Brad!” I screamed as I ran alongside the inexplicable group of rollerbladers. My pulse was pounding in my throat, and though my feet still hurt, they’d just been pushed so far down the priority list at the moment, it was like I was barely aware of them. I turned in a circle, desperately searching for any sign of a tiny, fluffy dog. “Come back here!” I yelled, my voice breaking.

“Yeah?” One of the bladers slowed and did a little hop out of the group onto the grass. “I’m Brad.”

“Not you,” I said as I hurried away. He shrugged and joined the group again. “BRAD!”

“He’s up ahead,” a woman said cheerfully to me as she bladed past.

“Not him,” I said impatiently, picking up my pace. I tried to look across them to the other side of the path, where Matty was. “Anything?” I yelled.

“No,” he said, and I caught glimpses of his beanied head in between the bladers. “Bradford Higginbottom!” he yelled.

The final, straggling rollerblader moved on with the group, and it was just Matty and me looking at each other across the path lit by streetlights, his horrified expression reflecting exactly how I felt. “What if we can’t find him?” I whispered, the thought making my stomach clench. The park seemed suddenly so vast, and so dangerous… there were animals in the park, weren’t there? Wasn’t there a zoo?

“We’ll find him,” Matty said, his voice determined. He nodded down the path. “We know he went this way. Brad!”

“BRAD!” I yelled, hurrying alongside Matty, searching desperately for any glimpse of his white-and-tan fur. “C’mere, boy!” I turned fully in a circle, my thoughts starting to spiral out of control. This was all my fault. I never should have come into the city tonight—and if I had just stayed home, where I belonged, Brad would be safely in his apartment, not running around, lost, scared.…

“Stevie,” Matty said, relief in his voice. He nodded down the line of benches, where I could see an older woman sitting on a bench, Brad cuddled in her lap.

“Oh my god,” I said, starting to run again, Matty falling into step next to me. We reached the woman—she had Rollerblades on and a tracksuit, and Brad was getting hair all over her, but she didn’t seem to mind.

“Hi,” Matty said, sounding out of breath as he reached her first. “I see you found our dog.”

“He found me,” she said with a smile, giving him a scratch behind the ears. “He ran into us on our first loop.”

“I didn’t realize,” Matty said, shaking his head, “that there was a Central Park night rollerblading club.”

“There is,” she said cheerfully as she tightened her buckles. “Twice a month, rain or shine. You want to join?”