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BY THE NEXT DAY, THE fire was 65% contained, but nerves were on edge with every breeze. People hosed down yards, cut back branches close to houses, and mowed borders around fields. The air smelled strongly of burning wood and the sky was leaden with ash. In the brief time since I’d visited Beryl Jensen’s, the wildflowers had faded. The brilliant green glasses were shifting to gold and my boots were no longer new, but worn in, the leather molded to my feet.
Jaison was at the kennels, letting out the dogs. “Hey, boss lady. You don’t have to be here.”
“There’s no place I’d rather be. Besides, business is up so we have to work harder.”
He ran through the roster of dogs with each one’s status, and I realized how much he’d learned over the last year.
“I was going to wait for our off-site meeting to make the announcement, but I’ve changed my mind. I’m promoting you to Assistant Manager and giving you a raise.”
“How much?”
We discussed numbers and came up with a salary I could manage now that things were better. “Zoe from the feed store will be here in the summer. You can supervise her, and we’re going to have to follow HR guidelines because I want us to set good examples. So no smoking, drinking, and dirty talking on the job. I want to hire another full-timer so we can have flexibility and take actual vacation days.” I took a breath and said, “Kenzie’s moving in with her boyfriend, so she won’t be around to help.”
“No shit! His gain, our loss. Do you think she’ll ever start her sessions again? Because if not, could I move into one of those trailers?”
“Kenzie’s handing over management of the ranch to me, so, yes, you can have a trailer. No rent, but you have to maintain it and kick in to cover electricity. I’d really like it if you were close-by. Not that I need you to babysit me.”
“Course not. You’re a grown woman, but it would be convenient for the both of us. I could help with other chores.” Jaison picked up a stick and threw it for the dogs. “Boss, you seem a little...more off than usual.”
“There are things I wish I could tell you. Are you sure you’re not magical yet?”
“There’s a steep learning curve. It might take another fifty years for me to get all grizzled and reach peak magicality.”
We stood there as the sun glowed higher in the gray sky, the dogs playing around us, the green mountains framing our little piece of the world.
“I don’t want to be a fake psychic anymore,” I said. “I don’t like tricking people even if I am helping them with their dogs. I hate keeping the truth a secret.”
He considered for a minute, comfortable with silence, before saying, “You know, people say you’re only as sick as your secrets, but I call bullshit on that. We all have secrets and our private lives are not public property. Beside, you keep a secret long enough and it’s entirely irrelevant.”
I thought of how daylight obscured the stars and planets and how it made no difference to us. “Long enough in human time or geologic time?”
“Both.”
* * * *
I BEGAN ANSWERING PHONE calls and telling people, “I’m no longer conducting psychic readings, but I’m happy to meet with you in my capacity as a canine communicator and rehabilitator.”
I’d finished advising a client on his Schnauzer’s separation anxiety when Sasha Seabrook called to tell me that her manager had approved a weekly segment. “Only ten-minutes dealing with behavioral problems. Because animal features go through the roof.”
“Well...”
“Of course, you’d be paid and get a SAG card.”
“I’m suddenly very interested. I’ve retired from psychic readings though.”
“But that’s your hook!”
“You can think of another one. Let your imagination run amok.”
She laughed. “Stay weird, Maddie.”
“What?”
“I’m from Austin. It’s our motto.”
“Oh. But you’re not weird, Sasha.”
“Only on my carefully cultivated surface, Dr. Whitney.” She laughed. “Okay, I am normal. My livelihood depends on it, just like yours depends on you to be fearless.”
“I’m so not fearless.”
“Try to convince me of that the next time a snarling dog charges you. Talk to you soon!”
* * * *
I HAD TO TAKE A BREAK from things and hide in my room. I looked through a notebook where I kept a list of all my favorite shows and all the series and movies I wanted to watch. I was thinking of Doctor Who: The Empty Child because of the ending. I wished that no one would die today.
There was a rap on my door. “Come in.”
