Page 131 of Wayfarers

“I dunno. Feels like you’ve invited me into your house.”

“I already invited you into my van house.”

“I know. But like your house house.”

“I promise you I am not some great daughter of Springfield.”

“No, I don’t mean that I think this specific Jimmy John’s or Starbucks somehow shaped you and made you who you are. But they’re part of the story of you. You have a history. And I’m getting to see it.”

“Aha!” Sylvie comes up with the key. She turns to me. “You say that like you don’t have a history.”

“I do, but it’s much less tangible. We moved around so much that I couldn’t show you the mundane places that were important to me.”

“You wish you had that?”

“I do. Human beings are creatures of memory. I think we’re made to fall in love with places and form emotional bonds to even pretty ordinary parts of those places. Like maybe you got a really great piece of news and then went to that Jimmy John’s to celebrate.”

“If it helps mitigate your jealousy, let me assure you that I never chose that Jimmy John’s or any other to celebrate anything.”

“You’re making fun of me.”

“Swear I’m not. I think it’s adorable how in wonder of pedestrian stuff you are. You’re like a thawed-out caveman or something.”

“Best compliment one could hope for.”

“I mean that in the nicest possible way. Like one of the cavemen who made cool paintings.”

“Well, in that case. Anyway, to answer your original question before we started discussing printer paper and cavemen—”

“And celebrating life’s great victories at Jimmy John’s.”

“Yes, that too. I was wondering what you were thinking about because you got quiet.”

We enter the post office and make our way to the PO boxes.

“It’s just weird being back home,” Sylvie says, unlocking her box. “I don’t know. There’s baggage. Put it this way: I’d have much preferred not losing my card and skipping this step.” She comes up with the envelope containing the card and pumps her fist. “Nice! The only thing that would have been worse is not getting to skip this step and not finding the card here.”

“Sylvie Blake?” A glammed-out, red-haired woman dressed head to toe in expensive athleisure approaches, her head cocked. (I can recognize expensive clothes because we’d thrift and resell them at a markup at flea markets.)

The sound of someone else calling Sylvie’s name makes us both startle.

Sylvie snaps to look. She curses under her breath. “Helena!” she says brightly with what I already recognize to be a pained and false smile.

Helena grabs Sylvie’s forearm. “I thought that was you! I was like ‘Is that Sylvie?’ and I thought ‘it can’t be’ because your mom said you were out on the road! What are the odds?”

Sylvie laughs nervously. “Yeah, what are the odds, huh? I had to stop back in to grab something.”

Helena’s brow furrows with concern and her clutch on Sylvie’s forearm tightens. “Hey. How are you holding up? With everything?” Her tone is suddenly somber.

“Oh yeah, fine,” Sylvie says breezily. “All good.”

“Yeah?” Helena draws back skeptically. “You’re doing all right?”

“For sure, no, yeah.”

“You have my number? Did your mom give you my number? Any time you want to talk?”

“I think so?”