My Father's Words

by Patricia MacLachlan

  I am in second grade, and my friend Millie is mean to me. I am complaining to my father.

  “Did Millie say she was sorry?” he asks me.

  “She did.”

  “Are you friends again?”

  “Yes.”

  “Well then, let the whole thing float down the river on a little boat. Good-bye!”

  And I do.

  And that night, for the first time since the accident, Finn slept in his own bed all night.

  He didn’t cry in his sleep.

  Emma had come away from the wall.

  Finn had let some of his bad feelings float down the river on a little boat.

  Chapter 9

  Dona Nobis Pacem

  When I woke in the morning it was late. I jumped out of bed and went to Finn’s room. His bed was made.

  His bed was made?!

  I couldn’t remember when Finn had last made his bed.

  My mother’s room was empty, her books gone.

  I hurried downstairs. Luke sat in the kitchen calmly eating vanilla Swiss almond ice cream.

  “Where did you find that?!”

  “In the basement freezer,” said Luke. “Your mother keeps a stash there.”

  “Where is Finn? We’re late!”

  Luke held up a handwritten note and gave it to me.

  “Finn left an hour ago,” said Luke.

  Today is the day.

  Today I sing.

  Today I find Emma’s true home.

  Finn

  “I found it here on the table,” said Luke.

  I sat down.

  “Finn said he had a plan but wouldn’t tell me. What does he mean ‘true home’? I thought Finn might want to adopt Emma himself.”

  Luke shook his head.

  I reached over and took his ice cream bowl and spoon and began eating.

  “I think we should go,” said Luke.

  “I’m ready,” I said.

  “You have your pajamas on,” said Luke.

  “I don’t care.”

  “They’re plaid. You never wear plaid.”

  I grabbed Luke’s arm, and we started off to the shelter.

  When we opened the door, Martha pointed.

  “Wild pants,” she said.

  “I told you,” said Luke.

  Dogs swarmed around us, wagging their tails.

  “Where’s Finn?” I said. “He left before I got up this morning.”

  Martha pointed to the door, open an inch. “He’s been singing his sweet song in his sweet voice for an hour. And something amazing has happened. He has taught the song, a canon, to Penny and Joe. They don’t get it right sometimes, but they’re working at it. You’d better go in to see for yourself.”

  Luke and I went slowly through the door.

  Voices surrounded us—the high, sure voices singing in unison. Sometimes they sang together, sometimes in parts that blended.

  “Dona nobis pacem, pacem.

  Dona nobis pacem.”

  The staff members were there. All the dogs were listening. Jenny came over to see me.

  “I’m here, Jenny,” I whispered. “I’m here.”

  We walked closer as Finn and Penny and Joe kept singing. Emma didn’t even look up at us.

  She moved closer and closer. Then she turned back for a second and picked up her blue stuffed toy. Finn still sang.

  “Dona nobis pacem, pacem.

  Dona nobis pacem.”

  Emma came up to where Finn sat. And she pushed her toy through a space in the pen. A gift for Finn.

  He reached out and touched her nose. She licked his hand.

  And still they sang.

  They sang my father’s song. The music that sounded like tumbleweeds blowing in a prairie wind.

  Martha came to stand next to me. She held a leash.

  When Finn and Penny and Joe finished the song, Finn still stroked Emma’s face through the pen.

  And I knew that the leash Martha carried was for Emma. Emma was going for a walk with Finn.

  Finn came out of the rescue room.

  Martha handed the leash to him. “Do you want me to help you?”

  Finn shook his head.

  “I know how to open her door. I’ve done it before,” he confessed as he went back into the rescue room.

  Martha handed me Jenny’s leash. “Emma may be frightened or skittish,” said Martha.

  “I’ll walk with them without a dog today,” said Luke.

  “You mean you don’t want some new troublesome dog?” asked Martha with a sly look. “I have two small, fluffy dogs named Betty and Bitts. They tumble all over each other. I can’t tell them apart. I don’t know if they can either.”

