Say No More

by Sasson, Gemini

  Outside? I sprang to my feet, wagging my nub. Suddenly, my foot didn’t hurt so much. Yes, outside! I gave a short, excited bark. Because that’s what my mother did when Lise said the word ‘outside’. I had no idea what it was. But it must have been a fabulous, super-exciting thing. Maybe a special toy. Or food. Or a magical place.

  Outside! Outside! I barked.

  “Yes, yes. I get the idea.” She reached out to scoop me up. I began to toddle toward her, limping for dramatic purposes so she didn’t forget to carry me, when another puppy appeared next to Lise — a very strange-looking puppy. Bigger than me, but not nearly as big as Mother. With pointy ears, wiry whiskers, and a long, fluffy gray tail. Most unbecoming. Downright ugly, in fact.

  Twitching a pink triangular nose, it studied me in an oddly disturbing way. I took a step and woofed. It arched its back, hair standing on end, and drew its lips up to show pointy teeth. From deep in its throat, a low growl emanated, and then a demonic hiss issued forth.

  Every hair on my body stood on end. A shiver of fear zinged down my backbone, urging me to run for my life, but I was frozen, couldn’t move.

  What was that ... that thing?

  Its eyes glowed green, little slatted pupils reflecting the darkness within. Yes, I knew what it was now. All dogs knew. That was Evil Incarnate. Cause of all chaos. Enemy of all dogs.

  And it must be killed before it hurt Lise or my littermates.

  My muscles coiled tight. I bared my teeth. I wasn’t afraid to bite. To kill even, if lives depended on it. The creature lifted a paw, drew back. I exploded forward, my nails scrabbling over the slick floor.

  This will be a fight to the death!

  I slammed the pads of my feet before me to take my stance. The devil flicked a tiny paw and —

  A single, razor-sharp claw sliced the air. I jerked my head sideways, but not quickly enough. Its hook connected with the leather of my nose. It stung like a knife to my flesh. I yowled.

  I’ve been cut! I’ve been cut! Help me, I’m bleeding!

  My rump slammed into the devil’s side, knocking him across the floor. We collided against the wall. But before he could strike again, I gathered myself and ran to Lise’s feet. To protect her, of course.

  “Shhh, shhh, little one.” She gathered me in her arms and rocked me. “It’s just a scratch. Trust me, that cat is more afraid of you than you are of him. Isn’t that so, Trouble?” She looked past me toward where the cat had landed, but he was long gone. Apparently, I had made my point.

  “What’s going on here?” A deep voice sounded from behind her.

  I squirmed against her chest to look over her shoulder. Lise’s mate, Cameron, stepped through the door from outside. Scents, begging to be discovered, wafted in around him. I lifted my nose and inhaled.

  “Barely a drop of blood.” Laughing, he swiped a calloused thumb at my nose. “Poor little puppy. Sounded like you were going to die.”

  “Hey, Cam.” Lise juggled me over to her hip and smacked her lips against Cam’s. “How’s the baling going?”

  “Good. Just praying the rain holds off.”

  She frowned at him. “So you’re not sitting down to dinner? Again?”

  “Just helping Dad out, honey.”

  “I understand, but you’re at the farm almost every day. Can’t he get someone else to help, like one of the teenage boys around here?”

  “Most are either too young or have other jobs. Jobs that don’t break your back. It was easier on Dad when Ben and Drew were still around.”

  “Yeah, well, your brothers shouldn’t have moved out of state after he paid for their college. You didn’t.”

  “Because you were here.” He slid an arm around her waist and nuzzled between her neck and shoulder. His tongue lapped at her throat. She tilted her head back as he pulled her closer, trailing little kisses from her chin to her collarbone.

  I couldn’t ... breathe. I was being crushed between them. It was worse than having my brothers and sisters piled on top of me. I grunted to let them know I was short on air. When that didn’t work, I kicked my feet, trying to push them apart.

  “Cam ...” Lise murmured, “the puppy.”

  Laughter rumbled from his chest. I loved the sound. It meant he was happy. If I could laugh, I would. I sneezed instead. It was the closest I could manage. He lifted me from Lise’s arms and touched his forehead to the top of my skull, so that his face was close to mine. “You are keeping this one, right?”

