One Door From Heaven

while he travels in its company.
        He dares not continue southwest, for eventually the valley must bring him to the interstate, which will be patrolled. He came out of the east. The ghost town lies north. Therefore, he has little choice but to cross the width of the valley, heading due west.
        Although he's in no danger of setting a land-speed record, and although he sometimes progresses in fits and starts as he cranes his neck to see over the steering wheel or ducks his head to peek between it and the top of the dashboard, he discovers that the salt flats arc negotiable terrain. When he reaches the slope of the western valley wall, however, he realizes that he can't go farther in this fashion.
        Here, the saltless land doesn't have an accommodating natural glow. Visibility already limited by the boy's height immediately declines to a condition not much better than blindness. Switching on the SUV headlights will provide no solution-unless he wants to call attention to himself and thereby commit suicide.
        Furthermore, the rising land will be rocky and uneven. Curtis will need to react to conditions more quickly with both the brake pedal and the accelerator than he's been able to do thus far.
        He shifts into park and sits high, gazing at the route ahead, stymied by the challenge.
        His sister-becoming provides the solution. During the slow ride across the last of the salt flats, Old Yeller sat in the passenger's seat, decorating the side window with a pattern of nose prints. Now she stands in her seat and gives Curtis a meaningful look.
        Maybe because grief is weighing on his mind, maybe because he's still rattled by his strange encounter with the caretaker, Curtis is embarrassingly slow on the uptake. At first he thinks that she simply wants to be scratched gently behind the ears.
        Because she will never object to being scratched gently behind the ears or virtually anywhere else, Old Yeller accepts a minute of this pleasantness before she turns away from Curtis and, still with hind legs on the seat, places her forepaws on the dashboard. This puts her in a perfect position to see the route ahead.
        This boy-dog relationship would be worthless if Curtis still failed to get her drift, but he understands what she has in mind. He will operate the controls of the SUV, and she will be his eyes.
        Good pup!
        He slides far enough down in his seat to plant his right foot firmly on the accelerator and to be able to shift it quickly and easily to the brake pedal. He is also in a satisfactory position to steer. He just can't see out of the windshield.
        Their bonding is not complete. She is still his sister-becoming rather than his sister-become; however, their special relationship grew considerably in that scarey moment when each of them saw both of their lives Hashing before their eyes.
        Curtis shifts the SUV out of park, presses the accelerator, and steers up the relatively easy slope of the valley wall with the eyes of his dog to guide him. Together they gain confidence during the ascent, and they function in perfect harmony by the time they reach the top.
        He halts on the ridge, sits up, and through his own eyes looks northeast. The fighting at the ghost town seems to have ceased. The scalawags and the worse scalawags have realized that neither of them has captured their quarry. No longer battling each other, they are turning their attention once more to the search for boy and dog.
        The running lights of two helicopters float in the sky. A third is approaching from farther in the east. Reinforcements.
        Slouching in his seat once more, Curtis drives down off the ridge, heading farther west into unknown territory that Old Yeller scouts for him with unwavering diligence.
        He drives as fast as seems prudent, keeping in mind that his sister-becoming could be hurt if he hits the brakes suddenly at too high a speed.
        They need to make good time, however, because he can't expect the dog to be his eyes as long as he would like. Curtis requires no rest. Old Yeller will eventually need to sleep, but Curtis has never slept in his life.
        After all, he must remember that he and his sister-becoming are not merely members of different species with far different physical abilities and limitations. More significantly, they were born on different worlds.

Chapter 33
        
        THURSDAY'S GHILD