My Funny Valentine

Jamie automatically put the others between herself and any staff to conceal her feet. She was pretty good at walking in rollerblades as if she was wearing shoes, she wasn't too clunky, but a lot of places didn't like her going inside with them on. When she finally sat down across from Johnny, she was in the clear.

She pulled out her new deck of cards and opened the box, and slid the crisp new cards out into her palm.

"Okay." She said, suppressing a smile. She placed the cards neatly on the table in front of her and folded her hands, and began to speak again but was interrupted by a waitress looking for their drink orders.

"Um... Hot chocolate." She had ordered it there before, but she still didn't know how to say it in Japanese. Whatever. Back to the trick.

"Okay, so this is a good one," she grinned. "D'you wanna see? It's for you," she looked directly at Gum.

When Gum watched Jamie slip into the booth across from Johnny, she suppressed a smile of her own, trying not to seem too happy, and took a seat right beside of him. She scooted up close to him, looking up at the waitress for a moment to place her own order.

"Water. Lots of ice."

She then looked back at Jamie, looking right back at her. There was something suspicious about her grin and the way she had said the trick was for Gum.

"Sure. Let's see it," she answered, propping her elbows on the table and setting her chin her her hands, keeping her eyes on Jamie. "Let's see what you can do."

Johnny ordered while Gum squeezed in next to him. He could feel the curve of her hip against his but ignored it. Japan had pretty tiny booths. <Hot chocolate, water with lots of ice and a beer for me.> He said in Japanese. The waitress quickly shuffled off.

Johnny turned and smiled at Jamie. "Yeah man. let's see it. You've been sayin how great it is so show us what ya got!" He said eagerly.

"Okay," she said, and began to rapidly shuffle the cards with dextrous, practiced hands. "Okay."

She fanned out the deck and held it out toward Gum. "Pick a card! Remember what it is, stick it back in the deck. Shuffle the deck if you want." She consciously strapped and unstrapped each of her fingerless gloves several times.

Gum watched as Jamie shuffled the deck around. When she fanned out the deck, Gum reached out and drew a card, leaning in close to Johnny, letting him see what it was: the three of hearts.

"Gimme the deck," she said, reaching forward to grab it. She shuffled it around, not nearly as skillfully as Jamie, but well enough for the purposes of the trick. She then sat it back on the table, cut the cards, and slid the deck back towards Jamie.

"Alright. Let's see it," she smirked at Jamie. She leaned back in the booth, confident that Jamie wouldn't find her card.

"Uh, uh, uh!" Jamie wagged a finger at Gum, terribly pleased with herself. "I'm not gonna give it to you. You have to go get it!"

She slid out of the booth and faced down the row of booths, toward the front of the building, so that Johnny and Gum were on her right. "I'm gonna throw 'em as hard as I can, and the one that goes the farthest? That'll be your card," Jamie said like a master used car salesman. "And I've got a preeeetty good arm, so get ready for a walk."

She began to warm up her arm, loosening up and stretching and winding it up like a crank until finally she flung the whole deck into the air. "Ffffeh!" Every card anticlimactically fluttered to the ground no more than a few feet from her.

"Aw. Well... Go find the farthest one."

Gum's eyes went wide, as Jamie warmed up her arm. Was she really going to throw them? SERIOUSLY?

Yeah. She was.

Gum lifted a hand to her face, groaning quite audibly as Jamie let the deck fly, the cards fluttering through the air and to the ground in front of her. She didn't know whether to be embarrassed by the display or just feel bad for the dork. Either way, she wasn't going to go pick up her cards.

"Yeeeah...I'm not going to go pick up your cards," she said towards Jamie, shaking her head. "There's no way you could control how far my card went anyway! You didn't even do anything special with the deck or anything, you dork!" She sat back, folding her arms over her chest. "Do you really think I'm that dumb?"

Johnny was watching as Jamie performed her trick. He never really had an opinion on magic or anything like that. Magicians were probably cool but that's all he knew. Jamie's trick seemed pretty cool too, even though she just sort of threw everything everywhere. Even he had to slink in the booth a little bit.

However, when Gum got obstinate, Johnny gave her a nudge. "C'mon, dude. You don't have to pick up all the cards, just the furthest one. She'll pick up the rest. I know ya wannea see if it's your card, right, dude?" He said grinning at the blonde.

Jamie lifted her hands and got huffy. "Yeah, c'mon!" She whined. "All this work, and you don't wanna do the trick now? C'moooonnnn!"

Gum would have scowled at both of them, but Johnny's grin and his nudge was keeping her on good behavior. Dammit.

She sighed and threw up her hands, rising up out of the seat. "Alright, alright. Sheesh, I'll go get the card." She stepped over, carefully walking around the cards so she didn't step on them, and knelt down, picking up the furthest card, revealing it to be...

The Joker!

She stood back up, turning back towards Jamie with a smirk, waggling the card at her. "Ah ha! This wasn't my card at all!" she declared, shifting her gaze towards Johnny. "Tell her, handsome! This wasn't it, was it?"