A Final Drive Home: A Midnight Call, a Loyal Dog, and the Last Goodbye
When Mark’s phone rang at midnight, he assumed it was another round of unnecessary worry from his father. What he didn’t expect was a message that would pull him three hours across the state and back into a part of his life he thought he’d outgrown.
His father claimed their aging dog, Rusty, was refusing to die until Mark came home. It sounded like emotional leverage—a familiar kind of guilt. Mark was drowning in work and deadlines, with a briefing at dawn and a list of responsibilities that didn’t leave space for late-night drives to the suburbs. But then his father said something that made the world tilt.
Rusty wasn’t resting in his bed. He wasn’t anywhere warm or soft. He had dragged himself into the garage, curling up beside the old red pickup truck—the one Mark had driven all through high school. Rusty was waiting for the driver who had once taken him everywhere.
