Shane picks his mysteries by their covers. Trench coats, fedoras, shadowy back alleys, that sort of thing. One Sunday afternoon, at a restaurant called Chester’s, Shane was caught up in a mystery involving a stolen antique spoon when a dark-haired young lady leaned across her table to say, “Any guesses?”
Shane blank-faced her over top of his paperback.
“Who stole the spoon?” she said. Her voice was low, syrupy, and her smile said she was about to give away the answer.
“I don’t usually guess.”
One week later, Shane returned to Chester’s. It was a short walk from his condo in Albuquerque, and he’d been eating there at least once a week since Lisha left. This time, he came with his kids, Virginia and Liam, who had been staying with him since Monday. The hostess led the three of them to a square table by the street-side window where the sun came through. It was a little late for lunch, a little early for dinner. In the center of their table was an unlit burgundy mood candle.
Shane pointed on Virginia’s menu to the two or three things she and Liam might like to eat. Liam pointed to a homeless man on the other side of the window who was missing his right arm and leg, who made his way down the sidewalk on a single crutch. “Don’t point,” Shane said, and then he watched his seven-year-old son’s quiet stare change from surprise to somber contemplation.
She was there. The woman with the syrupy voice. Shane spotted her as soon as they walked in. He figured her for a student, because Chester’s was always full of UNM students. She wore a Black Sabbath t-shirt and sat on the far side of the restaurant. Shane unintentionally met her stare twice before he even finished ordering. As he took the menus from his kids and gave them to the student waiter, he could see in his periphery the woman as she stood and approached their table, plate and mug in hand. Pretending not to notice as she took the empty table beside their own, Shane asked Virginia how she was enjoying her first week of summer vacation, and she gave him the same vacant shrug she’d been giving all week.
“What’s your favorite thing we did this week?”
She studied her hands, picking at her pink-polished nails, and shrugged again. Shane was about to put the same question to Liam, because Liam was guaranteed to give a better response than that, but then the woman leaned over from her neighboring table and said, in a kind of sing-songy way, “Hi, Dad.”
Shane looked up at her. He smiled politely.
“Were you surprised it was the curator?”
“The curator?”
“Who stole the spoon.”
A young man getting up from his seat behind Shane accidentally bumped Shane’s elbow with his chair and apologized. Turning to the woman again, Shane said, “I actually haven’t quite finished it.”
“Well,” she said, “I wasn’t surprised one bit.”
Shane could have sworn she licked her teeth at the last word. Up close, he was surprised to discover that despite having the shape of a college freshman, her face was past forty.
“Because the curator called the cops,” she explained. “Half the time the bad guy is the first person to talk to the cops.”
Liam was shaving an orange crayon with his fingernails and leaving a waxy mess on the white tablecloth, so Shane told him to cut it out or put the crayon back in his pocket.
“I can’t put it in my pocket. It’s not mine.”
Shane held out his hand until his son gave up the crayon, then he put it in his breast pocket. “Hey,” said Liam. “That’s not yours.”
Shane started brushing the crayon shavings into his cupped hand when the woman addressed his daughter, saying, in her friendliest voice, “What’s your name?”
“Virginia,” she said shyly.
“Virginia. That’s a cool name. I used to live in Virginia, Virginia. Lots of cool people in Virginia. You must be pretty cool, Virginia.”
Virginia blushed.
“My name’s Amani. People call me Ani. Do you like to read, Virginia? Like your dad?”
Virginia looked at her dad, clearly wondering how Amani knew he liked to read. “Not really,” she said. “Sometimes he reads to us.”
Amani nodded along, then she leaned in to whisper, “Hey, Virginia, tell me the truth: is your dad cool like you?”
This time Shane laughed when his daughter gave that same vacant shrug. She blushed again and said, “I mean, he’s pretty nice.”
