“I’m not gonna tell anyone,” he says. “But Iamsaying I can give you a break from your car, if you want one.”
There’s a desperate part of me that wants to say yes just to sleep somewhere warm, but that piece of me makes my stomach hurt.
“I’m good,” I say. “Got plans with Bob.”
“Your loss.” He shrugs and pulls away, already done with this conversation now that I’m not giving him what he wants. “Have fun with your stupid dog.”
He saunters off, and I’m left standing there staring at the unfinished doorway he just walked through with the screw gun in my hand. For a second, I let myself consider it. I could lose myself for a few hours. Have a shower with hot water and soap that doesn’t come from a gas station bathroom dispenser.
God, how can I even consider that? Is that how I’m going to honor my family’s memory today, by letting Dylan try tofuck the grief out of me?
Plus, Bob’s not a stupid dog. He’s perfect, and he loves me, and he’s never once made me feel like I’m only worth something when I’m useful.
Still. I fire the screw gun into the wall, pretending it’s myface.
By the end of the day, my arms feel like cooked spaghetti, but in a good way. Ray pays me in cash. I splurge on chicken thighs at the grocery store because Bob deserves something tasty for dinner on a day like today, and honestly, so do I.
I cook them with a can of tomatoes on my propane stove in the parking lot, the smell making my stomach growl so loud I’m pretty sure the people three rows over can hear it. I eat straight from the pan because washing dishes is annoying when you live in a car, and I mix a tiny piece of chicken with Bob’s kibble.
His whole body wiggles with excitement, and watching him get that happy over a bit of chicken feels better than any hot shower could. At least I can give him this.
I change parking lots for the night, heading to the far corner of the mostly empty Walmart lot. Bob finds a piece of kibble in the back footwell and paws the mats frantically like he’s discovered buried treasure. His tiny teeth crunch as I pull out my sleeping bag. Oh, sonowhe will eat his food.
Bob has become such a big part of my life that it makes me sad my family never got to meet him. Rosie would have loved him. Actually, it’s probably better for Bob that he never met Rosie, because all she would have wanted to do was dress him up.
Eight years. How has it already been eight years?
I jam my privacy shades up so nobody walking by can see me sleeping, then climb into my sleeping bag in the back seat. I uncap a bottle of Jim Beam and take a swig. The first sip burns all the way down, but by the third, the cardboard panels I wedged into the windows and the sleeping bag bunched around my legs blur in a way that feels like mercy.
I’m sliding onto my pillow, closing my eyes, and hoping the alcohol will drag me so far under that the nightmares can’t reach me. But then Bob whines, this urgent little sound that means business. I glance up to see him shifting from paw to paw.
“Seriously? I just took you out half an hour ago.”
Bob vibrates with need, and I immediately feel like an asshole. It’s not his fault that his bladder is so small.
“Okay, okay. I’m sorry. Let’s go.”
I shove my feet into my boots and open the door. The air tastes like exhaust and cigarette smoke. Bob circles, sniffing a patch of oil-stained asphalt as if he’s reading the world’s most fascinating newspaper.
I bounce on my toes to stay warm. A guy with pants hanging low on his hips sorts through bottles near the garden center. Two teenagers pass a cigarette back and forth inside their idling Civic, their laughter floating out of the cracked window, and I feel a familiar pang of loneliness.
“Come on, buddy,” I say. “Pick a spot.”
Bob sniffs another section of asphalt.
A footstep scrapes behind me.
I spin around, scanning the spaces between parked cars. There’s nothing there. Shadows pool under the broken streetlight, making my surroundings look more intimidating than they are. My brain is doing its anniversary special.
Bob’s standing in the wood chips, abandoning his bathroom mission to stare up at me with those enormous bug eyes.
“It’s okay, buddy,” I say. “Can you please pee so we can get back to the car, where it’s warmer and less creepy?”
He goes back to sniffing, taking his sweet time like we’ve got all night. Which we don’t. I want to be back in the car. I want to stop feeling like something’s wrong.
There’s another sound behind me.
I go to turn, but then a growl rumbles out of Bob’s tiny chest. I’m distracted for a second, glancing down at him instead of behind me, and that’s when something coarse drops over my head and cinches tight around my throat.
