Finding Fortune Read Free

Maybe I’d even hitchhike. It would serve Mom right for refusing to let me have a cell phone until I started seventh grade. I was so ready to give up that I flinched in surprise when I heard the sharp click of a lock turning and someone grumbling on the other side of the doors.
    â€œWhat do they think this is?” an old woman’s voice croaked. “The Plaza Hotel?”
    I flinched again when the door finally swung open and a blinding light shone in my face. I shielded my eyes. Was that Hildy Baxter? Listening to Gail, I had been imagining a plump grandmotherly sort of lady with white hair and spectacles. But the person at the door, with her face half hidden in the shadows of her flashlight, reminded me of one of those clowns you see in horror movies. She had on a lopsided brown wig and thick red lipstick smeared into her wrinkles, and she was wearing a droopy cardigan that hung like a sack on her stick-figure body.
    â€œWhat on earth?” she said. Her voice was as rough as sandpaper.
    â€œI’m looking for Mrs. Baxter?”
    â€œThat’s me,” she said. “I go by Hildy. What’s this all about?”
    My words came out in a rush. “I saw your ad at the Short Stop. My name’s Ren Winningham, and I rode my bike here from Bellefield. I was wondering if I could rent one of your rooms.”
    She turned off her flashlight and reached over to flip a switch near the doorway. A fancy light fixture, piled with dead bugs, flickered on above her head. “Come in here where I can see you,” she said.
    I shuffled inside and stood blinking into the dim corners while Hildy lifted her eyeglasses from a chain around her neck, rammed them in place, and finished looking me over from head to toe. I tried to keep my nose from wrinkling. The school smelled like the terrarium I had made for my science project last year. Mossy and damp.
    â€œHow old are you?” she asked.
    I swallowed hard so my voice would be steady. “Fourteen,” I lied.
    Her eyes narrowed behind her thick lenses. She tucked her flashlight in the pocket of her sweater and put her fists on her hips. “So you’ve run away from home.”
    â€œOh, no,” I said. “I just need a place to stay until…” My voice trailed off for a second. Why hadn’t I practiced this part on my way over? “Until my mom and I get some things sorted out.” I wriggled out of my backpack and dropped it on the floor like a bag of boulders. I should have felt better after that, but when I looked up at Hildy again, I felt my eyes start to sting and I had to suck in my breath so I wouldn’t cry.
    â€œWell, honey,” she said. “I’m sorry, but the fact of the matter is I can’t let you stay. You’re underage.”
    Something about the way she called me honey suddenly made me want to keep trying. “But I can’t go home now,” I said, flapping my arms at my sides. “It’s almost dark and my tire’s flat.”
    Hildy peered around my shoulder at my bike parked out in the weeds and she blew out a heavy sigh. “How about if we call your mother and check this out with her? You got a phone?”
    I shook my head no.
    Her wig inched back and forth as she scratched the stiff curls at the nape of her neck. I was bracing myself to be turned away when she pushed the front door closed and bolted the lock. Was she really going to let me stay?
    She patted at the pockets of her sweater. “I must have left my phone back on the stage,” she said with another ragged sigh. “Wait here while I go get it.”
    My heart sank. Her phone? Once she had disappeared down the murky hall, I anxiously checked my watch. It was after eight. Nora would be home from the diner by now and she’d have seen the note I had left for Mom on the kitchen counter. “I saw you with him tonight,” I had written. “I’ve gone to Allison’s and I’m not