Josie didn't answer. Ms. Ochoa wrote her cell phone number on the back of the card in blue ink and pressed it into Josie's hand and went down the new pine step to her state Ford with the cracked windshield and drove away.
* * *
"Marla and Gus fostered kids for eleven years," Boone said. "In Elko. Teenagers, mostly, the ones nobody else would take. Their license lapsed in sixteen when Gus had his heart thing. Marla says they can get it back. Says there's a thing called fictive kin, where it doesn't have to be blood if there's a real connection, and they can move faster. She already called that Ochoa lady."
They were in the blue shop. It was Saturday. The Sportster's carburetor was in pieces on the cookie sheet in front of Josie, and she had stopped touching it.
"You talked to them about me," she said.
"I'm telling you first. Like I promised."
"You're telling me after you already talked to Marla. And Marla already talked to her." She heard her voice climbing and didn't stop it. "You're making a plan. You're making a plan for me to leave him."
"I'm making a plan for when he leaves you," said Boone. "He's going, Josie. Not because anybody takes him. Because of what's happening in his head. You know it. You've known it longer than anybody."
"He's fine on Wednesdays. You've seen him. He's fine."
"He's fine on some Wednesdays."
She stood up so fast the stool fell over. Penny got up from the doorway and slunk out into the yard.
"You said—"
"I said I wouldn't do anything without telling you. I'm telling you." He didn't raise his voice. That was the worst part; she wanted him to yell so she could yell back. "Listen to me. You remember that wire? On the Shovel?"