My knees banged the underside of the table as I hopped up. We all knew I was the fastest way for us to get the dog outside. I grabbed the leash and pulled my jacket on in one motion. “Here, here, here! Let’s go! Outside! Outside!” I called, and clapped, and since he liked being outdoors so much, he came right to me.
The dog dragged me to the enclosure, where I let him go. He trot-hopped a few yards—escaping. “Because you always have to escape, now don’t you?” I said. He ignored me, marked a tuft of winter grass. Then he sat down.
It’d dawned on me that these suppertime interruptions never turned out to be about the dog’s urgent need to relieve himself; they weren’t about needing exercise or running away either. (He saved that for dusk and daylight.) Once it was dark, he wanted to come outdoors and sit and stare.
I looked at the dog’s long pale back. “You always face the same way,” I said. “Why? What’s out there?”
I oriented myself; I knew where the sun rose and set on this farm. “You face south,” I spoke to his back. “And you came from Tennessee. Blountville, was it? Are you facing home?” Then I asked him, “Does it help?”
I turned my back on him and pointed my own toes north. Well, Rochester was actually to the northwest, so I shifted my heels a few degrees. I stood staring into the evening until two things happened. One, I started to shiver, and two, I decided that this was ridiculous.
Later, in front of a rewarmed bowl of minestrone soup, I asked my new adults, “Is there something—anything—you know about dogs that suggests that they prefer to face a certain direction?”
Well. That stopped all the soup eaters in midsip.
Eileen pulled her double chins in, turtle style. “Hmm . . . not sure what you mean.”
“Does a dog know where it came from? Where its old home is?”
“Wow.” Aunt Brat thought for second. “That’s profound. An internal compass? That sort of thing?”
Elloroy stopped spooning his soup. “Why do you ask?” he said.
“Because I’ve seen the new dog facing south. A lot.”
“Oh, I don’t know, then,” Elloroy said. “Because that’s not my dog.” Eileen snorted and gave the old man a tap with the back of her hand.
“Well,” said Aunt Brat, “we know the earth has a magnetic axis, right? Although, it’s not perfectly stable. Prone to disturbances. . . .”
“And so are we,” said Eileen.
We’re prone to disturbances because we have this dog. . . .
Meanwhile, Aunt Brat had gotten up and gone to the kitchen window for the best signal. She was doing a search on her phone. “Oh, interesting. So what I’m seeing here is, there have been studies. It says, there is some evidence that dogs choose to position themselves on a north-south axis when they pee or defecate.” Aunt Brat laughed. “My apologies for being scatological during suppertime. But they did have to isolate the collection of data to times when the earth’s magnetic field was most undisturbed.” She put her finger in the air and looked at me with wide eyes. “And that would be at nighttime,” she said. “There could be something to your theory, Lydia.”
“You know, I think I’ve seen him facing south, too,” said Eileen.
Then Elloroy said, “I’ve just seen him face his dinner bowl.” They laughed, and I had to smile too. Elloroy reached over and tapped one finger on the table next to my bowl. He gave me a kind smile, big buggy eyes twinkling under his lenses and all his tiny brown moles magnified.
That night I went through the same little bedtime ritual I’d been doing since I’d come to the farm: I took off Mom’s sweater, changed into my sleep shirt and pajama pants. Then I put the sweater back on and wrapped it close. Normally, I’d fold myself right into bed and start warming it. (My room got cold once the fire died.) But this night I set my hand into the pocket of the sweater and found that old dog tag. I rubbed my thumbs over it. I held the tag under the reading light beside my bed. I squinted. Wait. Was that somebody’s name? And a phone number?
I read: “Ci . . . ci . . . Cici. Hoo . . . ver. Cici Hoover.” I snapped my hand shut on the tag. “Whoa!” This was not a rabies tag. It was an ID. Were we supposed to have it? If someone surrendered a dog, shouldn’t that be it? A done deal. No trail back.
We’d been trying so hard to decode not-Bullet. Now I wondered, did this Cici Hoover know all his secrets? Was she the thing he yearned for, the thing he wanted to go home to?
