The Last Dog on Earth (10 page)

“Is that your dog?” Devon yelled, running to catch up. He couldn't run very fast because he was dragging Otis through the rain. Otis didn't look happy about it. He kept trying to turn in the other direction. His collar was stretched so tight that Devon was practically choking him—not that Devon seemed to care. For once, Logan felt sort of sorry for Otis. After all, Otis didn't have any say over who owned him.

“Why'd you get a dog?” Devon asked.

Logan shrugged. “It was Robert's idea.”

“Yeah, but why
now
?” Devon asked.

“Why not now?” Logan asked, frowning.

Devon sneered at him. “Because of the dog disease, you idiot. Don't you watch TV?”

Logan furrowed his brow. Actually, he didn't. The sight of Robert in the living room every night, staring at the tube with that lobotomized look on his face … well, that had sort of turned Logan off the whole TV-watching thing.

“It's really bad. They say people can get it, too. We're getting Otis checked out this afternoon,” Devon said. He peered down at Jack with a slightly curled lip. “So … what's his name?”

“It's a she,” Logan said. “Her name is Jack.”

“Jack? You named a girl dog
Jack
?”

“It was the name of Robert's dog when he was a kid,” Logan said. He glanced toward the deli at the end of the block. The neon beer signs glowed red in the wet, gray morning. He could see the deli owner, Mr. Boone, behind the counter. He was reading the paper. He looked dry and cozy. His dog, Thor, sat beside him. Logan could just barely see Thor's pointy ears sticking up from behind the window display of beer cans.

“She's a mutt, huh?” Devon said. “I mean, she's got to be. No purebred dog would look like
that.
”

Otis started sniffing Jack's behind. Jack backed away from him. Her ears flattened. It was sort of funny. Judging by the annoyed look on her face, you'd have thought she felt pretty much the same about Otis as Logan did about Devon.

Otis barked.

“No barking,” Devon commanded. He yanked Otis away from Jack with a sharp tug on his leash. The chain jangled again. Otis sat on his haunches. His tail was wagging. He tried to get up again, but Devon held the leash fast.

Jack stared at Otis. She growled.

“Your dog is weird,” Devon muttered.

“Yeah, well, look, I better get going,” Logan said. “I've got to buy some whole milk for Robert's coffee.” He started back toward the deli. Jack trotted along by his side, her soggy paws splashing on the sidewalk.

“Dogs aren't allowed in the deli, butt munch,” Devon called after him. “Mr. Boone put a sign up a long time ago.”

Logan stopped and turned around. “Mr. Boone
has
a dog.”

“No duh, Einstein.” Devon's lips turned downward. “Thor doesn't get along with other dogs. And there's no way Mr. Boone would even think about letting another dog in there now. Your dog might be sick.”

For a second, Logan hesitated on the sidewalk. But then he turned again and started jogging down the block. He refused to worry. Jack wasn't sick. The disease was a Redmont thing. It had nothing to do with him or Pinewood.

“Mr. Boone isn't going to let you in!” Devon yelled.

Sure enough, there was a big sign on the deli's sliding glass double doors. It hung right at eye level. Logan could read it from a good fifteen feet away. NO DOGS ALLOWED.

Funny, he had never noticed it before. Then again, he'd never noticed a
lot
of things before.

Ever since he'd gotten Jack, certain little details of life had suddenly started jumping out at him. Like the way different people behaved with their dogs. Some people controlled their dogs with punishment—Devon Wallace, for example. Other people allowed their dogs to control
them.
Like Mr. Boone.

Not that Logan could blame the guy. If Logan owned Thor, he'd probably have a hard time keeping control, too. Thor was a German shepherd, but he looked more like a wolf. He was huge—maybe a
hundred and forty pounds (he definitely weighed more than Logan), with thick, splotchy, brownish-gray fur. His eyes weren't bright and intelligent, like Jack's. They were hard and cold, like two black stones. And when Thor stared at you, you couldn't help wondering:
Is he sizing me up for a meal?

Logan looked at Thor through the window.

The drizzle was turning into a full-fledged downpour. Logan didn't want to leave Jack out in this cruddy weather.

This is stupid
, he thought. Buying whole milk wasn't going to take longer than ten seconds. Mr. Boone could deal with another dog for
ten seconds
, especially if it was raining. Right. Logan hurried forward, pulling Jack along with him. The sliding doors parted with a swish.

