DOG FOOD

“DOG FOOD”

The night was the only time I could forage safely. They knew I was nearby, and they still couldn’t find me. I knew how to be quiet, how to wait. That alone, and the fact that I didn't stink saved me on more than one occasion. I had an old compound bow and four modified hunting shafts. It was a quiet killer and if a shaft didn’t fly straight and missed then it was hard to know where it came from right away. I could move and shoot again. I also had a Bear Grylls fixed blade knife, but I was running out of luck. It will be light soon and I haven't found anything yet in what remains of this city. Hopefully, they were just dogs, not wolves. In fact, if they were actually wolves I’d be dead; wolves hunt in silence and you don’t know they are there until it’s too late. No, these were dogs and they wanted me for dinner, I was dog food.

They hadn’t seen me yet, but they knew I was close, a crunching sound under my shoe alerted them instantly. I had to make it to the river. I knew the pack would come around the side of the building that separated us and I had to choose which way to go and just hope my luck held. I went left after I threw a water bottle filled with rocks the other way. It worked and gave me an opening. As I ran to the edge of the Miami River and to the piling where my pile of trash that covered an old cooler was tied off, I was 50 yards from black, inky freedom -- a way out, when a flash of lightning reflected off a pair of eyes. Head down, waiting, silent. Was it a wolf? No way, but I was running too fast to slow down while trying to notch an arrow at the same time. Now I could hear the paws against the pavement, and then another flash of lightning, and I turned to take my shot,

The bow is drawn, it was coming at me, alone, and now had cut the distance to 20 yards, ten more and I had my target in sight. Lightning again, it stopped, pulled up, looked like a wolf but...was it wearing a collar? A Shepard? Alsatian? It stopped too and then sat down, never taking its eyes off me. What the hell was this? Barking again, getting closer, and it looked back and then looked at me. COME! I shouted and turned as fast as I could and in ten more steps was in the air, jumping off what used to be a dock into the warm salt water. Behind me, I heard another splash and I knew it followed me into the river. I could feel the warmth of saltwater, the tide quickly moving out. It was swimming hard behind me. I found my piling, the nylon rope held my makeshift debris pile and I lifted it off and began to float. I made a split-second decision, I kicked my raft to the dog swimming frantically in circles, catching up to it, a fast shove and it was on the raft. Lightning flashed again and I saw its eyes looking at mine, intelligent eyes. It didn’t attack me, ok, and followed me into this darkness and was now looking at me as we floated in silence. Thunder rumbled as it scrambled up the raft for a better place to ride as the current got stronger. A girl! I pulled a piece of black visqueen to cover her. We floated in silence for about ten long minutes. We looked like trash mingled with palm fronds, floating out of the mouth of the river past the Miami Circle. At the fork, the tide was either going to take me out of Government Cut or through the Rickenbacker Causeway Bridge.

My boat was actually a skiff I kept nearby, it was tied off near what used to be called Dodge Island. I kicked us slowly to the north side of the river and let the tide carry us over the shallow, silted-up entrance of the river and into the channel. The current was still strong, and in the dark, I could guide us to the skiff and then to home, but how am I going to get my new friend into the skiff?

I knew I had only one chance as the tide took us nearer, I knew the boat was here but I couldn’t see the black grimy hull. The sky was thick with rain clouds, and the occasional flash of lightning was all I was going to get. There it was, coming up fast, there was no way I was going to be able to swim back against the current. My new friend seemed to know it too, sensing my urgency. I flipped the visqueen back and started kicking hard to the skiff. As we neared she stood on the wobbly cooler while I tried to hold it in place as best I could; that’s it, NOW! She leaped from the cooler to the bow of the skiff and tumbled into the small vessel, good girl! My turn but the motion knocked me back and I had to kick again. I had already passed the skiff, a short line played out from the stern for me to catch, it was the only chance I had. With one last strong kick, I grabbed the line and held the cooler in my other hand. The flotsam that was covering it was stripped away. Now I had my chance to pull myself in but wasn’t going to be able to do it with the cooler as well. I let it go, hoping to recover it later. I pulled myself to the skiff and my new friend appeared looking over the stern at me. I slid into the skiff and untied us from the cement piling. We glided away from Dodge Island in silence as the silver sky of pre-dawn broke through the clouds in patchy spots reminding us that it was a chilly morning. I pulled up more black visqueen and we hid under it, my new friend on her side and me just looking at her. I went on a foraging mission and found a dog. I guess that’s better than getting caught by a pack of them.