I held that tag between my hands. Maybe this person could help us. Maybe this was something I could do for Aunt Brat and Eileen—and Elloroy too, since it was his house—and his floors. I could make a call.
But what would I say to Cici Hoover? Hello. Have you ever owned a difficult yellow dog? Then I wondered this: What if Cici Hoover had never meant to give him up? What if the yellow dog was lost?
No, Lydia . . . unlikely. . . .
Someone would have called the number on the tag long before we’d gotten the dog. The rescue group would’ve checked. I was certain. I pulled my art box out from under my bed and opened the lid. The smell of wooden pencils, paint and wax, and glue came at me like a thousand memories. My heart thumped. A set of colored pencils lay in the open tray at the top. I rolled my palm over them. When would I use these again? Would I still know how? I tucked the dog tag between crimson and pomegranate and put the lid back on the box.
I pulled Mom’s sweater tight around me again and climbed into bed. I pulled Aunt Brat’s old sleeping bag over me, leaving a tunnel for my face to look out. I fixed my gaze on the sheep poster across the room. I had not messed with the hole behind it all week. Opportunities were slim, what with Aunt Brat home most afternoons. In less than two weeks she’d go back to a new semester teaching at the university. But I wanted to pick more plaster before that. Maybe tomorrow. I sighed a big Friday-night sigh and watched for the mouse until I couldn’t keep my eyes open anymore.
19
When Girls Come to Go Walking
I took in the quiet of Saturday morning. The weekend had arrived—a welcome break from a string of days of getting used to new people at that impossibly tiny school.
Aunt Brat and Eileen and Elloroy were all seated for breakfast with various reading materials in front of them. Soonie was asleep on her cushion at Aunt Brat’s feet. The yellow dog had been outside for a haul around the yard with yours truly, and now he was settled, with his chin resting on one tucked paw. Aunt Brat and Eileen had managed to fasten his rabies tag to his new green collar. There was something dog-proper about the look of him. But I knew better than to be fooled.
Funny, this scene didn’t feel so strange to me. I was still hoping to spend most of the day alone in the narrow room upstairs. I wanted to open the box of goddesses. I also had a wall to pick open, and I’d been thinking about both all week.
I poured my milk and coffee, added my honey. I held the mug up to my nose just to breathe in the scented steam. My new adults didn’t seem to notice my coffee drinking this morning. Hmm. Were we all getting used to one another?
I put my lips to the rim and took the first glorious sip—
Rap-rap-rap!
My coffee sloshed. Soonie leapt onto her spindly legs and let out a sharp bark. The yellow dog rose. He fired off a throaty alarm. Aunt Brat slapped her hand to her chest. “Whoa!” she said. Two barking dogs streaked toward the door.
“Umph!” Eileen stiffened in her chair. “Dogs! You disturbers of the peace!”
Elloroy, several beats behind, peered over his milky-blue glasses. “What was that?” He looked left and right.
“Door.” Eileen angled toward Elloroy while she pointed to the front of the house. “Somebody’s knocking at the door.”
“Someone was barking,” said Elloroy.
The yellow dog crowed again while all his back hairs stood on end.
Aunt Brat raised her voice. “Lydia, could you get it? Since you’re up?”
I nodded in answer. Dog vocals would have drowned me out. I set down my mug and hurried over. The
yellow dog was slinking back and forth, sniffing at the doorsill. I grabbed his leash, then had to step around Soonie to get to him.
“Encourage her out of the way!” Eileen flapped her hand helpfully from her spot at the table.
“Excuse me, Soonie.” I sounded meek, even to myself.
I would never be used to dogs, even this sweet one. I leaned over her and hitched up the bad boy. Only then did I glance out the window to see who had knocked on the door. There stood tall Raya Delatorre right next to short Sari Winkle.
Oh . . . shoot. . . .
They had said they would come get me and take me walking—something about a tour of Chelmsford. Something about the farms. But nobody had said anything about today.
The dog was using all his different barks now. I called back toward the breakfast table, “I’ve got it!”
“Whomever it is, explain the invisible dog drill to them,” Eileen called as she settled her eyes back on her newspaper. “Arms crossed over the chest, look up, and ignore. Shun that bad behavior.”
