Journey For Love

         Duffy was a good dog.  Or at least he thought so.  He had never really understood why the humans had brought him to this place, but they had and there was not all that much he could do about it.  Already he had been here for a month, by his calculations, and not so much as a little girl asking her daddy to look at him.  No, Duffy had pretty much given up trying to look pretty and act interested.  He just wanted to get out of this place, but he no longer cared who took him.
         It was on a day such as this when he met his new neighbor, the old one having been adopted three days before.  When the shelter attendant brought the black and white dog in, Duffy sat up and tilted his head.  The kennels were all chain link, so he could see his new neighbor clearly and saw how scared and nervous the dog was.  Poor thing, he thought as he settled back down to lie upon the cold cement.  His brown eyes, however, continued to watch this neighbor of his.  After ‘lights out’, Duffy stood up and walked to the wall separating the two kennels.
         “Hey kid, what’d you do?”
         The shivering black and white lifted its head and swallowed, but did not answer.  Duffy wondered if perhaps this dog couldn’t speak.  He waited patiently.  Well, as patiently as a Labrador retriever could be when presented with something new and, yes, exciting in his world.  Duffy sighed and waited.  And waited.  And waited.  It paid off, though, when the black and white slowly sat up and looked around the shelter.
         “Wh-who are y-you?  Wh-where am I?” it said in a scared, frail voice.  It sounded female to Duffy, but he couldn’t be exactly sure anymore.  After so long in a place like this, everyone started to sound the same.
         “Name’s Duffy.  This is the animal shelter.  What’s your name, kid?”
         The black and white’s eyes widened and then it began to pace the small kennel, sniffing and whining softly.  Duffy shook his head with a sigh, having seen this far too often these days.  Some beloved pet finding itself suddenly placed in the shelter simply because of ‘no time’ or ‘new baby’.  It bothered him and he always made sure to befriend these such unfortunates because they’ve certainly been given the raw end of the deal.  At least the reason he was here was a good reason.  His loving mistress had passed away and she had had no family that could take him in.  Thus he had been placed here.
         Finally, the black and white stopped pacing and whining, looking at Duffy before speaking, fear still in its voice.
         “M-my name?  I am called…Fara.  I have heard of this place.  I never thought to be here, though.”
         Duffy felt sorry for Fara, knowing that it was always tough for the first timers, but even more so when they were so wickedly tricked into it.  He would guess they asked Fara if she wanted to go for a ride.  That she had joyfully jumped into the car and sat just so during the trip here.  He shook his head again and circled three or four times before lying down near the separating wall.
         “Yes, it is a harsh shock to one’s system to find oneself in such a place, but you will get used to it.  Tell me, do you know what breed you are?”
         Duffy asked the question carefully, knowing that a lot of the dogs brought into the kennels were not purebreds, but mutts.  He never liked to offend anyone, especially a first timer.
         “Breed?  I do believe the humans called me a border collie.  Yourself?  What is yours?”
         “Labrador retriever.  Pleased to meet you, Fara.  Get some sleep for morning comes early here in the kennels.” Duffy then closed his eyes and started to drift off to sleep.
         Fara could not settle down.  Put it up to her being a border collie, or new to the shelter life, or just homesick for her old life.  Whatever the reason was, she couldn’t lie down, never mind trying to sleep.  It wasn’t going to happen.  She started to think, why me?, but then realized that it was no use.  Her master had been putting things away into boxes for weeks now, she guessed now that she had not meant to go with him wherever he went.  It saddened her, but angered her at the same time.  Why couldn’t he have taken her with him?  It wasn’t as if she ate that much, and she wasn’t demanding.  At least, she hadn’t thought she was.
         As Fara sat in her kennel, listening to the sounds around her, she sighed and lowered her frame to the cold ground beneath her.  Already she didn’t like this place and with the rumors that she had heard, she could only hope to be adopted quickly.  Surprisingly, she found her eyes drifting closed after a short time and then she was asleep.

