"Come. Now!"
She looks toward the edge.
"Storm, come!"
I hear a noise. At first I think it's the water below. It must be. It cannot be what it sounds like.
Storm is growling. At me.
She growls again, jowls quivering.
My dog is growling at me.
I know it can happen. I've read enough manuals to understand that a growl is communication, and not necessarily threat. What it communicates is a clear no. A test of dominance. Yet it feels like a threat. Like I have failed, and she's questioning my authority. Telling me she's not a little puppy anymore.
"Storm," I say as firmly as I can.
Don't show fear. Don't show hurt.
She lowers herself to the rock in submission, as if I misheard the growl.
"Storm. Come here."
Still lying down, she begins belly-crawling toward the edge.
"Goddamn it!"
I don't mean to curse, but my words ring through the canyon. She whines. Then she continues slinking toward the edge.
My heart thumps. There are only a couple of feet between us, and I want to lunge and grab her by the collar and haul her back from the edge. Yet if she resists at all, we'll go over.
I keep moving, as slowly as I can, trying to figure out how to get her back without turning this into a deadly tug-of-war.
Please, Storm. Please come back. Just a little. I can grab you if you come a few inches my way.
She puts her muzzle over the edge, and I have to clamp my mouth shut to keep from screaming at her, from startling her into falling. She lies there, looking down. Then she glances back at me. From me to the river below. Her nose works. She whines.
"I know it's water," I say as I get down onto all fours. "I know it looks wonderful. If we keep going down the ridge, there's a basin. You can swim there. I promise."
I'm talking to myself. I know that. But I hope my voice calms her, even casts some kind of spell luring her from that edge.
Again, though, she looks from me to the river. Sniffs. Whines.
I form a plan. It's dangerous, but there's no way I'm taking a chance she'll go over the edge. I creep along on all fours. When I reach Storm, I rub her flank. My hand travels up her side, still petting, aiming for her collar. I carefully hook my fingers around it.
I won't pull Storm until I'm farther from the edge, with a better footing. Before I inch backward, I glance down into the gorge. I'm getting a look at what we face, so I will be prepared should we go over. And the moment I look down, I know I do not want to go over. Glacial ice coming off the mountain has been wearing away rock for centuries, and the walls go straight down. Below, there isn't even a safe amount of water to drop into. It's a shallow mountain river, more of a stream, filled with rapids and--
There is something in the water. An unnatural shape, unnaturally colored. Long and slender. Black on the bottom. Purple and yellow on top. It's the purple and yellow that I focus on. It's a pattern of some sort, and it jogs a memory of me thinking:
I haven't seen that shirt before. It's pretty. Far more colorful than usual. Did she bring it with her, tuck it at the back of her closet, an unwanted reminder of a time when she hoped for a brighter future in Rockton.
This is Val's shirt.
It is the blouse I last saw her wearing.
I tell myself she's lost it, that maybe she removed it to wash in the stream and it floated away and that's all this is. All this is.
That's a lie. An obvious, blatant, ridiculous lie.