“Good boy, Kong!” she said.
He turned his head back at her, and looked her directly in the eye. She reached her hand out tentatively, and thumped his back with her palm. Her voice skipping, she said, “Oh, OK, there you go.” She laughed a little bit, and patted him once more. “Yes, good, yes.”
WHEN BILL RETURNED from his trip later that night, he found Christina sitting on his favorite chair in the corner of the living room, a copy of his second novel, On the Emperor’s Ridge, in her lap, and Kong at her feet. He jumped up when Bill entered the room, raced around him, then after a few pats, loped back over to Christina’s feet, and sat.
“What’s going on over here? Did we make friends?”
“We made friends,” she said, and recounted the incident in the woods.
“I can’t tell you how much this pleases me,” he said.
“I feel like everything is going to be fine now,” she said. “I think he just needed to save me.”
“He truly is a king among dogs,” said Bill.
“Well, I don’t know about that, but I do know that he’s a good boy,” she said, and patted Kong’s rump.
“OVER HERE,” said Christina. “That’s where I saw the deer.” They were heading back up to the peak again, so Bill could see where the actual bonding had occurred. Bill had insisted on getting up the next morning, as soon as the sun rose. He said it was because it would be cooler earlier in the day, but she thought he seemed a little restless, and, frankly, jealous at how close Christina and the dog had become in just one day.
“You’re always going to be the leader of the pack,” she assured him. “I’m just the damsel in distress.” It amused her tremendously that this dog saw her as weak and defenseless. But she had to admit she was glad he had been there, even though it had been just a deer.
“That’s the spot,” she said, and pointed.
Bill and Kong stood there, both peering into the bushes, as if they could uncover some great mystery of the universe with the force of their vision. My heroes, thought Christina. She walked up the trail ahead of them, near a pair of manzanitas, and leveled her footing on a small space of flat land. Behind her she heard them traipse into the bushes, and the crisp noise of their feet on the leaves. What does he think he’s going to find in there, she thought. Deer shit?
Christina placed her hand gently on one of the trees. Kong let out a bark, and she heard Bill hush him. She began to finger the peeling trunk, scraping off small bits along the way. As she watched the skin flutter to the ground, she felt extremely satisfied. It was as if she were tidying up the tree. Grooming it. When I am done with this tree, it will be the most perfect tree on the mountain. I can make it work. I can make it happen.
There was a rustle, closer to her, and she looked up the trail, past a trail marker, past a mess of shrubs, till her gaze arrived at a mountain lion, the eyes in his squat head glowering at her above his slender frame, his long tail cutting calmly through the air. Christina jumped back, and fell into a tree. She felt her head collide with something, a branch maybe, and it stung deeply. She sunk to the ground. “Bill!” she yelled. “There’s a mountain lion!”
“I can’t hear you,” she heard back.
“Bill, there’s a goddamn mountain lion!” she screamed. She met its golden eyes. It still hadn’t moved.
Suddenly Kong came running out of the bushes and up the path, Bill following a moment later. Kong took a moment to make eye contact with the other animal, and let out a low growl. Bill stood back away from the two animals and Christina. Kong began to bark, and then burst up the trail toward the mountain lion, who turned and ran. The dog followed him into the bushes. There was a tumble of noise, and some moans and cries of an animal, and then the rustle of leaves. Bill gingerly walked to Christina and leaned down next to her. She put her hand on the back of her head. It felt sticky. “I think I’m bleeding,” she said.
And then Kong emerged, triumphant, from the bushes, and Bill stood.
“Did you get him boy? Did you get him good?” He strode over to his dog. “Holy shit, did you see that, Christina? He took him. He fucking took him.” Kong gave a mighty shake of his head. “That’s why I have this dog, for exactly that reason.” He slapped Kong’s back, ruffled his head. “Yes, Kong, good dog. Yes, you are.” He pulled his hand up and examined it. It was red. “He got you a little bit, didn’t he, boy? But I bet he looks worse.”
Christina hoisted herself up on the manzanita tree, the flakes of trunk falling under her fingertips.
He turned back and smiled at Christina, his cheeks burned with red. “Did you see him, Christina? Did you see what my dog did?”