         Time seemed to move swiftly in the shelter kennels and the dogs in Kennel 5 and Kennel 4 grew closer together with each day that passed.  Duffy took on the role of mentor and taught Fara about living at the shelter, as his old neighbor had taught him.  He taught her how to act, how to look, when to bark, when not to bark.  He taught her everything and she caught on very quickly.  By the time it was nearly a month since she had arrived, Fara was surpassing Duffy and he would laugh each time he learned something from her.  When the dogs were let outside to romp and play together, Duffy and Fara were almost always together, though they never separated themselves from the other dogs.
         They had just finished their breakfast one day when the word was passed through the kennels that a group of potentials were on their way in.  This is it, Duffy thought.  Time to see just how much Fara has learned from me.  When the group came in, he was glad to see it was a large one.  It meant better possibilities and that was always a good thing to a dog.  He sat perfectly, whined when the children came up to the door, then rolled over when they laughed at him.  Out of the corner of his eye, he watched Fara’s progress as well.
         Fara was excited, but she had managed to keep her happiness from taking over.  She would have to be on her best behavior or there would be no hope for her.  She knew this.  When a little girl came to the door of her kennel, she whined and wagged her tail as Duffy had taught her.  Her ears perked and her blue eyes were full of the excitement she was feeling.  However, the parents of the little girl soon ushered her onto the smaller dogs and Fara felt sadness falling over her.  Of course no one wanted a big dog like her, especially with a child.  She might knock them over during play.  She kept up, though, hoping that another would pass by and show interest.
         Duffy was having his own fair share of disappointment, but he’d had longer to get used to it.  He felt sorry for Fara, but knew that she would soon get over that first time feeling.  It had taken him a few times to do the same, so he knew how it felt.
         “Oh Mama!  Look at this one!  He’s so pretty!  I want him!” a little girl about the age of ten or so stood in front of his kennel.  The girl’s mother beside her shook her head and sighed.
         “Jenny, the card says he’s six years old.  Isn’t that a bit older than what we discussed?”
         “I don’t care.  I want him.”
         The girl, Duffy noted, was obviously used to getting what she wanted and wouldn’t be stopped in this situation.  He had to give the girl points for effort, though he doubted by the look on her mother’s face that she would get it this time.  His heart fell as he realized yet again how close he’d come to a new home only to have it vanish in front of him.
         “All right, fine.  Let’s go find the attendant and fill out the paperwork.”
         “Yay! Thank you Mama, so much!”
         Duffy stared at them as they left the kennel area.  Had he just been adopted?  No, well, things had to be finalized first, but…the mother had said…  He tried not to get his hopes up, but knew a moment of sheer happiness and let out a loud bark and turned a couple circles in his excitement.  A soft whine caught his attention and he looked over at Fara’s kennel.  She had a young boy looking at her and he looked to be about twelve or thirteen.  A good age, he thought, to take on a new pet.  Anyone younger than ten was really not old enough to understand how to treat a pet of their own, so it was preferable to have someone older.  He hoped that Fara found a home as well today.
         Fara looked at the boy and tilted her head, whining again, then stepped up to the door.  She sat down and waited, placing one paw on the wire and lifting her blue eyes back to the boy’s.  She lolled her tongue as Duffy had taught her.  He had told her it made her look “cute and irresistible”, so she used it now.
         “Hey Pop, come and look at this one.  Says she’s a two year old border collie.  Bet she’d be great with the sheep.”
         Fara wanted to roll her eyes so badly at that statement, but she resisted the urge to do so.  She knew that would not look good, so she refrained.  Why was it everyone thought all border collies knew how to herd sheep?  She, personally, had never seen one before except on television and wouldn’t know the back from the front on them.  She continued to look at the people though.  The father had come over to the kennel and was reading her card.  She couldn’t see it, so she didn’t know what he was reading.
         “Hmmm.  Might be, but you never know son.  She could be a complete flop at it too.  Why not go look at another dog?”
