Page 54 of Wayfarers

That feels uncomfortably true. It also feels wrong. “No.”

“And being mad is easier than crying?”

“No,” I say. “Besides, I already cried. I’m done crying. I don’t need to worry about my steering column because I’m already worried about everything else. The steering column can wait, okay?”

“Sylvie—”

“What, Knox?”

He clears his throat and points with his good arm. “That was our exit. We’re gonna have to turn around.”

Knox Even Then

With the crying

and the puking

and the playing dirty

at arm wrestling

and the getting

mad at me

for suggesting keys

on a lanyard around

her neck

and the missing

of exits

and the increasing

obviousness of the complicated

nature of Sylvie, even then,

with all that, after only hours

at her side, I can see

she has a red rose of a heart

and an electric wit and

a face people would run into walls

admiring and the best

(naughty) dog and an explorer’s spirit,

all of it adding up

to me wishing she would