I am trying to send a variable to display on my LCD screen. I am using

I2CWRITE I2C_COMM, I2C_CLK, CONT_SEND, ADDR1, [$FE, str num_of_beacons\1]

to write the number of beacons. I keep getting two vertical lines on the screen where that character would be.
Normal strings with the quotes around them work fine, but this is giving me some trouble. Any ideas?