Earl Hutchins had been walking since sunrise, and by the time the light started going gold and low over the ridge, his boots were done arguing with him — they'd just given up, and his feet along with them. Rusty trotted a half-step behind, tongue hanging sideways, the way it did when the old mutt was too proud to whine about it.
They'd been on the road eleven days. Earl couldn't have told you exactly how far Route 9 had carried him, only that his water bottle had been empty since Tuesday and the last gas station was a memory of a Coke machine that didn't work.
Then the trees opened up.
There it was — wrought-iron gates painted gold, tall enough that Earl had to tip his head back to see the top of them. Behind the bars, a white mansion sat glowing in the last of the sun, and somewhere inside a piano was playing something soft and expensive-sounding. Sprinklers hissed lazy arcs over grass so green it looked painted on. Earl caught the smell of it — cut lawn, chlorine, something like barbecue smoke drifting from around back.
A man in a crisp linen shirt stood at the gate, hands folded like he'd been expecting company.
"Excuse me," Earl rasped. "What is this place?"
"This," the man said, smiling the kind of smile dentists dream about, "is Heaven. You passed, my friend. Welcome to your reward."
"There's — there's water in there?"
"Pools. Fountains. A koi pond you could swim laps in, if you wanted."
"Food?"
"Whatever your heart desires. Steak, lobster, pie — name it."
Earl's knees nearly buckled with relief. Then he looked down at Rusty, who'd sat and was leaning his whole weight against Earl's shin.
"He comes with me."
The man's smile didn't move, but something behind his eyes did. "No dogs. House rules. He'll have to stay outside the gate."
"Outside where? There's nothing out here."
"Not my department." The man had already half turned back toward the music.
Earl stood there a second, felt Rusty's ribs rise and fall against his leg, and then he did the only thing that made sense to him — he turned around and walked back the way he came, boots and all.
The road kept going. Maybe twenty minutes on, past a stand of cottonwoods, Earl came up on a farmhouse — sagging porch, chickens working the dirt, a hand-painted sign nailed crooked to a fence post that just said WATER. An older man sat on the steps in overalls, whittling something that wasn't turning into anything in particular.
"Mister," Earl croaked, "I am about to fall over. You got water?"
"Pump's around back, by the barn. Help yourself."
"And him?" Earl nodded at Rusty.
"There's a trough next to the pump. Fits a dog just fine."
"You wouldn't have anything to eat, would you? I don't want to impose—"
"Got beans on the stove and cornbread that ain't half bad. Come on in."
"And Rusty?"
The old man set down his knife. "Boy, I got a soup bone in the icebox been waiting on a dog like that for a week." He whistled low, and Rusty's ears came up like he understood English better than most people gave him credit for.
Earl drank until his stomach hurt, ate cornbread standing up in the kitchen, and watched Rusty work that bone on the porch floor like it was the last thing he'd ever get. Only after, wiping his mouth, did Earl think to ask.
"This is a nice thing you're doing, mister. What do they call this place?"
"This here's Heaven."
Earl frowned. "Can't be. Fella up the road at the big white house with the iron gates — he told me *that* was Heaven."
The old man laughed, short and dry, and went back to his whittling. "That there's the other place. You just don't see the flames from the road, is all." He glanced at Rusty, gnawing happy and unbothered on the porch boards. "See, folks who'd leave a dog standing at a gate — they don't get let past mine. Real Heaven's got room for the ones who wouldn't leave a friend behind. Everybody else can go on and enjoy that piano music."
