Nebraska

***

Dew soaked his knees as he unclipped the chain from her collar. She shook her head and shoulders and watched him walk out the gate. He turned and stood there, stooped and unsure. She tilted her head, glanced at the house. He slapped his thigh softly and she dashed to him and knocked him over with her paws.

Hey! he said. Careful.

He cuddled her and struggled to his feet. He turned happy, tottering circles, his eyes brimming. He rubbed his cheek in her fur. You and me, he whispered. You and me.

She was skittish on his bed. He'd roll with the covers and she'd bolt to the floor. He'd drop his arm over her neck and she'd lie there as though her head were caught in a fence. In the morning she balanced on his chest and gazed out the motel window, barking at semi trailer trucks.

As he drove the jeep he scratched his dog's ears. The dog smiled and lifted her nose, so he spidered down the white patch of fur all the way to her chest. Then he looked in the rearview mirror and his hand went to the glove compartment. He put on the rubber mask. He slowed. A family in a station wagon tried to pass him. He looked at them. They dropped back. He cruised for a while and they slipped up on his left again. The children were wide-eyed, the man and woman laughing.

He glowered in his mask. The man floored his car and the children turned in their seats, staring until they vanished over the hill.

He looked at his dog with victory. She panted.

He cranked down the right window and his dog poked her head out. Her nose squirmed in the air.

We're on the lam. Ever hear that word before? It means we're hiding from the cops.

She bit at leaves and branches that slapped against the door. He chuckled. He patted her rump.

I could watch you for hours, you know that?

He set the brake and opened the jeep's door. His dog clambered over him and ran among the pine trees and across a moist, shady yard to the cabin. She sniffed at the door frame, hopped weeds to the back, came out prancing. She wandered to the lake, waded in to her belly, and lapped at the clear water. She walked out heavily and shook, spraying him. He sat on the bank and smoked a cigarette. When his dog came up and licked his face, he petted her so hard her eyes bulged.

He split logs, nailed up shutters, patched the hull of the rowboat, skimmed stones. She stayed with him.

He found an aluminum bowl and poured in brown pellets. He unwrapped a package of meat and sliced raw liver into the meal. He called his dog. When she chewed at her food, the bowl rang.

He pushed himself back from the table and crossed his stocking feet over the arm of the other chair. He lit a cigarette and stared out at the night. Cigarette smoke splashed off the window. He petted her.

You know what?

Her ears perked forward.

This is exactly how I thought it would be.

He pried a tin box, shook an envelope, stuffed it in his coat pocket. He looked through a stamp collection and sighed with puzzlement. He moved on to another room. He dumped a jew- elry chest, stirred things with his finger, dropped a pair of earrings and a necklace in his pocket. He smashed the head of a piggy bank, shook it on the bed, picked out the quarters and dimes. The coins clinked in his pocket as he walked down the stairs.

Coming out of the lake house, he saw that his dog, the blue-eyed husky, had a rabbit in her mouth. He buried it and wiped the blood from his hands with a handkerchief. He wouldn't speak to her.

He jerked cupboard doors, banged pans on the stove burners, looked out the cabin window all through the meal. Finally she came to him and rested her head in his lap. He cradled it and played with her ears and tipped her nose up so that her eyes fixed on his.

What's the deal with that rabbit? What's got into you, anyway?

His dog was far ahead of him. There were noises in the distant woods, of tearing leaves and snapping twigs. It sounded like food frying, like talk. He picked up his pace and called to her. He caught his ankle in tangling vines. He shouted her name. The weeds rustled and his dog bounded through, her black fur thorny and snatched with brambles. She circled him and he thumped her side with his hand. He leaned against a tree, rubbed his brow, and looked through the bare upper branches at the sun. He kneaded the muscles of his arms. I'm so afraid I'm going to lose you.

She shook the earrings off every time he clipped them on. The necklace was probably snagged on a stump somewhere.

***

He fed the fire and knelt there, staring at his dog. She raised one eyebrow, then the other, and her tail beat against the chair. He broke a piece of kindling and tossed it to a corner. His dog chased the piece, bit it gingerly, flipped it in her mouth. He threw the stick again and his dog ran after it, paws rattling on the floor. They played like that for a while, then he picked up a hot stick from the fire and threw it. A wisp of smoke streamed after it. His dog stood there.

Well, get it.

His dog sat and looked around the room, smiling.

He glared, then stood, feeling his knees.