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By Root 392 0

Cooper’s breathing, his scent, his demand to go outside, to draw her out, his soft eyes, and his need of her. She missed the sprawl of his body, his satisfaction after his meal, his enthusiastic tail wagging when she walked in the door, or watching him gnaw on a stout stick until some artistic culmination caused him to stop and add it to a pile of similar sticks on the deck. She kept picturing him running around Liz’s old house in Orono three times. Had he really done that? He came and stood by her when he was done. She spent days picturing his ritual and in an early morning bout of insomnia, she suddenly realized what had happened. He had completed what he needed to do with Liz and then there was nothing old between them; he had signed on with Rocky completely.

This was a miserable job and she regretted taking it. When Isaiah returned, she would tell him that she was resigning before she did any more harm. She had hurt Cooper by getting too close to him and letting him get too close to her. He couldn’t understand about property laws and estates.

The island was muffled in the silence of empty houses. Christmas came and went. She drove the truck around the island twice each day. No stray animals were reported, no lost animals needed finding, and no dead animals needed removal.

She went to Tess’s house and practiced archery for hours each day, letting her thumb slide along the edge of her jaw as Hill had demonstrated. She wore silk long underwear under her jeans so that she could stay outside as long as possible to shoot again and again at the target. Pull and release. Fewer arrows strayed to the outer edges. She allowed her muscles and bones to take over. Nothing was going right in her life; there was no reason for archery to be any different. The light was fading and she wanted a few more shots.

She pulled back her right arm, and the arrow and the bow became a part of her, extra appendages that attached firmly to her ligaments. She sighted the target and saw, before she released the arrow, exactly where it would pierce the target. Rocky took a breath and released the air in a slow and perfect stream. She suddenly saw it, the place between breaths that Hill had talked about. What he had not told her was that it was as real as a spot on the map, like Portland or Boston, and that she could step into it. There was nothing between her and the target. She released the arrow and followed it to its certain home, dead center. Rocky felt a tingle of exquisite light run up her spine, unimpeded from her tailbone to the top of her head. She shot for several more minutes before the new and strange sensation left her as unannounced as it had arrived.

When she returned home, she called information for the Townsends’ phone number in Providence. It was still her job to see how Cooper was doing. They were unlisted. When Isaiah and Charlotte returned, she’d get their number from him. How else could she reach them? Then she remembered that she had the obituary from the newspaper. She’d send them a note in care of the funeral home who would forward it to the Townsends. She tore a sheet of paper from her black journal that she had not touched in days. The edge of the paper bore ragged tears from the metal spiral binder and she evened it out with a scissor.

Dear Mr. and Mrs. Townsend,

If love is the reason that you want Cooper, then I am glad and I wish you well. But if you took Cooper in order to repair something that was broken between you and your daughter, then I ask you to look into your hearts and think about what Liz would want and what the dog wants. I think you know. I think he belongs with me. I will take him back any time. I will come and get him and I will take care of him for the rest of his life.

She dropped the letter in the mail drop box outside the grocery store. There were a few more hours of thin daylight left and she didn’t want to go back home yet. Even Peterson the cat seemed disgusted with Rocky and avoided her, refusing to sit on her lap.

In the evening, she tried Hill’s number again and this time she left