David Nickle - Monstrous Affections

They slowed past one. Rupert peered up the driveway — a short ribbon of dirt and gravel, dressed in low flowering weed. The house at the end of it was one floor, with a small porch on the front. The wood had been painted a pale green. The shingles were green with moss. An apple tree bent close to the south side. Looking close, Rupert could see the bruised red curves of fruit that had fallen into the high grass.

Wallace stood on the balls of his feet, craning his neck as though there were a fence to look over. The house was quiet.

“This is the place,” Wallace said gravely. He worked the Webley’s grip where it protruded over his belt, kept peering at the house. Rupert stood there with him, and looked.

This wasn’t how the plan was supposed to go. Wallace had gone over it just minutes before.

Okay, so this dog (he’d started to call it a dog by that morning)… it comes down the driveway. Fast. So fast you have to run. It’s like you don’t have a choice. The dog knows this. And it gets on you. On your tail. And then you’re done for. Except this time, when the dog comes… we’ll trick it. It’ll start coming at us, and then I’ll take the Webley. And I’ll sight down the barrel (he checked around, then pulled the gun out, and sighted down the barrel). And then: I’ll let fly (and he made a quiet sound like a pistol report through his teeth). And that’ll be the end of that damn dog.

“Maybe it only sees you when you’re moving,” said Wallace. “We should go back, and walk by the driveway again.”

“We should just go to school,” said Rupert. “Maybe on the way home…”

But Wallace was already doubling back, beckoning him to follow. Rupert sighed and walked back one house, and then they both turned around and crossed the driveway again.

It was the same this time as the last: nothing.

Wallace stood as he had before, staring at the house. A pickup truck rolled past them on the road into town. It kicked up a small cloud of dirt around them; the morning sun through the leaves gave it a glow like magic dust.

Wallace’s mouth turned down at the corner, and he glared through it at the house. He swore under his breath, and then at volume: “Goddamn.” Rupert, liking the look of the dust in the light, kicked up more dust with his feet. And looking down, he spied Wallace’s grammar text. He picked it up.

“Hey,” he said. “You drop this?”

“Goddamn!” Wallace’s face went red, and his shirt went up, and the Webley drew across his white belly, and it was pointing right at Rupert.

The gun barrel wavered in Rupert’s face, and as the dust settled around them, Rupert thought about their battle a week ago in the dust, the sickening feeling of Wallace’s fist in his face, the taste of dirt, and wondered: Should I have apologized?

The book fell from his hands. And after a long moment, Wallace lowered the gun.

“I won’t shoot you,” he said flatly. “We got to stick together.”

“Don’t point that at me again,” said Rupert.

“I already said I won’t shoot you.” Wallace bent down and picked up the book. Tucked it into his bag one-handed, while the Webley dangled from the other.

“The dog—” Rupert was about to say that it wasn’t coming. But as he spoke, he glanced at the house. The screen door rattled, and through the slats in the porch railing, he could see the flank of an animal. Wallace saw it too.

“Goddamn,” he said, and crouched down.

Rupert looked some more, and finished the thought. “The dog isn’t coming.”

The dog had settled on the porch, at the end near the apple tree. Squinting, they could make out his eyes — unblinking, peering through the slats and the high grass at them.

“Should we walk past again?” asked Rupert. Wallace hushed him.

“I’m gonna see if I can hit him.”

“Not from here you can’t.”

“I bet I could.”

Rupert shook his head. “Best luck, you’ll just wound him. Then he’ll be angry, like a bear.”

Wallace considered this — and, Rupert hoped, considered the wisdom of retreat — just putting the Webley away, dumping the bullets first, and going on to school, grammar text retrieved and calling the game even. But Wallace was considering something else. His lips set thin against his teeth, and he nodded briskly. “You’re right,” he said, and pulled off his book bag, and set it down in the slope of the ditch. Then, keeping low, Webley held in both hands, he made his way up the driveway.

Rupert didn’t follow. It felt like the dream, him watching his brothers file into the barn — the wolf, hiding in wait. He couldn’t do anything then. He couldn’t — wouldn’t — couldn’t do anything that morning. Not anything but watch, as Wallace walked down the driveway, gun held in front of him.

The dog shifted, and Rupert could no longer see its eyes. Wallace could, and he lifted the gun. “Here, doggy,” he said. His voice sounded higher. The gun wavered in front of him, as Wallace tried to sight down the barrel.

A low growl came from the porch. Even as far as the end of the driveway, it raised hackles on Rupert’s neck. Wallace moved his finger behind the trigger guard — touched the curve of the trigger. Peered through the grass and the slats, looking for the eyes.

And then, as he watched — the dog vanished. There was nothing but the peeling green paint on the porch; the screen door, half-ajar.

Wallace didn’t see the dog leap. Rupert did. It was the first time he saw the dog in full, in morning light. It was a beast.

It came up over the railing of the porch fast — touching it with front paw, then pushing off a second time with its hindquarters. The old wood of the railing protested at the launch, and the animal flew, a twisting, dark missile. It came down hard amid the high grass. Then it came up. And down again, lost in a swirl of weed. Up once more, lunging high and throwing off barks like punches — as Wallace raised the gun.

Rupert shut his eyes, expecting thunder from the Webley’s short barrel, and the barking to turn into a short yelp, and a thump! Then maybe another shot, to finish the kill. He shut his eyes and then held his breath.

There was no shot. Rupert opened his eyes. He looked out at the empty yard. Held in perfect silence, for a perfect instant — long enough, just, to let him think: Wallace is gone .

Then the dog’s back, curved and shaking, emerged over the grass. And the scream came. It was a bleat — a baby scream. It was, a deep part of Rupert knew, how he’d sounded, pressed into the dirt, crying out under the flurry of Wallace’s fists.

The grass rustled and the dog’s head came up, eyes turning to show thin crescents of white. It dropped again and another cry came, and Rupert, a shameful grin seeding his face, thought:

Wallace is gone .

He couldn’t even pull a trigger , thought Rupert. He couldn’t even manage that.

Rupert bent down, and reached into the scrub. His hand closed around a rock. And he stood straight, and without aiming, he pitched it. The rock went too far, clattering onto the porch and falling just short of a window. He picked up two rocks next time, one in each hand, and he threw them fast, one after another.

The second rock hit home and the next fell short. The dog yelped and its muzzle flashed up as the third rock thumped into the ground. Rupert and the dog met eyes an instant. Its eyes were not red but black, as unreadable as a bug’s. Its teeth flashed. It growled.

Rupert reached down again. His hand closed around sand and pebbles, and by reflex, he flung them, not even standing up to do so. They made a rushing sound as they cascaded off the leaves of a shrub.