“But don’t shun the dog,” Aunt Brat added.
“Well, you have to act like you don’t see him,” Eileen began to argue.
“Right, right,” I said. All I could think about was how much I did not want to take a walk with the girls who were waiting just outside the door. Not even a little bit. It was going to mean more new people. And more strange places. Since we were talking about farms, some places were likely to smell bad. I had to come up with something—some way out of this.
I opened the door. Not-Bullet yanked me out onto the porch boards—in my socks. Raya and Sari stepped back to make room for us. The dog stopped and stared at them. He coughed out a few barks. His hairs still stood high on his spine. Soonie followed me, her nose right at my hip.
I caught sight of my three adults leaning from their chairs and peering at my situation. I reached back and pulled the door shut. I didn’t want them to hear the lame, lying excuse I was about to make. And what would that excuse be, anyway? Think, think, Lydia. I looked up at my classmates.
“Hi!” I said, faking friendly.
“Hey-hey,” said Raya.
“Hi, Lydia,” said Sari.
“So . . . this is that bad dog I mentioned. Still no name. He won’t hurt you,” I assured them. “He’s sort of a scaredy-cat,” I added, realizing only then that I was exactly right about that. How funny it was to hear myself talk about this dog—any dog—as if I knew what was up with it.
They stooped down and held out their hands to him. “Good boy, good dog.” He sniffed their fingers, then jumped backward as if they’d stuck him with pins. More barking.
“So, what we do is, we ignore him,” I said. “Like this.” I modeled the shunning pose. They gave it a try. Trouble was, it was hard to visit with humans when you had your arms over your chest and your chin in the air.
And then there was sweet Soonie, who nosed forward, practically speaking the words “love me, love me.” Before long, she was resting her chin in Sari Winkle’s mitten-soft palm. Meanwhile, the yellow dog had quieted.
“So,” I said. “Surprised to see you.”
“The walk,” said Raya. “We’re going to show you around.”
“Right,” I said. Then I realized, maybe I didn’t have to lie. The truth was, I didn’t want to wreck my boots. I had just the one pair and I was kind of in love with them. I wanted to keep the lime green bright and the orange laces unmuddy. I’d seen enough of the farms of Chelmsford from Aunt Brat’s car and from the school bus to know that they were fields of wet brown glop in this weird, warmish January. But as I took the breath to speak, Raya swung a pair of old brown hikers off her shoulder by the laces and dropped them at my sock-covered feet.
“You’ll want these,” she said. “Yours are too nice.”
I caved like a sinkhole. I’d be taking that walk—through every cow pie and pee puddle in Chelmsford.
Darn it!
Aunt Brat was thrilled when I poked my head back inside to tell her the plan. She fetched my jacket and phone for me. She took the dog’s leash so that I could step my feet into the old boots.
I remembered to introduce my welcomers to my new adults. Then they, along with Brat, counted the ways in which they already sort of knew one another. It was easy to make connections in Chelmsford, especially once Eileen arrived at the door to chime in. It became clear: the Feed was Chelmsford’s hub of communications.
“Oh, it’s so nice of you girls to come for Lydia,” Brat said. “Thank you.”
“Oh. Yes. Thanks,” I echoed. I pulled the bootlaces tight. One end snapped off in my hand and I tried to hide it. I opened the boot up and did a hasty rethreading. That’s when I noticed the initials lettered with a black marking pen inside the tongue of the boot: MCAP. What did those have to do with a girl named Raya Delatorre? I finished tying and stood up, ready as I’d ever be.
“Have fun,” Aunt Brat said. “Touch base if you need to.” She pantomimed a phone. I wondered if that meant, Call me if you can’t stand it. Did she know how much I did not want to do this?
Elloroy had come to join Brat and Eileen. The three of them, and both dogs, stood in the door frame—with some pushing—as they watched me slog away.
“So long, youth and beauty,” Elloroy said.
“What did he say?” Sari giggled and bumped up against me. I hummed a little nothing of an answer. For some reason that made Raya laugh out loud.