The store was bright and warm. Logan wiped his feet on the mat and took a deep breath. His eyes flashed to the refrigerated aisle in the back, the one with all the dairy products. He'd be in and out before Mr. Boone even noticed.

“Hey!” Mr. Boone shouted. “Get that mutt out of here! Can't you read?”

Mr. Boone had never been Logan's biggest fan. Mr. Boone wasn't a big fan of anyone, really. Except Thor. He reminded Logan of Robert, only he was older. He was probably close to sixty. Like Robert, he yelled a lot. He wore the same blue polyester shirt every day—either that, or he had a bunch of shirts that were all exactly alike. His skin was the color of rotten lettuce.

“I'm sorry, Mr. Boone,” Logan said. “I saw the sign, but I figured since it's raining and all, and I only have to buy one thing, I could just run in and—”

“Get out!” Mr. Boone shouted.

Logan could see Thor's ears pricking up behind the cash register.

“I promise I won't be long,” Logan said. He started toward the dairy case.

Thor barked at him. It was a loud bark. Louder than Jack's, even. Logan stopped.

Thor stood up on his hind legs. He eyed Logan and Jack across the counter with his cold, hungry stare.

Mr. Boone grabbed Thor's thick leather collar to hold him still.

Logan felt nervous. But for some completely unfathomable reason, he laughed. Thor really
did
look as though he wanted to eat Logan and Jack for breakfast. He was actually slobbering. Foamy drool fell from his jowls. He was quivering, too, as if he couldn't contain his excitement at the prospect of tearing both Logan and Jack to shreds.

“I'm not going to tell you again,” Mr. Boone said through his teeth, which were clenched under the strain of holding on to Thor's collar. His knuckles turned white. “Get out of here. That dog of yours might be sick. I'm not taking any chances. No way am I going to send Thor to a quarantine center just because some idiot brought his sick dog in here.”

“A
what
center?” Logan asked.

“You heard me,” Mr. Boone said.

Quarantine center? They were quarantining dogs now? Logan's stomach contracted. This disease thing was getting pretty freaky.

Jack tugged on her leash. She tried to pull Logan toward the counter. She was staring straight at Thor. A low growl rumbled deep in her throat.

“She's not sick,” Logan said. “I promise. We had her totally
checked out last week. I'll only be a second. My stepdad just wants me to buy him some whole milk for his coffee.”

Mr. Boone's face darkened. “Fine,” he murmured. “You want to play games with me, go ahead.” He flashed a humorless smile, then let go of Thor's collar. “Go get 'em, Thor.”

Thor didn't need any more encouragement. With a mighty jump, he sprang over the counter and dove down into the main aisle—skidding halfway across the floor, his front legs splayed in front of him.

Logan's jaw dropped. He couldn't move. He couldn't believe this was happening. He stared in horror as Thor's thick, barrel-like body slammed into a display rack of potato chips and knocked a couple of bags loose. One hit Thor's head. He didn't even seem to notice.

“Jack, run!” Logan shouted.

He sprinted toward the dairy case, clutching the leash as tightly as he could. He wasn't thinking; he was just trying to put as much distance between himself and Thor as possible. Luckily, Jack followed him. Thor came within inches of nipping one of Jack's paws. But he skidded on the muddy linoleum and bumped into a table that had a microwave oven on it. The table's legs wobbled. So did Thor's. He fell on his side.

“Ahh-oooo,”
he howled.

Logan spun around.

He was at a dead end. His eyes darted to Thor, then to Jack, then to Mr. Boone, then to the sliding glass doors—now fifteen feet away. Thor blocked his exit.

Think, think, think!

Thor was having a hard time getting back up. He kept slipping
and falling back down. There was too much water on the floor.

“Go on, boy!” Mr. Boone shouted. “Go on!”

Logan gaped at Mr. Boone. The guy was smiling.
Smiling.
Over the fact that his demon wolf-dog was terrorizing one of his customers.

All at once, a switch flipped inside Logan's brain.
Click!
The frightened part of him shut down. The angry part of him took control.

Something on one of the shelves caught his eye. It was a can of bug spray marked fifty percent off.

The plan came together even before Logan realized it. Sometimes an idea just came to him like a big, soft mallet falling out of the sky— and when it hit, it didn't hurt so much as tickle, and everything suddenly became crystal clear.