  “Not today,” said Luke with a smile.

  And then Finn came out with Emma, who did not look skittish or nervous. She walked next to Finn as if they’d been walking together day after day.

  Maybe they had.

  “I’ll sing to her,” said Finn. “And we’ll have a conversation.”

  “Let me know if Emma has anything interesting to say,” said Martha.

  And then we went out the door, Jenny nosing Emma, and Emma nosing her back.

  Emma wagged her tail.

  “Ah, she has a tail!” Luke said softly.

  And I realized that we hadn’t seen it. Emma, for much of the time, had been a huddled-up body, facing the wall.

  “Good girl, Emma,” said Finn. Then softer, “Don’t talk about her tail. She might be shy about it.”

  “You taught Penny and Joe ‘Dona Nobis Pacem’?” I asked Finn.

  “Yes. Father taught me all the parts.”

  “Where was I, I wonder?” I said.

  Finn just smiled.

  “Father said it is beautiful when all the parts were sung together. But it is simple enough to sound beautiful even if he sang it all by himself on the basketball court at night. He could hear all the parts in his head.”

  I stopped walking, remembering.

  Finn and Emma stopped, too. Jenny looked up at me.

  “What?” asked Luke.

  “In my room one night, before I went to sleep, I opened the window. He sang it softly, almost to himself out in the dark. His voice was beautiful.”

  “Even as he bounced the basketball and made and missed baskets,” said Luke. “I could hear him from my own room.”

  We walked across the lawn and crossed the street to the park. We walked several paths and were about to sit down on a bench when Emma suddenly straightened and stared at the far end of the park.

  “Let’s keep walking,” said Finn, smiling at me.

  I knew what the smile meant. “Finn has a plan,” I reminded Luke.

  Luke nodded. Jenny looked up at me.

  “Keep on walking, Jenny,” I said.

  I leaned down to hug her. She licked my face.

  And then, all of a sudden, Emma began walking faster and wagging her tail. Finn had trouble keeping up with her, and Luke ran up to walk next to him.

  Luke put his hand over Finn’s to help him. Jenny and I went faster, too. Jenny seemed happy with the fast pace.

  And then we came to the other side of the park. Luke helped Finn hold on to Emma. We had never walked this far before.

  I looked across the street at a tall brick-and-stone building. Finn saw my look.

  “The Chance Conservatory,” said Finn.

  “Chance,” I repeated, suddenly remembering what Martha had told Finn.

  “The name of Emma’s owner,” said Finn, nodding.

  And we crossed the street, Emma leading, straining at the leash. She wagged her tail and began walking up the steps of the tall building.

  “What are we doing?” I asked, Jenny cheerfully running up the steps, following Emma and Finn and Luke.

  Emma jumped up on the door of the building.

  Finn opened the door, and we all went inside.

  There was a great center hall and many doors, and stairs going up.

  We could hear music behin
d every door: violins and cellos behind one, an orchestra behind large double doors, and a choir behind another.

  A place of music.

  Finn went up to a counter. A woman was working at a computer. She looked up to see Finn there.

  “Hi. May I do something for you?”

  And then Emma jumped up and looked over the counter, her tail wagging.

  The woman rose and almost tripped, standing up to the counter.

  “Emma! Oh, Emma!” she said loudly.

  The woman opened a door and came out into the big hallway, then sat down on the floor and took Emma in her arms. Emma licked the woman’s face, wiggling around like a puppy and ending up on her lap.

  “Oh, Emma!” she cried again. Then louder she called, “Richard! Richard!!”

  A door opened, and a tall man came out. Behind him a string quartet played on.

  “What, Estelle?”

  And then he saw Emma. And he let out a yell and sat down next to Estelle. Emma went from lap to lap. He looked at us.

  “We thought she was with David’s family. We’ve missed her! Who are you?”

  The large door opened, and the singers came out, filing up the hallway.