“Ah,” said Amani. “Pretty nice. I get you.” And then Amani put two fingers in her mouth and removed her gum, sticking it to the inside of her empty mug. She moved her chair just a few feet from Shane. “Well, it’s pretty nice to meet you,” she said, holding out her hand for Shane to shake, but before he could take his hand back she grabbed his wrist with her free hand and flashed him a playful smile.
“Hey, Virginia,” she said. “I bet I can guess your dad’s favorite book. If I do, will you tell me his name?”
Virginia looked at Liam and they both laughed.
“Do you know what his favorite book is?” Amani asked.
Virginia nodded and shushed Liam, who was clearly on the edge of blurting it out.
All the while Amani kept hold of Shane’s hand. Around her wrist were about two dozen metallic hoop bracelets and what resembled a knotted leather shoelace. She had a tattoo on the inside of her elbow. “Faith Not Fear” in courier typeface. Shane’s instinct was to pull his hand away, but Virginia and Liam looked happier than they had all week, and all week he’d been trying to make them happy. He wasn’t about to be the killjoy now, not with only one more day before they go back to their mom’s.
“I get three guesses, okay?”
She narrowed her eyes at Shane, who faked a smile and said, “Fine.”
“I know one thing already: you like mysteries. And I’m willing to bet they’re almost all you read.”
Virginia smiled and looked at her brother, which Amani took as confirmation. “My first guess is something by Milford Tansey,” she said, lowering her voice. “Something hot, drenched in alcohol.” She held up one finger, still grasping Shane’s wrist with her other hand, and said, “Sun Setting.”
Virginia shook her head. “Nope.”
This time Shane didn’t have to force a smile. “So far off,” he said.
Amani smiled back, glad he was showing a little spirit. “I guess I forgot,” she said. “You’re ‘pretty nice.’ Lemme think—mysteries for nice guys. Old-fashioned guys. Classic noir. Cool hats. Smoky apartments. Yeah? A private dick sniffing a money trail through the heart of Chicago. I’m getting closer. I can see it on your face. Distant City by Will Foley. His best. That’s my second guess.”
Liam looked to Virginia, who shook her head again, but Amani just watched Shane’s face as she said, “Not so far off that time.”
Shane only smiled, trying not to give himself away.
“Third guess,” she said. “I’ve only got three guesses.” Amani turned Shane’s hand over and spread his fingers. “Have you ever had your palm read?”
Shane laughed a laugh like he should have known.
So Amani asked Virginia, “Do you know what palm reading is?”
“It’s when someone looks at the lines in your hand and predicts the future.”
“What’s this going to cost me?” Shane said.
“No, no, I never perform for money. I’m a committed amateur.”
“You can predict the future?” Virginia asked, and Liam giggled.
“Palmistry isn’t about the future. Our hands reveal multiple dimensions of our being. The past can leave deep creases. Pain and heartbreak leave physical marks.” She had begun to caress Shane’s hand softly with her fingertips as she spoke, starting at the center of his palm and moving outward. “Our palms tell us what we are afraid of, how we love, why we love. They reveal things we are ashamed of. Who knows? Your dad’s palm might even tell me what his favorite book is.” She looked directly into Shane’s eyes. “I’m sure I’ll learn something.”
Amani lowered Shane’s palm close to her bare knees, which were pressed tightly together, and bent down so her face was only a few inches away. She drew lines in his hand, following the intersecting creases with her index finger like she was trying to read a map, or tracing constellations. Shane was surprised at himself for suddenly feeling nervous. Naked. He leaned in a little to study his own hand as though trying to peek first in order to prevent her from seeing something he’d prefer she not see. But, of course, the lines in his hand meant nothing to him. All he saw was the Mississippi Delta from a satellite. Amani sometimes acted surprised by where the lines led. She would pause there and move her mouth as though whispering, but Shane never heard her speak. Then she would follow another crease, turning his hand around a little, and stop to think.
