Be careful what you wish for. A boy and his friends wanted more. More adventure, more excitement, more interesting moments and events in their lives. After trespassing on a local business mogul's farm, Jesse and his friends, Kate, Brad, John, and La...
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Jesse's punishment was the usual; the rest of the weekend spent at home, no television, no Internet, no first-person shooters of any kind. He would spend the next two days mowing the yard, pulling weeds, folding clothes and getting the cold shoulder from his mother. It was a technique she developed to a science over the years since his dad died and it proved particularly effective against her eldest son.
No matter how amazing or how terrifying the morning's events had proven to be, there was no amount of half-seen shadow or half-crazy old man that compared to how guilty Jesse's mother could make him feel.
Still, the morning's events stayed with the boy and he wondered, as they drifted farther into the past, how real could it have been?
Of course, he'd gone to the woods with his friends. But the rest of it? The trilling sound? The giant shape? I mean, come on, what could it have been? It had to have been a bull or something.
And the old man? Well, he was a crazy old man, and who could account for crazy old men? He sure seemed to know Bear, though. And Bear sure knew him. Bear knew that old man. Somehow, Bear, his dog, knew Fisher King.
Bear.
Where is he?
Jesse hadn't seen his dog since he had returned from the barn, and the old dog hadn't eaten. Bear never passed on a chance to eat. Ever.
"Bear?" Jesse walked through the kitchen, looking on all sides of the big island, and into the laundry room. He then went back out into the family room, checking all his dog's favorite haunts. He looked on the couch, just under the edge of the couch. That little spot just between the couch and the end-table, Bear had a thing for the couch.
"Bear?" He went upstairs and searched bathrooms (the old dog always got locked in the one up there), and bedrooms. He searched all the quiet or out-of-the-way places where Bear might be napping.
No dog.
Back downstairs, Jesse walked through the back door and into the backyard. His mother was there. She was struggling against the breeze and a batch of freshly laundered sheets she was trying to hang out to dry. The white sheets billow in the wind, a ship ready to sail.
"Mom, have you seen Bear?"
She peered around the edge of one of the sheets. "Aren't you supposed to be folding clothes?"
"I was, but Bear hasn't eaten and I wanted to make sure he wasn't locked outside or something."
She gave him a skeptical eye. "Well, I haven't seen him since this morning," she said, returning her attention to wrangling sheets. "He's probably stuck in the bathroom again."
The day had gone from hot to miserable to nearly unbearable. While the sky itself was cloudless, the smoky haze from the forest fires had drifted back over the area again. It gave everything a dirty brown tinge. In times like these, if the oily black dog was caught outside, he typically sought shelter under the deck. The deck Jesse was now standing on.
Like so many of the yards in this hilly neighborhood, Jesse's backyard dropped away from the rear of the house. It ended at a great old pear tree which, at this time of day, provided little shade for the rest of the yard. To provide a common area, this small wooden deck was built out from the back of the house. Even as Jesse spoke with his mom, he is already moving down the steps to check for his old friend under the deck.
The deck itself is barely three feet off the ground, and while it couldn't be called cool, it was at least away from the sun and, sure enough, there was the old dog. He lay on his side, panting.
"Bear?" At the sound of his boy's voice, Bear tried to stand. But something was wrong. Something was very wrong. He stumbled, fumbled and in the end fell gracelessly back onto his side.
"BEAR!" Jesse exploded in motion, fighting his way under the deck.
The dog was trying to get to his boy, but he couldn't get his legs to work right. They kept falling out from under him.
"Jesse?" His mother had just stepped from behind the billowing white sheets. She came out just in time to see her oldest son scrambling under the deck and her heart died in her chest.
"Jesse!"
She ran to him. She had lived in dread of this moment for the past year as she watched the brave dog succumb to age. It had been waiting for her in every corner of her home and just behind every minute of every day, and she knew in her heart that eventually it would come for her and her son. But not now. Please God, not now.
"Bear!" The old dog was still trying to stand. He was trying to go to his boy, to be with his friend. Jesse grabbed him around the chest and felt him go limp. Bear relaxed, he stopped struggling and allowed his boy to be his legs again, like when he was a pup.
Tears burned from Jesse's eyes and he dragged his dearest friend from under the porch. His eyes blurred as he felt his world falling apart. "Mom! Bear!" It is all he could think to scream. His mother grabbed him from behind and helped pull the old dog from under the deck.
Jesse fell backward into his mother's arms, pulling his oldest friend to him. "It's going to be okay, boy. It's going to be okay." He held the barely conscious dog tight. He stroked his graying head and tried to blink away this thing that he knew wasn't going to go away.
He tried not to hear his friend's ragged breathing; he tried to pretend he doesn't know what it means, tried to pretend that it meant nothing, tried to pretend that it didn't mean that his world was leaving him. He puts his face to Bear's, pushing his cheek into his dear friend's face. Stiff whiskers scrub against his skin. The old dog's ordinarily cold, wet nose was now dry and strangely without temperature.
"Oh, Bear. It's going to be okay." He choked on the words, insanely hoping that he could believe this thing away.
Bear's breathing was coming in gasps, and Jesse can no longer speak through his own great heaving sobs. His mother held her son and his best friend, squeezing the two as hard as she could, her own tears falling with his.
Bear licked at Jesse's tears, his tongue dry and rough, and he pushed his head into Jesse's. He then lays his head on Jesse's shoulder, filled his lungs one last time with his boy's scent, and stopped breathing.
