Winn-Dixie

“Come on, Winn-Dixie,” I said to the dog.

I started walking and he followed along behind me as I went out of the produce department and down the cereal aisle and past all the cashiers and out the door.

Once we were safe outside, I checked him over real careful and he didn’t look that good. He was big, but skinny: you could see his ribs. And there were bald patches all over him, places where he didn’t have any fur at all. Mostly, he looked like a big piece of old brown carpet that had been left out in the rain.

“You’re a mess,” I told him. “I bet you don’t belong to anybody.”

He smiled at me. He did that thing again, where he pulled back his lips and showed me his teeth. He smiled so big that it made him sneeze. It was like he was saying, “I know I’m a mess. Isn’t it funny?”

It’s hard not to immediately fall in love with a dog who has a good sense of humor.

“Come on,” I told him. “Let’s see what the preacher has to say about you.”

And the two of us, me and Winn-Dixie, started walking home.

-Katie DiCamillo, Because of Winn-Dixie