“It’s me, Heather.” Dawg’s widow stood in the doorway holding a large satchel with Gizmo. Her face was pale and vulnerable without her usual makeup. “Your sister let me in.”
“I’m so sorry, Heather.”
Her eyes welled. “He was a fool to go on the mountain, but I loved him, because of his foolish dreams. He thought I didn’t know he sold joints to make twenty bucks here or there for the casino and his next big win. He loved taking chances. Who else would gamble against land mines to save a dog?” Her smile was brief. “Well, you would.”
“I know he loved you,” I said. “One of the last things he said to me was that no other woman could compare to ‘my girl.’ That’s what he called you. Is there anything I can do for you?”
“You already have, telling me that.” She held out the satchel. “He keeps looking for Dawg. He won’t eat and he wanders around the house, and I can’t tell him Dawg’s never coming back. Dawg told me, if anything ever happened to him, you should be the one...Explain to him that Dawg’s somewhere better. Can you?”
I took the satchel and the small blind dog snuffed my scent. His pink tongue flicked out and licked my hand. “Would you like me to keep him for you? For Dawg?”
She nodded, and I said, “Thank you for trusting me with him. The pack will heal him.”
She nodded. “I’m sorry if I’ve ever treated you like...”
“Like I’m weird?”
“Yes.”
“It’s okay. I’m finally coming to terms with it.”
“Dawg liked that about you. He always said you danced to your own tune,” she said. “There’s something I wanted to mention. You went out with Claire, and you and Oliver are ‘friends’ now, aren’t you?”
“If you mean...”
“Let me give you a tip. I was head-over-heels for him, but he never felt the same way about me. The rest of us are seeking our soul mate, our missing half, but Oliver and Claire don’t have that need for someone to fulfill them. Oliver’s sister will always be his most important relationship. It’s that way for twins.”
Like me and Kenzie, I thought, but I knew it wasn’t the same.
“Everyone thinks I married Dawg for the money, but I crazy for him and his dreams and the way he treated me like I was his biggest win of all. Oh, Dawg.” Tears ran down Heather’s face and she sniffed. She reached out to pat Gizmo. “Bye, Gizmo. He loved you so much.”
* * * *
“LIVE IN THE NOW.” I walked with Gizmo by my side, his steps tentative as we went through my center’s entrance.
“What are you telling Gizmo?” Jaison called from where he was sitting on the deck.
“It’s what he’s telling me. Live in the now. He’s our newest resident. Dawg wanted me... He asked...” But I couldn’t finish the sentence.
The other dogs came forward and Gizmo stood straighter, making himself as big as he could. Ghost, who generally kept to herself, approached him, sniffed and presented her bottom for his inspection. Dawg’s mutt seemed to approve. I watched the animals for several minutes, alert for any problems, but Gizmo, like Bertie, had excellent social skills.
Even though I desperately wanted to pick up and cradle the little dog, I held back, letting him stumble, letting him teach the Things not to jump on him, letting him live in the now with all its sensations, letting him heal. It might take days and it might take weeks, but I knew that he’d feel joy again because that was the great gift of dogs, their ability to live in the now.
Jaison came to me and took my hand, his strong bony fingers twining with mine, squeezing tight, and not saying a word. I tried not to think. Not to think about Sherry Rae, Rafe, Dawg, my brother. Not to think about Kenzie moving away. Not to think about my own role in sorrow and tragedy.
We saw Oliver’s patrol car approaching. Jaison said, “Here comes your boyfriend.”
“He’s not my boyfriend. We don’t have a physical relationship.”
“You look at him like he’s a wallet full of twenties someone left on the coffee shop counter.”
“No, I don’t.”
“Boss, the only thing you’re subtle at is correcting a dog while in motion, and you’re an ace at that. Go on and grab the wallet.”
“No way. I already had an awful experience with him. Once bitten, twice shy.”
“Says the most bitten woman in the state. So you two already...?”
“Why are you encouraging me to put the moves on a cop?”
“Because I don’t reduce people to stereotypes.” Jaison let go of my hand and made himself scarce.
