2015 Young Explorer's Adventure Guide Read online

  “Come on, boy,” Kevin yelled. “You can do it!”

  “Twenty-five!” Trevor called.

  “What?”

  Kevin looked at Meredith, who nodded morosely.

  “But Goliath was ahead after the first toss,” Kevin complained.

  Trevor cackled. “Hear that? He thinks his fleabag was ahead.”

  “I saw it. Robodog was just returning when…”

  “Robodog was on his second stick when you looked back, Kev,” Meredith said quietly.

  “Can’t wait to see the look on Calhoun’s face when he sees your underwear spread out all over his desk,” Trevor said. “I expect it’ll be there first thing Monday morning, right Robbins?”

  The kids laughed and gathered around Robodog, asking a barrage of questions.

  Kevin hung his head. Goliath gave a plaintive whine and stepped up beside Kevin. Goliath’s wet nose nuzzled his hand.

  He pulled it back.

  “I’m sorry, Kev.” Meredith put her hand on Kevin’s shoulder. “At least Goliath is a better friend than Robodog will ever be.”

  “Don’t take that to the bank,” Trevor said.

  Robodog sat at his heel.

  “Shake hands!” Trevor said. Robodog raised a paw. “Roll over.” Robodog did a crisp barrel-roll in the grass.

  Kevin’s face burned.

  “Come on, boy,” Kevin said to Goliath. “We’ve got to get home.”

  …………………………

  Kevin trudged home. Goliath ambled beside him, his tags rattling, looking as defeated as Kevin felt. The spryness of their step was long gone. The muscles in Kevin’s jaw clenched, and he made fists so tight his nails bit into the meat of his palms. All he wanted to do right now was scream. He punched the air. Right, left. Right, left. He kicked the fire hydrant at the corner of the street.

  What good was a real dog anyway?

  What good was school, or friends? Or, when it got down to it, what good was he? Maybe Mom and Dad should just go out and get a roboboy and be done with it. At least then they would have someone who finished his homework, and cleaned up, and didn’t get pushed around in school.

  Kevin turned the corner and froze when he saw his mother’s white car parked in the driveway. He was late.

  There went dinner.

  Kevin hung his head and bit back tears. Might as well get it over with.

  “Come on, boy.”

  He tugged on the dog’s collar.

  Goliath, who had taken advantage of the pause to sit down, came along without a whimper. Kevin let Goliath into the yard, and ran him some water from the hose.

  …………………………

  Music was playing as he stepped through the door. Old stuff, the stuff his parents listened to when they were kids. Was it Cold Play? Who could tell?

  “Mom?” he called.

  “We’re in the living room,” she yelled, her voice muffled.

  He walked through the house. They were dancing, if you want to call it that, pressed together arm-in-arm and swaying to the music. Mom’s head was buried in Dad’s shoulder. Dad’s eyes were closed. He looked tired, but he held her tightly to him.

  “What’s going on?” he asked.

  Mom turned her head, leaving a damp spot on dad’s shirt. Her eyes were soggy.

  “It’s cancer,” Dad said, swaying a little further.

  Kevin was stunned. He sat down on the couch.

  “So ... why are you dancing?”

  They stopped, and Dad gave a half shrug and a thin smile. “Because I feel better just knowing?”

  “What?”

  His mother put her arm around his father’s waist.

  “It’s in his kidney,” she said. “And it’s in the early stages. Its good news because there’s an approach that should get rid of it.”

  Kevin sat, listening, trying to hear it all.

  “The treatment is fairly new,” Dad said. “They remove a bit of the tissue, and take proteins from it.”

  His mother followed, “Then they tailor a drug to hunt out the cancer cells.”

  They were talking like they did in the old days, Kevin noticed, bouncing sentences back and forth. It was kind of like watching a ping pong match. Was that good? Was it not good?

  “The doctor was optimistic,” his dad said.

  “They already took the baseline tissue,” his mother added.

