Listen! (9780062213358) Read Online Free

Quiet. Nothing chasing animals away.
    But there is no one doing nature photography anymore. She can have a dog now if she wants.
    When she and Sadie come down out of the woods and cross the embankment at Heron Pond, the smaller of the two ponds, half-choked with cattails, Charley hasn’t seen the wild dog again. But she knows now that not seeing him doesn’t mean that he isn’t around somewhere, among the trees, keeping pace with them.
    She is picking her way across the Heron Pond spillway on broken chunks of concrete, listening to the cheerful sound of the waterfall where the water slides over a tumble of boulders on its way to the lake, when Sadie runs past her, splashing her with mud and water. It feels so good on her hot, sticky skin that she wishes she could climb down and sit under the waterfall, letting it wash away the sweat and grime. What she wants more, though, is to get home, wash the poison ivy off, take a pain pill, and lie down for a while.
    At last she emerges from among the trees onto the broad swathe of trail that is the sewer line access for the housing developments up beyond the woods that surround Eagle Lake. Every couple of years the utilities people come with a truck and mow down the poison ivy and blackberry brambles, the honeysuckle and sweet gum saplings that grow so fast and thick that they practically choke off the trail between cuttings. She follows it across a tiny creek and up the last slope to the chain that stretches across the end of Eagle Lake Drive. The chain is low enough to step over.
    Jasmine and Bernie, the two German shepherds who live at the last house on the north side of the lake, bark at Sadie from their pen down near the water as she goes by. Sadie stays well away. Jasmine, the younger shepherd, sometimes attacks other female dogs, so Mr. Garrison, their owner, keeps them penned while he’s at work.
    When Charley gets home, Sadie is with her, but the wild dog is not. As she starts down the driveway toward the house, she hears Jasmine and Bernie barking again. A minute later the wild dog comes down the road, shoulders hunched, nose up, sniffing for danger. He really does look like a coyote, Charley thinks. Rangy and wild. As she watches him, braving the open road to follow them, his eyes meet hers for a moment. Again there is that feeling like an electrical current between them. Coyote . She thinks the word toward him as if she were saying it out loud. That’s your name. Coyote .
    She makes her way down the driveway, up the ramp, and through the sliding door into the dining room. The vacuum cleaner is running in her father’s bedroom. Sarita, her eternal jigsaw puzzle abandoned on its table by the windows overlooking the lake, is working. “Sarita!” she yells, not sure she can be heard. “I’m back.”
    The vacuum stops. “You okay?”
    â€œYeah!” It isn’t true, but as long as she isn’t actually dead, she’s okay enough for Sarita. Charley figures she’s just another chore for this woman her father pays to run the household. Like the laundry or a room that needs vacuuming.
    She takes the can of dog food into the kitchen and opens it, then gets out a heavy serving bowl. Hurrying, she spoons out the food—cube-shaped chunks of meat with gravy—and goes to see if the dog is still out there. If Sadie starts for home, Coyote will surely follow her. It takes her a minute to spot him across the road, almost in the woods, standing and watching the house.
    She sets the bowl on the buffet and opens the sliding door. Then, stick in one hand, bowl in the other, she steps out onto the ramp. Instantly the dog disappears into the woods. Charley can hear Sadie swimming for home, making big splashes with her front paws the way she always does. “Lunchtime!” Charley calls to the wild dog she can’t see anymore. “Come and get it!”
    She limps out to the end of the drive and sets the bowl down