GPS Watchdog

Marv hung his note on the refrigerator magnet.

Going to try and find Luke again.

His arthritis keeps him from wandering far.

Never gone this long though.

Gotta be close by.

Got my phone.

GPS on.

Be back in an hour.

Marv

After waking up and reading the note, Priscilla yawned, stuck it back on the fridge door.  ‘Well… What you think Luke?  Think he’ll ever give up tryin’ to find you?’  She glanced down at the underside of the kitchen table.  ‘Might help if you ever came out from underneath there and stopped pulling the tablecloth down on ya.’  She looked out the window at the small corn field, its harvest completed, its mulching process on full display.  Then, her eyes focused across the road to the forest pines. ‘Thank God, winter mornin’s coming up.  That should stop him cold.’

Luke thumped his tail on the linoleum as Priscilla chuckled at her joke and glanced at her phone propped on the countertop where Luke liked to watch the GPS dot move about like all the other times.

‘That dot still movin’ across the screen?  Your nose be too old to smell much, but those bloodhound eyes never fail us, do they?  You let me know if the dot stops, okay?

Gonna stir up some eggs for you, prunes for me, and some oatmeal for Marv.

Work for you?’

The old hound gave a sigh, repositioned his jowls on his paws, did a small adjustment to his arthritic back side and stayed fixed on the little dot, now going in circles.

Luke squeezed out an ancient, but friendly, growl.

Priscilla glanced again at the phone. ‘You know, Luke, Marvin’s the one needin’ a leash, don’t you think? You eat first, then go fetch him, and don’t be upset if he doesn’t recognize you”

She reached down to the floor, patted his head, ‘Such a good doggy,’ slid the scrambled eggs into his bowl.  ‘Just like you like ‘em.  Soft, but not runny.  Gotta look after those gums of yours, right?’  She stood back up, took another look at the phone and its GPS still going in circles. ‘You know, Luke, I’d say he picked that up from you, the circling I mean.  Just like when you were a puppy.  Always chasing your tail.

‘Marv’s  a good guy, though.  Don’t ya think?  Good to me for 58 years now.  Good to you for… damn.  You gettin’ old too, you know.  14 years.’  She picked up the phone.  Looks like he’s back to that old tree he loves.  Buried your mum there, Luke, when she died, right next to his own mother’s grave.   Maybe he thinks that’s where you’ll eventually come to visit.  You know where that is, Luke.’  She leaned down, picked up the empty bowl as the old dog lumbered to the back door, nudged the screen open and sauntered toward the woods.

Holding the phone now with both hands, she gazed at Marv’s circle not moving.  It stayed still.  It didn’t stir.  She waited.  It remained still, oh, so still. 

Priscilla’s eyes filled with moist memories.

She moved to the screen door and stared out.

In a tear-filled whisper, she muttered, ‘He would have wanted his usual hot bath later.’