  “Oh, Cam, you know it’s too early to decide. Besides, I kind of had my eye on that flashy red tri boy — Scout.”

  “Trust me, Lise, this red merle girl —she’s the one. There’s something special about her. Something ... different.” He handed me back to her. “What do you call her?”

  “Halo. But why do you like her so much? She’s the runt, you know.”

  “Just a feeling. Don’t ask why.” He ruffled the fur on my neck, then patted me once hard on top of the head. “Someone has to look after you and Hunter if anything ever happens to me. This one’s fierce.”

  “Don’t talk that way, Cam. Anyway, I’m trying to build a breeding program. I can’t go on ‘feelings’. I have to pick the one with the best structure and type and —”

  He silenced her with a long kiss. His fingers slipped beneath the waistband of her pants to untuck her shirt. This time she was careful to hold me off to the side. Her eyes drifted shut. She took a deep breath, shivered. Was she cold? Afraid? Humans made very little sense sometimes.

  “Maybe you could take pipsqueak here back to her mother?” Cam slid his hand under her shirt, over her belly and then slowly upward. “I have forty-five minutes before I need to be back out in the field. You can stand here and talk — or join me in the shower. So, what d’you wanna do?”

  Her eyelids fluttered. She glanced dreamily down at Cam’s hand as it curved around her breast. “Give me sixty seconds. You start the water.”

  “Meet you there.” He dashed from the room, tugging his shirt over his head. “Just let me rinse the dust off first.”

  Lise spun around to shout over her shoulder, “Not too hot!”

  “Lukewarm! Got it!” he yelled back.

  I bounced in her arms as she jogged down the short hallway to the laundry room. Then she plopped me down on the other side of the baby gate, not even bothering to put me in the nest. Mother lifted her head lazily from inside the box to look at me, blew out a breath, and laid her head back down. Scout was slurping away at her teat, his belly already plumped up like an engorged tick.

  When I looked back up, Lise was no longer there. Whatever happened to ‘outside’? I had to pee. Now. So I did. Lise or Mother would clean it up later. When that was done, I waited for Mother to come out, but she was locked inside that cage around the box.

  I was alone. And hungry. My stomach twisted in pain. I might die if I didn’t eat soon.

  So I cried awhile, ramping up my volume as time went on. Desperate for a response, I hooked my front feet in the latticework of the baby gate, howling as loud as I could so Lise would hear me. But there were strange noises coming from the other end of the house — laughter, squealing, pipes clanging as water rushed through them, then muffled voices, thumping — drowning out my pleas. I shoved a back foot into one of the holes, pushed myself up, and reached with a front paw. Soon, I was hanging at the top. Carefully, I lifted a back foot again, my toes swinging through the air until they landed on another foothold. I pushed myself over and —

  Thump!

  Momentarily dazed, I lay beside the gate, waiting for someone to rescue me. But no one came. No one cared if I was okay or had just broken every bone in my body.

  I shook myself off and trotted across the floor, more sure-footed this time. I could still smell the Devil-Cat, but I didn’t see him. I slowed my pace, casting looks from side to side, behind me, pausing when I reached the edge of the big room to stare down the long narrow space where Cam had disappeared. There were doors on both sides of the wall. All
closed.

  I stood there, listening. But it was quiet now. I couldn’t tell which door they were behind. I looked around. It was a long way back to the laundry room. A yawn pushed up from my chest. I was tired. Needed a nap. After that, I’d go back to Mother. Climb over the gate. The Devil wouldn’t dare go in there with Mother around to guard me.

  Again, I looked down the long narrow room lined with doors. That was when I saw Cam’s shirt crumpled in a wad halfway down. The outside smells on it called to me. I went to it, sniffed, let the scent of crushed green stems and earth fill my lungs. Lay down. Stretched my legs. Closed my eyes. Just for a minute.

  In my dreams, strong, protective arms cradled me. A kiss alighted on my brow. Scruff whisked across my cheek.

  “You’re the one,” Cam’s voice whispered. “Watch over my family, okay? They’re going to need you.”

  chapter 2

  The door creaked as Cam pushed it open. He put me down in the front seat of his truck, closed it, and got in on the other side.