         “No Pop.  She’s looking at me like she knows what I’m thinking.  I want this dog.”
         The father scratched his head, then sighed.  He hadn’t wanted to get a dog in the first place, but the fact that their best sheepdog had recently been put down due to age surfaced.  Here they were, miles from home for sheepdog trials, and they were without their best dog.  His son had talked him into coming to the shelter to find another dog.
         “I suppose we could try her out.  It’s a long drive home though.  You think you can keep her settled?”
         “I sure will, Pop!  You’ll see, she’ll be the best sheepdog ever!  Cause I’m gonna train her.”
         The two of them walked away and back through the door they’d entered from.  Fara wagged her tail and ran around the kennel a few times to release the energy she’d built up during the entire ‘meeting’.  She looked over and saw Duffy watching her and he looked…happy!
         “Oh Duffy!  I think I’m going to get out of here!  Those people said they wanted to take me home.  Isn’t that great?”
         “Yes, Fara, it is.  I think I’m getting out of here as well.  A little girl said she wanted me and then left to speak with an attendant.  This is exciting.  I wonder if we’ll be close enough to see each other.  Do you think, Fara?”
         “I don’t know, Duffy.  The man said it was a long drive home.  I hope it’s not too far though.”
         Duffy frowned at that and sat down, thinking about it.  Even when the little girl returned, told him that he was now her dog and that she would be back in a couple days to pick him up, he didn’t whine his happiness to her.  He was absorbed in the puzzle before him.  He didn’t want to leave Fara, but he wanted to get out of here.
         That night, after both dogs were now assured of their adoption by their new owners, Duffy looked over at Fara and sighed.
         “I don’t want to leave you, Fara.  I like you and you make me laugh.  I wish we could be together forever.”
         “Me too, Duffy.  Me too, but what can we do?  We have to go with the people, don’t we?”
         “Well, perhaps there is a way to get away from them.  If we could, couldn’t we meet up together?  Down the road.  I mean, it can’t be that hard, right?”
         “I wouldn’t know, but I hope not.  If I can manage it, I bet we could.  But how would we know where the other one was?”
         “Hmmm.  Do you know of any famous places?”
         “I heard of a place called New York City, even saw it on the television once.  It was pretty big and busy, but I figure it shouldn’t be too hard to find, right?”
         “Perfect.  I know of that place too.  We could arrange to meet there.  I hope your humans don’t live really far away.”
         After a little more discussion, plans were set in stone and then they settled down to sleep, dreaming of their new homes and what it would be like.  Duffy dreamt of meeting up with Fara again, wondering if it would really happen or not.  She might like her new life enough to stay there.  As might he.  Only time would tell.

         The day came that their new people came to take them away from the shelter and Duffy and Fara said good-bye to each other one last time, assuring the other that they would meet in New York City soon.  Each was then taken to their own vehicles and driven off to start their new lives apart from one another.  Duffy’s family lived in the state they were in already, Pennsylvania, and only about 40 minutes from the shelter.  Fara’s new family, however, lived in West Virginia.  Of course, neither dog knew where the other was now living, but they still kept their dream of meeting in New York.
         Months passed and Duffy settled into his new life.  His mistress, the little girl, took to dressing him up for tea parties.  He put up with it because, well, what is a dog to do?  He couldn’t growl or snap at her, afraid that he’d be sent back to the shelter.  So he dealt with it, begrudgingly.
         Fara had been brought to her new home and put straight to work in the sheep pen.  It was hard work and something she wasn’t used to.  It made her feel clumsy and useless, but after a few months she was finally catching onto the signals and whistles that she had to know to herd sheep.  She also learned that sheep were stupid.  When Fara had first arrived, she had tried to talk to the sheep and ask them nicely to do what she wanted, but the stupid beasts ignored her and did whatever they wanted to anyway.  It was ridiculous.  But now, now she knew that to get them doing what she wanted, she had to just bark and growl a bit, perhaps snap at a nose or a foot here and there and they listened.  It was impressive, really, and her master -the little boy- told her this all the time.
