Due to what he’d termed a “sparkler deficit,” John David had opted for themed decorations. The theme he’d decided on was “Star Wars Spangled Banner.”

“Does the cart look enough like the Death Star?” John David asked, eyeing his work critically. “Except also like the American flag?”

I thought there was some questionable and assuredly unintentional symbolism at play there for a holiday that was supposed to be patriotic, but who was I to argue with genius?

“It looks exactly like the Death Star,” I told him. “And also the American flag.”

“Good.” John David narrowed his eyes at Lily and me. “Listen up, soldiers. We only have ninety minutes to finish these lightsabers and droids.”

It turned out that when it came to arts and crafts, John David was an even stricter taskmaster than his mother. With five minutes to go on our ninety-minute deadline and all three of us sopping wet from sweat, he stepped back to appraise our work.

“Perfect,” he declared. “Now all we need is to get William Faulkner into her costume.”

Putting pants on a dog was not what one would call “easy.” Putting pants on a purebred, hundred-pound Bernese mountain dog who was fairly certain she did not want to wear pants could have substituted for one of the twelve labors of Hercules.

But with enough cajoling and the right bribes, we did it.

“Bless William Faulkner’s little doggy heart,” Lily said as John David proudly drove past us in the Death Star, dressed like a Jedi, with a canine companion costumed as Uncle Sam.

Including the hat.

There were easily fifteen or twenty carts in the parade, plus bicycles, strollers, and at least a half-dozen other costumed dogs.

“How much do you think he understands?” I asked Lily as John David’s cart disappeared from sight, and the two of us melted back into the crowd. “About everything that’s happened?”

Lily’s blond hair caught in the wind. For once, she didn’t try to tame it. “More than he lets on.”

Thanks to being drafted as John David’s assistants, the two of us had managed to avoid Aunt Olivia this morning. My mom, as far as I knew, was still asleep.

“About last night,” I said, but before I could say more or Lily could interject, her phone buzzed—three times. I was close enough to see her screen.

The first text was a rose. The second was a snake. And the third started with the words YOUR CHALLENGE, SHOULD YOU CHOOSE TO ACCEPT IT . . .

“Why,” Lily said for the fifth time, “do they want me to enter the pie-eating contest?”

“Not enter,” I clarified helpfully, taking a bite of the snow cone I’d just acquired. “Win.”

Lily didn’t respond to the teasing tone in my voice the way she might have, pre-Ana. She didn’t respond at all. The thumb on her left hand prodded the bruised and battered knuckles on her right.