“Are you going away on business?” I ask my dad. This is sometimes why he walks me in the morning—when I won’t see him for a few days.

“I’m sorry, Son,” he says. “Yes, I’ll be sleeping on the plane.”

I can see Jake and his mom up ahead, waiting for the light to change, and we cross over together. When we reach the sidewalk again, Jake taps me on the shoulder.

“Race you to the corner,” he says. Jake has a lot of excess energy to burn off. At least, that’s what my mother says.

He always wins, but I don’t mind letting him win. I mean, not letting him but racing anyway. At the next corner, I turn around and see my dad talking to Mrs. Schultz. He walks with his hands behind his back, and he’s leaning over, too, as if he’s listening carefully. He’s just being polite—that’s what he’s always like with the other mothers.

But I don’t think he likes Jake much. Or maybe he doesn’t like . . . me when I’m hanging out with Jake. When we finally get to the school gates, he sort of holds me back a minute.

“Why aren’t you trying?” he asks.

“What do you mean?”

“When you race against Jake, you let him win.”

“Jake’s the fastest kid in our class,” I say, in, like, a hushed way, so Jake can’t hear us; but he’s talking to Addie and Zach, his other friends, so he’s probably not even listening. And Mrs. Schultz is talking to their moms.

“I don’t care about that,” Dad says, in his normal voice. “You’re still not even trying.”

“I am, Dad. Jake’s just faster than me.”

“That’s got nothing to do with it,” Dad says. “I don’t mind watching you lose if I think it’s the best you can do.”

“It’s just a dumb race,” I say. “I mean, who cares?”

“That’s not the point.”

The kids are starting to file into class. I have to leave. “When are you coming home?” I ask my dad.

“I’m not sure yet. It depends how things go.”

“Where are you flying this time?”

“London,” he says, and puts his arm around me but doesn’t really hug me, and after a few seconds I break away. There’s a river of kids going through the big double doors and I kind of join the flow. When I turn around at the top of the entrance steps to look for him, he’s already gone.

Mom picks me up after school—Jake and a couple of his friends are allowed to walk home by themselves. They have their phones out and are going to get something to eat. I watch them walk off together.

“When are you going to let me go to the coffee shop with Jake?” I ask her. “I’m twelve years old. It’s just around the corner. Everybody does it.”

“I don’t like not knowing where you are,” she says.

“Well, then, buy me a phone. I’ll text you when I get there. I’ll text you the whole time—I can leave it on.”