  “I’ll get the procedure in two days.”

  “Sunday?” Kevin finally said something.

  “Yes,” Mom replied.

  “That’s quick.”

  “They want to move fast.”

  Dad took a visible breath. “It’s going to be a tough few weeks, though.”

  “Pish,” Mom said, patting his chest and pressing her lips into a hard line. “Now is not the time to be Debbie Downer.”

  The song ended, and the three of them stood there, Kevin more than a bit dumbstruck.

  “I better get dinner ready,” Mom said, looking at Dad. “You lie down and get some rest.”

  Dad nodded and sagged into the recliner, kicked the leg support, and laid back.

  He did look tired. In fact, Kevin thought, he looked like a balloon deflating before his very eyes.

  “And you, young man,” Mom said, “can feed the dog.”

  She went to the kitchen to put something together. Kevin looked at his father.

  “You heard your mother,” Dad said.

  Kevin nodded, suddenly afraid. He wanted to ask Dad how he really felt. Was he as tired as he looked? Did it hurt? Was he as afraid as Kevin was?

  Instead he put his head down, went to the mud room to fill Goliath’s bowl, and stepped into the back yard to feed him. He put the bowl down on the concrete slab that served as their patio, and sat on the bottom of the four steps that led back to the house. The breeze was cool against the late afternoon sun. He smelled clover from the yard. A car rolled down the street across the back way. Tears welled in his eyes. Why, he thought. Why now? Why me? He hadn’t cried about anything for a long time, but now he had just listened to his mom and dad talk as if everything was so promising. He saw the way they had been holding each other so close, as if it could be the very last time that might ever happen. And now he cried.

  He didn’t understand.

  Or maybe he did understand and it was all just too much.

  He wiped his eyes on his shirt sleeves, and drew a cleansing breath.

  Looking down, he saw Goliath sitting quietly next to him, his tail twitching every so often. Goliath had to be hungry after their earlier adventures, but his bowl was untouched.

  Kevin scratched Goliath behind his ears.

  The dog gave a gentle whine, and rested against Kevin’s knee.

  “You’re a good boy,” Kevin said. “But I’ve got to go in.” He stood up, and pointed to the bowl. “And you’ve got to eat.”

  Goliath waited, staring back as Kevin climbed the stairs. Kevin watched him from inside. Once the dog was certain he had left, he gave a grumbling growl, then went to his bowl.

  Kevin smiled despite himself.

  It wasn’t until he was falling asleep that night that he realized his mother hadn’t said a word about him getting home late.

  …………………………

  Saturday was an endless process of waiting while Kevin’s dad underwent a barrage of tests.

  Kevin read a book in one waiting room. He walked up and down the halls at another. He watched television. For a while he looked at other patients being wheeled around, but it felt like he was prying, and he didn’t like that. His mom and dad chatted briefly at times and read. Mom brought her crochet but didn’t spend much time with it.

  Hospitals made Kevin anxious. They seemed so cold and so stark. Everyone talked in big words and with such practiced professionalism. It created a distance that made Kevin feel alone. The doctors and nurses strode with purpose. You could hear their voices, but their rubber-soled shoes muffled their footsteps and made it seem like they w
eren’t really there.

  It was dark by the time they got home. Mom was cranky, and Dad was so tired he conked out within seconds of hitting the recliner.

  …………………………

  They had to be back at the hospital at 8:00 on a Sunday morning, which flat-out sucked.

  Meredith offered to look in on Goliath through the day, so Kevin fed him early.

  Doctor Schivitz came into the waiting room after a few hours to let them know the procedure had gone “just beautifully.”

  He took a seat across from them and explained.

  “We placed a half-dollar-sized wafer alongside his kidney,” he said, making his thumb and finger into a round shape to indicate the size. “It will dissolve over the next week and release the counter-drug directly into the cancer.”

  They planned to get Dad up and moving today, and he would be released tomorrow if all went well.