         Then came the day when Duffy had had enough ‘tea parties’ to last him another lifetime.  He saw her coming with the ribbons to tie around his neck and he whined, going to the door, as if he had to go outside.  When he was let out into the backyard, he started to sniff around as if he were looking to go to the bathroom.  At least until he saw the girl leave the window.  Then he moved in a circle and backed up, then ran towards the fence, leaping it with agility.  Well, almost.  Duffy landed with a thud on the other side and lay on his side, catching his breath.  He had never expected it to be so tall, but he was over it and there was no going back.  He stood up once he could manage it and took off running down the street, away from the neighborhood.  On to start his journey to New York City.
         As this was going on, Fara was being pushed around by the other sheepdogs and even the sheep themselves.  She had accidentally crossed in front of one of the older dogs and she’d gotten reprimanded for it by the dog she’d crossed in front of.  She had made herself look like a fool and lost some of the respect from the sheep.  It was not a good feeling for a sheepdog to listen to the stupid sheep laughing at you.
         It all finally came to a head when they were out herding and an older dog, Surrey, crossed in front of her!  She couldn’t believe it, but then she realized that he had done it on purpose, making an even bigger fool out of her.  She growled and bristled quickly, running after Surrey.  She caught up with him and he laughed at her.  It didn’t last long before she lunged at him.  The two dogs fought together for a bit before the humans came and broke them up.  The father took Surrey off, the boy took Fara.  Having the boy she had become close to yelling at her angered her.  It was Surrey’s fault, not hers.  He had goaded her, upset her and caused her to lunge at him.  When the boy sent her back to the house, away from the sheep, she went.  She didn’t return to the house, though.  Surrey would be there, she knew, and she didn’t want to face him.  So she did the only thing that she knew she could do.  She fled to New York City to meet up with Duffy.  The only friend she had ever truly had.  And so her own journey started.

         Honestly, the journeys of both dogs aren’t really the important matter here, but rather the fact that without even knowing where the other dog was, they both managed to set out on their own to a place they had never been to meet up with the other they weren’t even sure was there.  Leaving within only a few days of each other, no less.  Keep in mind, the strange fact that each dog also had roughly the same distance to travel to reach New York City.

         As Duffy made his way to the city he knew in his heart was in this direction, he thought of Fara constantly.  She kept him moving, even when his paws were sore, cracked, and bleeding.  It was the thought that he might be letting her down if he did not reach the city to meet up with her.  He had no way of knowing even if Fara was heading there herself, but he had to tell himself that she was, or he would have stopped there and let himself go.
         Duffy began to sing to himself softly as he traveled, for it kept him from going crazy and he didn’t want that to happen.  It didn’t matter what he sang, sometimes it was a song he had heard during his life and sometimes it was a song he made up all on his own.  Whatever the words, they kept him moving when his body wanted to lie down and die.  Food had become something he had learned quickly about.  Out here, there were no plastic food dishes filled whenever you were hungry.  There was no one to feed you when you whined or wagged your tail.  He had to hunt his own food if he wanted to eat.
         That was an experience and a half for the nearly seven year old Labrador retriever who had never hunted in his life.  Yet another misconception that humans make is that all Labradors can hunt.  After nearly three days of traveling without food, though trying to hunt, Duffy was starving.  When he had seen a rabbit leap from the bushes in front of him, he had drooled and then taken off after it.  The burst of energy at the thought of food helped him catch the rabbit and he enjoyed the meal quickly.  From then on, the dog had managed to catch enough small meals to sustain himself, though he had lost a little weight.  He rested when he was too tired to go on and continued when he felt better.
         Finally, after several weeks of traveling in the woods and suburban backyards, he saw the great ‘towers’ of buildings ahead of him and knew he was going in the right direction.  From the closeness of the structures, he was not too far from the city.  It gave him a little extra energy and he traveled a little longer each day, getting closer and closer with each step.  As he neared a highway, he saw no other way to get into the city, so he began to travel along the shoulder of the road.  He had long lost his fear of cars and this was not a trouble for him to travel as such into the city.  However, once inside it, he realized with disappointment just how large it was.  How would Duffy ever find Fara?
