The working lady glances at the glaring electric screen. Bored and dulled by repetitive work rendered meaningless by its eternal presence, brown eyes choose to peer into a smaller rectangular light box.

Another trite advertisement for a reality-shifting, fortune-sifting, instantaneously provided filter of artificially created prophecies catches her attention like a worm on a hook catches that of the lazy and world weary fish unceremoniously dumped into the outdoor pseudo-aquarium pseudo-fisheries known as man-made lakes.

She clicks on the icon and directs the android’s gaze unto herself, who peers back. In a processed and fake image lies captured a moment not yet come to pass.

Herself, just older.

The lines of of time are weathered into the stone face. The remarkable resemblance to the gargoyle’s visage speaks of one now designated to watch from a dated, antiquated perspective as the roaring river of life rushes forward to form white water rapids. 

Yarns of the story-telling sort spill from the puckered mouth while wrinkled, knobby hands click and clack with needles moving quicker than the eyes can see. The skill of a lifetime pours into a scarf made of itchy yet warm wool for an unappreciative grandchild. 

Liver, not livor, spots the face and hands where soon true mortis may dwell. The top of the skull is as threadbare as the clothes that hang on the skeletal frame. 

Eyes tinged with melancholy and tiredness grow ever more droopy until one day they will close forever, locked in a dream of when colors were brighter.

With a sigh, she exits the application on her tiny glowing cursed artifact, returning to that world which perhaps she will someday remember fondly.