  “Callie! Come see!” called Estelle, still sitting on the floor, where now Jenny licked her face, too.

  And Callie was as happy as anyone else to see Emma.

  I was about to say something. But Finn spoke.

  “She was left at the dog shelter across the park,” said Finn. “She was so unhappy. She only looked at the back wall. I volunteered to read and sing to her. She liked music best. And when I sang ‘Dona Nobis Pacem,’ she came close to me.”

  “That’s what the choir had been learning when Emma was last here!” said Callie.

  “It was my father’s favorite song,” said Finn, his voice softer. “Maybe the song brought her back here.”

  I could feel tears in my eyes.

  Finn took a breath. “She was wondering all along where you were,” said Finn. “Now she’s found you.”

  Then Finn burst into tears. Estelle got up and put her arms around Finn.

  “You’re a hero,” she said, which made Finn cry harder. “We’ll adopt Emma. All of us. Richard lives here in David’s apartment! You’ve brought her back to us!”

  Estelle kept her arms around Finn. She cried, too.

  And Emma leaned against the two of them.

  As if we were in a dream, Luke and I knew what to do. We went behind the counter to call Martha. Jenny followed. No one noticed us. Children had come out of a music class and run to Emma.

  “Emma, Emma!”

  Luke dialed the phone on the desk. “Martha? It’s Luke. No, no, there’s nothing wrong.”

  Luke shook his head. He couldn’t speak. He handed me the phone.

  “Martha? It’s Fiona.”

  “What is happening?!”

  “Finn has found Emma’s true home,” I said.

  There was silence.

  “Martha?”

  “How could he do that?”

  Her voice broke. Martha was crying. Was everyone crying?

  “Martha? Emma will be living at the conservatory across the park. The Chance Conservatory.”

  I waited for Martha to remember what she had told Finn. And she did.

  “Chance,” she said softly.

  “They are overjoyed to see her. They want her. And Martha?”

  “What?”

  I took a deep breath.

  “We’re not bringing Emma back to the shelter.”

  We closed the big door of the conservatory behind us, leaving Emma in her true home. Finn and Luke and I walked Jenny down the stairs, across the street to the park.

  Jenny looked at us all as if to say, “Why aren’t you talking?”

  I smiled at her and whispered in her ear, “Good girl. What an adventure we had.”

  She pranced a little at the sound of my whisper. We walked for a while.

  “That was quite a plan of yours,” Luke said to Finn.

  Finn smiled.

  “I thought hard for a long time. Father once said to me, ‘If it’s hard, you’re doing good things.’”

  No one said anything. We walked silently across the park, back through paths we hadn’t walked before until today.

  Emma had led us.

  Chapter 10

  Jenny

  We walked down the yard to the shelter.

  “Are you sad a bit? Emma going there instead of home with you?” I asked Finn.

  “No. The conservatory is her true home. It is where she is meant to be. Richard ran out to buy her favorite food.”

  Finn shrugged his shoulders.

  “I can visit Emma whenever I want. They told me.”

  “I’m kind of sad myself,” I said.

  “Then talk to Jenny,” said Finn, making me smile. Finn was smart. Smart like Martha.

  When we got to the shelter, a woman was coming out with Lulu on a leash. Lulu was going home.

  Lulu pulled on the leash. Luke couldn’t help himself.

  “Sit, Lulu,” he said firmly. Lulu looked up at Luke and sat.

  “Oh my,” said the woman. “Where have you been all my life?”

  “Lulu and I took walks together while you were away. You can do it, I’m sure.” We laughed as we went up the steps to the front door.

  “No,” said Luke softly. “She’ll never control Lulu. She’s not an alpha. Lulu rules.”

  And when we opened the door, there was my mother! She stood by the counter talking to Martha.

  “I called your mother and told her what a great job you did for Emma. She wanted to come to the shelter.”

  “And did you sing ‘Dona Nobis Pacem’?” my mother asked.

  “I did. And at the conservatory Callie told me she had been teaching that to the choir when Emma was there,” said Finn.

