Abby flung the covers back. The sudden flare of the bedroom light half blinded her. “What’s wrong?”
“You just slept through a damn poolside turf war.”
“What?” She sat on the edge of the bed and pushed the hair out of her eyes. She’d been sleeping so deeply that her whole body buzzed with the shock of waking up. “I slept through what?”
“Look,” Quinn commanded.
She did, and… “Oh, my God, Griffie! What happened?” She grabbed the scooter’s handlebars and hurried toward Quinn. The cat was lying limp in Quinn’s arms, torn and bleeding, eyes half-closed, tongue hanging out. “What happened,” she screeched, one-hundred-percent awake now. She reached out to stroke Griff’s head, but couldn’t find a spot to touch that wasn’t bleeding.
“He was fighting a bunch of raccoons on the patio. I heard Georgia barking.”
“Oh, no. Why would—” She stopped. She knew why. The raccoons had come to eat the dog food she’d left out for the stray, and Griffin had been defending his territory.
“Some of the other cats were involved, too, but he’s the only one I saw. Hopefully, everyone else is okay.” Quinn paused. “Or okay enough.”
“Shit.” This was all her fault, and with her damn self tied to a damn scooter, there was just about nothing she could do about it. “He’s in shock, and hurt too badly for Band-Aids and Neosporin to do any good.”
She sat on the scooter’s seat and called Mack’s cell phone. He answered, sounding groggy. She explained the situation, and he agreed to meet them at the vet’s office in fifteen minutes. “Okay,” she said to Quinn. “Give him to me. You’ll have to get a crate from the laundry room and line it with towels.”
Twenty minutes later, they pulled up in front of the vet’s office. The lights were on, and the front door stood open a crack. Quinn grabbed the carrier and rushed up the steps, then looked back at Abby—he’d forgotten her handicap.
“Go,” she ordered. “I’ll use the wheelchair ramp and catch up with you.” When she came in, the bell that hung from the doorknob jangled, and Mack called out. “Lock that door, then come on back.”
Though the waiting area had been dusty the last time Abby was in the clinic, the surgical room gleamed with shiny silver everything and smelled faintly of Clorox. Mack wore jeans and a wrinkled green scrub top, and his dark-brown hair stood up on one side. He had clearly rolled out of bed and come straight to the office, but he already wore a pair of surgical gloves and had assembled a tray of sharp objects and other frightening veterinary paraphernalia.
Griffin lay on a big, silver operating table, his mangled body illuminated by a bright adjustable lamp above the table.
“Y’all want to stay and help?”
“Um.” Abby looked down at the cat’s bloody gashes, and a spotty haze started to close in on her. She gulped. “I think I might wait outside, if that’s okay.”
Mack shrugged. “I don’t want to be picking you up off the floor, so yes, it’s fine.”
Quinn wrapped his arms around her and held her close. “Are you okay? Do you need me to take you out to the car? Or take you home? Tell me what you need.”
She burrowed into his warmth. Wrapped her arms around his waist. Held on to his solid strength. “I’m okay.”
He squeezed her tight. “Can you make it back to the waiting room?”
She made herself pull away. “Yes.” She scrubbed her face with her shaking hands, though there were no tears to wipe away. “I’m fine. I’ll be fine. If you can stay, I’ll wait.”
He stepped closer and tucked a wild strand of hair behind her ear. “You sure?”
Not at all sure but determined not to be a wimp, she nodded and stepped back, gripping the handlebars of the scooter. “I’m sure. I’ll go to the waiting room and text Reva.” She turned and left the room, glad for Mack and Quinn’s ironclad stomachs and compassionate resolve.
“I’ll stay,” she heard Quinn volunteer.
“Great, thanks,” Mack said. “They sure got him good, didn’t they?”
She didn’t hear Quinn’s response; she had already scootered halfway down the hall, headed for the dusty waiting room. She almost fell off the scooter when her cell phone buzzed in her back pocket. For a split second, she imagined that a big, hairy raccoon had come up behind her and taken a swipe at her butt. She stopped near the receptionist’s desk, pulled the phone from her pocket, and looked at the screen. Aunt Reva, of course. Calling after midnight—no doubt because she’d had a disturbing dream about raccoons.
“Hey, Aunt Reva.”
“What’s going on? I was dead asleep and woke up thinking I heard cats fighting. I think it was just a dream, but I can’t shake the feeling that something bad has happened. I called the house phone, and…well, as you know, you didn’t answer. What’s happening? Who’s hurt? Are you okay?”
