Page 70 of Wayfarers

one twenty. The last thing in the world you want

is for a fortune teller to be

exactly 50 percent right.

Knox

“Well, that was sixty bucks well spent,” Sylvie says. “You win this one.”

“Huh?” I say, surfacing from my reverie.

“You win.”

“Win what?”

“I thought that fortune teller would have some great gift because of her huge billboard and she definitely has . . . a huge billboard.”

“Oh, yeah.”

“Are you okay?”

“Fine. Why?”

“You haven’t said a word in like twelve miles.”

“Oh. I’m good. Just—”

“Knox.”

“Sylvie.”

“Did that fortune teller get to you?”

“No. I mean . . . a little.”

“The thing about your arm? That was pretty harsh. Like I’ll go to a large-billboard-having fortune teller, but I draw the line at the idea that you got that broken arm as karma for anything. Come on.”

“It’s not that,” I murmur, though since Sylvie mentioned it, it is a little bit that now too. “Could I use your phone for a sec?”

Sylvie hands me her phone. “Go for it.”

“I want to look up my mamaw’s phone number. I think I remember it, but I’m not sure.”

“That was the part that got to you?”

“I want to check in. It’s a little nuts for me to just show up at her door unannounced anyway. I don’t know what I was thinking.”

“I guarantee she’s fine. What could be safer as a fortune teller than to say a grandma doesn’t have much time? She could go thirty years from now and that fortune teller would be like I told you, thirty years is the blink of an eye.”

I can’t help but smile at Sylvie’s spot-on imitation of Miss Tara’s dreamily ominous intonation. “You’re probably right. But still.” I enter my mamaw’s name in Google and scan the results. I see a phone number that looks familiar. My palms start sweating. “Okay if I call her?”

“Dude, of course. Tell her I said hi.”

I dial, bracing for a ring. Instead I get some weird fanfare and a robotic voice says, “We’re sorry. The number you have dialed has been disconnected or is no longer in service. Please check the number and try again.”

I end the call, suddenly feeling queasy. I don’t think my mamaw would have passed away without my hearing anything about it. We got word when my dad died.

“You didn’t let it ring enough,” Sylvie says. “You hung right up. She probably takes a minute to get to the phone.”