Well, the boots were at least a full size too big for me. That was obvious halfway down the hill from Pinnacle Hill Farm. Walking on the flat road was easier, though I scraped the pavement noisily. Both Raya and Sari looked at my feet as if to check on the oddball. I filled with dread as we turned down the driveway of the first farm.
I followed them, ducking under fence rails and navigating sloppy corrals. I had to crimp my toes to keep the mud from sucking the borrowed boots off my feet.
Those girls led me right up to animals. We walked between living, mooing cows, so close I could feel the heat from their huge bodies. A powerful stink rose up from the ground and into my nostrils. I held my breath. I got dizzy. Mud and manure slipped away underfoot, like the earth was leaving me. Clumsily, I grabbed for tall Raya. Without a word she clapped her hand under my arm and helped me across the mud and up a high step onto the floor of the barn. Wood. Something solid. I stood with two hands holding the jamb and looked back across all the black-and-white cows’ backs.
Raya and Sari were used to this. I was not. I didn’t even want to be used to this. Why had I not come up with a reason to stay on Pinnacle Hill today? Suddenly, I was thinking of my mom again. She’d loved rain and mud, and now I wished I could ask her if she liked mud that had a lot of manure mixed into it. There was something I’d never know. Mom had had that way of marveling at small things. She hadn’t loved the concrete all around Grandma’s neighborhood; she’d missed her garden and the clover-filled lawn after we’d moved. But she’d always been the first to notice where a weedy little wildflower had pushed through in a crack in the concrete.
I walked up Raya’s heels twice inside the barn, just trying to stay close. Problem: I was afraid to be behind cows or next to cows. I’d heard they could kick. I’d read about a boy being crushed between two of them. Once we were by all those enormous rumps and swatting tails, I could breathe again.
We walked out of the barn and into a long field. Partially frozen pumpkins that had long ago split and leaked their seeds lay beside their dry stems. Pumpkins not chosen, I thought. Like leftover dogs—except not.
Even in winter there was work happening at every house, every farm. Some places we heard stories. Other places we got a friendly nod as we leaned on fence rails and stared out at resting winter rows. I didn’t speak, except to say hello, but I paid attention. I learned that people either invited you in at the door or told you to go ahead in from the yards and barns and fields. There were cider doughnuts on the tables, granola bars in the pantries. Might be some tea left in the
pot but maybe not, but you could put the kettle on if you wanted to. This was normal for a Saturday, according to Raya and Sari. Welcome mats in Chelmsford meant what they said.
“Come on, I’ll walk you all the way to the back of the property line.” A Mr. Blasey made the offer proudly, and we went. There was nothing there except a pasture that ended at the base of a hill, much the way Elloroy’s meadow met the woods. I caught on quickly: you walked out there for that look at nothing because you’d been invited. Never mind that mud creeping up to the laces of a pair of borrowed boots. Mr. Blasey’s brother—also Mr. Blasey—rolled up on his noisy tractor with a flat wagon in tow. We were invited to have a lift back to the barn. Yes! I boarded most ungracefully—jump, belly flop, legs kicking the air. Raya and Sari laughed as they dragged me onto the flatbed.
Mr. Blasey took us up to the road, where we jumped off. I could not have been happier to hear Raya announce, “Last stop before home.”
20
The Onliest Few
I was pretty sure I had blisters on both my heels, and for sure, I had cramps in both my calves. Raya and Sari and I swished our boots through a clear puddle in the gravel of the last driveway. Rinse cycle, I thought.
We’d come down a long, long drive to reach this place. I expected to head to the front door with its plaque that said Gerber. My stomach would’ve been pleased with another snack. But Raya and Sari turned toward a small gray barn in the side yard instead. I shuffled after them.
“I hope Florry’s here,” Sari said, and she skipped ahead a step.
“Of course she’ll be here,” Raya scoffed. “She’ll be with her bun-buns.”
Bun-buns?
I followed close behind Raya. Instead of walking up her heels, I paused and let my eyes adjust to the low light.
“Florry? You here?” Raya did have the huskiest voice.
“Yee . . . ah, I am,” came the answer. This voice was funny—like a very little child—and the reply sounded like a question because of a lilt at the end.
A Home for Goddesses and Dogs Page 7