I watched as Ollie got out of the car, wearing his usual khakis with a blue button-down shirt, waiting to see if he would enter the gate properly. He was too full of attitude for a moment, and the dogs instantly noticed, but then Oliver relaxed and they backed off, except for Zeus, who sat obediently until Oliver acknowledged and pet him.
“You aren’t a bad student, Oliver Desjardins.”
“Please write a letter to that effect to my high school history teacher who called me ‘lackadaisical.’ I think it means ‘insufficient daisies.’ How are you—”
“I’ve come to realize that most of the conversations throughout my life begin with people asking how I am. Not as a common greeting, like ‘How are you?’ but more as an actual question. Usually I say I’m fine, but the truth is that I feel pretty fucked up.”
“Well, that is in your wheelhouse.”
“You’re a ray of sunshine in khaki. Honestly, Ollie, why don’t you wear jeans like a normal human being?” I said, smiling.
He smiled back, looking like he did in that childhood photo with his twin. “Normal men wear jeans. Extraordinary ones wear khaki.”
“That is the most ridiculous thing I’ve heard today,” I said. “Heather came here and brought Gizmo. She thinks Dawg was dealing small time for party money. How many secrets do you keep about peoples’ dark sides, Olly? How can you stand it—because knowing what I know is a burden. Being kind to Dawg’s family means that Sherry Rae’s family won’t ever know who killed her and why. They’ll never have an answer to that miserable question.”
“Since her killer is likely dead, I’m going to weigh the lives of the O’Donnell children over adults wanting answers that won’t bring back their loved one.”
“And if Sherry Rae had children?”
“Like Jeanne Gallego, I don’t deal in hypotheticals. Answers don’t automatically bring comfort because loss is still loss and damage is still damage,” he said. “My system of misery management isn’t perfect, but in the big picture, it’s all irrelevant.”
“Stop trying to cheer me up. Is there a reason you came here?”
“Do I have to have a reason to visit my dog?” he said. “We’re invited to ride on a float at the Bonanza parade, which means I can’t have my Bearcat Personnel Carrier float.”
“We who?”
“The Midnight Runners. Ben’s invited, and you can ask Franklin and Jaison.”
“Olly, when are you going to take Zeus to live with you?”
The dog’s large ears perked at his name, and Oliver said, “He’s happier with the pack, but I can keep him a few nights a week, I guess, and I’ll continue to pay to board him.”
“Of course you will and since you’re here, let’s set up the auto payment now.”
“Don’t you trust me?”
I raised my eyes to his. “You know I do.”
He nodded and said, “Here’s something else for you.” He took an envelope from his pocket. “I requested that Bertie be officially released from his army handler to your care as our county’s official SAR trainer. It’s as good as done.”
I snatched the envelope and read the letter inside, and then I flung myself at Oliver and said, “Thank you! Thank you!”
In a voice that was honey and gravel, he said, “Careful, Maddie. People might get the wrong idea.”
Confused, I pulled back, and read the request over again. “This is dated just after we found Eileen. Why the fuck didn’t you tell me?”
“Because I’m not an idiot. It gave you an incentive to continue training with someone you hated.”
“I wouldn’t have dropped training.”
“Yes, you would have.”
“Okay, yes, I would have, but I didn’t think you were willing to learn.”
“I didn’t think you could actually teach me anything. Maybe I wanted you to fail.”
“Didn’t I tell you to stop trying to cheer me up?”
* * * *
THE FIRE WAS SOON EXTINGUISHED, but the smoke lingered for days, never letting me pass an hour without reminding me of what had happened. In town, everyone was preparing for the annual Bonanza Days celebration. Banners were hung from lamp posts and tables, chairs, and sawhorses were piled in parking lots. Bertie stopped to pee on every sawhorse, and I told Gizmo, “He thinks the entire town belongs to him.” The little dog’s tail wagged against the pouch.
A crew unloaded a van at the bungalow beside the veterinary clinic. Ava Meadows came out of the bungalow and waved me over.
“Welcome to Doc Pete’s crash pad,” I said.