  Lise stepped up on the running board to lean in through the open window on my side. Clutched at her hip, their little boy Hunter tugged at his lower lip.

  “Are you sure you want to take Halo with you?” Lise said. “She’s barely twelve weeks old. She’ll probably throw up. You won’t even let me eat carry-out in here. Besides, you really should have her in a crate. What if she climbs onto your lap while you’re driving? Puppies are distracting. You could crash, you know.”

  “Seriously, Lise, don’t worry. I’m just going a few miles down the road. I doubt she’ll get sick in the amount of time it takes us to get to Dad’s house. Besides, if she’s going to be my dog, you said it was okay for her to ride shotgun with me when I went to do chores.”

  “Yeah, but —”

  He poked a finger in her direction. “You said she could, remember? At least I’m letting her ride in the cab. My dad used to make the dogs sit in the bed.”

  Lise opened the rear door of the cab and buckled Hunter in his car seat. After shutting the door, she reclaimed her spot on the running board.

  I dug at my new collar with the nails of my back foot. Itchy, itchy! It hung around my neck like a yoke of stone, a supposed symbol of my inferior status to humankind. I scratched furiously at it, waiting for her to realize how uncomfortable it was and take it off, but she simply hissed ‘Stop it!’ at me.

  Lise’s nose crinkled as her gaze returned to Cam. “Okay, okay.” Subtly, she extended her hand over my head and dropped something beside me. It had a shiny metal clip on one end and a loop on the other. “You’ll keep a leash on her while you’re there, won’t you?”

  What? And drag me around like a circus monkey? I don’t think so!

  A barely audible sigh escaped Cam.

  “Please?” Lise added, gripping the inside edge of the door.

  “All right, all right. I won’t let her out of my sight.” He hooked the snap of the leash onto a link in my collar. I didn’t like it there. It was heavy. I bit at his hands to make him stop, but he pinched my mouth shut and gave me a firm ‘No!’

  When he let go, I sneezed. Hunter laughed. I sneezed again, which sent him into a fit of delight. He had just turned five, so not quite old enough to go to school himself, which meant Cam’s mother, Estelle, would be taking care of him today while Lise went to work. Estelle and Lise had a tenuous relationship at best. It was easy to see Lise’s irritation every time she got off the phone with her.

  “Don’t let her near the cows,” Lise said over Hunter’s laughter.

  “Well, that’s kind of impossible, seeing as how I’m going there to help take care of them.”

  “Cameron Scott McHugh, don’t you dare —”

  “I got it, I got it. Don’t let her near the cows, right.” He slipped the key into the ignition and twisted it. The engine coughed, sputtered, and then roared to life. He yanked the shifter into reverse, but his foot was still locked against the brake. “I’ll be back by supper tonight. Mom and Dad have a dinner date with the DeLeons at 5:00.”

  Lise stared at the side of Cam’s face until he turned his head.

  “What?” Cam said. “Did I forget something?”

  “No, just ...” — she stepped down from the running board so I couldn’t see her anymore and patted the outside of the door twice — “just be careful today, okay? And tell Estelle to keep an eye on Hunter. His asthma’s been acting up lately.”

  “I will, hun. See you at 4:30.” He blew her a kiss. Lise’s open hand appeared briefly through the window. Her fingers snapped shut, then disappeared.

  “You can have your kiss back,” she said, “when you get home later.”

  “Okay. Promise not to keep you waiting. Have fun at school today.”

  “Yeah, right. We’re talking about second graders. The first rule is always survival.”

  “See you later, then.”

  “Bye now.”

  “Bye, Mommy!” Hunter yelled. “Byyyyyyye!”

  Chuckling, Cam eased off the brake. The truck rolled backward, jerked to a brief stop, then lurched forward. Through the open window, I saw the clouds spinning. I hopped over to the door and planted my paws on the armrest to raise myself up and look out. Trees whizzed by, low branches slapping the sides and top of Cam’s big black truck as we rumbled down the lane.

  In the little mirror next to the window, Lise stood before the house, its crisp white clapboard siding a stark contrast to the flaking green shutters. A minute ago she was very big. Now she was tiny. And how did she get inside the mirror? This confused me. Next to her sat my mother, Bit, looking very unimpressed with the fact that I was flying as fast as a bird down the lane in the big wheeled monster Cam called ‘The Ram’.

