes are made. Come. Look. You’ll see what I mean.”

Jenny takes a couple of steps closer to the wishing well and holds onto the stone top of the circular wall, letting her upper body lean over the rim.

Jason stands close beside her, his arm pressing tightly against hers.

In the dark, murky water, they can clearly see many high-rise structures, built so close together there is no space for trees, or grass, or even a flower.

“Where is this place?” Jenny whispers.

“It’s New York.”

Her head jerks up so quickly to look at him, she feels a spasm of pain at the back of her neck. “New York? Really?”

He nods his head, while a smile plays at the corners of his mouth.

“Now, draw some water and you’ll be able to someone’s wish.”

Jenny gives him a disbelieving look.

He smiles. “Go on. Use the lever to lower the bucket into the water, and then turn the lever in the opposite direction to bring the bucket back up.”

She does as he says and soon the bucket full of clear, transparent water is hanging in the centre of the well, suspended by chains on either side of it. 

“Look inside,” he says softly.

Jenny looks in the bucket and sees a coin at the bottom. A strange light shimmer along its rim. She asks, unsure, “Do I take the coin?”

“No. You can leave the coin, it will be used if you decide to grant the wish, if not, it will go back to the pond or well where the wish was made.” 

An image appears upon the surface of the water in the bucket. They can see an elderly man and woman, standing in an area filled with shelves and shelves of food.

“Should we use the children's birthdays?” The woman asks the man standing beside her.

The man smiles at the woman, and Jenny can see he has loved her for an exceptionally long time. “Who knows, today may be our lucky day.”

The woman smiles sadly. “It may be. If not, we're going to lose our house.” 

Earlier today, when the woman had gone for her daily walk in the park, she had stopped at the fountain in the centre. She stood there, staring pensively at the bronze and silver coins on the bottom of the pond. The way the sun shimmered through the water and caught on the coins, making them shine like stars, made her wonder if wishes did come true. 

Without thinking, she pulled a penny from her pants pocket which she had picked up on the pavement on her way here. See a penny, pick it up. All day long, you’ll have good luck. Tightly, she held the coin in the palm of her hand, closing her fingers around it, made her wish and then tossed the coin in the pond. She watched it tumble and turn as it made its way to join the many other wishes, like stars in the midday sky.

“Two, Nineteen, Twenty, Twenty-four, Twenty-eight, and Thirty,” the man interrupts her memory as he calls out the numbers quietly while he marks them on a slip of paper. Once his numbers are marked, he hands the slip of paper to a man standing on the other side of a counter, then hands him some coins when he receives a similar slip of paper in return.

Jenny looks at Jason with a look of hope. “Are they playing a game of chance? Please tell me those are the winning numbers.”

“Use your power of premonition. What do you see? Does having ten million dollars change them? Are they still together after having all that money? Do they still love each other as much as they do now at this moment?”

Looking down at the couple again, Jenny can tell the old man’s burden is great. The woman depends on the man, always have. They are old and come from a generation where men created security for women, where men went to work, and women made a happy home. Soon, though, that happy home will be taken away from them. When the man received the slip of paper with his numbers printed on it, black on pale pink, Jenny could hear his thoughtful pleas as if he was standing right beside her.

As images of the couples’ future flash through Jenny’s mind, Jason asks, “So, are you going to grant them their wish?”