Man's Best Friend
Dennis Maguire had always considered himself a happy man, one blessed with a beautiful wife, good health and a successful career. A well-known author of a popular series of children's books, he was financially set for life. He drove an expensive Italian sports car, traveled extensively and was the proud owner of a restored eighteenth-century mansion originally built by a wealthy New England sea captain and American patriot. Fortune had indeed smiled down upon him, but fortune was often a fickle friend whose smile could quickly turn to a scowl.
His misfortune all began one warm, early September evening when Dennis returned home from Fenway Park where he had attended a baseball game on behalf of one of his favorite charities. He was in good spirits because the Red Sox had beaten their archrivals, the New York Yankees, in a twelve-inning game. When Dennis entered his house, he was surprised to find his wife, Brenda, standing in the hallway with her Louis Vuitton luggage by her side.
"What's wrong?" he asked, fearing something might have happened to his elderly mother-in-law. "Why are your bags packed?"
"I've had enough. I'm leaving you, Dennis," Brenda replied calmly.
There were no bitter tears, no angry condemnations and no hysterics. She might just as well have been telling him she was going to Shop 'N Save to get a quart of milk for all the emotion she displayed.
"I don't understand. We've been married for fifteen years. Why, all of a sudden, do you want to just walk out on me?"
"Because I've always believed marriage ought to be based on two people making a life together, each one contributing something and each getting something in return. For the past several years, I just haven't felt that I've gotten anything out of this relationship."
"What did you expect to get out of it? We've got a beautiful home. We travel all around the world. I buy you just about everything you want."
He stopped speaking. This was clearly the wrong tactic to take.
"Look, honey, I'm sure we can work this out. I love you, and I don't want to lose you. Just tell me what you want."
"I want romance. I want to feel love and passion again." She paused momentarily, her eyes cast down, and then delivered the pièce de résistance, "I want to be with Alan."
"Alan? Alan Worthington?"
Dennis was dumbfounded. He had not had any clue that his wife was involved with his old college friend.
"Why Alan of all people? He's nothing but a cad, a ladies' man. You know how it is with him. He's all moonlight and roses at first, but then he loses interest after the conquest. Surely, you don't want to be another one of his castoffs."
"It's different with us, Dennis. Alan really loves me. He's told me so, and I believe him. He's even asked me to marry him."
"You're talking about marriage? How long has this been going on between you two?"
"About six months now. You were so busy writing, you never even noticed."
"Oh, so everything is my fault! Is that what you're saying?"
Dennis could feel a deep-rooted anger beginning to surface.
"No. I suppose I'm as much to blame for the failure of our relationship as you are. I could have come to you long ago and told you how lonely and dissatisfied I was, but I didn't."
"No, you didn't. Instead, you ran into the arms of another man."
Brenda sighed; she had hoped they could end their marriage on good terms and that they could remain friends, but clearly such was not to be the case.
"Goodbye, Dennis," she said with a sad finality and walked out the door.
* * *
Dennis was surprised at just how little his life changed after Brenda walked out on him. He still woke at seven each morning, ate his breakfast alone at his desk and then spent most of the day writing. But what else was he to do? Writing was his profession. He had given birth to a series of books about a boy named Casey Cochran and his German shepherd, Ranger. For close to two decades, Casey and Ranger were staples of children's literature.
As Dennis pounded away at the keyboard of his old IBM Selectric typewriter—he had yet to make a switch to a computer word processor—he thought about Brenda and the life they had shared. Perhaps she was right. Day after day, year after year, Dennis had shut himself away in his den. Within those hallowed walls, there had been no room for a wife. There had only been room for Casey Cochran—who was nothing more than the sum of Dennis's own childhood memories—and his ever-faithful canine companion, Ranger.
The real Ranger had been a gift to Dennis from his mother and father on his second birthday. The boy and dog grew up together and became inseparable playmates. Despite the number of human friends the child made over the years, his German shepherd would always remain the most cherished.
Time, unfortunately, put an end to their close friendship. When Dennis turned seventeen, he was considered a young man with his whole life ahead of him. But the years had not been so kind to Ranger, who was, in a dog's short life span, very old. Blind in one eye, partially deaf and suffering from the aches and pains of advanced age, Ranger was no longer the energetic playmate he had once been. Approaching sixteen years old, all he could do was lie on his cushion, lift his head and wag his tail whenever Dennis stooped to pet him.
Then the inevitable day came when Dennis's mother took Ranger to the vet for his annual check-up. Afterward, she came home and broke the sad news to her son.
"Dr. Brady thinks it's best if we put Ranger to sleep."
"No," the teenager cried, "we can't let him kill Ranger."
"I know how much you love him, Dennis. That's why you have to do what is best for him. He can barely walk anymore, and when he does he whimpers from the pain. It's hard, but you have to face facts. He's not going to get any better; he's only going to get worse. Do you want to stand by and watch him suffer?"
In the end, Dennis himself took Ranger to Dr. Brady's office. He even cradled the dog in his arms while the vet prepared the shot.
"Hey, Ranger, that's my good dog," he said, looking down into the shepherd's pain-glazed brown eyes.
A lump caught in his throat as he said farewell to the best friend he had ever had.
Ranger looked up, wagged his tail and licked Dennis's face. Perhaps he was saying goodbye, too. Dr. Brady administered the shot, and in a few moments, it was all over. There was no movement, no sound and no apparent pain—not for Ranger anyway. He simply drifted off to eternal sleep. Dennis, however, ran from the room in tears, suffering enough pain for both of them.