“Griffin had an altercation with a raccoon.” No way was Abby going to tell Reva about her broken foot in the same phone call as this horrible news. “We’re at the vet’s office now.”
Reva took a breath, then went quiet. After a second, she spoke. “Griffie says that it looks bad, and it feels bad, but he’ll be okay, so don’t worry. Just stop telling the raccoons they’re invited to dine on his patio.”
“I know.” An unexpected prickle of tears tickled Abby’s sinuses. She sniffed the tears back into submission and got hold of herself. Falling apart wouldn’t help anyone, least of all Griffin. “I’m sorry. I put food out for the stray dog. I shouldn’t have done that.”
“Why didn’t you put the food across the street? Isn’t that what you’ve been doing up until now? I’m getting a strange feeling that you’re not telling me everything. Not that I don’t trust you—of course I do. But are you okay? You’re not sick, are you? You don’t sound sick.”
“No, I’m not sick.” Luckily, Reva asked a hundred questions at a time instead of just one, so Abby could pick the ones she wanted to answer and ignore the rest. “I wanted to lure him closer to the house.” True, even if it wasn’t the actual reason she’d put the food on the patio.
“Good instinct,” Reva praised. “But he wants to earn his place. He won’t come to the patio until he knows you’ll welcome his presence.” Reva paused, and Abby heard her take a breath. “Aww. He’s been bringing you presents?”
Holy shit. The newspapers. The realization had come to her in a barely remembered dream: The newspapers didn’t contain a message; they were the message. “He’s been bringing me newspapers. I’ve been leaving the gate open, and he’s been putting them on the patio by the back door. Should I close the gate, though? I mean, because of the raccoons?”
“No. Gates don’t keep raccoons out. They can climb anything. Hang on a second.”
Abby took the opportunity to lay the phone on the scooter’s seat and push the contraption to the dark waiting room, where she sat on one of the dusty Victorian velvet sofas. She picked the phone up again and put it on speaker. “Reva, you still there?”
“Hang on,” Reva said, sounding a little irritated.
While she waited, Abby switched over to her texts and saw one she’d missed from Reva. Couldn’t find the mama deer’s babies, but met a nice farmer who sold me a runty baby goat that he was bottle-feeding. I didn’t get in trouble—my roommate (who is usually a pain) covered for me. Now everyone is wondering where the baby goat came from. And look! Abby scrolled down to see the photo of a spotted baby goat nursing from the mama deer.
She hit the !! button.
“Okay,” Reva said. “I talked to the wolf dog.”
Abby switched back to the phone-call screen, though it didn’t really make any difference; she could hear and respond either way. “And?”
“He wants to be useful. He wants to know the rules, because human rules don’t make sense to him, and even when he thinks he knows what people want, the rules keep changing.”
“Okay. So what am I supposed to do with that information?”
“He wants to know where he belongs. He is afraid you’ll chase him away again.”
“I won’t.”
“Well, he doesn’t know that.”
Frustration crawled up Abby’s throat and came out as a growl. “How am I supposed to let him know I won’t chase him away?”
“Tell him!”
Abby closed her eyes. “Okay, fine. Tell me how to do that.”
Reva’s huff of irritation sounded the same as Abby’s had. “How many times have I explained this to you?”
Starting when Abby was five years old? Maybe eleventy-million times by now. “Not enough, I guess.”
“Pay attention this time.”
“Fine.” Abby sighed. She had paid attention all those other times, too, but it didn’t make her any better at communicating with animals. Truth was, she didn’t trust herself. Reva had done her best to teach Abby to trust, but then she’d go back home and have that trust shamed out of her. What felt right at the farm felt silly everywhere else. “I will.”
“All right. Both feet on the floor, relax your body and let your breath flow through you, as if you’re an empty straw.” Reva took a slow, deep breath and let it out with an audible whoosh.
Abby did the same.
“Breathe up through the soles of your feet, then down through the top of your head,” Reva instructed. “Release anything that isn’t yours. Release your worries to the heavens, release your baggage to the earth. Clear yourself, clear the channel of communication.” Together, they did a few cycles of deep breathing over the phone.
“Ready?” Reva asked.
“Ready,” Abby responded. Her body felt energized with a pleasant buzz, oxygenated by the deep breaths she rarely took in her day-to-day life.
“See the wolf dog walk up and stand in front of you.”
With her eyes closed, Abby imagined what it would look like if Wolf came up to her, sniffed her hand, and sat, giving her his full attention. “His name is Wolf.”
“Good!” The approval in Reva’s voice stroked Abby’s ego, giving her a burst of confidence. “He’s giving you information you haven’t even asked for. Now you know you’re in. Tell him you won’t chase him away again. Tell him he is welcome to live at the farm. Ask him to come.”
