I try to think what I should say and blurt out, “I want you to be happy. I don’t want you to cry anymore.”
He nods. “Yeah, I know. I won’t. I’m okay now.”
I feel like . . . I feel like I gotta take care of him at this moment, and that maybe he wants to talk, so I say, “Actually, that’s great news. I mean, you’re a great cop, but you’ll be great at anything you do. I—” But he’s leaning back and closing his eyes like he’s exhausted, probably ’cause, let’s face it, raising a hockey kid probably is pretty exhausting. So I just say, “Thanks, Dad,” but he doesn’t answer. I look out the window at the lights below. We’re in flyover country, where I once lived, and where Dad once played hockey back when he thought he’d be an NHL star someday. And now here he is. My dad.
CHAPTER 43
* * *
BACK AT HOME, Sinbad squeals like a puppy when he sees me. He jumps up and nips at my forehead, just like he used to when we first got him and he was excited. I think he actually breaks skin. I touch my forehead, and there’s blood. But I’m so happy to see him that I say, “Good boy!” I hug him close, which makes him so still I can’t even feel him breathe.
Then I hug my aunt. “Thanks, Aunt Mo. I really appreciate it.”
“I know you do, hon. It was fun. He’s a great dog.”
“Where did he sleep?”
“By the front door, actually.”
“Every night?”
“Every night.”
I kneel in front of Sinbad, show him the second-place medallion I won.
“Did you come in first?” Aunt Mo asks.
“Nah, second. It was a lot of fun, though. I mean, it kind of sucked when we lost, but overall it was fun. I guess you could say I screwed up toward the end. We could have won. I had the whole game in my hands there for a second, and I blew it.” I put out my hands and look at them, like I still can’t believe it.
She shakes her head. “Oh, honey, no no no no no, a game is three periods, no one person is at fault. You didn’t screw up!”
“I did, actually. But it’s okay. Next time I won’t.”
“He played great,” Dad says. “Really, really great. The best I ever saw him play.”
“Thanks,” I say. “Maybe this’ll turn our season around.” Sinbad is pressing his whole body into my side, so I slide down and hold him with my eyes closed.
“Thanks, Mo,” Dad says. “I owe you.”
“No, you don’t. I’m your sister, you don’t owe me anything.” I stand up, and she kisses my cheek. “Okay, I better get going, I’ve got work tomorrow. See you on Thanksgiving.”
That makes my insides wrench: my grandparents—Aunt Mo asked me to call them before I left. I go into my room. Two phone numbers are scribbled on a slip of paper. My grandparents’ home number—they don’t have a cell—and their hotel number. They’re probably still at home, so I dial their number, and someone picks up on the first ring.
“Hello?” a man says.
“Hi, this is Conor.”
“Conor!”
I just blurt it out. “I just wanted to say I hope to see you at my aunt’s house on Thanksgiving.” There’s a silence that goes on so long I say, “Hello?”
“Hello, yes, we’ll see you there. Thank you. Thank you.”
“My pleasure.” I wait. I remember Dad telling me about the long silences that could happen sometimes with them. “I look forward to seeing you.”
“All right, bye.”
He hangs up abruptly, and I just look at my phone for a moment. “Bye,” I murmur to nobody.
Since I took Thursday and Friday off the previous week, I’ve got schoolwork to do. I’m awake until midnight working.
At school the next day, everybody’s in a good mood ’cause it’s a short week. Monday and Tuesday I’m sleepy both days. The junior high holds a special assembly on Thanksgivings, where kids in chorus and dance perform. The elementary kids are here too. So the last thing we do Wednesday is watch the show. It’s pretty entertaining, with two or three standouts like every year. There’s a boy whose voice fills up the entire auditorium, and a break-dancing group with two amazing athletes. I’m so used to being out there in front of people playing hockey, it feels kind of unusual to be watching other kids perform. It’s really cool.
CHAPTER 44
* * *
ON THANKSGIVING I decide to wear my only button-up shirt. Dad gets me a new one every year. Otherwise I only wear T-shirts, with a hoodie if it’s cold. I put Sinbad’s special red-and-green Christmas collar on—the one that Aunt Mo got him one year—and he looks all dressed up. He can feel something special in the air, ’cause when we get to the front yard, he’s pulling so hard I decide to unleash him. He runs circles over and over around the yard while we wait for him to calm down. Dad and I watch, amused. When he settles, we get in the car.
Suddenly I’m so nervous about seeing my grandparents that there’s a part of me that just wants to stay home, and hear the coyotes yipping and howling and the wind blowing through the hills. Home. I wonder if I’ll ever feel the same about any home again in my life. If I make the NHL, maybe I’ll have a fancy house, a house like Ryan’s. But it won’t be the same. It’ll never be the same. My dad won’t be there. Sinbad won’t be there.
