QUOTE : Charlie pulled their car out of the indoor garage, and the two of them drove together to the vet, Homer's panting loud in the back seat. As she ran her fingers through his pied coat while he stood shivering on the stainless-steel examining table, Nora realized there was no flesh between fur and bone. She kept telling herself that she was assuming the worst, but when the vet came in after the exams, the scans, she knew the news was terrible. She and Charlie held each other and cried, for Homer and for all the rest of it, as the vet gently pushed the plunger on the syringe and the dog's heart ceased to beat beneath their joined hands.