“Stupid kid,” a driver who almost ran him over yelled. Alvin kept running, pulling away from the bustle of the main street and arriving at a big, oddly shaped parking lot. He couldn’t see the hamster-rabbit but her whistles still filled his ears. He lay down on the cold asphalt, scanned the objects around him. It took him a few moments before he spotted her again. She was standing in front of him, next to a pair of brown sandals sporting dry, cracked feet. Then a chubby hand reached out and scooped up the hamster-rabbit, carrying her out of Alvin’s view. He got up from the floor, sidled up against a minibus, and peeked through the front windshield. Not far from him stood a short, dumpy woman in an oversized black shirt. She had dark curly hair, a double chin, and small round glasses perched on the tip of her nose. He came around the minibus and stood in front of her. He watched her gazing at the hamster-rabbit with a serious expression, holding her in her wide hands, petting her with big, circular motions. The woman whispered something to the animal. She was about his mother’s height, but clearly older.

When she saw Alvin standing close to her she jolted and almost dropped the hamster-rabbit. Her face flushed. She started shouting and it took Alvin some time to understand what she was saying. “Is this yours? … I mean … I’m sorry … I just saw her and … sorry, really.”

She handed him the hamster-rabbit but he didn’t take her, just kept listening to the small animal’s whistles. They were light and calm, nothing like the noises she made when he held her.

“She’s not mine,” he said. Then he asked, “What’s your name?”

“Shabtai. I mean, Anita,” she replied. “Sorry, my head isn’t screwed on straight today,” she said and withdrew into her silence.

“Maybe you know what animal that is?”

The woman pushed her glasses up the bridge of her nose and stared at the animal, studying it up close. “It’s a guinea pig, I think,” she told Alvin with a loud, clear voice.

He thought it was a funny name. Guinea pig. “You take her home?” he asked.

Shabtai-I-mean-Anita hesitated and started to giggle. “I think so. I mean, why not? I have room for it. A little company could be nice,” she mumbled and immediately backtracked. “Unless you want her, of course.”

Alvin lifted his hand to pet the hamster-rabbit, but changed his mind. “No,” he replied, then turned around and ran back toward the station. He thought he heard Shabtai-I-mean-Anita yelling something, but he wasn’t sure.