Little Bird - Honey Palomino

Chapter 1

DOVE

PRESENT DAY

Once I made the decision, the rest was easy.

Peering down at the shimmering black surface of the East River below, I watched as the suitcase bobbed on top of the water a few times before sinking below into the dark depths of the rushing water, carrying my entire identity with it.

“Goodbye, Dove,” I whispered, a wave of grief washing over me. Grief for the woman I used to be. Grief for the life I once had. Grief for the future I’d always imagined for myself.

That woman was dead now.

With a deep, shuddering breath, I turned and walked back the way I came, to my car parked a few blocks away at the end of the Roosevelt Island Bridge.

I opened the car door and grabbed Gigi’s leash as she leapt from the car. The car had been a gift. Another piece of me I’d be leaving behind.

Gigi jumped and nipped at the leash, pulling on my arm and looking at me with confusion, as I stood there for a moment, frozen in time.

Frozen between my past and my future.

“Let her go,” I said to myself, as I glanced over my shoulder one last time at the bridge, tears stinging my eyes. I pulled another suitcase and my backpack out of the trunk and slammed it closed.

“Come on, Gigi,” I said, forcing myself to put one foot in front of the other.

Leaving the car where it was parked, I walked several blocks into Queens before I hailed a taxi. The driver cringed when he saw Gigi, but I was used to that reaction. I knew that slipping him a crisp hundred dollar bill would take away his reservations about letting a hundred and forty pound drooling St. Bernard into his backseat, and I was right. In seconds, we were tangled up in the early morning traffic and on the way to a car rental agency.

My heart raced as the enormity of what I was doing hit me. The danger I was putting myself in alone was enough to leave me trembling in fear. Unfortunately, staying a moment longer meant putting myself and Gigi in worse danger.

The risk to stay had become larger than leaving.

I had to do this now. I’d been given no choice.

I thought about everything I was leaving behind — the glamour, the lifestyle, the man — and I realized I’d miss none of that.

The only thing I missed was the person I used to be.

With any luck, I could find her again.

Chapter 2

DOVE

ONE YEAR AGO

Gigi pulled on the leash so hard she almost yanked my arm out of the socket. The fact that she was so big at just a year old amazed me. I’d rescued her from a negligent breeder about a year ago as a puppy, and she’d grown into a massive ball of unruly drooling fur within months.

She drew attention no matter where we went. Everyone wanted to pet her and she was such a ham, she’d happily allow anyone to touch her. That intuition dogs are supposed to have to inform you who was bad and who was good seemed to be broken in Gigi. She loved everyone equally.

Of course, I’m her favorite, but that’s only because I’m the one who feeds her. And walks her. And brushes her thick fur. And her teeth. And picks up after her massive dumps. And pays her expensive vet bills. And and and…

But hey, that’s what it’s all about right? They give us unconditional love for all the gross and endlessly expensive things we have to do for them.

Today is my day off from the clinic, and the last thing I wanted to do this morning was get out of bed and take her for a walk but she flashed me those big brown eyes and whined at me like I was the worst dog mom in the world.

I ignored her for a few moments, my face in my phone as I endlessly scrolled through Instagram, but once she’d gone and pulled her leash from the hook on the wall and dropped it in my lap, there was no mistaking what she wanted from me. So, here I am, looking like I’d just rolled out of bed, because I had, and letting her pull me down the street in search of squirrels to terrorize.

“Gigi, stop pulling!” I hissed, pulling back on the leash. She was so heavy, it was useless. We’d gone to puppy obedience classes and tried every form of training I could find, from clickers