“You okay?” Dad says as we drive off.
“Yeah.”
I keep my head turned away ’cause for some reason I’ve started crying. I think Dad knows I’m crying, but he doesn’t say anything. And, you know, it feels good. I cry almost all the way to Long Beach, and I’m not even thinking about anything specific. Maybe Sinbad. Maybe the game I blew. Maybe who knows what. I’m just crying.
“Something I never mentioned to you,” Dad suddenly says when we’re almost there. “I never told this to anybody. But right around the time your mother was dying, I saw her face as clear as day. I was in Nebraska for a game, and I was taking a nap at the motel. I was dreaming, but I wasn’t dreaming. She told me to take care of you, and then I woke up and knew she was dead before anybody called me with the news.” He pauses and adds, “I’m just telling you because I want you to see how when you love someone, you’re really connected to them in ways that I don’t think anybody comprehends. I want you to understand all that when you see your grandparents. They were really connected to your mother. So . . . you should keep this in mind tonight, that’s all.”
I’m not sure what he’s saying, but I answer, “Okay, Dad.” I dry off my face on my shirt.
When we get to Aunt Mo’s house, my heart is beating hard. I close my eyes and focus on being normal.
We let ourselves in like we do when we know Aunt Mo is home, and my grandparents are sitting at the dining room table. They both quickly stand up, their mouths dropping open, like they’re literally flabbergasted to see me. I don’t move until Dad gently pushes me forward. I guess I’m supposed to hug them, so I do. Then Grandma Toshi stands there staring at me with the back of her hand against her mouth. Her round face . . . she looks so much like my mother it’s shocking. I almost cry again. Grandpa Takao takes my hand, and for a second I think he’s going to say, “Nice to meet you.” Instead he says, “Sit down and talk to us. You’re big!” They both sit down, and so do I.
Grandpa is not much taller than me, and you can see his face is old, but all his hair isn’t gray yet. They’re somewhere in their late sixties, I think. Grandma is small too and looks like she weighs maybe ninety-five pounds, if that.
“Aren’t you tall for your age?” Grandma asks.
“Uh-huh—I mean, I’m not the tallest kid on my team, but I’m one of the taller ones.”
“Hockey, yes?” she asks.
“Right.”
“Do you enjoy that?”
“Yes, I spend a lot of time at it. I want to be a professional hockey player one day.”
“Ohhh,” they both say, glancing at each other with no particular expression.
Grandpa suddenly seems to remember something, stands up, and holds his hand o
ut to Dad. “Keith . . . Keith.” They do a quick man-hug. Then Grandpa’s face kind of contorts before becoming calm again as he says, “You’re a good man.” They hug again, less quickly.
They ask me a lot of questions about school and almost none about hockey and none at all about Sinbad. That’s ’cause they don’t know me. But they’re cool; they remind me of my other grandparents in that they seem to have lots of stories about their lives. Like about how they were hippies during the sixties, which is hard to picture, and how Grandma was told she couldn’t have kids, and then she had my mom.
Aunt Mo sets all the food on the table, and I suddenly decide to say a prayer. “Thank you for this food, and for my aunt and dad and Sinbad and all my grandparents.” I hesitate. “And thank you for my mother.” I hesitate again, then finish: “That’s it, thank you very much.”
Even after the long talk with my grandparents, I can’t deny that dinner’s a little awkward. It seems like nobody ever quite relaxes. But I eat about half a pound of turkey stuffing, which is one of my favorite foods, and afterward we all watch Happy Gilmore. Dad and I watch it with Aunt Mo every Thanksgiving—it’s rated PG-13—’cause it’s basically the funniest, most totally ridiculous sports movie ever made. The grandparents are not amused!
Before Grandpa and Grandma leave, Grandpa invites me to play miniature golf the next day, and I say sure even though I’m really too old for that. I also hate miniature golf ’cause the turf is always uneven, and I’m so competitive I hate feeling like I can’t really use my coordination to control where the ball goes. That doesn’t mean I’m not happy to do it, ’cause I am. When we all say good-bye for the night, they study my face, like they’re looking for my mom. Grandma reaches out and touches my cheek like she’s amazed. “Your mother was a wonderful girl,” she says. “And you’re just like her.” I don’t know what to say to that. I guess it makes me feel surprised, ’cause I always assume I’m just like my dad. She and Grandpa leave then without saying anything more, not even “bye.”
“She looks like Mom,” I say.
“I know,” Dad answers.
Aunt Mo packs leftover food for Dad, me, and Sinbad. “So what did you think?” she asks as she hands over the food.
“It’s all good,” I say simply.
“Do you like them?”
“Yeah, I liked them a lot. It did feel kind of strange. But they’re—they seem like really good people.”
