Chapter 7

By Carrie Jacobson

The story so far:

When James Dunning lost his job, it meant losing his home and his dog, Zoe, too. He and his wife had to move in with her mother, who’s allergic to dogs. James took Zoe – who is old and mostly blind – to the shelter in Shohola, Pa., and left her there, in the night. He was too sad and humiliated to do otherwise.

Kaja, a big red dog who’s been on her own for a while, found Zoe and freed her. They are tracking through the woods, heading toward the Delaware, to try to find James.

Ashton and Samantha Morrone are pretty well disgusted with summer so far. It’s great to be out of school, that’s for sure. But it’s rained pretty much every day. Rain and rain and rain and more rain. And their mom doesn’t really want them out in the rain. For starters, she doesn’t want them tracking rain and mud all through the inn.

The second thing, the thing they don’t know, is that she really doesn’t trust the river any more.

The Morrones bought this place, the Tow Path Inn in Barryville, in 2001. Pete thought it was a good idea. He would cut back on his work at the law firm in Goshen, the kids would get to grow up by the river, and he and Angie would do what they’d always wanted: Run an inn.

They’d be busy in the summer, and probably in the fall, too, but they’d take it easy in the winters, and probably close down for a month or so and take a vacation. Go to Italy or Spain, some place warm and exotic, take the kids out of school and give them whatever lessons they’d need. It would be great!

Angie leans on the edge of the kitchen sink, and watches the raindrops hit the river, and remembers Pete’s face when he’d come up with the idea. He’d looked like a kid. He’d looked like he’d looked when he was 12, and he’d come over from next door to show her a bird’s nest or a snakeskin or a glittering rock. Looked like he’d looked when he’d gotten into Brown, and when she’d gotten into Brown. Looked like he’d looked when she said of course she would marry him.

And now he’s gone, and has been gone for three years, and she’s left with the inn, the kids, the insurance money, and a life’s worth of memories. She rubs her eyes and empties her coffee cup and talks to him, silently. She only talks aloud to him these days when the kids are asleep or she’s alone in the car. There are almost always guests at the inn, and the kids are getting old enough now to remember. She doesn’t want them looking back and remembering her as a crazy mother who spent her days talking out loud to her dead husband.

She steps out on the deck and peers down toward the river. The kids are still in the screen house. She can see the tops of their heads, and can hear their voices going up and down. She can’t hear what they’re saying, but they’re talking and laughing about something, and she thinks that’s all she needs to know.

It’s not.

Ashton, who’s 7, and Samantha, 9, are plotting. They’ve started building a fort, at the very edge of the Delaware. It’s anchored in a thicket of fallen trees there, trees that the most recent flood wove together. It’s hidden from the inn now by vines and leaves, and so Angie doesn’t know about it.

Ashton and Sam have built a sort of raft of twigs and branches, balanced on the fallen trees’ larger limbs. They’ve put some walls up, too, but these are just to hide their fort-raft from prying adult eyes.

Now, in the screen house, they’re plotting. The fort is great as a fort. But it needs a place where they can cook, a fire ring or a grill or something. And it needs some places where they can sit. And it also needs some short walls, sort of edges, so that when they take it out on the river, their stuff won’t fall off.

Sam is making drawings and planning. She’s being pretty bossy, but for once, Ashton doesn’t mind. It’s a great plan, a fort that’s also a raft, and it was all her idea. He can hardly wait to finish it and try it out.

Carrie can be reached at carrie@zestoforange.com

Chapter 6

By Carrie Jacobson

The story so far: James Dunning worked at the Record for more than 20 years before his job was eliminated. He and his wife had to leave their home and James had to take their little, blind lhasa apso to a shelter. He tied Zoe to the gate of the Pike County Humane Society in Shohola. In the night, a big red dog named Kaja came along and untied Zoe. The two have set out to find Zoe’s home.

Kaja and Zoe have reached the end of the road. Now, there is only woods.

