calling Mashmallow’s name. It was clear to me that Marshmallow had been a bad dog and had gone off somewhere on her own adventure.
Her scent was most recent in the area of the creek, but there were so many children and dogs, I didn’t have a good sense of what direction she’d taken. Chelsea was sad and cried, and I felt bad for her and put my head in her lap, and she hugged me.
Todd was one of the children who were helping to look for Marshmallow, and curiously, her scent was on his pants. I sniffed him carefully, and he frowned and pushed my head away. His shoes were muddy and Marshmallow’s scent was strong there, too, plus other things I couldn’t identify.
“Come on, Bailey,” Ethan said when he saw Todd’s reaction to my examination.
Marshmallow never did come home. I remembered my first mother, running out the gate and into the world without a look back. Some dogs just want to be free to wander, because they don’t have a boy who loves them.
Eventually Marshmallow’s scent faded from the wind, but I never seemed to stop sniffing for her. When I remembered playing with Marshmallow I found myself thinking of Coco, back in the Yard. I would have loved to see Coco again, and Marshmallow, but I was beginning to understand that life was far more complicated than it had appeared to be in the Yard and that it was people who were in charge of it, not dogs. What mattered was not what I wanted; what mattered was that I was there in the woods when Ethan was cold and hungry, keeping him warm at nights, being his companion.
That winter, around the time when Dad put a tree in the living room for Merry Christmas, Chelsea got a new puppy. They named her Duchess. She was relentlessly playful, to the point where I’d get annoyed at her sharp teeth digging into my ears and would give her a quick growl to make her stop. She’d blink at me innocently and back off for just a few seconds before deciding I couldn’t have meant it, and then she’d come right back at me. It was very irritating.
In the spring, the word “go-kart” swept through the neighborhood, and all up and down the street the children were sawing and hammering on wood, totally ignoring their dogs. Dad would come out to the garage every evening and talk to the boy while he fussed over whatever he was doing. I even went so far as to go into the boy’s closet and bring out the loathsome flip, thinking I could tantalize him with that, but he remained totally focused on playing with pieces of wood that he never once threw for me to chase and bring back.
“See my go-kart, Bailey? It’s going to go fast!”
Finally the boy opened the garage door, sat on the go-kart, and rode it like a sled down the short driveway. I trotted beside him, thinking we’d both been through a lot of bother for such a pointless ending, but when the go- kart reached the bottom of the driveway he picked it up and carried it back into the garage to play with it some more!
At least with the flip you had something you could chew on.
On a sunny day when there was no school, all of the kids in the neighborhood took their go-karts to a long, steep street several blocks away. Duchess was too young to accompany the procession, but I went along with my boy, though I had no enthusiasm for his initial idea that he should sit in the go-kart and I should pull him down the street by a leash.
Todd and his older brother, Drake, were among the kids and laughed and said things about Chelsea’s go-kart, and I could sense that her feelings were hurt. When they lined up the go-karts at the top of the hill, Todd’s was next to Ethan’s.
I was not at all prepared for what happened next: someone yelled, “Go!” and then the go-karts were off, rolling down the hill, gathering speed. Drake ran up behind Todd and gave his go-kart a big push, and it leaped ahead.
“Cheating!” Chelsea yelled. Her go-kart was moving very slowly, but Ethan’s was gaining speed and soon I had to run to keep up. The other go-karts fell away, and after a little bit it was just Ethan’s go-kart, steadily closing in on Todd’s.
I ran with abandonment, an exuberant freedom, galloping down the hill after my boy. At the bottom a boy named Billy stood with a flag on a stick, and I sensed that he was somehow part of what was happening. Ethan was hunched over, his head low, and it was all so much fun I decided I wanted to be on the go-kart with him. I put on an extra burst of speed and leaped through the air, landing on the back of his go-kart and nearly toppling off again.
The force of my impact threw us forward, so that we were now passing Todd! Billy waved his stick and I could hear yelling and cheering behind us as the go-kart, now on the flat part of the road, rolled to a stop.
“Good dog, Bailey,” the boy told me, chuckling.
All the other go-karts rolled up behind us, followed by the rest of the children, who were all yelling and laughing. Billy came over and held Ethan’s hand up into the air, dropping his stick with the flag on it. I picked up the stick and pranced around with it, daring someone to try to take it and have some real fun.
“Not fair, not fair!” Todd shouted.
The crowd of children grew quiet. A hot fury poured off of Todd, who stood facing Ethan.
“The damn dog jumped on the kart; that’s why you won. You’re disqualified,” Drake said, standing behind his brother.
“Well, you pushed your brother!” Chelsea shouted.
“So?”
“I would have caught you anyway,” Ethan said.
“Everyone who says Todd’s right, say ‘aye!’ ” Billy called.
Todd and his brother shouted, “Aye!”
“Everyone who says Ethan won, say ‘nay.’ ”
“Nay!” all of the other children shouted. I was so startled at this loud outburst, I dropped my stick.
Todd took a step forward and hit Ethan, who ducked and tackled Todd. They both fell to the ground.
