I opened my parents’ door and peered out into the hall.
The raccoon was gone—or at least gone somewhere I couldn’t see him. He was probably in the bathroom, which was fine by me. I was prepared to let him go about his business so long as he let me go about mine. He could have the upstairs bathroom. I’d use the one next to the kitchen.
I stepped out into the hall, hugging The Art of French Cooking, and started for the stairs. The light was still on, and that made me feel a little better.
I’d just made it to Jeanine’s door when I heard a flush, and Zoe raced out of the bathroom.
“What happened?” I said, dropping the book and grabbing her arm as she sped by.
“Mommy promised me new glitter glue if I flush,” she said, breathing hard.
“Oh. Everything okay in there?”
“Yeah. Just number one.”
“No, I mean, you didn’t see anything…weird?”
She shook her head.
I’d really thought he was in the bathroom. That had, after all, been where he was heading. I picked up the book and marched past Zoe into the bathroom.
I peeked behind the bathroom door.
No raccoon.
I ripped open the shower curtain.
No raccoon.
Zoe, who’d followed me in there, threw up the toilet seat. “What are we doing?”
“Looking for a raccoon.”
The second I heard the words come out of my mouth, I wanted to shove them back in. Zoe was scared of the flush and the blow-up rat. She wasn’t going to be okay sharing the house with a rodent who weighed more than she did.
“Awww. Was he cute?”
“Huh?” I’d gotten so lucky. “Uh, sure, yeah. He looked really…cuddly.”
“And he was just walking around?” she said, laughing.
“Yup. Just walking around like he owned the joint.”
Zoe stopped giggling suddenly. “The mystery poop!”
“What?”
“On the rug, remember?” She ran back into the hall and jumped on the spot where the mystery poop had been.
“Oh right.”
“I told you it wasn’t mine.”
“I know. I believed you,” I reminded her.
“Jeanine didn’t.”
“Jeanine won’t believe that it was a raccoon either.”
“Can we take a picture?”
“Of what?”
“Of the raccoon, so Jeanine knows.”
“Sure. If I see it again, and if I have a camera on me, I promise to take a picture, especially if I see it pooping in the hall.”
“Thank you!” She threw her arms around my legs and squeezed.
“Uh, no problem.”
We stood there for a few seconds like that, then she unhugged me, wrapped as much of her hand as would fit around mine, and said, “What do you wanna do now?”
Unlike my parents, Zoe wasn’t going back to sleep with a raccoon on the loose, not even if it was the cute, cuddly kind.
23
If I’m telling the truth, I never would have gotten the doughnuts done on time if Zoe hadn’t helped. She cut while I fried, filled, and rolled. She kept pestering to fill too, but I’d learned my lesson so she stuck to cutting, and when she was done, I put her in that big, cardboard box till the last doughnut was rolled and the pastry gun had been cleaned and put in a secure location.
At seven, my parents came downstairs.
“Isn’t it beautiful?” Mom said.
“Isn’t what beautiful?” I said as I boxed up the last doughnuts.
“The snow.” Dad pointed to the window.
There had to be a foot of snow on the ground, and cotton-ball-size flakes were still floating down.
“No! No! No!” I shouted. We hadn’t planned for snow.
“How could you have missed that?” Jeanine said as she came down the stairs.
“I don’t know. It was dark before, and I was concentrating.”
“On what?” she said.
“On doughnuts.”
“They’re doughnuts, not brain surgery,” she said, opening a box.
“Don’t even think about it!” I warned.
“Jeanine, leave your brother and his doughnuts alone,” Dad said.
“I have to go to this doughnut stand opening, and I can’t even get a doughnut?”
Jeanine was on a mission to make my parents regret forcing her to come to the Doughnut Stop’s grand opening instead of letting her stay home to study for the Solve-a-Thon. Of course, the person who was really going to regret my parents’ decision was me. I’d told them I didn’t care if Jeanine came. And I really didn’t. She and I were okay. But my parents said there was no way she could miss it. They said we all had to support each other. I tried to get them to see that even though they could force Jeanine to come, they couldn’t actually force her to support me, but if you haven’t noticed, parents like to pretend they can control things they can’t.
“Tris maked believe he saw a raccoon,” Zoe said to my father.
“Oh, that’s right! I completely forgot you came in last night,” he said.
“What was that about, honey?” Mom said.
“What was that about? It was about a raccoon in the house. Not a make-believe one. A real one. A very large, very real one.”
“How would a raccoon even get inside?” Jeanine said.
“Good point,” Dad said. “They’re not like mice. They can’t fit under doors. Okay, can anyone recall holding open the door for a raccoon? After you, Monsieur Raccoon.”
Zoe giggled.
“Ha. Ha.” So they didn’t believe me. Let them bump into Monsieur Raccoon in the bathroom in the middle of the night. I hoped they did. They deserved it.
“It’s just magical, isn’t it?” Mom gazed out the window at the snow-covered trees. “It’s like the world’s been iced.”
“Does everything have to be about food with you?” Jeanine said.
“This cannot be happening.” I looked from the window to the doughnuts and back again.
“What did you think?” Jeanine said. “You’re opening an outdoor stand in the middle of winter.”
“I know. We just…” What could I say? I was a nuddy.
“Go ahead. Have one.” I shoved the box at her. “Nobody’s going to show up now anyway. What’s the point?”
“Oh, no.” Mom snatched the box. “You’re going. Even if you’ve only got one