Kaja leads the way into the underbrush. The soil beneath their paws is sandy and soft, with layers of leaves and pine needles to cushion their steps. It’s quiet, too, and shady, and cool, even though the day has grown warm.

They’re heading for the river, and it’s a route that Kaja knows. But she’s never traveled it with another dog, and never thought about leading one who is blind and old and small. The little dog wants to find her human, though, and all that Kaja knows now is that he is on the other side of the river.

Zoe has no idea of rivers or of roads. She knows about houses and humans and cities, but she doesn’t know about the woods. She knows that James and she had driven over water, but she doesn’t know what that means.

Kaja knows what it means. She knows about the river. She knows that sometimes, she can go in the water and get cool, and that at other times, the river is too high and too fast and too dangerous.

She knows that in the winter, she can sometimes walk on the river, at least on its edges. And she knows that in the summer, there are lots of people on the river, in boats, and swimming and fishing. People mean danger, she knows that, too. They will have to be careful.

But first, they have to get there. They scramble through the brush, and into the deeper woods. Kaja sniffs the air, focusing on the scent of the water, walking so the scent gets stronger and stronger.

They scramble down a small hill and Kaja sniffs the air and stops. There’s something ahead. She can smell it and she can hear it. She and Zoe drop down, bellies on the ground, and Kaja sniffs the air again.

Then, in a clearing, she sees a mother deer and two spotted babies. They’re eating ferns, and the mother is pulling berries off a bush in a splash of sunlight. The babies buck a little then and one snorts, and they prance around the mother deer –

And then she freezes. The babies freeze, too. They stand absolutely still, stiller than the trees and the branches and the bushes. In the sun and the shadows of the woods, it’s almost impossible to see them. The mother tenses, her eyes wide, turning in her head, and then she gives some sign and the three of them explode into action, leaping up a hill and vanishing, just like that, into the woods.

An instant later, a coyote angles into the clearing. He is smaller than Kaja, but he looks taut and tough and mean. She trembles. She hears Zoe sniff the breeze beside her, and before she can do anything, Zoe starts a soft, small growling, deep in her throat.

The coyote’s eyes turn toward them. He drops his head and curves his body and sinks into his legs.

Kaja watches. Zoe growls again, and Kaja knows the coyote knows the little dog is there. She’s not so sure he knows she’s there, though, and so she gathers her feet under her, and just when he’s ready to spring at Zoe, Kaja leaps from the underbrush, with a wild, raw growling bark, and lunges toward him.

There’s a moment when he thinks about attacking. She can see it in his yellow eyes. She can smell his raw breath and the oily stink of his coat and she can see that one of his teeth is broken. She gathers her courage and her strength and she bounds right at him, and she is ready to bite him and rip at him if she has to, to save herself and Little Zoe, but he sees her, a giant, wild, red, snarling beast and he sees his defeat, and he turns and runs away into the woods.

Carrie can be reached at carrie@zestoforange.com

Chapter 5

The story so far:

James Dunning worked for the Record for more than 20 years. When his job was eliminated, he and his wife were forced to move in with her mother, who is allergic to dogs. James had no choice but to leave his mostly blind lhasa apso, Zoe, at the pound. He brought Zoe there before dawn and tied her to the entry gate. As the sun began to come up, a strange dog approached and freed Zoe from her leash. The two have set off toward adventures.

By Carrie Jacobson

Zoe. Original oil painting by Carrie Jacobson

The big dog starts down the road. Zoe can hear the dogs in the pound barking and baying and whining, and something in her wants to bring all of them along. But the big  dog – her name is Kaja – knows that it would be too hard.

The road here is mostly dirt, with bushes along the edges, and deep green woods beyond. In the thin morning light, the two trot slowly down the middle of the road. Zoe sniffs the air. There are new smells – animals, a muddy river – and the scents of pine and dirt and the woods, scents she knows.