Finally, she looked up, still holding his hand loosely, and smiled, sadly, as though she’d been caught doing something she shouldn’t have. Her voice shaking a little, she said, “You have a beautiful future.”
Shane shifted uncomfortably. Liam held his breath. Virginia looked confused. She was the first to break the silence. “Did you see it? What’s your third guess?”
Amani shrugged. “Long Train to Newark,” she said. “Lucio Fanelli. Spaghetti noir.”
The table was silent. Amani looked to Virginia, who smiled, though she seemed a bit let down.
“Sorry, Ani,” said Shane.
“Dad’s favorite book is Sam Lansley in San Francisco,” said Liam. “He’s read it to us twice already.”
“I don’t like it as much as Sam Lansley in Baltimore,” said Virginia.
“I see,” said Amani. “Dime store stuff. Very classy.”
Amani finally let go of Shane’s hand. He suddenly felt embarrassed for both of them. “Long Train to Newark sounds good too, though,” he said.
The waiter came balancing three plates. As Amani stood, Virginia said, “Don’t you want to know my dad’s name?”
“Virginia,” she said, standing, “stay cool.” She fist-bumped the kids, then left. The waiter laid a plate in front of each of them. Macaroni, macaroni, turkey-swiss panini.
⁂
All night Shane dreamed he was a sixteenth-century explorer navigating the tributaries of the Mississippi Delta, mapping the tangle of river systems, scribbling notes on native flora and fauna. The next day, a large, nervous woman visited Shane’s family practice seeking treatment for varicose veins. She removed her sweatpants and stood still as Shane examined the bulging, twisting circulatory system that traveled from hip to knee. He felt the veins with his fingers, marked where they ended and where they began, and briefly wondered if some message could be found in them.
He didn’t really believe that Amani read some message in his palm, but he couldn’t stop thinking of her assurance of a promising future. “A beautiful future,” she said.
At a used bookstore, on the way home from work, Shane found a hardcover copy of Lucio Fanelli’s Long Train to Newark. The cover showed a man at a busy 1940’s train station wearing his fedora low to shade his face. In one hand he held a suitcase, and in the other, a ticket stub. He looked over his shoulder as though he felt a presence following him, but he didn’t seem to notice the woman in the shadows, her hat similarly tilted down over one eye, a cigarette in one hand, the other reaching into her purse.
When Virginia and Liam saw the book on the kitchen table, they begged their dad to read it to them. The night before, as they were walking home from Chester’s, Virginia told her dad that Ani really liked him, she could tell. In the morning, Shane found Virginia and Liam sitting cross-legged on the kitchen tile, staring into each other’s palms and saying, “You’re going to be very, very rich,” or “You’re going to be a famous scientist,” or “Next year, in school, you’ll have lots and lots of friends.”
Shane had one more night with his kids before they were to go back to their mom’s place for a month. He cooked Virginia’s favorite meal, spaghetti and meatballs with extra red wine vinegar. After they finished eating, Liam ran off to play Nintendo, Shane got up to wash the dishes, and Virginia stayed sitting at the dinner table as she scrolled through pictures on her phone. Shane was surprised when, completely unprompted, Virginia began telling him about her friend, Dana, who acted one way in front of her and another way in front of others. Shane listened closely, nodding along, but in the end, he made the mistake of giving advice when she was only asking for sympathy.
“Does that make sense?” Shane asked.
She just nodded and went back to her phone. After a long silence, Virginia said, “What do you think Ani meant when she said your future would be good?”
“I don’t know, sweetie. She was just being nice. People can’t really tell those things by looking at hands.”
Neither of them said anything for a while. Shane was finished scrubbing the last dish, so he went to scrubbing the inside of the sink. He always felt he needed to show his kids he was busy.
Virginia stood from the table and left the room.
⁂
Shane wore a black button-down and jeans. He sat by the window and ordered tea. He scanned the room casually. She wasn’t there. Per usual, there were several university students sitting in small groups or reading alone. Shane brought his copy of Long Train to Newark and picked up where he left off, but he lost interest after two or three pages.
