question it. “Bentley! Where is he?”
Her mom came into the hall from the kitchen, drying her hands on a towel. “You found the dog?” she said to Patrick.
He nodded, still grinning.
“Where is he?” Ellie asked, almost pleading.
“He’s over on Cotton Court,” Patrick said.
Ellie made a move for the door, but her mother grabbed her arm. “Hold on a sec’, hon. Why didn’t you bring him home?”
Patrick’s grin grew and he glanced at Ellie and then his mother. “I couldn’t move him,” he said.
“What do you mean?” his mother said warily.
Ellie felt something in her stomach lurch. She grabbed her brother’s arm tight and said with a voice that sounded far away, “What’s wrong with him?”
Her brother continued to grin but said nothing. Ellie bolted for the door, bursting out into the morning cold and snow in just her PJ’s and socks. She ran as fast as she could, her feet numb from the snow and tears streaming back into her hair as she fought back the panic rising in her throat. Her mother’s voice chased her down the street, but Ellie was too fast and nothing would have stopped her anyway. Cotton Court was up ahead.
* * *
Jimmy and John stood staring at what was left of the dog while Luke scraped snow over the vomit with his shoe. He didn’t want to look at the headless dog anymore even though he had little left to throw up. He’d seen worse in his short life and it wasn’t that he couldn’t handle some cut up animal, but he knew this dog and knew its owner. In fact, Ellie Pemberton was someone very special to him. And Bentley had been pretty cool, too.
“Crap,” Luke said. “Why did someone do this to Bentley?”
Jimmy and John knew the dog, too, and shook their heads slowly in unison, like they were watching some demented tennis match.
“I want to know WHO did this,” Jimmy said. “’Cause when I find out…” His voice trailed off as his fists clenched and unclenched in his gloves. It was so quiet, the leather squeaked as his fingers squeezed.
The other boys had left and Patrick Pemberton had gone home to tell his sister. Luke had seen the glint in his eye and knew he would not be gentle with the news. Had Luke known exactly what Patrick was going to do, he would have never let him go alone. Luke couldn’t understand the huge difference between Patrick and his sister, Ellie. It was like night and day.
Luke caught movement out of the corner of his eye and turned to see a harried and distraught Ellie lurching through the snow toward them.
“Oh crap!” he said, and hurried to cut her off. John and Jimmy moved in front of the frozen Bentley to block her view.
“Ellie! No!” Luke said grabbing her shoulders and stopping her from getting any closer.
Her face was pale except for two red spots high on her cheeks. Her breath came in gasps and she was trembling beneath his hands. “Lucas Harrison, you get out of my way!” she said, trying to look past him.
“No,” Luke said, and he shook her shoulders once. “Look at me.”
She wouldn’t at first and struggled a bit in his grasp, then her lip trembled and her eyes went to his. As she saw what was in them, she dropped her head to his shoulder, clutched at his coat and sobbed, “No!”
He held her that way until her mother came up and took her into her arms.
Chapter 3
A week passed since the discovery of Bentley’s frozen and decapitated body, and Luke finally stopped having nightmares. School re-opened and he trudged through each class as the day dragged. Ellie shared two classes with him and he tried talking to her but she was withdrawn and quiet. He understood, he just missed his happy go lucky friend.
On the fourth day after they found the dog, Luke put a small, white, stuffed bear on her locker and watched from a distance as she finally smiled for the first time. She looked around finding him, and she raised it in a salute as her eyes found his, a small glimmer of a smile sneaking across her lips. He knew then she would be alright.
Ellie’s mother had called the police and they came out and looked around, inspecting the dog’s carcass and hauling it away. They promised they would follow up but they told the Pembertons it had probably been some kids. The one detective had eyed Luke’s little group of boys as he said this, but didn’t question any of them. Luke had been pissed that he would silently accuse them just because they were conveniently there. At least Ellie hadn’t seen the detective look at him that way. He didn’t know if he could handle Ellie blaming him for Bentley.
On Friday, snow started to fall again and they were expecting a blizzard. Hopefully it would snow all weekend and school would be canceled again on Monday. Luke was walking home from the bus stop with Jimmy and John when he saw Ellie sitting on her front step. She hadn’t been at school.
“I’ll catch up with you guys later,” he said, and wandered over to her.
When he got closer he could see she was crying. He stopped short of her porch thinking he should just leave her alone, but then she wiped her face and looked up at him.
“Hey,” she said.
“Hey. Missed you in class today. You sick?”
She shook her head. “No, I didn’t want to go.”
“Me neither. Maybe school will be canceled again on Monday because of the snow.”
“Uh huh. I hope it snows hard.”
Luke didn’t know what to say so he just stood there for a minute as the silence dragged out. Finally he said, “Whatcha doing?”
“Just watching the snow.”
He nodded and the silence went on for a few more seconds. “Are your parents gonna let you get another dog?”
He watched her face fall and realized, too late, what an idiot he was. He tried to backtrack. “I mean, when you’re ready. Jeez-I’m sorry Ellie. I didn’t mean…”
“I know. It’s ok. Come sit by me.” She patted the spot next to her and he walked over and sat. “I just don’t know right now,” she said. “I can’t even think of looking at another dog. Maybe it sounds stupid to people, but he was like my best friend. I could never replace him.”
Luke nodded. “He was pretty cool.”
She was silent for a moment and Luke could actually hear the snow falling. Just a hint of a whisper as the snowflakes fell past his eyes. Ellie had a few flakes stuck to the bangs around her face and he thought she looked like an angel.
“I’m glad you stopped me the other day. I was a little out of my head.”
“No problem,” he said. “He was…uh, kind of messed up.”
She looked about to cry again. “Was he really that bad?”
Luke nodded. “I got sick.”
“Oh God-maybe I shouldn’t have asked you.”
“I’m sorry. I won’t say anymore.”
“Ok-I don’t want to know. They took him away and I won’t ever see, so that’s good, right?”
“Yeah.”
“I’ll just remember him the way he was.”
Luke looked at the ground thinking he wasn’t helping her at all. He didn’t know how to talk to her without upsetting her. He felt like a jerk.
She was staring off into the falling snow and a single tear ran down her cheek. He wanted to reach up and brush it away, but was scared, so he just sat and shuffled his feet, not knowing what to do.