“Come on, Thor!” Mr. Boone hollered.

Logan bolted back down the aisle. With his right hand, he held Jack's leash. With his left, he snagged the bug spray. In a single, deft maneuver, he jumped over Thor—and as he landed, he shoved the spray can into the panel that popped open the microwave's door:
ping.

“Hey!” Mr. Boone yelled. “Get away from there!”

Logan could hear Thor scrabbling to get up. He could practically
feel
those teeth. Jack was straining to get to the sliding doors—as far away from Thor as possible. She pulled the leash tight. But there was no time to worry about all that. Logan tossed the bug spray into the microwave. He slammed the door shut and punched Popcorn, then hit Start. His legs were already in motion.

“Are you out of your mind?” Mr. Boone shrieked.

Logan broke into a full-on sprint.

The sliding doors parted. Logan and Jack flew through them,
picking up speed as they sloshed down the sidewalk. A smile crept across Logan's face. Rain pelted his skin. His legs burned. His lungs felt as if they were about to burst. Jack ran beside him—mouth wide open, as if she were smiling, too. Logan could hear Mr. Boone's muffled voice behind them, although he couldn't understand what Mr. Boone was saying. It sounded like gibberish.

A few seconds later, Logan heard a soft
pop.
More like a
pffft.
Very short. It was followed by the tinkle of shattering glass.

Apparently, the plan had worked.

Logan reached the end of the block and spun around. He doubled over, struggling to catch his breath. Then he looked up.

The plan had worked a little better than expected.

One of the deli's sliding doors was stuck in the closed position. Thor must have hurled himself against it because he lay beside it, in the opening where the other door should have been. A crazy, jagged, spiderweb pattern spread from a six-inch hole in the glass—at about the same height as Thor's snout. A small blaze was raging inside the store. There was a lot of smoke. Mr. Boone was busy trying to put it out with a fire extinguisher. He hadn't stopped yelling, although Logan still couldn't understand what he was saying.

For a second, Logan felt kind of sick. Maybe he should stick around and try to help Mr. Boone put the fire out….

But no, sticking around was a bad idea. Sticking around meant getting into some serious trouble. The kind of trouble that involved fire trucks and cops and a very angry Robert.

So Logan did the only thing left to do.

He took off, running as fast as he could. Jack loped beside him,
her tongue hanging out. When he looked down at her, he could have sworn she was grinning.

“Sorry I took so long,” Logan called as he opened the front door. “I had to go all the way to the supermarket to get whole milk. Mr. Boone had a little—”

He broke off in midsentence.

Mom and Robert were standing in the hall, side by side. Robert's face was blank. There was no expression—no anger, even. Nothing. But that wasn't what freaked Logan out. What freaked him out was that Mom looked as if she were about to cry. She swallowed a few times. Her lips were trembling.

Jack's leash slipped from Logan's fingers. He clutched the carton of milk against his chest. His hands felt clammy all of a sudden.

“Mr. Boone isn't going to press charges,” Robert said.

Logan's insides curled into a painful knot. “Mr. Boone …” He left the words hanging. His eyes wandered from Mom to Robert and back again. He didn't even know what he wanted to say. Or if there was anything
to
say.

“I just got off the phone with him,” Robert said. “Insurance should cover the fire and door damage. But he's going to have to close up shop for the next few days. Which means he's going to lose money.”

Robert's voice was as flat and even as radio static. There was no emotion. Computers spoke with more feeling.

Jack ran upstairs. The leash dragged behind her.

“I can get a job,” Logan said. “I can pay him back. I'll take care of it.” He hadn't planned on confessing or apologizing, but the
offers just exploded from his mouth.
Warning. Flammable. Contents under pressure. Do not expose to high temperatures.
“I mean it. I'm fourteen years old. Maybe I can—”

“Be quiet, Logan,” Mom breathed.

“Mom, seriously, I didn't—”

“Enough, Logan,” Robert said. “Don't turn this into a production.”

A tear slid down Mom's left cheek.

Why are you crying?
Logan wanted to shout at her.
Stop it!
A large, painful lump lodged in his throat.

“I'm going to take care of paying Mr. Boone back,” Robert said. “That's not the issue. The issue is that you destroyed somebody's property. That's vandalism, Logan. It's a crime. You've gone too far this time.”