The next evening was the same, except that he wore a blue button-down. Shane ordered tea and kept an eye out for Amani, but she never showed. Shane was trying to concentrate on his reading when a man came walking in to the rhythm of pocket change and asked to use the payphone in the lobby. The payphone. Like it was 1995. The hostess said, “Fine. But keep it down.”
The man looked to be in his early thirties. He held his long hair back with a rubber band and soon he was speaking loudly into the phone, saying, “Baby, if you don’t come back to me, I’m going to kill myself. I swear it!”
He dressed like an actor dressed as a poet. He had on a silk scarf and he wore a goatee. The whole restaurant was listening as the man went on and on, pleading with some woman to give him another chance. He sounded as though he was on the verge of tears before he lowered his voice to whisper.
“Hello?” he said. “Can you hear me?”
He reached into his pocket and removed a handful of change. Then with the phone pressed between his ear and his left shoulder he found three quarters and hurried them into the coin slot. Shane immediately recognized that metallic sound he hadn’t heard in years.
Shane closed his book. Amani wasn’t coming. But before leaving, Shane decided to ask around.
“Oh, I know who she is,” the hostess said. “I never knew her name, but I know who you mean. She hasn’t been here for a while.” She frowned. “Sorry.”
“Thanks,” Shane said.
Then a customer sitting close by, a female student in a red t-shirt who Shane had seen in the restaurant before, said, “Yeah, I know who you’re talking about. She used to come in here and talk with me about whatever I was studying.”
Behind him, Shane could hear the ponytailed man still whispering, but now he was standing close enough to make out what the man was saying: “I swear to God if you leave me I will come after you. No, I don’t mean you, I mean him. I’ll find him. I promise I’ll find him and I’ll… Please, Laura, listen to me. Laura, Baby, don’t make me…”
Speakers overhead played “Running Scared” by Roy Orbison. The student in the red t-shirt went on. “Actually, the last time I saw her she was talking to you. You were with a couple kids and she was looking at your hands.”
Shane wasn’t paying attention to her, and when he realized she was finished speaking he said, “Yeah, that’s her. Thanks.” Then he turned to the hostess. “Are you hearing this?” he asked quietly, signaling toward the man at the payphone.
“What? Oh, him,” the hostess responded. “Don’t worry about him. He comes in here the same time every week and goes through this whole routine. He’ll be finished in a minute.” Then she leaned forward and whispered, “He does it for the room, you know. I don’t think ‘Laura’ even exists.”
Before Shane could ask the hostess what she meant, she rushed off to seat a young couple who had just walked in. Shane did his best to ignore the man on his way out the door. Outside, the air was wet with an approaching storm. Shane could see the moisture just under the streetlights. People were hurrying to get home. He remembered the man with one hand, one foot, and one crutch and wondered if he was outside somewhere or if he had someplace to go. After Shane walked a little more than a block, he heard someone calling from behind.
“Hey! Hold on a sec!”
It was the ponytailed man from the payphone. As he caught up with Shane, he said, “The girl you’re looking for. Amani. I know where you can find her.”
“You know her?”
“Oh yeah, we’re close friends. Both artists. Listen, I’m late, but come back to Chester’s Thursday night. Around the same time.”
“Amani will be there?”
“She’ll be there,” he said, and then the man turned and started jogging back in the direction from which he came. After a few steps he looked over his shoulder and waved to Shane. Then he was gone.
That night, when Shane got home, he took off his shoes and his socks and left them on the entryway floor with his copy of Long Train to Newark, then he fell asleep on the couch watching I Dream of Jeannie reruns. He dreamt he was walking I-40 through New Mexico as punishment for some unnameable hubris, and when he woke to the booming thunder, he fumbled upstairs to his bedroom, feeling in the dark with his naked fingers and toes.
