A Snicker of Magic: Chapter 18–Epilogue

“I need to use the facilities. Be right back.”

“The two of you have a lot in common, actually. Toast is self-conscious about his voice and you’re afraid to use yours.”

“Not even a little bit?"
“Maybe you only have a snicker of it,” he conceded.

His yell must have woke up the storm, because suddenly the clouds split apart and the rain fell, hard and heavy against the roof.
Deluge
Waterwall
Silver, stormy, star curtain

As I listened, I wondered if there was any story in the world better than music, a wordless and weightless lullaby wind, prone to fly right off pages and strings.

I didn’t know he was a bona fide baby Mozart. “He can play the daylights out of that piano, can’t he?”

Toast trudged back into the kitchen and shoved his books into his backpack.

“Tell me the truth, Florentine. Don’t hold back. I can handle constructive criticism.”

“Shhhhh!” Jonah chided.

But he and Oliver knew every so often, in emergencies, they’d need help with logistics, deliveries, and heavy lifting.

“There’s an obituary in there for Delora Riggins,” Oliver sighed. “I know her husband, Clifford. I’ll drop by Ponder’s and get a pie for him. Maybe run over there and give him some company.”

Dr. Zook was a superhero in disguise. A frazzled chemist by day. A crime stopper by night.

Oliver slammed on the brakes, just in time for a fat white cow to meander across the road.

The Honeycutts were older than most folks are when they had their baby, so they doted extra special on little Burl.

I mean, I’ve been trying to talk you into doing something you are morbidly afraid of.

“And clowns are severely creepy. They have painted smiles.”

Something was happening in my heart, too. At first, I thought I was getting sentimental on account of Boone’s sweet music.

Mama was already past-tensing, already reminiscing about a place we hadn’t even left yet.

One more day.
That’s all I had left in Midnight Gulch. Twenty-four measly hours.

“What I got,” Cleo said, “is age and insight.”
“Hindsight,” Mama whispered.

“Maybe you should come down and hear what I have to say? And if you don’t like what I’m saying, you can mosey back up to that apartment and I’ll never bother you again.”

“You might as well go down, Cleo,” Mama said. “He’s a persistent man.”

“Where’d the bird go?” Jonah looked stricken. “You were banking on the bird!”

Impulsive. I was too much of that.

Opportunist. I smiled.

Miss Lawson had asked me for Boone’s contact information a few days ago. She said she was hoping he’d consider playing at the end of the Duel. Truly, I think Miss Divinity Lawson just wanted Boone’s phone number. I was happy to oblige regardless.

As I concentrated on Ramblin’ Rose’s guitar, words slid down the taut strings and curled around the frets...

I held it so close to my face that my eyelashes fluttered against the glass. But all I could see was murky, dusty nothing.

He said, “Care to divulge what this little road trip is all about?”

“Not really. This is more of a symbolic observance.”

Mama looked down at me with the sort of stare insinuating I might be in trouble.

She pointed to the painted likeness of Ramblin’ Rose—red dress and cowboy boots and silver hair falling in curlicues around her face.

“Do not open that infernal jar! Who knows what diseases and dirt and critters might come spilling out!”

“I’ll be! There’s my bird roosting on your wall. Hope’s coming down, y’all!”

Since the shadow incident in the auditorium, tourists have flocked to Midnight Gulch again to hear the story of the Brothers Threadbare. Day Grissom converted an old bus to shuttle tourists to all the pertinent historic locations.