Mourning Sunshine

Visits from karma

Author’s Note: Socrates Ninekiller is a character in my fictional world. He makes minor and prominent appearances in three of my novels in and around the little Oklahoma town of Tsalagee (Cha-la-gey). A Cherokee elder who fought in the Pacific during World War II, he’s a local legend. Wiser than most, he keeps his own counsel unless called upon. Even then he uses an economy of words. This vignette takes place on a spring morning in one of the town’s parks.

Soc and Little Wolf

Eighty-six-year-old Socrates Ninekiller never kept the leash on Little Wolf when they came to Veterans’ Park, even though Officer DuFranc told him he should.

DuFranc’s first warning had come a week past. Soc nodded and complied. But that was last week.

“I told you last week I could write you a ticket for that,” Officer DuFranc said in his deep cop voice. Charlie DuFranc was an imposing figure, standing six foot five in his leather cop jacket bristling with cop tools and burnished badge. And, of course, there was the daunting Glock holstered at his side. The stern visage on his broad black face helped, too.

Soc wasn’t intimidated by Officer DuFranc, though. He’d known Charlie since he was a chubby brown butterball in diapers. Still, the elder wasn’t one to tempt the White Man’s Law, even those administered by a black man. From his seat on the park bench, Soc whistled his dog over and snapped the leash onto the collar. Little Wolf put his front paws on the policeman’s razor-creased blue pants at the knees. Officer DuFranc reached down to pet the miniature husky and scratch his scruff.

“How you doin’ girl?” Charlie asked. “Huh? How you doin’?”

“Son of a bitch,” Soc said.

“What?” Charlie looked up, surprised.

“Waya is a male.”

“Oh. Well, you need to keep him on a leash, Soc.”

Soc nodded. “He seems to like you, Charlie.”

“Mind if I sit?” DuFranc asked. Soc made a gesture indicating consent, so Charlie sat. Little Wolf sat, too, and looked up at Charlie with a tongue lolling grin. His panting made him appear to be laughing.

“Where’d you get this dog?” Officer DuFranc asked.

“Didn’t,” Soc answered. “Showed up on my porch one morning, grinning like now, wanting breakfast.”

“You try to find his owner?”

“Yep. Checked the neighbors; put flyers around. Even took out a classified. Been a month. No response.”

Charlie nodded and looked down at the dog. Little Wolf looked intently up at Charlie, prancing his front paws. “Woof,” he said to the policeman.

“Dog like that must belong to somebody,” Charlie said. “Doesn’t look like a mongrel.”

“My wife always liked dogs,” Soc said. “Had one when the kids were little. But they grew up and left home, and that old dog died. Never got another.”

“Why not?”

“Raised on a farm where dogs were outside animals, had to earn their keep. Help with the livestock, go hunting. Never had one as a pet. My kids fed their dog treats and loved it up. Sometimes I believed they liked that dog more than me.”

“Hmmph,” Charlie said nodding, as if he understood, himself the father of two adolescents.

“Wife asked if we could get another dog a time or two, but I refused. Dogs are a pain, I told her, so she let it go.”

“So now you got this dog,” Charlie said. “How does that square?”

Soc looked off into the distance remaining silent for some time. DuFranc was about to stand and depart, when Soc continued. “My wife was just a girl when I married her. Prettiest thing I’d ever seen. We were together sixty-two years before the cancer took her. Been about a year now.”

Charlie didn’t say anything. He remembered Lola’s death, attended her funeral. Knowing Soc, he figured that ended the conversation, but the old Cherokee went on.

“I had no idea what a broken heart was until she was gone. Never knew loneliness was such a deep hole.”

Soc got quiet for another spell. Charlie waited, his tongue knotted against speaking appropriate words of comfort.

“You believe in the spirit world, Charlie?” Soc asked at length.

DuFranc looked sideways at Soc. “If you mean God, yeah. I believe in God.”

“Well, there’s Him,” said Soc. “But I’m talking about things happening. Some call it fate, some karma. Others say it’s just coincidence, like this dog showing up on my porch. I never had much truck with dogs, now this blame thing jumps up in my bed every night. The odd thing is I let him.”

The officer’s gaze turned to a redbud tree spangled in the beauty of its bloody spring blooms. The mangled scene of the road accident he’d worked the day before flashed up from deep in his memory where he’d stuffed it. There’d been a fatality, a teenage boy. He knew the kid, had given him a speeding ticket last fall. Knew his folks, too. Good people. His thought shifted to his own boy and girl. Fear and sadness and terror touched him at the thought of losing them. He lingered there a few seconds, still unable to come up with the right words for his old friend.

“Well, I better get back at it,” he said. He stood and touched the bill of his cap. “You and Little Wolf have a nice day, Soc.”

After DuFranc’s patrol car rolled out of sight, Soc reached down and unsnapped the leash from Little Wolf’s collar. The dog gave Soc a cheerful “Raff!” and ran off to continue his sniffing tour. Soc knew Little Wolf wouldn’t go far.

Thanks for reading this little vignette. If you’re at all interested in who or what the heck I am, the links below will give you a little more insight.

I like to call myself a storyteller and novelist, because that’s what I do. As yet, not quite for a living but that’s okay. I’m retired from the work-a-day world, so I enjoy the journey. Click the image above to visit my website where you can read excerpts from my novels.