⁂
The Albuquerque heat was driving everyone to their pools. On Thursday morning, Shane filled prescriptions for six children with swimmer’s ear. In the late afternoon, he sat on a white patio chair and finished Long Train to Newark. It was fine.
He arrived at Chester’s around eleven o’clock—thirty minutes before closing. He noticed Amani immediately. She was sitting alone, drinking water and snacking on edamame while she read. As soon as he saw her, he realized he hadn’t actually expected to see her. He was greeted by a new hostess. He ignored her, then went straight to Amani’s table and sat across from her.
“Hi,” Shane said.
“Hello.” She smiled and closed her book, setting it down next to her plate of edamame.
“I didn’t know they serve edamame,” Shane said.
“They don’t,” Amani said, stuffing a Ziploc bag into her purse.
Suddenly, Shane felt nervous. He noticed she was wearing a tiny diamond stud in her left nostril. “Is that new?” he asked, touching his nose with his finger. “Or did I just not notice?”
Amani only shrugged. She turned her head just a little to her left and the tiny diamond stud, failing to reflect any light, disappeared completely.
“I’ve been thinking,” Shane began, “about the last time we met. When you came to our table and read my palm. You said I have a beautiful future.”
Amani nodded, then picked up her glass and sipped her lemon water.
“What did you mean, exactly?”
She set down her glass and smiled. “Have you been looking for me? To ask me that?”
“Didn’t your friend tell you I’d be here tonight?”
“My friend?” Amani looked genuinely unaware.
“He said he was your friend. An artist. With a ponytail. He was here using an old payphone, if you can believe that.”
“Oh,” she said, “I see.” Then she leaned forward and whispered, “He’ll be here in a few minutes,” and then she put her finger to her mouth to indicate this was a secret.
She bit down on an edamame pod, keeping her lips parted as she slid the beans out with her teeth. She placed the empty pod in a small bowl with the rest. “So you want to know what I saw when I read your palm.”
“Did you really see something?”
“Of course,” Amani said. “Always.” She thought for a moment, then she said, “I saw you raising your kids to become successful, happy people. I saw their families—your grandchildren. And I saw you, retired, every day reading your favorite mystery novels.”
Shane waited for her to say more. “That’s it?”
Amani laughed. “Yeah,” she said flatly, “That’s it. Just a happy life. Is that not enough?”
“No,” Shane said, “of course it is.”
He sat back in his seat and watched her put another pod in her mouth. Then he leaned forward again and said, “Do my kids still like me? When they’re grown up? Do we spend time together?”
“Of course.”
“Am I alone? Am I with someone?”
Amani closed her eyes and exhaled loudly. “Buy a dog,” she said. “I saw you with a dog. One of those big yellow ones that would make anyone happy. You two were cute together.” She winked. “What’s the matter,” she said. “Were you hoping for something different?”
Shane looked out the window, at the street, and then he smiled at Amani. “That night you read my palm, my daughter, Virginia, she said she could tell you liked me.”
Amani crossed her legs and her arms. “Huh,” she said. She seemed to be looking past Shane, at someone who just walked in.
“Listen, my name is Shane. Do you want to go out for a drink or something?”
She smiled and flashed her diamond stud. “Tonight?”
“Yeah,” he said.
“What about your kids?”
“They’re at their mother’s.”
Her smile weakened a little. “Sorry, Shane. The trouble is I’m right in the middle of something.”
Then he heard it. The ponytailed artist was here, at the payphone, and he began shouting into the receiver.
“Don’t. Laura. I swear it. I’ll kill myself. What? My mother’s? Are you out of your mind?”
The whole room put down their forks. The artist was hunched over the old payphone and spewing his agony into the receiver, like a scene from a one-man play. Shane turned back to Amani, who was listening closely to the artist. “Another time then?” he asked.
“Probably not, sweetie,” she said, never taking her eyes off the artist.