  Martha’s eyes were red and puffy. She came around the counter and gave Finn a hug.

  “I am still going to come to the shelter,” said Finn. “Maybe I’ll read to Marco. He’s a bit shy.”

  Martha smiled.

  “There will always be more dogs,” she said.

  I had unleashed Jenny and hung up the leash.

  Jenny surprised me. She walked right up to my mother and sat down, gazing up at her.

  “That’s Jenny,” I said. “I walk her every day.”

  “And in return Jenny comforts Fiona,” said Luke.

  My mother sat down on a bench, and Jenny went over to my mother and put her head in my mother’s lap.

  “Martha and I have noticed that Jenny protects and likes the people who need her,” I said.

  “So I see,” said my mother.

  Martha took Jenny’s leash off the wall where I’d put it. “Here.” She handed me the leash.

  “What?”

  Martha smiled. “I told you Jenny would choose the people she loved. She chose Finn first, then you. And now she has chosen your mother,” she said softly.

  And that is how we took Jenny home.

  We piled into Mother’s car, Jenny in the backseat sitting between Finn and Luke. She licked Finn’s face. He was the first she had loved. She tried to sit on Luke’s lap and put her head out the window, but that didn’t work well.

  If a dog could smile, Jenny was smiling.

  When we turned into the driveway, Jenny went to the front door, went into the house, and chose my mother’s favorite white couch.

  “Let her be,” said my mother.

  Luke laughed.

  “This is what Father used to call ‘the eternal fitness of things,’” said Finn brightly.

  “What?” I said. “What do you know about that?” I asked.

  My father had said those words the last time he cooked us runny omelets. I had asked him before he’d rushed out the door.

  “Father told me it was the way things are or should be. It is like the seasons in the book The Year at Maple Hill Farm. Winter begins, followed by spring, then summer and fa
ll. The animals know it. It is their eternal fitness of things. It is Emma going home to the place she loves. Her true home.”

  Finn thought a moment.

  “Thomas would say it was Jessie coming here to tell us about the accident that was no one’s fault,” he said.

  Jenny walked into the kitchen and Luke put down a food dish.

  “And it is Jenny coming here,” said Luke.

  My mother cried.

  It was dusk.

  The katydids were beginning their song outside.

  Jenny had eaten, explored every room in the house, sniffing the smell of them all. She had gone for two walks, happy when Duke and Daisy came out next door to meet her.

  “Oh, maybe there is a dog at the shelter for us, too!” said Daisy, excited.

  “So far there is not,” said Luke, making Duke laugh.

  My mother had gone to class late, leaving us pizza so I didn’t have to cook.

  The phone rang.

  I answered without thinking.

  “Hello?”

  “Hello, Fiona.”

  “Hello, Thomas. We just adopted a dog, Jenny.”

  “Then you will know every day how good you are,” said Thomas.

  “And Finn found the true home for Emma, the lost dog. Maybe I should sit down and write about all this so I don’t forget,” I said. “Like a journal.”

  “Your father once said, ‘The only good thing about journals is the date.’ I think he meant, when the days pass by, we progress and grow as well. Something to think about.”

  I was quiet.

  “Fiona?”

  “Yes?”

  “If I was to write a book about your father, it would be titled Growing Up One Hour at a Time.”

  I smiled at this. I knew my father’s sessions lasted for an hour each week.

  “Or,” I said suddenly, “My Father’s Words.”

  Thomas was silent for a moment.

  “Oh yes,” he said softly.

  “Oh yes,” I repeated.

  “I’ll call you next week,” said Thomas.

  “Good-bye, Thomas.”

  “Good-bye, Fiona.”

  That night, when Luke had gone home and we went to bed, Jenny slept with me.

  “No,” said Finn in the morning. “Jenny slept with me!”

  “But she slept with me, too,” said my mother.

  And she laughed.

  My mother laughed again!

  Jenny had slept with all of us.