A Dog's Purpose (18 page)

At the sadness in him I always pushed my nose under his hand.

“My whole life’s dream. All gone now, because of Todd.”

Ethan had brought the flip with him to the Farm, for some reason, and sometimes he would cut it up and resew it, generally making it even more embarrassing than it had been before. But my favorite time was when we’d swim together in the pond. It seemed the only time that the boy’s leg didn’t give him pain. We even played the sinking game, as we had been doing for years; now, though he was much heavier, harder to drag out of the water than ever before. When I dove after him I felt so happy, I never wanted it to end.

I knew it would, though. I felt the nights growing longer, and that meant we’d soon be going home.

I was lying under the table one evening while Mom and Grandma talked. Ethan had gone on a car ride with Hannah and had not taken me, so I assumed they had to do something that wasn’t very fun.

“I want to talk to you about something,” Grandma told Mom.

“Mother,” Mom said.

“No, just listen. That boy has completely changed since coming here. He’s happy, he’s healthy, he’s got a girl . . . why take him back to the city? He can finish high school right here.”

“You make it sound like we live in the ghetto,” Mom complained with a laugh.

“You’re not answering me because . . . well, we both know why. I know your husband will be against it. But Gary is traveling almost one hundred percent, now, and you said your hours at the school are killing you. The boy needs a family around him while he rebuilds.”

“Yes, Gary’s traveling, but he still wants to see Ethan when he’s home. And I can’t just quit my job.”

“I’m not telling you to. You know you are welcome to come up any time you want, and why can’t Gary fly into our little airport here on a given weekend? Or, and please know that I only want the best for you, wouldn’t it be good for the two of you to be alone right now? If you and Gary are going to fix the problems between you, you need to do it somewhere other than in front of Ethan.”

I pricked up my ears a little at the boy’s name. Was he home? I cocked my head but didn’t hear his car.

When the nights turned cool and the baby ducks were all as big as their mother, Mom packed the car. I paced nervously, afraid I’d be left behind, and when the moment was right I jumped neatly into the backseat. For some reason, everyone laughed. I sat in the car and watched as Mom hugged Grandma and Grandpa and then, curiously, Ethan, who then came over and opened the car door. “Bailey? Do you want to go with Mom, or stay here with me?”

There was nothing in the question that I understood, so I just looked at him.

“Come on, doodle dog. Bailey! Come!”

I reluctantly jumped out into the driveway. No car ride?

Mom drove off in the car, with Ethan and Grandma and Grandpa waving. Though it made no sense, the boy and I were staying on the Farm!

That suited me just fine. Almost every day started with a long car ride in the dark, driving from house to house to drop off papers. By the time we got home, Grandma would be cooking breakfast, and Grandpa always slipped me something under the table—bacon, ham, a piece of toast. I learned to chew silently so that Grandma wouldn’t say, “Are you feeding the dog again?” The tone in her voice when I picked up the word “dog” suggested to me that Grandpa and I needed to keep the whole operation quiet.

The word “school” was back in play, but there was no bus, just Ethan driving off—though sometimes the girl came over and they took a car ride in her car. I understood that there was no reason for alarm, that Ethan would be back by the end of the day and Hannah would eat dinner with us as often as not.

Mom came to visit a lot, and Mom and Dad were there during Merry Christmas. Mom’s hands smelled like Felix the kitty when she reached down to pet me, but I didn’t mind.

I thought the boy and I had decided to stay at the Farm forever, but toward the end of that summer I sensed we were headed for yet another change. The boy started putting things in boxes, a sure signal that we were soon going to be on our way home. Hannah was around nearly all the time, and she felt a little sad and fearful. When she hugged the boy, there was so much love between them I couldn’t help but try to squirm in between their bodies, which always made them laugh.

One morning, I knew it was time. Grandpa loaded the boxes into the car, Grandma and Mom talked, and Ethan and Hannah hugged. I paced, looking for an opening, but Grandpa had gotten pretty good at blocking me and I hadn’t yet managed to get inside the car.

