Free Racing in the Rain by Garth Stein

way.
    After two weeks of this pattern, Maxwell and Trish offered to keep Zoë for a weekend, so as to give Denny a bit of a break. They told him he looked sickly, that he should take a vacation from his troubles, and Eve agreed. “I don’t want to see you this weekend,” she said to him, at least that’s what he told Zoë and me. Denny had mixed feelings about the idea. I could tell as he packed Zoë’s overnight bag. He was hesitant to let Zoë go. But he did let her go, and then he and I were alone. And it felt very strange.
    We did all the things we used to do. We went jogging. We ordered delivery pizza for lunch. We spent the afternoon watching a fantastic racing movie. After that, Denny took me to the Blue Dog Park that was a few blocks away, and he threw the ball for me. But even for that venture, our energy was wrong; a vicious dog got after me and was at my throat with bared teeth everywhere I moved. I couldn’t retrieve the tennis ball but was forced to stay close by Denny’s side.
    It all felt wrong. The absence of Eve and Zoë was wrong. There was something missing in everything we did. After we had both eaten dinner, we sat together in the kitchen, fidgeting. There was nothing for us to do but fidget. Because while we were going through the motions, doing what we always used to do, there was no joy in it whatsoever.
    Finally, Denny stood. He took me outside, and I urinated for him. He gave me my usual bedtime cookies, and then he said to me, “You be good.”
    He said, “I have to go see her.” I followed him to the door; I wanted to go see her, too.
    â€œNo,” he said to me. “You stay here. They won’t let you into the hospital.”
    I understood; I went to my bed and lay down.
    â€œThanks, Enzo,” he said. And then he left.
    He returned a few hours later, in the darkness, and he silently climbed into his bed with a shiver before the sheets got warm. I lifted my head and he saw me.
    â€œShe’s going to be okay,” he said to me. “She’s going to be okay.”

Chapter Twenty
    Z oë and me, playing in the backyard on a sunny afternoon. She made me wear the bumblebee wings she had worn the previous Halloween. She dressed herself in her pink ballet outfit with the puffy skirt and the leotard and tights. We went out into the backyard and ran around together until her pink feet were stained with dirt.
    It was the Tuesday after her weekend with Maxwell and Trish, and by then she had thankfully lost the sour vinegar smell that clung to her whenever she spent time at the Twins’ house. Denny had left work early and picked up Zoë so they could go shopping for new sneakers and socks. When they got home, Denny cleaned the house while Zoë and I played. We danced and laughed and ran and pretended we were angels.
    She called me over to the corner of the yard by the spigot. On the wood chips lay one of her Barbie dolls. She kneeled down before it. “You’re going to be okay,” she said to the doll. “Everything is going to be okay.”
    She unfolded a dishcloth that she’d brought from the house. In the dishcloth were scissors, a Sharpie pen, and masking tape. She pulled off the doll’s head. She took the kitchen scissors and cut off Barbie’s hair, down to the plastic nub. She then drew a line on the doll’s skull, all the while whispering softly, “Everything’s going to be okay.”
    When she was done, she tore off a piece of masking tape and put it on the doll’s head. She pressed the head back onto the neck stub and laid the doll down. We both stared at it. A moment of silence. “Now she can go to heaven,” Zoë said to me. “And I’ll live with Grandma and Grandpa.”
    I was sad. Clearly, the weekend of rest Maxwell and Trish had offered Denny was a false one. I had no clear evidence, and yet I could sense it. For the Twins, it had been a working