  Bit and Lise got smaller and smaller and smaller. I looked toward the rear of the truck. There, I saw them only a moment longer before they disappeared beyond the cloud of dust billowing out behind the truck’s big rear wheels. We turned a corner and the house, too, vanished.

  I leaned out further, wind beating against my face, my ears flapping back. I smelled clover, freshly cut grass, manure from those stupid creatures, or sheep, that Lise called ‘The Girls’, which she said were for training and keeping the grass down. That was when I saw them on the far side of a pasture as we drove by — ten big puffs of wool on skinny stick legs. Eating, like they constantly did. Around them were about a dozen miniature versions, the lambs, bouncing and bucking through the tall grass. They did this every day. Sometimes they stopped, looked up, and bleated franticly when they realized they’d lost their mothers. The ewes bleated back to give their location and the lambs leaped to them, suckled a bit, and then got lost again. They were even dumber than their mothers. No wonder Bit had to help Lise put them away in the barn every night so the coyotes didn’t get them.

  Cam snagged my collar and yanked me back down to the seat. He flicked a switch on his side of the truck and the glass in my window slid upward, so I couldn’t stick my head out anymore. I stood on the armrest and pressed my nose to the glass, watching new sights appear with every passing second. Who knew the world was so big? That there was so much to be discovered and explored?

  A few weeks ago, most of my brothers and sisters had disappeared one by one, until only Scout and I were left. It always began the same. The dogs outside would erupt into a chorus of barks, alerting everyone to visitors. Lise or Cam would poke their head out the back door and shout, “Knock it off!”, which was our cue to be silent so that they could assess whether or not there was any threat of danger. In my opinion, they often made those decisions too quickly. Humans were shifty creatures. They could open doors with their long, nimble fingers, and they apparently communicated with one another through small devices held to their heads or stuck right inside their ears. With those capabilities, who knew what they might try to steal from us? Any one of them could snatch a bag of our kibble, toss it inside a car, and be gone in seconds.

  Now they were stealing puppies. I’d be darned if they t
ook me away from Lise and Cam. I wasn’t going anywhere.

  Cam turned the radio on and fiddled with the knob until he got to a certain song. “Ah, my man Keith. Lise loves it when I sing Keith Urban songs to her.” He peered into the rearview mirror at Hunter. “Wanna sing with me, Hunter?”

  He cranked the volume up and began to croon. Hunter waved his hands above his head and joined in, but the words came out a little differently than Cam’s.

  “Take yo’ wreckers, take yo’ feet home,

  Take yo’ mommies, I don’t eat ‘em ...”

  I was about to howl along with them when we pulled onto a bigger road and gained speed. The world blurred past. Suddenly, I saw a hundred things that needed investigating: buildings of different sizes and shapes, endless fields of hay, rows of wheat and corn and soybeans, thick patches of woodland, and then more houses, crowded close together. Cam slowed to a stop at a flashing red light where two roads crossed. He flipped a bar beside the steering wheel and an odd ‘click-clack, click-clack’ came from somewhere up front. I cocked my head sideways, listening, then tilted it the other way, trying to zero in on the sound. Cam laughed at me and ruffled the fur on top of my head.

  A car pulled up beside us. In the front were two full-grown humans, but in the back I saw a little face peering up at me. A boy-child. Younger than Hunter. His mouth opened in an ‘O’, and he pointed a chubby finger at me. He had an honest face. Plump cheeks and a small nose. His smile matched the joy in his eyes. I would trust him. We could be friends. I barked a hello. The boy flapped a hand at me and smiled. But soon the car pulled ahead, and the boy disappeared from view.

  I was jerked back down onto the seat when Cam turned the truck onto another road. The houses became more spread out, the people fewer, and again the land opened up to far-reaching fields and expanses of rolling pasture. Beasts, bigger than the sheep but less shaggy, clustered near a muddy stream. Their great black eyes were vacant and lacking in intelligence, but one glance told me they were sturdy creatures who could shatter a dog’s ribs with one well-timed kick of their hooves.