At least she seemed friendly, a Belgian Malinois by the looks of her, wearing a collar that was black and greasy. She looked like a working dog. I needed to check her collar. Looking at her in the silence I opened a bottle of water and took a drink, she let me give her water and licked it from my hand. We glided through the cut past the pilothouse in silence. I stuck an oar in the water and guided the skiff across the channel to the old Miami Beach Marina, now a decrepit jumble of wrecks that littered the area, and inside the breakwater that still held. Dawn was still twenty minutes and rain clouds were blowing by briskly. The silver of the predawn was getting lighter, and you could make out shapes in the shadows, I was going to be seen. I couldn’t risk a stupid mistake and had waited too long already, it was going to be close. I tied the skiff off and pulled the plug, it took on water quickly and started to sink. I threw the jumble of plastic visqueen on my boat, an old Island Hopper with an inboard diesel. I dared not start her up this close to land as stealth was my best chance for a getaway, and I didn’t want to be tracked. Better to let the tide get me out of here than to give my position away. What was left of the gangs that hadn’t killed each other still found ways to make everything difficult. The world was upside down and life was short.

My new friend jumped into the Hopper from the now-sinking skiff and waited. A sound. Silence. A step. A growl, just one, and I turned to the dock with a three-band Arbalete speargun in my hand and saw the shadow move. Two more fast steps came at me and the speargun hit its mark as the sound of a piercing scream broke the silence before hitting the water. That would wake up anyone nearby, thanks, pal.

Luckily the Hopper started right up. She was really a prize, anyone would want her, and me with it to show them where I kept the fuel. No way that was happening as I backed her out and decided to open her up, a moving target is always harder to hit. I heard the sound before I knew that an arrow was lodged in the rail just above my head. Another two thwacks on the hull but by now I was 100 yards away and getting further every second. I saw two shadows running along the shore, but now I had to navigate around a freighter sunk right in the middle of the cut and had to pick a side to go around. The one side looked clear, but it was a trap. There was a thick chain from the wreck to the shore that would rip my prop shaft out of the engine. I had to take the other side and go closer to land. While there was more distance between me and the shore, there was no chain, just a freighter’s superstructure sticking out of the black water. The great high rises that once stood onshore were now piles of burnt rubble and somewhere further inland was a place that used to be called Joe’s Stone Crabs, another distant memory.

The shot went right through the wood and stopped in the center pillar of the bridge, knocking off a chunk of wood that landed on my foot. I heard the crack of the gun a moment later, but they missed. Even though my hiding place was blown I was getting away, driving into a squall that would obscure me long enough to adjust my course and complete the escape.

The rain covered us like a warm blanket, and the winds became calm. We listened to the droplets hitting the water. I cut the engine after clearing the remnants of a channel marker and floated South with the squall. I turned and looked at my bright-eyed passenger: “OK girl, who are you?” I found a piece of dried fish and made sure there weren’t any bones. I took a small bite and then tossed her the rest. She caught it in midair and wagged her tail. I looked at her again, gave her another bite of fish, and undid her collar while she ate. I opened a small velcro pad on her collar. I pulled out a card and read the name: Daisy. I looked at her. “Daisy!” and at that moment she was all dog and I was her new best friend. She even licked my face! Kisses! I saw on the back of the card the information that was to change my life, she was a rescue dog that was now six years old, her DOB was October 1, 2032. And along with the card I found something else, it was a strong leather lanyard with a small gold locket, and her name inscribed across the front. I put it on her and I could swear she smiled back at me.

“It looks like it’s just you and me Daisy,” and I tossed her another bite of dried fish.