The boy came over to me and knelt beside me. I could feel
some sadness coming from him. “You be a good dog, Bailey,” he said.

I wagged to show him that I understood that I was a good dog and that it was time to go on the big car ride home.

“I’ll be home at Thanksgiving break, okay? I’m going to miss you, doodle dog.” He gave me a big, loving hug. I half-closed my eyes—there simply was no better feeling in the world than to be hugged by my boy.

“You’d better hold him; he’s not going to understand,” Ethan said. The girl stepped forward and grabbed my collar. The sadness was coming off of her in waves, and she was crying. I was torn between wanting to comfort her and needing to get in the car. Reluctantly I sat at her feet, waiting for this strange drama to end so I could sit in the seat with my nose out the car window.

“Write me every day!” Hannah said.

“I will!” Ethan called back.

I stared in disbelief as he and Mom got into the car and slammed the doors. I pulled away from Hannah, who didn’t understand that I was supposed to go with them! She held tight. “No, Bailey, it’s okay. You Stay.”

Stay?
Stay?
The car honked and drove off down the driveway. Grandpa and Grandma were waving—couldn’t anybody see that I was still here?

“He’ll do just fine. Ferris is a good school,” Grandpa said. “Big Rapids is a nice town.”

They all turned from the driveway, Hannah loosening her grip just enough for me to break free.

“Bailey!” she shouted.

Though the car was out of sight, the dust trail was still in the air, easy to follow as I chased after my boy.

Cars are fast.

I never really knew this. Back home, before Marshmallow went away, she used to run down into the street, barking at cars, and they usually stopped, or at least slowed down enough that she could catch them, though all she ever did at that point was veer off and pretend she never wanted to attack them in the first place.

As I ran after the boy’s car, I had the sense that it was pulling farther and farther away from me. The scent of dust and exhaust grew thin and tenuous, but I picked up a clear sign of a right turn where the road became pavement, though after that I wasn’t sure I could smell him at all. But I couldn’t give up; I turned myself over to the mindless panic and continued my pursuit.

Ahead of me I heard the loud rumble of a train, clanking and
shaking, and when I topped a rise and saw it I finally caught a whiff of the boy. His car, windows down, was parked on the road at the train crossing.

I was exhausted. I had never run so far or so fast in my life, but I ran harder still when the side door opened and the boy stood up.

“Oh, Bailey,” he said.

While every part of me wanted to tackle him and be loved, I wasn’t going to miss my chance, and I veered from him at the last second and bounded into the car.

“Bailey!” Mom laughed.

I licked them both, forgiving them for forgetting me. After the train passed, Mom started the car and turned it around, then stopped because Grandpa showed up in his truck—maybe he was coming home with us this time!

“Like a rocket,” Grandpa said. “Hard to believe he got this far.”

“How long would you have gone, huh, Bailey? You doodle dog,” Ethan told me affectionately.

It was with great suspicion that I jumped into Grandpa’s truck, though—suspicion that proved justified, because while Ethan and Mom drove on, Grandpa turned around and took me back to the Farm.

Mostly I liked Grandpa. From time to time he’d do “chores,” which meant we’d go into the new barn, toward the back, where soft hay was piled, and take a nap. During cold days Grandpa had a couple of heavy blankets he’d wrap around us. But the first few days after the boy left, I sulked in Grandpa’s presence, punishing him for bringing me back to the Farm. When that didn’t work, all I could think to do was chew up a pair of Grandma’s shoes, but that still didn’t bring the boy back.

I just couldn’t get past the utter betrayal of it all. I knew that
out there somewhere, probably back home, the boy needed me, didn’t understand where I was.

Everyone was infuriatingly calm, seemingly oblivious to the catastrophic change that had struck the household. I became so frantic I even dug into the boy’s closet and brought out the flip, running down and tossing it into Grandma’s lap.

