“Are you okay? Do you need to go out?” He gestured toward the dog door, then pulled his glasses off and rubbed his eyes. “Whew. Little dizzy, there.”
I sat. He blinked, looking off into the distance. “Tell you what, old boy, let’s you and me go back and take a nap.” He got to his feet, swaying unsteadily. Panting nervously, I followed him back to the bedroom. He sat on the bed and groaned. “Oh,” he said.
Something tore inside of his head; I could feel it. He sank back, sucking in a deep breath. I jumped on top of the bed, but he didn’t say anything, just stared at me, glassy-eyed.
There was nothing for me to do. I nuzzled his slack hand, fearfully conscious of the strange forces loose inside him. His breathing was shallow, shuddering.
After an hour, he stirred. Something was still really wrong with him, but I could feel him gathering his resources, struggling to break free of whatever gripped him the way I had once struggled to find the surface of the cold water from the storm drain, when I had the little boy Geoffrey in my teeth.
“Oh,” Ethan panted. “Oh. Hannah.”
More time passed. I whined softly, feeling the fight continue within him. Then his eyes opened. At first they were unfocused, confused, and then they lit upon me, widening.
“Why, hello, Bailey,” he shocked me by saying. “How have you been? I’ve missed you, dog.” His hand groped for my fur. “Good dog, Bailey,” he said.
It wasn’t a mistake. Somehow, he knew. These magnificent creatures, with their complex minds, were capable of so much more than a dog, and the sure conviction coming from him now let me know that he had put it all together. He was looking at me and seeing Bailey.
“How about the day of the go-karts, eh, Bailey? We sure did show them, that day. We sure did.”
I wanted to let him know that yes, I was Bailey, I was his one and only dog, and that I understood that whatever was happening inside him was letting him see me as I truly was. It dawned on me how I might do this, and in a flash I was off the bed and down the hall. I reached up and grabbed the knob to the closet just the way my first mother had taught me, and the old mechanism turned easily in my mouth, the door popping open. I nosed it aside and dove into the pile of musty things at the bottom, tossing aside boots and umbrellas until I had it in my mouth: the flip.
When I jumped back on the bed and dropped the thing in his hand, Ethan started as if I had just awakened him. “Wow! Bailey, you found the flip; where did you get this, boy?”
I licked his face.
“Well now. Let’s just see.”
What he did next was the last thing I wanted. His body trembling with the effort, he hauled himself over to the window, which had been cranked open to admit the fresh air. “Okay, Bailey. Get the flip!” he called. With an awkward motion he managed to fumble the flip onto the windowsill and push it outside.
I didn’t want to leave his side, not even for a second, but I couldn’t disobey him when he repeated his command. My toenails scrabbling on the carpet, I bounded across the living room floor and out the dog door, peeling around the side of the house and scooping the flip up from the bushes where it had fallen. I spun and raced back to the house, resenting every second the stupid flip was keeping me apart from my boy.
When I returned to the bedroom, I saw that things had taken a turn for the worse. Ethan had sat on the floor where he had been standing, and his eyes were unfocused, his breathing labored. I spat out the object I’d brought him—the time for that had passed. Carefully, so as not to hurt him, I crept forward, putting my head in his lap.
He would be leaving me soon; I could hear it in the slowing of his raspy breathing. My boy was dying.
I could not join him on his journey and did not know where it would lead him. People are vastly more complicated than dogs and served a much more important purpose. The job of a good dog was ultimately to be with them, remaining by their sides no matter what course their lives might take. All I could do now was offer him comfort, the assurance that as he left this life he was not alone but rather was tended by the dog who loved him more than anything in the whole world.
His hand, weak and trembling, touched the fur above my neck. “I will miss you, doodle dog,” Ethan said to me.
I put my face to his, I felt his breath and tenderly licked his face while he struggled to focus his gaze on me. Eventually, he gave up, his eyes sliding away. I didn’t know if he saw me now as Bailey or Buddy, but it didn’t matter. I was his dog, and he was my boy.
I felt the consciousness ebb from him as gradually as daylight leaves the sky after sunset. There was no pain, no fear, nothing but the sense that my brave boy was going where he was supposed to go. Through it all, I could feel him aware of me lying in his lap until, with one last, shuddering breath, he was aware of nothing at all.
I lay there quietly with my boy in the stillness of that spring afternoon, the house silent and empty. Soon the girl would be home, and, remembering how hard it had been for everyone to say good-bye to Bailey and Ellie and even the cats, I knew she would need my help to face life without the boy.
As for me: I loyally remained right where I was, remembering the very first time I had ever seen the boy and then just now, the very last time—and all the times in between. The deep aching grief I knew I would feel would come soon enough, but at that moment mostly what I felt was peace, secure in the knowledge that by living my life the way I had, everything had come down to this moment.
I had fulfilled my purpose.
A Dog's Purpose Page 25
