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Anyway, the pool was heated and Levi had bought a wheelchair for the pool before Asher even came home, so he figured he might as well use it. In fact, Levi wanted him to get a leg specifically for swimming but Asher resisted. Not because he didn’t want one, but because Levi was already doing more for him than he could ever repay. Not that Levi would accept monetary repayment anyway, but Asher didn’t want to take advantage of him. Which Levi would totally let him do.
He swam a little but soon gave up in favor of floating. He let himself sink to the bottom, imagined what it would be like to just…not come back up. To not have to deal with anything. No pain. No struggle. No memories screaming in his mind and waking him up sweating and agonized.
Giving up wasn’t in his nature. Even if the nightmares at times made his life hell, even if it seemed like the pain would never go away, he was too stubborn to quit. He came back up to the top. A dog was barking. None of Levi’s neighbors were close enough that you could hear their dog. What the hell?
Then he saw it in the gloom, a few feet away from the edge of the pool. He swam to the beach entry and got into the wheelchair. First he stopped to pick up a towel, then wheeled himself to the edge of the deck. He and the dog stared at each other. It had stopped barking but he heard it whimpering. Asher held his hand out. “C’mere. I won’t hurt you.” The dog came closer, enough he could see its color and physique better. It looked like some kind of golden retriever mix. It was a reddish brown color, and would probably be golden reddish if it hadn’t been filthy. And it was a female. Unless he was mistaken, he saw as it came close enough that he could see her teats hanging down, a female with puppies.
Cautiously, she approached him. He didn’t move but let her come to him, talking soothingly. Finally she came close enough to sniff his hand, quivering when he stroked her. She must have sensed he meant her no harm because she let him pet her, gradually relaxing and stopping her quivering. “Where are your babies, huh?”
She ran a little distance away and whined, her tail wagging. When he didn’t move she came back a few feet away and barked at him. “You want me to come with you?”
She ran back and forth barking. Clearly saying, “Well, duh.”
Deciding this called for his crutches, he went over to where he’d left them, dried off some more, pulled on his shirt and stuffed his cell phone in his shirt pocket. Meanwhile the dog whined, looking at him as if saying, “Hurry up!”
“I’m not very fast. You’ll have to deal,” Asher told her.
She led him to the edge of Levi’s property to an old potting shed that was falling apart. It took forever since Asher had to be very careful not to fall. If he did he wasn’t sure he could get up without help. The dog wiggled through a hole at the base of one side of the shed and disappeared inside. Asher took the more conventional route and came in through the door. Then he turned on his phone’s flashlight and shined it around. There, in a corner of the shed, lay the mother dog and…seven, no eight nursing puppies.
What the hell was he supposed to do with a stray dog with eight puppies?
*
“What’s that smell?” Levi asked as he and Dana entered the kitchen through the attached garage.
“I don’t know. It smells like—” Dana wrinkled her nose. “Poop?”
“Shit or something dead, I’d say. Wait a minute. Someone’s in the laundry room talking.” It had to be Asher, but what was he doing in the laundry room talking to himself? Had he fallen into something outside and come in to wash his clothes? Dead animal? Dog shit?
Levi went to the laundry room just off the kitchen, with Dana following. It was a large room. Levi had had it enlarged during his first remodeling of the house. Muriel had “requested” he do that. Actually, she’d said she was not washing clothes in a room that was dark as a dungeon and not big enough to turn around in. Since Levi had no desire to do all his own wash, he gave her what she wanted. On the threshold he stopped short. “What the hell?”
“Good, you’re home,” Asher said. His crutches leaned against the dryer and he wasn’t wearing his prosthesis. Asher sat on the floor with a large, really dirty dog and her God-knows-how-many puppies. “I need some help here.”
“Ya think?” Levi said. “What the hell is this?”
Shooting him an irritated glance, Asher said, “It’s a mother dog and her puppies. Obviously. I found a blanket but she really needs a box for her and the pups.”
Levi looked at Dana, who was biting her lip trying not to laugh. “Has that dog been rolling in shit? It stinks to high heaven in here.”
“She, not it. You’d smell too if you hadn’t had a bath in God knows how long. I found some bowls and gave her water, but of course we don’t have any dog food. Poor baby was starving.” She lay stretched out with squirming puppies fighting for a place to eat. Asher stroked her head and she wagged her tail in response.
“What did you feed her?” He could tell there had been food in the other bowl, though it had been licked clean. “You didn’t—”
“There was a steak in the fridge. I didn’t think you’d mind.”
Dana burst out laughing.
Levi glared at her. “Of course I don’t mind you feeding a stray dog—with eight puppies—my filet mignon. Take whatever you want,” Levi said sarcastically, waving a hand.
The gibe went right over Asher’s head. “Great, thanks. I thought about giving her some rice too but didn’t want to feed her too much at once. Plus I had no idea where you’d keep rice or even if you had any.”
Levi had no idea either.
Asher continued, “I was going to wait until tomorrow to bathe her but now that you’re here, why don’t you help me? She just nursed the puppies, so they ought to be okay for a while.” He held out his hand and Levi grasped it and put his other hand under his arm, helping him up.
It was on the tip of his tongue to ask him how he’d planned to get up without help, but he squashed the question. Asher would have figured something out.
Asher picked up his crutches and started out the door, calling to the dog. “Come on, girl.” She shook off the pups and followed him as if she’d been obeying him for months. Over his shoulder, he said, “Better get some old towels too. I’ll just use my shampoo this time.”