Even now, as Dennis looked down at Ranger's framed photograph on his desk, he felt his heart ache with grief. He still missed his dog terribly. Ironically, he realized with astonishment, he missed Ranger more than he missed Brenda.
* * *
Barely three weeks after his wife walked out on him, fortune dealt Dennis Maguire a second blow. This time it was his literary agent, Eugene Worth, who was the messenger of bad tidings.
"Your publisher is not renewing your contract," Eugene informed him.
"Why not?" Dennis asked.
"He claims the Casey Cochran books just aren't selling well enough to warrant a continuation of the series."
"Then we'll go to another publisher," Dennis suggested.
"Not with the Casey Cochran books we can't."
Eugene always believed in being honest with his clients.
"Look, this isn't the Nineteen Fifties. Nobody wants to read about a little boy and his dog these days. That went out with Timmy and Lassie. Most kids don't even read books, except when their teachers or parents make them. Kids today are too busy playing video games or watching television."
"So what am I supposed to do then? What's your professional advice?"
"You're a good writer, Dennis, one of the best I've ever represented," Eugene replied. "Perhaps you should try writing for adults. Or, if you want to stay with children's books, try something new, like science fiction. Maybe you could dream up some new high-tech superhero."
"Okay. How about Cyber Boy and his faithful canine companion, Space Pup," the writer joked. "They would be Casey and Ranger of the twenty-fourth century."
It was the first time in weeks that Dennis actually laughed.
Then he added in all seriousness, "I'll give it my best shot, but I can't promise anything. Science fiction is not my thing. I'm no Gene Roddenberry or George Lucas."
But hard as he tried, Dennis found he could no longer write. Fortune had once again turned on him. Deprived of his muse, he sat at his desk for hours on end in front of a silent typewriter. Not one idea would come to him.
Science fiction! he thought with disgust. What do I know about science fiction?
There was no doubt in his mind as to the cause of his writer's block: how could a man who lived in the past write of a time in the future? How could one who still wrote on a typewriter relate to the technological marvels of the computer age?
Disgusted, Dennis finally got up from his desk. He grabbed his jacket and car keys and backed his Lamborghini out of the garage. Perhaps a change of scenery would help clear away the cobwebs in his brain.
* * *
Dennis Maguire had not been back to Folkston in several years—not physically, anyway. As he drove through the center of the small Massachusetts town, he noticed how time had left its mark on his boyhood home. The municipal building and public library had not changed much, but the post office was now located in a newer, larger building on the opposite end of Main Street. A new wing had been added to his old grammar school, which was subsequently renamed the Folkston Township Elementary Center. Gone was Sanders Dairy Farm, a part of Folkston's history since before General George Washington crossed the Delaware. In its place were an outlet mall and a small housing development.
As Dennis turned onto Warner Drive, he wondered if his old house was still there. He felt like Scarlett O'Hara anxiously looking through the thick mist for a sign of Tara.
There it is, he thought with relief and an acute sense of longing. Home!
Except for a new coat of paint the house had not changed since he last saw it. He pulled the Lamborghini to the side of the road and stared nostalgically at the old clapboard Cape Cod, the flagstone patio and the overgrown lilac bushes his mother had prized so dearly. The memories were so thick, he could practically reach out and touch them, could almost hear his mother's voice echoing across the years and calling him in for dinner. However, she had been dead for almost five years already and his father for more than eight.
I shouldn't have come back here, he thought, his heart aching for a life long gone.
In his present melancholic state of mind, the last thing he needed was another reminder of how his life had gone downhill. With unshed tears in his eyes, the writer drove away, trying to put distance between himself and the painful reminders of all he had lost.
As he headed down Main Street toward the highway, he passed Independence Park. Of all the memories he cherished of his boyhood, the hours he and Ranger had spent there ranked among the best. Dennis pulled onto the gravel parking area, turned off the Lamborghini's engine and looked out over the old playground. The swings, sliding pond and monkey bars had been removed a decade earlier. In their place were modern play units with ropes, rings and wooden ramps. Through the dense forsythia bushes that bordered the playground, he could still see the North River. A chain link fence had recently been built along its banks to keep small children from getting too close to the water's edge.
Dennis smiled as he remembered all those hot summer afternoons he and Ranger swam across that river. How he missed those wonderful, carefree days of his youth. For nearly an hour the despondent author stared out the sports car's windshield, looking not ahead at the playground, but back onto his past.
Suddenly a dog's bark called him to the present. The barking seemed to be coming from the direction of the river. Dennis got out of his car and walked toward the bank.
I could have sworn there was a fence here, he thought with mild confusion.
Then he saw a young German shepherd splashing playfully in the river.
"My God, it looks just like Ranger," Dennis cried.
The dog emerged from the water, shook itself off and, with its tail wagging happily, raced toward the startled author.
"Hey, Ranger," Dennis said, affectionately petting the dog's head. "That's my good boy."
Dennis, the man, glanced at the parking area behind him. Just beyond the mysteriously resurrected swings, sliding pond and monkey bars, he saw the Lamborghini parked on the gravel. Seated behind the steering wheel was the dead body of a man staring vacantly out the windshield.
Then with profound joy and a deep sense of inner peace, Dennis, the young boy, turned back to his dog and called, "Come on, Ranger, let's go for a swim."
The two old friends, reunited for the rest of eternity, raced to the river's edge, dove in and began swimming to the other side.
Once again, it seemed that fortune was smiling down on Dennis Maguire.
Even though Salem is a cat, he still loves dogs—just as long as they stay away from his food,
