The Rescue

30

Joe got himself from Chula Vista to La Jolla the same way any dog would — through a series of miracles that God only performs for the innocent and the pure of heart.

Along the way he ate fairly well, raiding garbage cans and pilfering from pet bowls left outside. He had especially good luck at those food places with the yellow arches, following his instincts and nose to the rear kitchen doors, into the kindness of the employees taking out trash, rinsing mop buckets, breaking down boxes for the dumpster.

He drank from streams and flood control channels, ponds and fountains, sprinklers, gutters and leaking hoses, swimming pools and drive-through car washes.

He mated three times in his first five days, all with beautiful females that would remain emblazoned on his memory forever and he would like to mate with again.

He slept in parks and yards, under freeways with tattered human beings and their fragrant belongings, in the median shrubbery of drive-throughs, where he fell asleep to the sound of idling engines and music and orders being placed.

The hardest part was taking long detours to avoid the cars that roared at him from all directions, while he tried to remain on course. At least what he thought was on course. Those cars could come at you so fast you didn’t have time to think, just Go! Sometimes he’d focus on one car, while another car came charging up behind him like a wild monster. Some were almost silent.

He hated the screeching brakes, but something told him it was good, that he was still okay and on his way to Teddy.

Three people tried to get him by his collar, but Joe skittered away on his dainty feet, and disappeared as fast as he could. One evening before sunset, three coyotes trailed him across a soft grass meadow with ponds and people with sticks hitting small pale balls, and one of the men chased away the coyotes in a small car.

Progress was very slow. Sometimes he’d have to go far out of his way to get on the other side of a freeway or a crowded city. Sometimes he’d go backward, then way around, just to get a little bit farther ahead. It felt safest to travel at night. He had to find places to hide and sleep during the day, and the hunt for food and water was constant and time consuming.

But somehow, Joe knew what to do. How to survive and how to get where he was going. It was like he’d done this before, or maybe had dreamed it, or maybe his mother had taught him, though he couldn’t remember that ever happening. Maybe the father he’d never met was good at these kinds of things. Or his father’s father. Somehow, navigation and street survival had gotten into his mongrel blood.

On his sixth day of travel through the most crowded half of the most populous state in the republic, Joe found himself on the shoulder of La Jolla Boulevard. The cars thundered past him and the gravel was salted with broken glass. He’d gone long without water, and this morning’s raided trash cans had given little but chicken bones, carrot peels, and lettuce.

But as he lay in the shoulder dirt, his nose to the air, Joe was reminded of where the policeman put him and Teddy into his car and took them back to Art and Nancy’s big house on the hill. The more he looked around, the more sure he became that this was the place. Joe’s inner navigator told him he was close to that house now. It was higher up in the sky, right under the cloudy sun.

It took him just a few minutes and a few steep side streets to find his big house with Teddy. Sitting on the sidewalk, Joe looked up at it, remembering Art and Nancy and the children. Remembered Wade coming here, and the serious meeting. And going with Teddy for sandwiches in town and how sad his Boy was because Dad and Mom had left them. Then walking all the way to the freeway where the policeman put them in his car.

Joe walked the fence line past the garage to the backyard. It was a tall black fence with pointed spears, impossible to climb. He could see through it to the grass and the pond where the children used to scream and play. The old smells flooded back to him — the grass with Teddy, the strong water in the pond, even the salty odor of the beach, which was not far away. He dug hard to get under the fence but hit concrete.

He followed the spears to the front gate, which people opened by pushing a small black box on a brick stand. Raised his nose toward the house and let the river of scent wash into him, smelling for Teddy.

No Teddy.

Then, just a hint of him....

Joe stood on his back legs and put his paws to the bricks, and found him, finally, his Boy, Teddy, right there on the black box with the numbers on it!

Art was there too. And others, and Nancy, the strongest scent of all, like Mom smelled before she and Dad left him.

The front door opened and Nancy stepped onto the porch and turned to lock the door. She wore her big white padded shoes and pink sweats and a small pouch around her waist, like he remembered.

Joe whimpered and yipped and wagged his long saber tail, his happiness breaking inside him like a warm wave.

Nancy looked at him, then came over. She never touched Joe and she didn’t touch him now.

“Joe, how did you get here? After four years! I can’t take you in again. I don’t want to put Teddy through losing you again after so long. I know you don’t understand.”

Joe looked up into her sad face. Then Nancy hurried back inside. Joe heard the dead bolt clank. Was she going to get Teddy?

He knew that Nancy would come out soon, but she didn’t. He lay down on the warm bricks and waited, wondering if Teddy was inside or if he’d gone off to school with the other children like he usually did.

He didn’t understand why Nancy didn’t come out. What was she doing? What was she waiting for? He felt sad, and like something bad was going to happen, but he didn’t know what or why.

All he could do was wait.

Half an hour later, Aaron parked his truck along the curb and got out.

“Joe! Joe, come!”

He had the leash in one fist and he was not happy.

The drive to Chula Vista was almost silent. Aaron’s anger came off him in noiseless waves and Joe could smell his sour bad temper. Joe felt punished by the silence and believed that once again he had failed to do the things that would make Aaron happy. He’d never done any of those things, except for Find Drugs and Find Money. And even those didn’t make Aaron really happy. They were not enough. Aaron wanted more. So Joe wanted more.

Aaron touched some buttons on his dashboard display and Joe heard the funny sound, then a voice.

A Woman talking with words Joe didn’t recognize:

“You have reached Apex Self-Defense. If this is an emergency, please call 911. No one is available at this time. Please leave...”

Joe yawned and closed his drowsy eyes.

“I’m returning Dan’s call about a dog,” Aaron said, though Joe only understood Dog.

Joe would have asked Aaron for water but had no way of doing that. So many things a Man or a Boy needs to do without being asked, Joe thought. If he wants a Dog. Like Teddy. Like Wade.

He felt the road bumping under him, wondered why Nancy hadn’t told Teddy that he, Joe, had come home.

Back to work, he thought.

Find Drugs. Find Money.