Ever Onward by Wayne Mee Read Free Book Online Page A

busting windows down on
main street. Set the alarm off in Godart’s Hardware. But by the
time these old legs of mine got me there, whoever it was was long
gone.” He looked from the son to the father. “Heard a car go by a
not long ago. Was that you?”
    Jessie beamed at his father. “I told
you I saw a car!”
    Josh tousled his son’s blond hair.
“No, sir, that wasn’t us.”
    “Call me Karl, or Doc. Now, how about
that coffee?”
    “My pleasure,” Josh said. “Mind if
Jess here has a look at your animals?”
    The old man cocked his bald head to
one side, reading the look in Josh’s eyes. He nodded, then turned
to Jessie. “Go right in, son. I’d appreciate the help. Got five
dogs and a slew of cats that need watering.”
    Jessie was through the back door like
a shot.
    Doc Gruber turned back to Josh, his
old eyes wise and knowing. “Good idea to get the lad a pet. That’s
why you came here?”
    Josh nodded. “We buried his mother
yesterday. I thought a dog might help take his mind
off...things.”
    “Hmmm,” Doc replied, filling a second
cup with coffee and motioning to a chair. “I was just sitting here
thinking on that when you two came by. ‘Things’ have gotten a might
out of hand of late. Got any ideas?”
    This struck Josh as strange. He was
hoping the old man might have some kind of explanation. “You’re the
doctor. I’m only a small town history teacher.”
    Doc seemed to find that funny. After a
cough and a spit, he explained. “Sorry, Josh. Education is a
wonderful thing, its just that over the years I’ve noticed that
stupidity comes in all colors and sizes. Some people never learn,
no matter what we do. Pearl Harbor. Hiroshima. Nagasaki. Viet Nam.
Iraq. Bosnia. You’d THINK we’d learn, but we never do.”
    Josh leaned forward, glad he’d sent
Jessie inside. “You think this was done on purpose?!”
    Doc sighed. “Someone sure as hell did
something. Probably hit us with a whole batch of new germs. There
side, our side, who knows?”
    They both sat there, each lost in
their own thoughts. Jessie came back outside, a cat cradled to his
breast, a Beagle pup at his heels. He was beaming from ear to ear.
Sitting down on the step, the cat hissed at the dog and bounded
off. The pup, its long curved tail wagging furiously, jumped up and
licked his face.
    “Found a friend, eh son?”, the old man
asked.
    Jessie’s answer came in the form of a
laugh. Both men smiled. Josh swallowed the lump in his
throat.
    “I got his mother inside with a sore
leg. The pup’s about a year old now, but he’s going to be a big
one. You can always tell by the paws. You’re welcome to keep him,
son, both if you like. But first you check with your
dad.”
    Jessie’s eyes went wide. “Can we, Dad?
Keep them both? I’d take good care of them, and we can’t take him
away from his mother!”
    His son’s innocent words hit Josh like
a kick in the stomach. “We’ll take both, Jess. There’s been enough
partings lately.”
    Jessie, already going back inside for
the pup’s mother, missed the sadness in his father’s tone. Doc
Gruber didn’t. The old man squeezed Josh’s hand. “I lost a brother
in W.W.II, a son in that sad joke called Viet Nam, and a wife to
cancer. Partings are terrible hard things, Josh, scaring the heart
and the soul, but in time the pain recedes. We never forget, but we
learn to go on. I did. You will too.”
    Josh nodded out of
politeness, even formed a half smile, but in his heart he ached for
what once was, and it was his wife’s face that swam towards him
through a watery film of tears.
    They spent the rest of the day driving
around Hawthorn, looking for more survivors. They saw some sign of
looters downtown; the liquor store had been broken into and the
large plate glass window in the front of Billing’s Food Mart was
smashed, but they met no-one. Then, when they were heading back to
Doc’s place for supper, Jessie saw someone run behind a house. It
was just a quick