She follows the big dog mostly by scent. The dog has an unusual smell, and it is enough for Zoe. She doesn’t need to see well, as long as she can smell the big dog. They walk along, and the day grows warmer and brighter, and then, the big dog stops.

She listens hard, and then nudges Zoe toward the side of the road. They walk into the bushes along the edge of the road. The ground is wet and cool beneath their feet, and the shadows swallow them.

In a moment, a car goes by. The big dog waits until it’s gone, and its sound is far away, and nudges Zoe up and into the road again.

This time, they only get about half as far before Kaja cocks her head and turns toward the bushes.

The next time, they don’t even cover half that distance.

Dawn is turning into day, and if they want to remain unseen, they’ll have to take to the woods. Kaja knows what will happen if someone sees them.

Deep in her heart, deep in her memory, she has a sense of her mother and her littermates. It’s like a shadow, like the scent of a room just after someone has left. It’s  something she can reach for but not grasp.

What she does remember is the pound. She remembers the cold floor, that it was always wet. She remembers curling in a heap with her brothers and her sisters, licking their faces and their ears, and playing. Milky smells, and soft warmth, and sharp teeth, she remembers all this. And she remembers being picked up, again and again and again, and then, one day, being torn from everyone she knows, and brought to a family’s home.

At first, it was good. It was great. She had a soft bed and the people paid attention to her, all the time. But one day, everything changed. The mother and father fought, all the time. They yelled and threw things at each other. They broke things against the walls. They paid no attention to her or to their children, and those children made Kaja’s life horrible. They yelled and threw things at her. They pulled her hair.

And so she left. It was the only home she’d ever known, the only home she could remember, but all she wanted was to leave. Somewhere, deep in her soul, she knew that humans could be kind. Humans could treasure her and love her. But not these humans.

So one night, they let her out to pee and she took off. She trotted into the shadows at the back of the yard and she kept going.

Humans drive in cars, she knows. And that means the two of them will have to cut through the woods. Kaja knows that there are creatures in the woods, creatures who could harm Zoe, but they have no choice. Kaja nuzzles the smaller dog and learns her scent, and in one moment, she feels the flash of memory – soft warmth, sharp teeth – and knows she will protect this little dog, no matter what.

Carrie can be reached at carrie@zestoforange.com

In June's warm dusks, thousands of fireflies light our back field every night. Oil on stretched canvas, 8x10. For more paintings, or for purchase information, see carriejacobson.blogspot.com

Paintings by Carrie Jacobson

The story to this point:

James Dunning worked for the Record for more than 20 years. When his job was eliminated, he and his wife were forced to move in with her mother, who is allergic to dogs. James had no choice but to leave his mostly blind lhasa apso, Zoe, at the pound. He didn’t have the heart to do it in the daytime, so he brought Zoe there before dawn and tied her to the entry gate. As the sun began to come up, a strange dog approached.

By Carrie Jacobson

Zoe looks into the eyes of the big red dog, and knows she is going to be saved. The dog comes up and sniffs her, and Zoe sniffs back. She smells dirt and pine, the scent of rain, and the river, and the pavement of a road. She smells humans and other dogs, and she smells food on the breath of this red dog and in her coat, and in that instant, Zoe realizes how hungry she is, and how thirsty.

The big dog is sniffing at something Zoe hasn’t noticed until now, something she can barely see, as it’s more than a foot from her nose. She gets up from her bed and walks as far as the leash allows. Now she can see. It’s a plastic box, and she can smell James’s scent on it.

The smell makes her heart ache, and beat faster, too. That smell, she loves that smell! It means he’s here, he’s coming – and then she remembers, and her tail drops, and she begins to wonder what the big dog is doing.

Then, in a flash, the big dog has pulled the lid off the box, and torn into the bag inside. With her paw, she turns the box on its side, and food spills out. The big dog eats hungrily, wagging her tail, and when she’s had enough, she moves aside. Zoe knows it’s her own food, and she eats until her belly is full.