  “Any other questions?” the doctor asked.

  The words came out of Kevin’s mouth before he could stop them. “When will we know if he’s getting better or not?”

  “Kevin!” his mother said.

  “That’s all right, Mrs. Robbins,” Dr. Schivitz said. “It’s a darn good question.”

  He leaned over and looked at Kevin straight on.

  “Your dad’s a trouper. We think he’ll do fine.”

  “But you don’t know, right? I mean. It’s not certain.”

  “You’re right,” Dr. Schivitz said. “Nothing is ever certain. But we’re doing everything we can, and the procedure has been successful in other cases.”

  Kevin chewed his lip, and the doctor sat back.

  “You’ve got a dog, right?” the doctor said.

  “Yeah.”

  “You might be interested to know that one of the very first patients they tried this on was a dog. A Belgian shepherd, I believe. Lived a good long life in Hawaii.”

  “A Belgian?” Kevin said. “That’s what Goliath is.”

  “Well,” Dr. Schivitz replied with a grin that was more honest than the one he had pasted on earlier. “What do you know about that? Maybe that’s a sign, then, eh? We’ll just hope for the best, and see what happens, all right?”

  “Yeah,” Kevin said.

  Then they were alone in the waiting room, and Kevin actually did feel better.

  “Thank goodness for dogs, eh?” his mother asked.

  Kevin nodded. “Yeah, thank goodness for dogs.”

  They had an early lunch, then went up to see Dad.

  Dad looked awful. He was drugged out, and, for a long time, could barely raise his hand. Dad lay on his side to keep pressure off the incision, which was wrapped in enough gauze to bandage the entire Civil War. The beep of a heart monitor pinged every second or so.

  Later that night Dad was able to get up and walk and eat his mashed potatoes and his meat-something-or-other. It seemed to help. By the end of visiting hours, there was color in his face, and he was laughing at the television. It was enough to make Kevin think there was real hope.

  Goliath was hungry when they got home, and pranced around the yard when they arrived. He nuzzled Kevin’s leg as he put the bowl down.

  It was dark out, and Kevin was tired enough for bed, but he watched from the window as the dog ate, lapping chunks of food, and huffing breaths between bites in his rapid-fire dog way of eating. There was something about Goliath at that moment, something about this dog with his slobber and his dog-breath and his fur all tufted up ... he thought about Goliath running against Robodog, and he choked down a breath.

  Goliath paused to scratch himself just like he had been doing since about as far back as Kevin could remember. Actually, Kevin couldn’t actually remember a time without Goliath, just like he couldn’t really imagine a future without the mangy beast, just like he couldn’t imagine...

  He had been such a dweeb, the darkest, dumbest, lowest form of dweeb that could ever exist.

  How could he ever think Robodog was better than Goliath?

  …………………………

  Trevor Johnson pressed Kevin up against his locker.

  “So, Robbins, where’s the underwear?”

  With everything going on, he had truly forgotten the bet until he saw Trevor coming down the hallway. For an instant he hoped Trevor would give it a pass, that the humiliation of losing would have been enough. But that was silly. Trevor wasn’t going to let up.

  Kevin wasn’t going to give him anything here, though. He wasn’t going to break down. He wasn’t going to cry. For a flickering instant, he imagined himself punching Trevor in the face, his fist connecting and Trevor flying skyward like Superman had launched him.

  Instead, Trevor bellied up to him, and Jimmie May and Kal McDaniels stood to either side, blocking his escape. Jimmie May cracked his gum.

  Kevin glanced up the hallway.

  “What’s the matter?” Trevor said. “Looking for your girlfriend?”

  “No,” Kevin said. “I just...”

  “You just chickened out is what you did.”

  “No, I didn’t,” Kevin said, using the wall to help him stand a little taller. “I just forgot. I’ll do it tomorrow, I promise.”