Her white shirt and jeans were dusty. “It’s going to be a tight fit, but I think we can manage. I’ll keep everything in boxes in case a decent rental comes up.”
“I’ll tell you if I hear of any place. Come and visit whenever you like. My pond is drying up, but the kids can splash in the creek.”
Gaskell’s Feed Store was packed with customers making last minute purchases of gear and accessories. I picked out a royal blue collar for Bertie. Travis Gaskell, Zoe’s dad, said, “It’s on the house, Maddie. Bertie deserves it.”
“Thanks, and, Travis, thanks for being patient with our bills before.”
“It’s a small town, Maddie. We have to look out for each other when things are tough. I’m glad business is better for you. Zoe can’t wait to start training dogs.”
“I’ll be glad to have her at my center. I know she’s a hard worker and there’s no one more energetic.”
I went out to the sidewalk, and the hardware store delivery van swerved to the curb.
Hardwire leaned out the window. “Hi, Maddie. Jaison said you might be hiring. I’ve been cut back to 15 hours and need a second shift.”
“How are you with animals?”
“Better than I am with people. I mean women. I get along with dudes fine but women are a fucking mystery.”
“Hardwire, it’s so not a mystery that a girl doesn’t want to be scared and insulted by a knucklehead flying by at a hundred miles an hour. How’d you feel if someone driving by called your mother a bitch?”
“I’d kick his fucking ass.”
“Here’s some news: it’s already happened. It’s happened to her and every woman you know, and it’s been done by Neanderthals like you who resent a woman’s autonomy. You wouldn’t have done it to me if you thought I was capable of retaliating, so it’s cowardly bullying behavior. Stop being a retrograde sphincter and tell your friends to stop being retrograde sphincters. On the non-sphincter front, Ben Meadows, New Doc, is looking for a front-of-office position at the vet clinic and I need is someone to build additional kennels.”
“Maddie, I’m glad I didn’t understand half the words you used, or my feelings would be hurt.” He grinned and I laughed. “Okay, I’m going to give serious thought to what you said. Second, do you mean Dawg’s old job? Think I’ll pass, but I’m your man for the kennels. My uncle’s a licensed contractor, and I grew up working with him.”
“Let’s talk next week. You can let me take your Raptor for a spin.”
Hardwire made a face. “Might have to give her up if I can’t make payments. I thought money would be coming in, but everyone’s freaking out after those earthquake swarms in Oklahoma...well, don’t count your chickens until they’re fracked, right? Later!” His eyes glanced off to the side before he drove away.
I reached down for Bertie, but he wasn’t there. I turned and saw him beside Claire, who stood in the shadow of the feed store awning. She wore a creamy vintage lace shirt that was too small in the right ways, jean cut-offs, and flip-flops. Her hair was pulled back loosely so that strands drifted around her face.
“Hi, Maddie.”
“Hi, Claire.”
“I was on my way to the Versailles. Why were you talking to Hardwire? I thought you hated him.”
“He’s going to do some work for me. He’s a nice guy once you get past the young man nonsense.”
“Oh. I was just surprised,” she said. “I’ve been thinking of you after the fire. Olly told me what happened.”
I couldn’t tell if she meant the truth or the official story. “Thank you for your concern.”
“That’s one of your phrases.”
“I mean them more now.”
“I’m glad you and Olly are getting along. It means a lot to me.”
I took in her wide, sensual lips, the curve of her shoulders, her long smooth legs, smudged with paint like wildflowers in a field. “How’s your painting?”
“Good. I’m working on a series about the illusion of vision.”
“Nothing is what we think it is.” I lifted my gaze to her green-gold eyes. “But I look at you and see the most beautiful woman in the world, and nothing will ever convince me otherwise.”
“It’s your delusion, Mad Girl, but I appreciate it.”
I waited for her to say something else, but when she didn’t. “Well, I better be going,” which was another of my phrases, and I walked away with my dogs, each of us learning to live apart from someone we loved.