Then the big dog goes to work on Zoe’s leash. She starts gnawing and pulling, biting and chewing, and soon enough, the leather has broken and Zoe is free.

There’s a noise of a car, then, and suddenly, the sun is up, the day is light, and the dogs inside the shelter begin to bark.

You can stay here, the big dog tells her, and go into the shelter, or you can come with me.

Zoe remembers the shelter. Not this one, but another one, far from here, long ago. She remembers how cold the floor was, and how, no matter what she did, she could never get away from that cold. She remembers the smells of the other dogs, dogs who were in the shelter with her, dogs who had been there before her, weeks before or years before… She remembers how those smells got into her nose, and onto her fur and into her very mouth, it seemed. And she remembers the noise, the constant, endless barking of the other dogs.

All she can really see is that this dog is big, and red and strong. But she can smell truth, and honesty and power. And so, she rubs her head against the big dog’s side, and when the big dog bends her head, Zoe licks her ear. She breathes deep, memorizes the big dog’s scent and follows her up the road.

Carrie can be reached at carrie@zestoforange.com

The story so far:

James Dunning worked for the Record for more than 20 years. When his job was eliminated, he and his wife were forced to move in with her mother, who is allergic to dogs. James had no choice but to leave his mostly blind lhasa apso, Zoe, at the shelter. He didn’t have the heart to do it in the daytime, so he brought Zoe there before dawn and tied her to the entry gate.

By Carrie Jacobson

Zoe listens as the car pulls away. She knows the sound, she’s heard it all her life. But usually, she’s inside when the car leaves. Now, she’s outside, but she’s in her little bed, and she has her leash and collar on, and so she curls up and falls asleep.

The night grows cold around her, and the chill awakens her. She hears noises she doesn’t know. A bird calls. Tree frogs make their noises. Something rustles in the bushes and Zoe is up now, and growling.

She’s been nearly blind for so long that she doesn’t even think about it any more. Day and night look pretty much the same. She can see big shapes, and she can see movement, and she can usually tell light spaces from dark ones. In these years, though, her hearing has sharpened, and her sense of smell has become acute, and now, she knows, there’s something out there.

She growls again, a low, throaty, vicious growl. Her chest swells and her muscles tighten. But what can she do, really, if something happens? She’s a blind 12-pound dog tied to a fence. If something comes at her, if something wants to hurt her, she doesn’t have a chance.

It begins to rain then, a cold, drenching rain that comes with the wind. It splatters on the rain, and on the concrete, and on the little dog tied to the fend. Zoe’s growl turns to a whimper. She listens hard, but whatever was rustling seems to have stopped, and so she curls into a tight ball and falls asleep again.

Hours later, she awakens with a start. The rain has stopped, and the clouds have cleared, and something is watching her.

The smallest of growls escapes her throat. She knows she should be quiet, but she’s scared. The hair on her neck stands up, and she stares into the darkness, and sniffs the air, pulling it into her lungs. She smells pine needles and dirt, and something that she thinks is a big animal. She smells rain. She smells things she’s never smelled before. She homes in on the big animal. Maybe it’s a coyote, or a fox. It has a strong smell.

Something rustles in the bushes, and she growls again, though she knows she should keep quiet. Something is staring at her. She can feel it. She can almost see an outline, something lighter than the woods. Something walking across the clearing. A smell getting stronger and stronger.

Zoe is trembling now, and growling, and pulling at the leash that’s tied to the fence. Pulling and pulling, but it doesn’t want to come loose. She can’t get free from the leash or the collar or the fence, and whatever it is, it’s coming closer, and she can smell it now, a rank stink, like it’s rolled in something dead.

