Toward the Sound of Chaos Read Online Free

one
wouldn’t be alone—you know how they get—and I mustn’t have locked the kennel
properly because it was wide open when I came in this morning. Billy Foster
found her by the side of the road out near the Biscuit King Café and called me an
hour ago. I been trying to work out a way to break it to you ever since.”
    “This
is all my fault,” I mumble through my tears, thinking of that gorgeous Golden
Retriever and all she’s done for my son.
    “Oh,
sugar, how in the world do you figure that?”
    “If
I hadn’t crashed my stupid car into that footbridge, you wouldn’t have been
here last night. You’d have been home with her. I am so sorry, Liv.”
    “Honey,
it’s not your fault.” She sniffles. “It’s mine. I didn’t double check the gate,
and Pebbles is a repeat escape artist.”
    “Is
she alright?”
    “She’s
still kicking, if that’s what you mean. Billy said she was huddled in against
Lady’s side; she snapped at him when he tried to lift Lady into the back of the
truck. He wound up putting Pebbles in an empty crab crate ’cause she tried to
bite his hands off.”
    “At
least she’s okay.”
    “Oh,
she’s fine; it’s me I’m worried about. How am I gonna rehome a Chihuahua with
that much sass?”
    “I’m
really sorry.” I take a Kleenex from off the top of the fridge and dab at my
eyes. “I better go break the news to Spence.”
    “Well,
I know it ain’t the same because tomorrow is Wednesday and he was expecting to
see Lady.” Olivia’s voice cracks, and she clears her throat. “But if you bring
him by Friday week, I’m taking in a whole litter of Retriever pups from the
Beasleys. We’re training them up as seeing-eye dogs for the center in Mobile,
so you bring that boy by in the afternoon and he can keep them entertained for
a bit.”
    “I
will,” I say, and lean my head back against the cupboard. “I’m so sorry, Liv.”
    “Me
too.” She chokes up as she says this, and my own tears begin to fall faster as
I hang up the phone and prepare to tell my son the bad news.
    As
expected, he does not take it well.
    He
cries so hard I swear to God he stops breathing, and just when I think he’s cried
himself out, he cries some more. I don’t know what to do, so I cry with him,
and there in a puddle on our kitchen floor, around spoiled ice cream that I’d
really been looking forward to and the remainder of the bag of groceries spilled
out around us, he climbs into my lap and lets me hold him for the first time in
a long time.
    We
cry over Lady, the dog who would have been his Autism assistance dog if only I
could afford to keep one and if Mr. Williams had allowed us to own a pet, and
when Spencer falls asleep and I carry him into bed, I send a silent thank you
to Lady—who I just know is in doggy heaven for all that she’s given to my
little man.

Chapter Four
    Jake
    I stand with my hands on my knees, my torso pitched forward, and my lungs on fire
as I gasp for breath. I don’t know where the hell I am, and I don’t much care
either, as long as I’m not cooped up in that doctor’s office no more.
    Rising
to my full height, I hug my ribcage and wonder if I ran so hard I dislodged a
piece of shrapnel from my side. A beat later the pain subsides, and I call
myself a pussy for the eighteenth time today, and it’s not even noon yet. I
stare at the car window in front of me and see what looks to be a homeless man
reflected back.
    Jesus . When did I become a fucking mountain man?
    I
scrub my hand over my too long beard and then up through my hair. When I was in
recovery in that German hospital after my service, I wanted nothing more than a
hot meal, a buzz-cut and a clean shave. I’ve grown both my beard and my hair
since my return to US soil, but then pretty blondes weren’t exactly lining up
around the block to date me.
    What,
like they are now?
    I
run over today’s checklist in an attempt to shut that voice in my head up.
    Run
with Nuke? Good.
    Leaving
Nuke at the house?