“They were devastated when your mother died. She was a wonderful girl, and you are just like her.” She musses my hair.
Embarrassing. But mostly great.
Later, at home, I take a plate of leftovers down to Mr. Reynolds. He’s not around, even though I wait for ten minutes. This is good—hopefully, it means he’s with relatives. When I return, Dad is in his room watching TV. I sit out front with Sinbad and hear a coyote howling in the distance. I think about processing the night, but my mind’s not working that well for some reason. Sinbad’s happy, but I can see he’s tired. There’s a look in his face, like maybe just being alive is a bit of a strain tonight. I remember the lady at the oncologist saying you can see how sick they are from their faces. I think of how hard the past few months have been for him. And I suddenly, totally understand that he’s got two years, tops, probably less, no matter how much I pray. ’Cause if there’s a God, that’s not what he is. He doesn’t just give you anything you beg him for. If that’s the way it worked, every single person in the world would be a Christian. And I guess I learned something these past few weeks from Lucas and the way he acts. You just gotta be a good person. But your dog’s gonna die when he’s gonna die. I’ll keep praying, though, ’cause it’s important to believe.
My mind drifts back to earlier tonight. I think about Grandpa and Grandma’s expressions when they first saw me. I think about Aunt Mo and how much she loves me. Something occurs to me that I never thought of before: if I live a happy life, I’ll make everybody happy. I’ll make my dad, my aunt, and my grandparents—both sets of grandparents—happy. Even just being happy now, that’ll make a difference to them all. It’s like I always wanted to be happy for myself, but now I see it as kind of a responsibility, too. So I gotta grow up and have a good life. Maybe I even need to work harder in school to make sure I have a decent backup. I’ll get Cs whether I work hard or not, but that’s no reason not to work hard.
Sinbad howls at the coyotes, which he does once in a while. He’s not as energetic as usual, but he’s so passionate when he howls. Owooooo! Someday, when I see his electricity in the room or he comes to me in a dream, I just feel like at that exact second I won’t be a kid anymore. It’s like that’s when I’ll change into a grown man, even if I’m only thirteen or fourteen. I’ll be in bantams, I’ll be checking, and I’ll say my last good-bye to my dog. I decide right then that I want to scatter his ashes in the hills of Canyon Country. Right where he belongs, and where I’ll always belong.
For now, I want to be right here, in the moment, the way Sinbad always is. Owooooo!
Acknowledgments
Thank you as always to my stupendously talented and stupendously patient editor, Caitlyn Dlouhy, who has to take so very much abuse from me!! And I can never adequately express my appreciation for Russell Gordon—it brings actual tears to my eyes because I love his work so much. Deepest appreciation as well to the incomparable Justin Chanda and Jon Anderson. And I’m just so fortunate to have had Jeannie Ng watching my back all these years with Atheneum—I’ve loved every copy editor I’ve ever worked with, but she is my favorite for sure. And Alex Borbolla rocks as well!
I would also like to thank David Rolston; George Miyamoto; Kimberly Freeman, DVM, DACVIM (Oncology); Christopher M. Fulkerson, DVM, MS, DACVIM (Oncology); Tina Stevens; Trifun Zivanovic; Todd Peterson; and Julie Ho. Any mistakes in the story about canine cancer treatment are most assuredly my errors and not errors on the part of either Dr. Fulkerson or Dr. Freeman. (That said, being two different people, they obviously do things somewhat differently, so I used what seemed to me to fit the story best, and also did some things they would probably both disapprove of, like having the main character take a shower with his postsurgery dog, letting a twelve-year-old boy pill his dog, etc.)
And of course thank you to my favorite hockey boy, Sammy!!
About the Author
Cynthia Kadohata is an utterly obsessed hockey mom who still manages to find time to write novels in between cheering on her son and railing at the other teams. Cynthia is also the author of the Newbery Medal–winning Kira-Kira, the National Book Award–winning The Thing About Luck, the Jane Addams Children’s Book Award– and Pen USA Award–winning Weedflower, Cracker!, Outside Beauty, A Million Shades of Gray, Half a World Away, and several adult novels. You can visit her at cynthiakadohata.com.
A Caitlyn Dlouhy Book
Atheneum Books for Young Readers
Simon & Schuster / New York
Visit us at simonandschuster.com/kids
Authors.SimonandSchuster.com/Cynthia-Kadohata
Also by Cynthia Kadohata
Cracker!: The Best Dog in Vietnam
Half a World Away
Kira-Kira
A Million Shades of Gray
Outside Beauty
The Thing About Luck
Weedflower
ATHENEUM BOOKS FOR YOUNG READERS
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This book is a work of fiction. Any references to historical events, real people, or real places are used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and events are products of the author’s imagination, and any resemblance to actual events or places or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Text copyright © 2018 by Cynthia Kadohata
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