She’s whining now, and growling, too, and shaking with terror. The thing eyes her and makes a huge, awful growling noise, and reaches one enormous paw toward her –

And out of nowhere comes a barking, baying, snarling bolt of red dog. It launches itself at the monster, biting and growling, gnashing out with its teeth, and the coyote – for that’s what it was – backs up and backs up again and then turns and runs into the woods.

The huge red dog stands there then, panting, and then looks at Zoe, and for a moment, Zoe is sure that this is the end. But then the dog wags her big, feathery tail, and Zoe knows she’s been saved.

Carrie can be reached at carrie@zestoforange.com

By Carrie Jacobson

James turns off the highway and onto Route 6. The pavement looks soft and blue in the moonlight. Zoe feels the change in speed and lifts her head. She looks toward him even though, he knows, she can’t see him.

He pats her head, strokes her fur, and she nestles in again.

They’ve been together for a long time, James and Zoe. They’ve been together longer than he and Susan have been together, and not for the first time, James thinks that he and Zoe should just take off. He could get back on 84, they could head west and see if there’s a new life out there. A grammarian and a scruffy, blind, old dog, yeah, right.

He remembers seeing Zoe for the first time. It was about 1 in the morning, and he was at work. The first editions were out, and he was leafing through the feature pages, looking for must-repair typos, when he saw the Pets of the Week page. There was Zoe. She was just a pup, but she’d been abused. She already was blind in one eye, and the shelter workers thought she was deaf in one ear. She couldn’t be around other dogs or young children. Her hair stuck up wildly. She’d been beaten and mistreated, ignored and abused, and yet, she was defiant, and this touched James. He woke up early, headed to the shelter in Sullivan County, and claimed Zoe the next morning.

On the ride home, she sat in the passenger seat, trembling and growling. He let her out of the car at his house, walked her up and down the street, let her do her business, and then unlocked the door to his little house. She looked at the step and the hallway inside, she looked at him and then she walked in and wagged her tail for the very first time.

Their relationship did not develop overnight. Zoe, James realized, might be a mutt, but she was mostly a lhasa apso, with all that that implied. She was loyal and protective, a fierce watchdog with an explosive attacking style. It had taken a lot of training before James could even begin to control her. But as they worked together, she began to trust him. The first time she jumped up into his lap, he’d stayed still for hours, until both legs fell asleep.

And now, old girl, now I’m about to abandon you. My friend, my little guardian, my  true-hearted little dog, I’m going to leave you behind. You’d never do this to me, he thinks, and the tears fill his eyes, and Zoe looks up at him again, cocks her head, puts one paw on his leg, and James nearly loses it.

I can’t do this, he thinks. I can’t.

But what choice do I have? Dear God, what choice do I have?

He turns in to the road to the shelter, and he has to pull over, he’s crying so hard. He picks Zoe up, pulls her to him, buries his nose in her rough dry fur and hugs her to him. She licks his face, licks the tears from his cheeks, and this brings a whole new wave of grief, and James just hates himself, hates himself more than he ever has – but he has no choice, he tells himself, for the thousandth time. They have no place to live if they don’t live with Susan’s mother. They will lose everything, everything.

And so he starts the car, drives down the road to the shelter in Shohola, and stops the car by the gate.

The night is warm and clear, and James is thankful for that. He clips Zoe’s leash to her collar, and they get out. He unloads her dog bed and her blanket and her favorite rubber chew toy. He makes sure the note he’s written is still attached to her collar.

“My name is Zoe,” it reads. “I am 12 years old, and blind, and deaf in my left ear.  My owner has lost everything and can’t keep me. I am a good dog. Please find me a good home.”

He puts her dog bed right up beside the gate, and puts her in it. He  covers her with the blanket, and ties her leash to the gate itself. Daylight is not too far off. There’s no other way to do this. James can’t hand her over in person. He can’t do it. This, this horrible thing, this is the best he can do.

He pats her one last time, and as he drives away, tears streaming down his face, he pretends he can’t hear her barking for him to come back.

Carrie can be reached at carrie@zestoforange.com