Stress Test Ch. 8

Black Wolf was so ugly and he stunk so bad he couldn't belong to anyone but Billey.

At first sight, Billey thought the dog was a chunk of tread that some old truck had thrown into the bushes.

But when it barked at him, Billey smashed his head against a low branch. Not much bigger than a can of beans on Sunday, the starving, mange-gripped pup reared and yapped at him.

"Here, boy," Billey said, patting the ground. "Here, Black Wolf."

A couple hanks of hair that even the mange wouldn't mess with poked out of the dog's wrinkled, dirty pink hide. Angry sores spotted his body. His belly swelled from the taut spring of his ribs like a brown berry about to rot. His brief legs bowed and ended in abrupt, floppy paws. His face looked flat as a penny on the railroad tracks.

At first, Billey tried to hide him in the camper, but he could hardly breathe for the smell. Before he could reckon what to do, Elwood spotted him.

"What the hell you got there?" Elwood asked, turning his head to the side and wiping his nose with his fist the way he did when he was figuring whether or not to whup Billey. "Where'd you get that?"

"I dunno."

"Don't tell me you don't know when you know. You think I'm as dumb as you are, Billey Elwood? Well, I ain't."

"He just came here."

"Ain't nothin' comes here without a damn good reason. I oughta shoot that son of a bitch." Elwood glanced at the truck. "Oughta shoot you, too, for all the good you are."

Billey tried to get rid of Black Wolf for the dog's own good. He walked half a mile from the road with the fast cars and told Black Wolf to stay. Soon as Billey took a step, the puppy bounded after him, its pink and black tongue poking in and out in synch with its stride.

He laid a plank across the creek, carried Black Wolf to the far side, then sprinted back and kicked the board away. The dog yelped and splashed through the water.

Wherever Billey went, Black Wolf was sure to follow.

"That dog's got the mange, Billey." Elwood spat in the dust. "What's the matter with your nose you can't smell it?"

"I dunno."

"That's right, you don't know a damn thing. That's why I'm tellin' you. You go touchin' that damn dog anymore and your weenie's gonna swell up and drop off on the ground. Then how ya gonna pee, Billey? Tell me that."

"I dunno."

"Boy that can't pee ain't no good to nobody." Elwood shook his head. "Might as well be shot. Fetch me that can of kerosene ‘round back and we'll fix this doggie's mange up good."

Billey ran around the shack, with Black Wolf in hot pursuit, grabbed a can and brought it back to his daddy.

"Not gasoline. Kerosene!" Elwood threw his cigarette down and ground it under his heel. "Come around here."

He led Billey to the jumble of cans and bottles behind the shack. "Gasoline. Kerosene. Turpentine." He swung each one in Billey's face. "Got that now? Fetch me that bucket."

Billey brought the tin bucket and watched Elwood empty the can into it. The stuff smelled bad, but not as bad as Black Wolf.

"Dunk him in there, Billey." Elwood waved at Black Wolf. "Just like your pork pig friends dunk their donuts."

Billey cupped Black Wolf in his hands and lowered him gently into the bucket. The dog howled and his leg stubs swam in four wild directions as the kerosene bit into his sores.

"Don't let go. Push him down in there real good," Elwood barked. "Sometimes it hurts to make things right."

Billey couldn't stand the wailing and squirming for long. He relaxed his grip and Black Wolf shot to the ground. The dog coughed and shook. It looked up at him like a wet, scalped rat. Elwood scooped him up and plunged him back in the bucket.

"Don't worry about the eyes, Billey. He'll close ‘em real tight when he gets under there. Now you do it." Elwood grabbed his son's hand and wrapped it around the struggling animal. He rubbed dirt over his hands to blot up the kerosene and then reached for a cigarette and matches.

"You just listen to me," he said. "I know how to fix that dog's mange real good."

Billey looked up to see his daddy waving the match over him. Black Wolf thrashed free and sent the boy tumbling backwards just before the flame leaped from the mouth of the bucket.

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Black Wolf filled out on bugs and bones and stolen beans. He assumed the shape of a mature animal, but one designed by consensus. He had the tooth and jaw of a killer, but the temper and leg of a lapdog. The broad pads of his feet propped up a body stout as a hydrant, shaggy as a goat. He defended Billey with a proud, defiant voice.

Billey's world ran from the creek to the highway and over to the hill that had been half scooped away. His daddy said the rock miners gouged out the hill, but Billey always figured some big, old brown dinosaur came by and got so hungry he decided to eat himself some dirt. Eating dirt made some sense to Billey.

Billey's world existed in the simplest possible terms. If you needed rocks, it had abundant rocks. If you needed dirt, dirt was cheap and plentiful. If you needed loneliness, it could provide that, too, because Elwood hardly ever came looking for Billey; he probably would have been just as happy if the kid wandered off for good. Anyway, Billey could always be counted on to come back in time to eat. "Little bastard plays deaf," Elwood always muttered, "but he can hear the Coleman fire up a mile away."

Billey shinnied up the tree that leaned over the creek bank. He stripped off his shirt and dangled it over Black Wolf who danced on his hind legs and barked like a fool. The tree trunk left a rough pattern on Billey's chest and gray flecks of it clung to his skin as he pulled away.

They found tadpoles, minnows and a little green snake that never blinked. Billey sat on the patch of grass and chucked stones in the water while Black Wolf watched with his long, pink and black tongue hanging out. The damp grass bled through his pants and made his skin feel cool and clean. When he leaned back, he could feel how the clear, blue sky came right down into his lungs and swelled his chest. Black Wolf felt it, too.

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Go back to Chapter 1 of Stress Test.

Read the next chapter.

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