Shane didn’t wait for an explanation. He stood up to leave but only moved a few steps before the whole room froze.
“Bitch!” the artist screamed. “You bitch!” Then he threw the receiver against the wall, shattering it, and in a bright flash of fury he smashed his head into the payphone. Several customers screamed and someone stood up instinctively. The artist dropped to his knees immediately, with his back to the rest of the restaurant, and pressed his hands to his face. He knelt like that for a few seconds, then he leaned back so his ankles bent and his face was turned dramatically to the ceiling. From under his hands, blood ran profusely down his neck and off his cheeks. He began to moan.
“Heavens,” said the hostess as she went to get towels. Suddenly Amani got up from her seat and ran to the man while everyone stared on. She knelt beside him and inspected his nose.
“Oh hell. It’s broken,” Amani said. “We need to take you to a doctor, okay?”
Out of instinct, Shane took one step forward before he stopped himself. The artist was hysterical, audibly swallowing blood, mucus, and tears as he spoke. “Why would she do this to me?”
The hostess came back with towels. She gave them to Amani and said, “Get him out of here. We can’t have him in here like this.”
“This man is in pain,” Amani said. Then she spoke to the artist again. “What’s your name?”
“Charlie,” he spat.
“Give me your hand, Charlie?” Amani took Charlie’s hand away from his nose to inspect it more closely. “All right,” she said soothingly. “Have you ever had your palm read, Charlie?”
“What am I going to do?” Charlie whined. “I’m gonna kill her…I can’t…”
“No, Charlie, you’re not going to hurt anyone. Things aren’t as bad as they seem. Look. Spread your fingers out like this. Good. Keep pressure on your nose with your other hand, okay? Don’t take pressure off that nose. I know it hurts. Where are you from, Charlie?”
“Here.” Every word was on the verge of tears.
Amani hummed soothingly while she read his palm. Charlie watched her, totally transfixed, and after a few seconds, she said, “Good. Oh, Charlie, this is good.”
“Good? What do you see? Is she coming back?”
Shane had heard all he needed to hear. As he crossed the room toward the front door, the hostess said, “That’s enough. He’s got to go,” and one of the customers said, “Give it a rest, lady!”
Shane couldn’t tell whether the customer was scolding Amani or the hostess, but he didn’t hang around to find out. Stepping into the summer night, all around him were the accompanying sounds of Albuquerque—someone kicking a soccer ball against the side of a brick building, the distant deep rhythm of reggaetón from a passing car, and the scream of desert cicadas, like rattlesnakes. Shane walked his usual path. As he went, he thought about all those other customers hypnotized by the performance. For some of them, it would be branded in their minds for days, weeks, maybe years to come. And even after they stop talking about it, it will come rushing back whenever they visit Chester’s and they see that payphone. Maybe any payphone. Charlie, his hand extended, covered in blood, and that tiny dark-haired woman bent over it—as though she were praying over him—tracing the intersecting lines and creases with her index finger, turning his hand over, letting him bleed onto her legs.
As he walked, Shane tried to forget the whole show at Chester’s. He thought instead of I Dream of Jeannie reruns and disappointing mysteries. But his mind came back to the blood again and again. Charlie faked the blood, he decided. His face never made contact. Shane didn’t know how he knew it, but he knew it. When he came to his street, he didn’t want to go home to an empty condo. He was too angry to go home alone. He passed his street and kept walking. “A beautiful future,” he said aloud. He turned his head and spat, walking faster. He considered what it might be like to keep walking and never go home. Just pick a direction and go on walking forever.
Tyler Corbridge is an Assistant Professor of English at Columbia College and Ph.D. candidate in Creative Writing at the University of Missouri. His work has previously appeared in Chicago Quarterly Review, Salt Hill Journal, Fjords Review, and elsewhere. In 2019, he earned an MFA in Fiction from the University of Alabama.
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