*
There were many nights when Axel squirmed and muttered and shouted in his sleep, and days when we were both astoundingly cold, clinging to each other for warmth. There were also times, seeming to grow more frequent in occurrence, when Axel would collapse and lie unresponsive, drooling, only to awaken and be sluggish and slow. He seemed sick and I nuzzled him anxiously. I wished Lucas would come. Lucas would know what to do.
Gradually the sun grew warmer and bugs and birds filled the air with their songs. There were squirrels at the park! I wanted to chase them but Axel always held fast to my leash. Dogs came, children played on the slides, and grasses waved moist and healthy in the breeze.
Tom came to feed me a treat. “With the weather, families are coming to the park. You’ll have to move on, technically no one is allowed here after dark,” he told Axel. “And people want to use the shelter but they’re … intimidated.” He sounded mournful.
“Not hurting anybody,” Axel said.
“Well … we’ve had complaints. I’ll hang on to your heater, you like.”
“I’ll leave. Hell with you all,” Axel snarled.
“Now, don’t be that way,” Tom said sadly.
I did not understand any of the words and my name was not mentioned, but Axel put all of his things in the cart and pushed it out of the park. We walked a long way along the road by the river and then turned down a path to where the banks were flat and sandy. Axel rebuilt his tent here and then he settled down in such a way that suggested to me we would not be leaving.
Over time Axel’s suffering became worse. He yelled out more in his sleep, and he had started talking loudly to me during the day, gesturing at the sky. Sometimes he would pant and twitch anxiously, then leave me tied to a stump while he left in the direction of town. Upon his return, he would have one of his pencils and would seem happy, but only for a little while. Then he would collapse and sleep deeply. Tied to him, I would go to the limits of the leash to squat to do Do Your Business.
One such night I caught a familiar stench and when I looked I saw a lone coyote watching me from the opposite riverbank. I growled quietly, but I knew it would not come across flowing water. Axel did not react to the smell, nor to the sound of my building fury, and eventually the small, bad dog slunk away.
I was alarmed when Axel began pacing and yelling along the riverbanks all day long. He took down the tent and threw it violently in a heap. He forgot to feed me once, then again, and then he poured an entire bag of food on the ground within my reach and left me, tied to a stump, kicking angrily at the rocks in his path as he marched away.
He was gone for two days. I ate all the food and drank from the river. I was sad and anxious. Had I been a bad dog? When he returned, he was stumbling and talking and did not acknowledge how frantically happy I was to see him. His breath reminded me of Sylvia.
He sat on a rock, hunched over by the river, and I knew from his motions that he was doing something to his arm and what would soon follow. Sure enough, he became very relaxed, and he laughed and called me a good dog. Peace erased all the fear and anger from his face. Soon his eyes were blinking very slowly.
“Bella. You are my best friend,” he told me. I wagged at my name.
Axel slumped into the dirt, breathing slowly. I curled up next to him, being a good dog and providing comfort. He had no pain and his breathing was slow.
After a time, his breathing stopped.
*
I lay all night with my head on Axel’s steadily cooling chest. Slowly, his scent changed, as more and more of what had been the man left, and more and more of something else came into his body.
Axel was a nice man. He was never mean to me. He was often angry and sad and frightened and upset, but never at me. I had done my best to be his good dog, to take care of him. I missed him now, lying there beside him, and wished he would sit up and talk to me one last time. I remembered how we would huddle together in the frigid night. How, when he had food, he would share it with me, just as I would share meals with Big Kitten. “You get the first bite, Bella,” he would say as he tore off a piece of something and handed it to me. I heard my name and could feel his love. Axel loved me, and now he was gone.
He wasn’t Lucas, but aching for Axel just then, I did not feel disloyal. I had cared for many people in my life, not just Mom and Ty and Mack and Layla and Steve, but Gavin and Taylor, and even Sylvia. It was what I was supposed to do. Axel had just needed me more than anyone else.
I had water in my bowl, which was good because my leash, now tied to Alex’s wrist, did not stretch to the river. Nor did it reach my bag of food.
When I got to my feet, I could see the cars flying past on the paved road nearby. Sometimes a dog would be hanging its head out the window and would bark at me as it drove by. Most cars did not have dogs, though, even if they smelled like they once did.
Eventually I grew hungry. I glanced at Axel’s still form, reflexively expecting him to feed me, and then when I saw him lying so motionless it would come back to me and I would be lonely again. I did Sit, thinking if people driving on the road saw what a good dog I could be they would stop and give me some food in my bowl. No one stopped, though, not that whole day. When night fell I strained on my leash, trying to reach my dinner and feeling a little like a bad dog as I was doing so, but Axel’s hand did not move.
Axel was cold and hard when I touched my nose to his face. His clothes still smelled like him but otherwise it was as if he had never been a person.
I looked out at the night, thinking of Lucas. Where was he, right now? Was he lying in his bed, missing his dog the way I was missing him? Did he open the front door to see if I had done Go Home and was lying in my spot? Did he have a treat ready to do Tiny Piece of Cheese, and was waiting for me to jump up to lick it from his fingers? I whined, I cried, and then I lifted my nose to the moon and wailed out a long, grieving howl. It was an odd noise, alien to my throat, and it carried with it all my heartache.
Far, far away, I heard a single answering cry, a song of loneliness from some other unknown canine, and many dogs barked, but no one came to see what could make a dog so sad.
The next morning my water was almost gone. I began barking at cars—if they would not stop for a good dog, maybe they would stop for a bad dog not doing No Barks.