         Fara, meanwhile, was making her own journey to the city.  She, too, had had to learn how to hunt, but having been trained as a sheepdog, she had a little more knowledge at how to go about it.  It was not so different from stalking the sheep, except that one got to catch what one stalked instead of leaving it alone.  Because of this, she lost only a little weight due to her constant exercise.  As with Duffy, she slept when she needed it and traveled when she didn’t.
         She met various wild things on her journey, not the least of which was a black bear.  That had been an experience and a half.  Fara had been jogging along through the woods when her nose twitched with an unfamiliar, yet strong scent.  She stopped and turned her head just in time to see a black bear exit the bushes, growling and threatening her.  Fara bristled and barked at the thing, but when she narrowly missed being clobbered by it’s large paw, she decided that it really wasn’t worth the trouble and took off running.  The bear chased her for a while, then slowly disappeared and Fara ran a bit more before stopping to catch her breath.  She determined to remember that scent and run away before another such encounter.
         It was a matter of only a few days that kept the two dogs from meeting up with each other before reaching the city.  Fara traveled through the same suburban backyards that Duffy had been through just three days before her.  She became excited when she caught his scent upon the trees she passed, knowing he had marked them.  It made her keep going, knowing that somewhere, not that far ahead, was Duffy.  She began to run, wanting to find him faster, never to leave his side again.  Traveling the same highway he had, Fara had a bit more of a hard time with the traffic, never having been very good about it before.  The only thing that got her to stay on course was the knowledge that Duffy had taken this same route into the city.  Her aqua eyes stared at the tall buildings and she swallowed, unable to believe the size of them.  Never had she seen anything like them.  The television didn’t show how big they were and she felt tremors of fear running through her that she would never find Duffy.  Tremors of fear that she would become lost here and perhaps die.  She shook those feelings off and continued on.  She found alleys to sleep in, noting that Duffy’s scent was stronger now.  She knew she was close to him.
         Duffy had no idea that Fara was behind him by only a day and that very soon she would catch up to him.  He was in another alley tonight and he had decided that perhaps he should stay here for a few days, just to give his paws a rest.  They were so sore and throbbing so much it gave him a headache.  That didn’t help matters any either.  Neither did the thought of being found here by humans who might turn him in to a shelter.  This was the reason he stayed in the alleys.  There was, at least, food to be found in garbage cans and he managed to find enough to keep himself fed.
         It was two days later, as he was digging in one such garbage can, that he caught a familiar scent and looked up from his meal.  At first, Duffy thought his eyes were deceiving him, but no, it couldn’t be.  Her scent was there as well.  Fara!  They ran toward each other and met in the middle of the alley.  Noses were touched, butts were sniffed, necks were nuzzled and tails wagged together.  Barks and yips of happiness would have told anyone watching that the two were old friends and seeing each other after a time of absence.
         “Duffy!  I was worried you wouldn’t be here, but now everything’s perfect.  Don’t ever leave me again.”
         “Fara, only the humans could drag me away from you now.  I love you.”
         “I love you, Duffy.”  Fara nuzzled Duffy’s neck and sighed, licking his cheek.  “I do not like the city after all, though.  Now that I’ve found you, I want to leave this place.  There are too many humans around who might separate us again.”
         “I agree, my love.  We shall return to the woods and make a home there.  Boy, do I have some stories to tell you.”  Duffy licked her cheek and wagged his tail, walking with her toward the opening of the alleyway.
         “You have stories to tell me?  I have my own to tell you.  Have you ever seen a bear?”

         And as the two of them walked away, keeping to the shadows, making their way back over the highway, and entering the woods once more, they exchanged each other’s story about their journey to find each other.  Their journey to find love.