After Emily left, Danny got two Tupperware containers from the top drawer. He stepped around the white shards of broken dishes and pulled the last package of ground beef from the fridge. He filled the first container with a handful of meat. He filled the second with cold tap water, dropped in an ice cube, and sealed them both tight.
They walked slowly down the tracks. Danny, with his head down, kicked at the sharp gray rocks that had worked their way up onto the railroad ties. A long barrel swung like a pendulum at his side — its metal as dull and etched as the iron rails that stretched for miles ahead. He squinted and stared into the distance through the rippled heat and hazy clouds of bugs. The rails disappeared around a sharp turn near the end of his vision. The Mississippi lay to his right, silent and still, like dirty glass. Con, a pit-bull mix with a wide, thick skull was at his side, panting and sniffing the air.
Danny thought maybe he would sense that something was wrong. Con was old, but he could still hear. And shit, even the neighbors up the block had probably heard him and Emily today. But Con seemed as happy as ever, his tongue hanging and the corners of his mouth pulled tight as he panted. He always looked like he was smiling when he panted.
The rails began to vibrate. Con stopped and moved over into the grass. Danny followed. He dropped his backpack to the ground, leaned the old bolt-action against a stump and wiped the sweat from his eyes. He tied his hair back and looked up into the trees. The woods were dry and stiff. It hadn't rained in weeks. The train was coming.
Con looked up at Danny with his cloudy eyeballs. The right one was worse than the left — white and empty.
Emily said she went to the basement to empty the hamper and take the laundry to the car and he growled and snapped at her, but he wasn't sure he believed that. Danny didn't believe much of what she said lately. He didn't believe she was just going out with her friends or that she was home late because she went back to Becky's house or Steph's house and drank and talked. He didn't even have the energy to argue with her anymore.
Most nights he was on the couch and pretended like he was asleep as she came in and showered. He would lay there, wide awake with his eyes shut — the blurry television casting a blue glow around the empty living room. He would hope she would come out of the shower, naked and clean, and lay with him. He wished somehow they could reconnect. He wished she would kiss him. Or touch him. Make everything okay again. But she never did.
"Come here, boy." Con sauntered closer and sat back on his haunches. Danny pulled the containers from his pack and opened them up. Con lapped up the water first — sticking his whole snout into the container. When he was done, the water dripped from his nose and his tail wagged. He finished the meat next and Danny bent down and hugged him and petted him. "You're a good boy," his voice was weak and shaky. The train was hammering by — metal against metal. The ground shook.
Con looked over into the trees and his jaw stretched to let out a long yawn. His fur around his eyes and nose was streaked with gray.
Even now, Con looked better than when Danny first saw him — with chunks of his fur missing, his ribcage and spine poking up through his skin, and dozens of tiny burns and scars on his head and neck. Except for a small strip of white on his chest, the rest of his patchy coat was coal black. He was completely still as Danny walked past. The others barked and howled and scratched at their cages. But he just sat there, like some broken convict.
Danny took him home and he gained ten pounds. His fur grew thick and glossy, and he looked like a puppy. They kept each other sane in their tiny trailer in the middle of nowhere. But the oil rigs closed down and their West Texas home began to look harsh and empty, like the lifeless desert it really was. Soon after, Danny packed what he could into the truck and they headed north, to the Heartland.
The train pounded the rails beside them. Con let out a breath and lay down in the grass, resting his head on his paws.
Con used to lie for hours next to Jason. Right on the corner of his yellow quilted baby blanket, like he was keeping watch. Jason would crawl all over him and pull on his ears, but Con never seemed to mind. Those were good days. When things were easier and even the sun seemed brighter. The days before the chemical plant closed — before they stopped answering the phone — before they waited all month, every month, for the mail to arrive with a check.
He still couldn't believe it — fifty fucking dollars to stick a needle in him and end it. Shit, that was groceries for a month or catching up the electric or new school clothes, or a first payment on a goddamn washer and dryer.
He stood back and aimed the rifle, blinking and fighting the tears settling below his eyes. He looped his trembling finger around the trigger. The end of the train was in sight now and Con stood up. Danny tightened his grip, looked away, and as the end of the train passed, it was not a caboose. Just another screeching, stained coal car like the rest and the sky filled with black birds as they left the trees and flew up, higher into the bluffs.
Joshua Anderson is twenty two years old and is currently an Accounting Major, Creative Writing Minor at the University of Northern Iowa (a combination that has confused many, including him). However, he hopes to someday spark a career in fiction. He grew up along the Mississippi River in Keokuk, Iowa and now lives in Waterloo with his beautiful and endlessly supportive girlfriend, Danielle. This is his first publication.