Copyright 2008 by Elizabeth Delayne

“Adam!”

The neighborhood was dark. The streetlights created a light spread thin so that the shdows o towering trees dipped long and wide across the yards. Flowering bushes, so pretty in the daytime, presented barriors to her vision.

“Adam!” Celeste called out again, looking left and right as she walked on. Her heart hammered as she tightened her grip on her cell phone. She couldn’t find him. What was she going to do if she couldn’t find him?

A car came down the road, its headlights a bright beam in the dark night. It was a busy road during the day. It reminded her that she didn’t know the neighborhood, didn’t know the people in this town. If anything happened to her it would be weeks before her brother returned and discovered her missing.

He wasn’t one to call in for periodic checkups. Anything could happen to her in the strage neighborhood, in the dark of night.

A chill ran down her neck. Dangerous, she thought, as the car sped past.

Okay, God. This isn’t so smart. I don’t know what else to do. You know Adam– she giggled a little. Well, you knew that Adam, too ... but this one’s not the original one, and I’m not so sure he has so much originality to him. He’s a dog who does his thing. And this is a dark road in a place I don’t know, in the middle of the night. Not the best thing for me to stand around doing. You know that. I know. Just nervous here, ha ha. Help me out here, please.

The windows of all the houses on the street were dark, reminding her it was well passed midnight. Adam’s bedtime was hours ago. He’d only lightly dosed since she’d arrived that afternoon.

Where had that bolt of energy come from?

It had seemed so simple. Watch Adam and their new house for the three weeks her brother and sister-in-law were in Europe on a late, but well deserved honeymoon. Between finding a way to transfer their jobs so they could be in the same city, moving, and using the remaining of their vacation time, it had taken awhile to work out. She was between jobs, needed a place to stay anyway.

“Adam!” she called out again. “Where are you?”

Another car approached and began to slow down. Celeste closed her hand into a tight fist, prepared to use her cel lphone, anything, to protect herself.

It turned out to be a patrol car.

The window was already down, the arm of the officer rested on the rim.

The cop was ... wow ... captivating in the least. Too ruged to be considered handsome, she supposed, but with intense eyes that she could tell were blue even in the darkness.

“You the one looking for the kid?”

“The kid?” she asked, in surprise. “No ... not a kid.”

“House on this street phoned in 911, said some lady was out searching for her kid.”

“No ... not, not a kid,” she held up the leash she had in her other hand. “Dog. Big brute of a dog that’s like a child to my brother.”

“A dog?” he asked. “Do you know what time it is? Out screaming for a dog.”

“You’re obviously not a dog person,” she muttered.

“I’m here to keep the peace. Dispatch said some lady was keeping up the neighborhood again looking for her kid.”

“Again? I just got here today,” she muttered, then understood that her brother hadn’t been so forthcoming in telling her of Adam’s behavior. “Look, it’s my brother’s dog. I don’t know this neighborhood. And I have to find him.”

The cop motioned for her to step back and moved his car to the curb. She watched as he parked, and climbed out. He was taller then she’d expect. Stood a near six inches over her five foot eight frame. He held out his hand for the leash.

“You’re going to help me.”

“Keep the peace,” he reminded her as he turned on the long metal flashlight he had brought out of his car with him.

She rolled her eyes, but handed him the leash.

“What’s the name?”

“Mine?”

“Lady, I’d like to help you find the dog. Do we have to find you first.”

“Very funny. It’s Adam.”

“The dog’s name is Adam?”

“Its certainly not my name.”

He grinned, looking her with a look of appreciation in his eyes. “I suppose not. Why’d you name the dog Adam.”

“It’s my brother’s dog,” she reminded him. “And it has something to do with the first man/first dog kind of thing. Or being a man’s man kind of dog.”

“It’s a big dog isn’t it.”

Celeste grinned at the trependation in his eyes. “Not so much for a big guy like you. And he’s not so big on the inside. A gentle giant, really,” she said, then frowned as she looked around again. “But he can show a surprising amount o energy in the middle of the night.”



They’d found him in the cemetery, not more than a mile from the house. He was curled up in front of the elaborate head stone of Ima Ray Jenkins, as if he had gone to keep her company. When Celeste and Jake arrived, he looked more affronted and bring pulled from his sleep.

And being that he was such a big dog, it took a little sweet talking and coercion to get him to his feet.

Jake just stood back and watched as he trained his police issue flashlight on them, his hard shell of a cop melting away–if any of it was left. They’d spent four hours together, looking through the neighborhood and doing their best not to wake the dead in their search for the dog.

Which was a good thing, he supposed as he scanned the cemetery–not waking the dead, of course. They hadn’t been as quiet as he’d planned, but after four hours of walking around, you got to know one another better. You start to tell stories, crack jokes. Find things that you have in common.

Find yourself a little surprised and ... in wonder.

It hadn’t seemed like four hours. It had seemed ...

Right. How could it just seem so right?

Jake watched as Adam finally lumbered to his feet. His big, sad, Great Dane sized eyes look at him and kept Jake from stepping forward. It wasn’t that he didn’t like dogs ...

He just wasn’t so fond of dogs that challenged him in size.

Celeste employed a firm dialogue with the dog as they walked the mile or so back to her brother’s house. Gone was the light chatter between the two of them that had kept them company through the early morning search.

So he watched her, watched the emotions play across her face as she talked to the dog and held firm to the leash. She was wearing somewhat of a tacky ensemble, he realized now as the morning light began to dawn. Something she’d pulled on to take the dog outside. Her blond hair that somehow it her name—Celeste—was pulled up in a pony tail. Her face, void of makeup.

But she was somehow ... captivating.

When they reached her house, she opened the front door and stood there with Adam on a leash. “I don’t know what I would have done without you. I don’t know how to thank you.”

“Just keeping—“

”The peace. Yes, I know.”

She smiled at him then.

“It’s getting ... early,” he said, at last. “I know a place where we can get a cup of coffee. Watch the street wake up into the morning. You don’t normally see as many celestial bodies during the day. Might to be nice to see how you are in the sunlight.”

“Oh ... you’re funny. And ... that would be ...” he voice faded away as she remembered her state of dress. She looked down then at the old sweat pants and t-shirt, and the flannel shirt she’d pulled on. He watched the blush steal up into her cheeks.

“How bout I go get my car, go clock out and change myself, and meet you back here in an hour.”

“An hour sounds nice.”

Her cell phone rang then and by the look on her face it was her brother returning the call she’d placed to him ours before.

“Hey–“ she answered the call as she stepped inside the house and shot him a parting smile. “You want to tell me what kind of death wish Adam has? He seems a little preoccupied with the cemetery in the middle of the night... Yeah, maybe you should have.”

Jake shook his head as the door closed and grinned as he headed back to his car.

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