“What in the world is this?” she exclaimed.

“It’s Ethan’s big invention,” Grandpa said.

I barked.
Yes! Ethan!

“You want to go outside and play, Bailey?” Grandma asked me. “Why don’t you take him for a walk.”

Walk? Walk to see the boy?

“I thought I’d watch a little of the game here,” Grandpa replied.

“For heaven’s sake,” Grandma said. She went to the door and tossed the flip out in the yard, barely sending the thing five yards. I bounded over, grabbed it, and then stared in absolute noncomprehension when she shut the door, leaving me outside.

Well, okay then. I spat out the flip and trotted past Flare, heading down the driveway. I went over to the girl’s house, which I had already done several times since Ethan left. I could smell her scent everywhere, but the boy’s scent was gradually fading away. A car pulled into her driveway and Hannah jumped out. “Bye!” she said. She turned and looked at me. “Well, hi, Bailey!”

I ran up to her, wagging. I could smell several other people’s scents in her clothes, but there was no sign of Ethan. Hannah did go for a walk with me back home, and when she knocked on the door Grandma let her in and fed some pie to her but not to me.

I often dreamed of the boy. I dreamed of him jumping into the pond, with me swimming down and down to play rescue.
I dreamed of him doing the go-kart, how happy and excited he was. And sometimes I dreamed of him jumping out of the window, the sharp crack of pain rising in a shout from his lips as he fell in the flaming bushes. I hated those dreams, and I was just awakening from one of them one night when I saw the boy standing above me.

“Hi, Bailey!” he whispered, his scent flowing off of him. He was back on the Farm! I jumped to my feet, putting my paws on his chest to lick his face. “Shhh,” he told me. “It’s late; I just got here. Everybody’s sleeping.”

It was Happy Thanksgiving time, and life was back to normal. Mom was there, but not Dad. Hannah came over every day.

The boy seemed happy, but I could also feel that he was distracted. He spent a lot of time looking at papers instead of playing with me, even when I brought him the stupid flip to try to shake him out of it.

I wasn’t surprised when he left again. This was my new life, I realized. I lived on the Farm with Grandpa and Grandma, and Ethan only came home for visits. It wasn’t what I wanted, but as long as the boy always returned, I had an easier time seeing him leave.

It was on one of his visits, when the air was warm and leaves were freshly out, that Ethan and I went to see Hannah running around in a big yard. I could smell her, as well as other boys and girls, because the wind flowed off the yard and their bodies were sweating as they ran. It looked like fun, but I stayed by Ethan’s side, because it seemed that while we stood there the ache in his leg became more pronounced, spreading through his body. Odd, dark emotions swirled inside him as he watched her and the others run.

“Hey!” Hannah came over to see us. I licked her leg, which was salty with sweat. “What a nice surprise. Hi, Bailey!” she said.

“Hi.”

“My times are really coming down in the four hundred,” the girl said.

“Who was that guy?” Ethan asked.

“Oh. Who? What do you mean?”

“That guy you were talking to and hugging, you two seemed really friendly,” Ethan said. His voice sounded strained. I glanced around but couldn’t see any danger.

“He’s just a friend, Ethan,” the girl said sharply. The way she spoke his name, it sounded like the boy had been bad.

“Is it that guy, what’s his name, Brett? He’s certainly fast on his feet.” Ethan stabbed at the ground with his cane, and I sniffed at the tuft of earth that he overturned.

“Well, what is that supposed to mean?” Hannah asked, her hands on her hips.

“Go on back; your track coach is looking over here,” Ethan said.

Hannah looked over her shoulder, then back at Ethan. “I do, I do need to get back . . . ,” she said uncertainly.

“Fine,” Ethan said. He turned and limped away.

“Ethan!” Hannah called. I looked at her, but the boy just kept walking. The dark, confused mixture of sadness and anger was still there. Something about the place apparently made Ethan feel bad, because we never went back.