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Back 3 a.m.
Chapters (67)
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  67. 3:46 a.m.

“Dude, what’s your problem?”

Meow.

“I told you. Murdock is sick. He isn’t going to be any fun.” Actually, Murdock isn’t sick. He’d become increasingly aggressive with some of the neighborhood dogs and the vet attributed this to the vast amount of testosterone in the one-hundred-and-sixty-pound English mastiff’s softball-sized testicles. He was getting neutered tomorrow and my dad didn’t want him chasing around Lassie while he recovered.

Meow.

“I don’t know, the flu or something. You can stay over at my dad’s for a month when we get back.”

He glares at me.

“Alaska is going to be great.”

Meow.

“No, we aren’t staying in an igloo. It’s summer there too. It’s supposed to be really nice.”

Meow.

“Can you ride a moose? Well, if we see one, I’m not gonna stop you, though I’m not sure if they have them in Fairbanks.”

He sighs.

“But what they do have . . .” I flip open the laptop and scroll through the pictures I’d downloaded. For the past month, I’d spent a couple minutes each day reading up on, and looking at, pictures from Alaska, aka The Last Frontier. I click on one of the pictures, then turn the laptop toward Lassie, “. . . is arctic foxes.”

Lassie’s eyes open wide.

“Now, go pack.”

Ten seconds later, he has his favorite jingle ball in his mouth and paws at the front door.

::::

“Alaska is going to be so much fun in a body bag.”

Ingrid gazes at me with pursed lips, which eventually turn into a smile. She slows down but still manages to get us to the Potomac Airfield with three minutes to spare.

A man in a golf cart waits for us, and we load our bags into the back. We’re only half in when he zooms toward the jet sitting on the tarmac two football fields away.

It is 3:58 a.m.

The chartered flight plus a week’s rental at one of Fairbank’s most luxurious cabins wasn’t cheap, but my last trade — loading up on corn futures — paid for the trip.

I can see the wheelchair waiting for me outside the small thirty-passenger jet.

I won’t need it.

At exactly 3:59 a.m., the golf cart pulls up to the plane. The man says he will take care of our luggage and the three of us jump out and clamber up the wheeled steps of the plane. The pilot nods his cap at me and gives Lassie a quick rub on the head.

We hurry down the aisle and fold into two of the large reclining seats.

Lassie settles in on my lap and Ingrid gives me a quick kiss before I fade into blackness.

When I wake up, I will be in Alaska.

And at 3:07 a.m., I will see the sun for the first time.

:02

June 19th

Sunrise 3:07 a.m.

Fairbanks, Alaska