Looking to the future

The small green bean did not go unnoticed. There was something about them that caught the eye, a kind of magnetism that made anyone nearby turn irremediably to look at the leafy, laden branches.

Two years ago a puncture in the rear tire had forced Mrs. Trevis to stop. She was on a back road where it was not easy to get help. The weary woman walked for a long time until she found a wooden shack. She shouted and shouted until an older man and a boy appeared out of nowhere. Between the three of them they managed to change the tire. Mrs. Trevis asked how much he owed and the old man replied that he owed nothing, that he was going to give her a present.

They returned to the shack and the old man disappeared through a door. On his way back he brought seven small bushes planted in clay pots. It's coffee, he told Mrs. Trevis. These bushes are special. But you have to follow certain steps to plant them...

It is very important that they never separate. You must plant them in a circle between them. Before planting them in the ground, you must break the clay containers and throw them on the same ground where the bushes will be. The first harvest will come in the second year, from which he should not take a single bean. In the third year she will be able to gather the fruits, dry them during the day and put them away again at night, and each grinding must be done only during the full moon.

Intrigued by this explanation, Mrs. Trevis continued on her way, reviewing in her memory the strange ritual that the old man had told her...

When he arrived home, he chose a shady spot. He took out the seven small plants and carried out each of the indicated steps. Every day he watched with joy as his seven bushes progressed...

The second year passed, the bean dried on the branches, fell to the ground and the bushes became more lush.

As the old man had said, in the third year the beans reappeared.... But as harvest time approached, Mrs. Trevis began to have strange dreams, seeing unfamiliar images, people and places. Each day dawned with those images vivid in her mind. Sometimes she felt a little uneasy...

One day he felt it was time to pick up the bean. With his own hands he plucked them one by one. He put them to dry as the old man had said, and made the first grinding, just when the full moon had arrived.

The first cup of that coffee gave her a strange drowsiness, it was as if her whole body was floating freely. With each small sip her state of relaxation was greater, her mind traveled and the same images that she saw in her dreams appeared, as if she was daydreaming. That situation caused her a lot of curiosity and she had no doubt that those bushes had some power that she could not pinpoint.

One afternoon she decided to offer her coffee to an occasional visitor, an old friend she had not seen for some time. She poured the two cups and they began to converse animatedly. By the third sip Mrs. Trevis began to have strange images, of a man and a woman celebrating the birth of a child, the woman looked familiar to her, but a small scar on her cheek puzzled her...

She asked about her friend's family and they replied that they were fine. Her daughter had recovered from an accident that left a scar on her cheek and was about to have her first baby, everyone wanted it to be a girl...

Mrs. Trevis restrained herself from telling her that a boy was coming instead of a girl. The conversation ended and the friends said goodbye. Later Mrs. Trevis learned that her friend's daughter had had a boy.

Those episodes were invariably repeated. Each coffee offered to the visitors brought to Mrs. Trevis's mind some images of their futures. She could thus anticipate new births, weddings, but also the imprisonment of a dear friend's son and the death of another's granddaughter. She never shared any of these images with anyone, as she thought it might be a problem if someone found out she could see the future.

One day Mrs. Trevis became ill, the doctor told her it was something serious, that she should find some company to assist her. She wanted to know what her end would be, but no matter how much coffee she drank the images never revealed anything about her own future.

She was tormented by the idea that that coffee with the power to see the future could fall into the hands of unscrupulous people. So he decided to have the bushes cut while he still had the strength to give an order...

A few months later, Mrs. Trevis died and took the secret of her coffee with her...

Frankiln observes the progress of his bushes, they are those that grew after sowing the beans that he kept when he cut those of Mrs. Trevis. Sometimes, on a full moon night, images of unknown places and people come to his dreams...

Thank you for your time.