In Abby’s imagination, Wolf turned away from her and looked down a hillside toward something she couldn’t see.
“He’s looking at something else.”
“Yes, he is. Ask him what he’s looking at.”
“Dogs. Lots of dogs. They’re everywhere, scattered all over the hillside, and none of them have people to belong to. They’re all separate, but they want to come together. They need a tribe to belong to.”
“Yes. But that’s not a literal image, right?”
Abby didn’t know how to tell the difference. “I don’t know.”
“Ask!”
She didn’t have to ask; suddenly, she knew. “He just wants to belong somewhere. He doesn’t care if it’s with a pack of strays or a human family.”
“Really?”
The scene of all the disconnected dogs scattered across the countryside changed, coalescing into a line of dogs, following the leader like sheep, all heading to Bayside Barn. “No, you’re right. They want a family, a home, and a safe place to live.”
“Anything else?”
“They want to love and to be loved.”
“Yes. And what does Wolf want? What does he want from you, in particular?”
In her imagination, Abby apologized to Wolf for chasing him away. She told him that she understood, now, that he had only caught the chicken because he was hungry. She asked him to please come to live at the farm, so she could stop worrying about him being on his own in the cat’s-claw forest.
“He’s listening,” Reva said. “But he wants to be useful, too. He wants you to give him a job.”
Abby laughed. “I don’t read the newspaper.”
“What else can he do,” Reva prompted. “What can he do to prove his worth and do his part as a family member at the farm?”
In Abby’s imagination, she saw Wolf turn toward her, his golden eyes shining. She asked him what sort of job he thought he’d be best at and enjoy doing. The word protector blossomed in her mind. “He can protect the farm’s cats from wild animals.”
“Get more specific. Birds are wild animals; blue jays don’t hurt the farm animals, but hawks will kill the chickens. You’re telling him what you want him to do. What do you want him to do?”
Abby felt like her body was floating, not quite connected to the earth anymore. “Protect us from animals who want to do harm.”
“Yes.” Reva’s voice was rich with approval. “Yes. Now, tell Wolf what you want. He needs a gold-plated invitation and a job to do, or he won’t come.”
Abby heard a door close, and Quinn and Mack talking to each other as they moved closer. She suddenly felt silly—talking to a dog or, worse yet, pretending to. The pleasant floating sensation evaporated, and Abby became aware that her foot ached. She snatched up the phone and turned off the speaker function just as the men walked into the room. “Just a minute, Aunt Reva.”
Quinn frowned at Abby and reached down to prop her foot on the scooter’s seat. “Elevation, remember?”
Without even asking, Mack took the phone from Abby’s hand. “Hey, Reva. How’s your class coming?” He walked out of the room.
“How’s Griffin?” Abby asked Quinn.
“If he makes it through the night, he’ll probably be okay. Mack is keeping him here for a few days so he can get IV fluids and antibiotics.” He sat next to her and put a hand on her thigh, lightly massaging. “You ready to go?”
“Welp, I’ll need to get my phone back first.”
Mack’s deep voice and low laugh drifted from the reception area.
“Sounds like they know each other pretty well,” Quinn commented.
“Yeah, they do. Mack and Reva’s husband, Grayson, were buddies from way back. Also, with all Reva’s animals, she’s one of Mack’s best customers.”
“Yeah, she is,” Mack confirmed, walking back from the reception area. He handed Abby her phone. “She single-handedly paid for my truck. Don’t tell her I said that, though, because then she’ll want to ride in it, and my wife won’t like that.”
“Probably not.” Abby would bet money that Patricia McNeil wouldn’t want Reva riding in Mack’s truck. Though Mack’s wife was pretty enough, she couldn’t hold a candle to Reva’s lit-from-within beauty; the kind that didn’t fade with age.
Quinn helped Abby to her feet. “Let’s get out of here so Mack can go home and get some rest.”
“Thanks for everything, Mack,” Abby said. “Meeting us here after midnight… That’s above-and-beyond territory.”
Mack chuckled. “Nah, not really, since I’ll be sending Reva the bill for my time.”
On the way back home, Quinn rested a hand on Abby’s thigh. “How are you doing? How’s your foot?”
“Fine. I’m fine. My foot’s fine.” Actually, she felt like death warmed over and her foot felt even worse than that. “I’m sorry you’re going to all this trouble for us.” Us being the multispecies collective at Bayside Barn. “I don’t know how we’ll be able to make it up to you.”