* * * *
I WAS LISTED AS A GUEST performer on the poster for the shelter’s karaoke night, and Georgie said, “You’re the big draw, since you’re a famous animal psychic.”
“Communicator. I have put away my crystal ball, and I don’t think five-minute spots on a local station make me famous.”
Sasha Seabrook sat beside one of the kitten wranglers, touching up her lipstick in a pocket mirror. “Maddie’s too cynical. If you’re not famous yet, you will be when I feature you with a roomful of kittens. Is Bertie good with cats? Because kittens playing all over the hero dog is guaranteed ratings gold.”
“To the best of my knowledge, he’s never eaten a kitten, but there’s always a first time.”
“Maddie!” Georgie said.
“What? I didn’t say he was likely to eat a kitten.”
“You’re up.”
I wove through the tables and hopped on the stage. “Give me a sec,” I said. “I’m overwhelmed by the choices.” I heard scattered laughter and looked up, but it was difficult to see faces behind the glare of the bright stage light. When I squinted, I was able to distinguish the color I always sought, the red-gold hair of Claire’s long hair, loose over her shoulder.
“Who else loves Rudy’s Brewhouse?” I asked, and the crowd hooted. As I sang, “I love this bar,” I looked at the faces, some familiar and some just passing through, and grinned. When I finished, I waved to Claire and returned to my table.
Knowing she was there and not looking was difficult, especially when Georgie said, “Aren’t you going to speak to Claire?”
“I’ve been told off and no jumping enough.”
Sasha asked, “Who’s she?”
“The sheriff’s sister.” I peeked around and Claire was gone.
“The buff sheriff? Is he single?”
“No,” Georgie said, and I said, “Yes. Are you going to sing, Sasha?”
“Prepare to be amazed,” she said. “I studied musical theater before I became a serious journalist.” She winked at me and took the next turn onstage. She had a sweet soprano voice and made dramatic arm gestures while she belted out, “The Right Kind of Wrong,” and cast intense looks at a table of crusty old codgers.
I leaned to Georgie and whispered, “The Brewhouse, once again the romantic hotspot of Coyote Run,” and she laughed so hard beer went up her nose, which made Angus laugh until his eyes watered.
I stayed for several more songs before calling it a night and heading to my truck. Claire had let down the tailgate and was sitting on it, swinging her legs.
“You took your damn sweet time.”
“I didn’t know you were waiting.”
I moved closer to stand at her knees. I wanted to say so many things that I couldn’t think of where to start, so I just gazed at her lovely face.
“You’ve changed, Madeline. Not changed...grown.” She reached out, clutched my arm, and drew me close. “You’re not hiding in your room, or behind your sister, or with your dogs all the time.”
“Maybe, but I’m still happiest by myself, or with my dogs, or with Kenzie. That’s never going to change. Everything else is an effort that I can only sustain for a limited period.”
“Come home with me tonight.” She pulled me between her legs and raised her face, illuminated by the street lights.
I hesitated because I wanted her so much and I remembered the feel of her supple body wrapped around mine. She was still the ideal, still luminous marvelous Claire, and the rest of the world was Not Claire, but that didn’t make me feel so desperate anymore.
I stepped back, out of her reach. “I have a Rottweiler named Heidi. Her owners paid a fortune for a purebred pup because they thought they wanted a Rottweiler. They’d researched breeds, analyzed their lifestyle, and that was their calculation. The owners are perfectly nice people, but it was a mismatch that made the Rottie unbalanced and them miserable. Away from them, the Rottie can be more than just a source of destruction and frustration: she can be fantastic on her own terms,” I said. “There’s nothing I want more than to be the right girl for you, Claire. But I’m not and never will be.”
“Perhaps you’re right.” She hopped off the tailgate and slammed it closed. “See you in my dreams, Madeline Margaret.”
I watched her walk away, resisting the urge to chase after her. It wasn’t until I reached to close the tailgate that I saw the rectangular package she’d left. I tore off brown paper wrapping and found a painting. Using the light from my phone, I read the inscription on the back: To my mad muse.