Matt & Zoe - Charles Sheehan-Miles Page 0,3

all looks so normal it's indecent.

The floor creaks a little as I walk down the hall toward the kitchen. The hallway smells, and the odor gets stronger as I approach the kitchen. It’s been three days since anyone has been in the house—it smells like something went rank in the trash can.

The kitchen is dazzling, the sun glaring through the window. The blue flowery wallpaper is peeling in the corners, and fruit flies buzz around the trash can. I brush the lid open and see a banana peel crawling with fruit flies. I shudder, then begin to gather up the garbage to take outside. I need to fix this right now.

Nicole is in the living room with Jasmine. I can hear Nicole’s voice but can’t make out the words. She’s speaking in almost musical tones, and I realize as I pull the bag out of the can that I’m crying.

Dad takes the garbage out at night. Took. He took the garbage out at night.

I can’t think of them in the past tense. But he won’t be taking any garbage out ever again. As I pull the bag out, the stainless steel can falls over with a crash. I stagger toward the kitchen door and open it up, then walk to the trash can out back. Flies buzz around the can.

I swipe my hands at my face and eyes. I need to hold it together. I have an eight-year-old sister in there who’s been through hell. And she needs my help. I turn and walk back into the house.

When I enter the living room, Nicole looks up. Her eyes narrow a little bit. “You okay?”

She could always see right through me. I shrug and say, “You know.”

“Yeah,” she says. “Let me get your duffel bag. Why don’t you and Jasmine check out upstairs? She was asking about her stuffed bunny, but didn’t want to go up alone.”

I smile at my little sister. Jasmine’s usually not afraid of anything. “Come on, Jasmine. Let’s both get changed and we’ll go check on the horses.”

I stand up and take her hand.

Chapter Two

Mono (Zoe)

“C—Ca—can I come with you to the stable?”

Jasmine looks frustrated and unsure of herself when she asks the question—as if she’s afraid I’ll say no—or maybe she’s just unsure of me. Either way, I tell her to come. She tags along beside me, a solemn expression in her face.

The stutter is new. I think. At least, she wasn’t doing it last time I visited home, and my parents certainly never mentioned it.

My sister doesn’t know me, and I know nothing about her. At least nothing that matters now. She doesn’t care that I used to mash up bananas and spoon feed her when she was a baby, or that I cried when I learned she’d been born, or that I used to blow on her feet to make her squeal with laughter. That’s ancient history, and well before anything she can likely remember.

As we walk down the back steps toward the stable, I rack my brain trying to remember her favorite color. What kind of ice cream she likes. Whether she likes ponies or unicorns or what.

I don’t have a clue. I know some things. Mom and Dad sent me pictures, and I always saw their updates on Facebook. I’ve seen a hundred pictures of Jasmine riding horses, including Mom’s giant Shire horse Mono. At 18 hands high, Mono looks fearsome, but he’s a gentle giant. The name was Mom’s little joke. He’s called Mono because he was sick for most of first year after Mom bought him. Mom said it was because he wasn’t getting decent nutrition, she got him from a divorcing couple in Hadley. When I was home on leave the summer after she bought him, her eyes were glassy with tears when she talked about the condition he’d been in. The first two months she’d had him, he had thrush in two of his hooves—from standing around in a soggy and filthy stall.

Mom’s Facebook page displays hundreds of photos of Jasmine with the horses, and especially riding Mono. She’d ridden him during the Memorial Day parade this year, a tiny girl on top of a giant horse.

As we approach the stable, I hear the horses nickering through the open stable door. A deep voice croons something to the horses. Who is it?

“Stay back.” Jasmine ignores my order—instead, she runs for the door and into the stable. I’m right behind her, but I come to an instant stop as