“You don’t owe me a thing.” He rubbed her thigh; she could tell that meant he was thinking. “But I do have a favor to ask. My son, Sean, is coming to visit next weekend. I really appreciate all the meals you cook for me when I’m at the farm doing chores, and it would be great if Sean could come, too, when he’s around. It’s not all that often.” Quinn sighed, and his hand on her thigh felt heavy. “Unfortunately.”
Quinn’s sadness and regret over the damaged relationship with his son ignited Abby’s despair over the daughter she would never see again. At least Quinn had a chance with Sean. Could Abby deny him whatever help she could provide? Offering to help didn’t mean she had to embroil herself in their relationship. She could cook a few meals and still remain uninvolved.
“Of course, Sean is welcome to come to the farm whenever you’re there.” She definitely didn’t want to form a personal relationship with the boy herself, but if Quinn and Sean could bond over her dinner table, what harm would there be in that? “I’ll be happy to cook all your meals, especially since you’re helping me so much.”
They had just pulled into the driveway at Bayside Barn when Abby’s phone pinged with a text message from Reva: Don’t forget to finish the conversation with Wolf. Also, why is Georgia telling me that you’re always riding a bicycle, even in the house?
* * *
Wolf heard Abby talking in his head. He had always been able to hear some of what the people near him were thinking, or understand some of what they were saying. But this was different. This time, he knew Abby wasn’t anywhere near him, but he heard her voice in his head. And she was talking to him, as if she wanted to have a conversation with him the way people talked to each other.
He’d been following his own scent back to the cat’s-claw forest, but he couldn’t talk to Abby and pay attention to his nose at the same time, so he flopped down exactly where he was: in a strange, man-made field with alternating rows of raw dirt and small bushy plants. To be sure he was safe, he took stock of the area by sniffing the air.
He smelled wild rabbits close by—different than the ones at the farm—and the oily, rubbery odor left in the dirt by farm equipment. He could still get a whiff of the female dog he had followed and coupled with. After he fulfilled her request, she had no further use for him and trotted away, unconcerned. He had hoped she would come back with him and help him to start a pack so he’d have a place to belong. But she made it clear that she already had a home, and he wasn’t invited to share it.
Georgia had invited him to live at the farm, but Abby had chased him away. He wished all the dogs who didn’t have homes could somehow find their way to the same place so they could be together. There would be safety and security if they all banded together.
He could tell that on some level, he was telegraphing his thoughts to Abby in the same way people often did without being aware of it. But he knew what he was doing, and so did Abby. He calmed his thoughts to make room for hers.
“I’m sorry,” he heard Abby say in his head. “I was afraid for the chicken you caught, and I didn’t understand that you were hungry. If you will come to the farm, I won’t chase you away, and you’ll have plenty of food to eat.”
Wolf could tell that someone else—another human—was listening in on the conversation. It felt like she was helping Wolf and Abby to hear each other better. He tried to show them how his fear and reluctance to trust held him back. He tried to show them that he needed to feel useful and have a job to do.
Then, the connection broke. Abby dropped out of the conversation. The other person tried to keep Wolf engaged, but he had to get back to the forest. It was unsafe to sleep in an unfamiliar place, and his body craved rest now.
But more than that, he had a bad feeling that he had somehow let Georgia down when he followed the other dog’s tantalizing scent. He would have to explain to her that he couldn’t help losing himself in these overwhelming urges that took over his rational brain and compelled him to do whatever it took to satisfy the biological imperative.
Then he thought of Georgia’s sweet face, her soft brown eyes, her healing presence; and he realized that he wouldn’t have to explain anything. She knew him, she understood him, and she accepted him, just as he was. That knowledge made him more determined than ever to truly deserve everything she gave him freely without demanding anything in return. Even though it scared him more than any terror he had faced before, he vowed to try to fit into Georgia’s life. Maybe he could do it without having to get too close to the humans.
He knew without asking that she wouldn’t leave her people to go with him. But if he could find a close-by place to dig a den for them to share, he might be able to convince her that he could be her home, too.
Wolf made it back to the forest when the sky at the horizon turned orange and pink. The hum of a small motorbike and the soft thunk of a rolled-up paper hitting the ground lured him out of the forest before he had the chance to lie down and rest. He picked up the paper—this one still sharp with the smell and taste of fresh ink—and carried it down the farmhouse road, then dropped it by the see-through door. Inside the house, the lights were off. He pressed his nose to the cool, damp glass. A small, dark kitten curled up on a soft pillow that was raised off the ground on polished blocks of wood.
He remembered pillows.
He missed pillows.