  “He forgot!” Trevor said, his voice rising. “You hear that, girls? Kevy Robbins just forgot that his sorry-assed dog got his sorry-assed butt whipped by Robodog.”

  “I said I’ll do it tomorrow,” Kevin said from between clenched teeth.

  The one-minute bell buzzed its warning, and kids scurried for class. Trevor leaned in so close Kevin could smell the sour odor of Trevor’s breath.

  “You better, if you know what’s good for you.”

  …………………………

  They released Dad around noon, and he was on the couch when Kevin got home. There were flowers on the side stand and a row of cards open on the coffee table, arranged around a potted plant with another card from Meredith’s family.

  “How you doing, Champ?” Dad asked as Kevin sat on a patch of couch.

  “Aren’t I supposed to be the one to say that?”

  Dad chuckled. “Yeah, maybe so.”

  “So?”

  “I’m sick and tired of lying on my side, I can tell you that much.”

  “How long do you have to do it?”

  “Nurse said three days.”

  “Are you getting better?” He said it straight out this time. No beating around the bush. “I mean, really better? That’s what I really want to know.”

  Dad shrugged. “You and me both, kid. I’m sure it’s too early. But I’m thinking good thoughts, you know? And I’m trying hard to fight it. I think about it all the time – taking my meds and telling my body to focus.”

  Dad moved a bit, taking pressure off his back. “No idea if all that ‘think good thoughts’ crap works, but if I don’t get better you can bet your behind it won’t be because I’m not doing everything I can.”

  Kevin nodded.

  “That’s all you can really ask for, right?” Dad asked.

  “Maybe you can’t ask for more,” Kevin said. “But I can ask for you to be all-the-way better.”

  Dad laughed and gave him a gentle punch on the arm.

  “I love you, Kevin. You’re a good kid.”

  “Thanks,” he said.

  Kevin looked at Dad.

  “Would it be okay if Goliath sleeps in my room again?”

  They had stopped that a year or so ago because dog hair got all over the place and both Kevin and Goliath had grown a few sizes since they were a kid and a puppy.

  “Fine by me,” Dad replied. “And if you do your sheets I don’t see that your mother would mind.”

  Kevin smiled.

  “Thanks.”

  …………………………

  There was no getting around it, Kevin realized. There was business he had to take care of, so he got up extra early and rode his bike to make sure he got to school before most everyone else.

  It was strange to be there with the hallways so emp
ty and silent. His footsteps echoed forever as he passed rows of lockers. It wouldn’t take long, but he was nervous enough he had to wipe sweat from his palms three times before he got to Trevor’s locker. He hoped he wouldn’t get caught.

  He put his book bag on the floor, and pulled out a glue stick and the pack of pictures he printed last night. One-by-one he put them in place. The first showed Goliath when he was a puppy and Kevin was five. They were playing with the garden hose in the front yard, and both of them were drenched to the bone. The next showed Kevin at eight. He had just had his tonsils out, and Goliath was sprawled at the foot of his bed as Kevin ate ice cream. In all he pasted up twelve photos. When that was done Kevin took a marker and wrote a sprawling string of text that snaked all around the locker, “What Robodog would dream ... if he could.”

  He stepped back. It was good. Perfect. He snapped a picture, and sent it to Meredith because he knew she would get a kick out of it.

  There would be a price, of course. Trevor would hunt Kevin down, and Jimmie May would crack his gum. But that was okay. He was going to have to deal with Trevor Johnson sometime, and Goliath was worth it – every day of the week and twice on Sundays, as Dad would say. In a strange way, Kevin even looked forward to the confrontation. It didn’t matter about any stupid fetch match or whether robodogs could do a hundred roll-overs at a time. Goliath was the best dog in the entire world, and more. If no one else saw that, well, that wasn’t his problem.

  Kevin pocketed his phone and shouldered his book bag.

  He glanced once more at Trevor’s locker, then he stood up straight and walked down the hallway toward his home room.