And this is how it goes. Jerry comes to me when he doesn’t know what to do. It could be van troubles or festival passes or broken legs. In the end, I always show up for him. I always will. He knows this. I know this.
“Let me figure out some things on my end,” I say. “Do you have a contact at the hospital? Give me the name. I’ll call—”
“Don’t make any calls,” Jerry pleads. “You’re already helping me enough.”
“I want daily updates.”
“I’m not calling every day.”
“Text, then,” I insist. “I’m serious. Or I’m coming out there.”
Jerry groans. “I regret this.” There’s a seconds-long silence. “Fine, I’ll text.”
We hang up. Right away, as if done out of spite, Jerry sends a photo of his cast-covered legs on a hospital bed.
LMK if you need any more proof, his text reads.
Shame shoots through me. I have the data to prove Jerry isn’t to be trusted. There’s always something wrong, and he’s never paid me back, to start. But this looks bad.
I envision the dark-blue sky and swords of the fortune teller’s card.
Lightning strikes. Storm clouds. Painful.
“Hey, everything okay?” Emma asks. She hands me a bag tied off with orange ribbon when I meet her at the counter.
“Oh, here,” I say, handing her my credit card.
“You already paid,” she says nicely. “I added some extra sour strawberries. I know you like those.”
I blink. “Right. Sorry. Thank you.”
I head back home, itching to get my job hunt started. As I walk, I research broken legs and surgeries. Depending on how long Jerry stays at the hospital, this might be a lot more expensive than he thinks.
I’m clutching the charm bracelet in my hand. The little gold dove with its black gem eye stares back at me.
Now birds make me think of the fortune-telling reading… and Logan. If birds as a collective whole are going to remind me of him, that will be very inconvenient.
Without thinking, I take the lottery ticket out of my bag and flip it over to Logan’s phone number.
Maybe I need a little sunshine.
Chapter 5
LOGAN
On the second day of load-in at the theater, I start a fire.
The smoke units were running fine at first, but the carpet wasn’t flameproofed and the whole thing turned to ashes.
And yesterday, the numbers that get attached to each set piece, the ones we use to guide us when we’re assembling them, were all mixed up. That was just the beginning of all the unusual things that have been happening—
Thump!
“Not the canoe!” Richie Berrío, the head of Props, groans.
We both run over.
“I got it.” I lift the now-cracked canoe. It’s not heavy, but it’s the type of weight I’ve missed ever since becoming head carpenter on this production. Before my title upgrade three months ago, when I was still a production carpenter building sets, I was the one measuring, sawing, hammering, drilling, building, and repairing. Now my days are filled with managing my crew and keeping them happy, approving payroll, and making sure the theater we’re moving sets into doesn’t fall apart. Still, I get to work on Broadway and be a small part of making imagined worlds come to life in the most literal way possible. It doesn’t get better than that.
