Read Online Best Friends (Until Someone Better Comes Along) by Erin Downing - Free Book Online

moment before she ran, I saw that her usually floppy ears were pressed tight against her head. “Coco!” I screamed. The rain was coming down in sheets, hitting me at an angle. I could hardly see the cabins on either side of me. The lake was just a swirling mass of waves and rain at the bottom of the hill. And Coco was a dark blur, zigging and zagging between trees. In less than an instant, I couldn’t see her anymore at all. “Coco! Come back!”
    Bailey and Ava both stopped running and turned back to see what I was screaming about. “My dog is gone!” I told them. Fear crippled my reflexes, turning me slow and useless. I bent down to pick up the towel on the ground, the one that my puppy had been wrapped safely in just moments before. It was warm and soaking wet. “I have to find her.”
    Without a moment of hesitation, both Bailey and Ava ran off in different directions, jumping into action. Seeing them react helped shake me out of my stupor. We all shouted for Coco, our voices muffled by the rain. I could feel the raindrops hitting my back, stinging the bare skin my swimsuit didn’t cover, and bouncing off my head.
    Thunder rocked the sky again. In the silence that followed, I thought I could hear Coco whining from somewhere nearby, but I couldn’t see anything except rain and trees. The way everything hung heavy and wet around me made me feel claustrophobic, and my breath became shallow. It felt like the world was closing in on me as I realized I’d lost my dog in a forest full of terrible creatures and beasts. I turned in circles, searching the dark woods around me for any sign of her. In the weeks Coco had been mine, she had hardly left my side. She wasn’t the sort of dog who wandered off—she was a cuddler, a snuggly puppy who would rather squeeze into the only open space in my twin bed than stretch out in her own fluffy, spacious dog bed on the floor.
    A tangle of lightning lit up the sky again, but I still couldn’t see where my dog might have run off. I thought again about the raccoons I knew came out at night—the ones that ate the barbecue remains—and about the other things thatmight be hiding in the woods that surrounded us. I choked on my own voice as I yelled again, and my cry was carried away by the wind.
    Bailey rounded the corner of a cabin, and as lightning flashed, I could see that she looked terror-stricken. “You can go inside,” I yelled. Bailey had told us she was scared of storms, and here she was, stuck out in the whipping wind and pounding rain. I understood how horrible she must feel, being stuck out here. “I’ll keep looking for her.”
    â€œNo way,” Bailey said, her chin thrust forward. She ran off again, yelling, “Coco!”
    Suddenly, Ava cried out to us from near one of the cabins. “I found her! She’s at Bailey’s cabin!”
    I ran, with Bailey close behind. When I got near, I saw that Coco had found shelter under the crumbling bottom step leading up to Bailey’s cabin. I reached down and held out my arms. “We’re going inside,” I cooed, trying to coax my puppy out of her hiding spot. “Come here, girl.” Whimpering, Coco reluctantly squirmed out from under the step, and I swept her up in my arms.
    Bailey, Ava, and I ran up the steps to Bailey’s cabin, and pushed open the screen door. Water dripped off our bodies and pooled on the floor, but Bailey didn’t seem to care. Sheflopped down in one of the wooden chairs and closed her eyes.
    â€œThank you,” I said, hugging Coco tight against my chest. Relief flooded my body, and I buried my face in Coco’s neck.
    â€œNo problem,” Ava said quietly. She pulled a couple of dry towels off the kitchen counter. She offered one to me, then handed one to Bailey. “I’m glad we found her.”
    Once we’d all dried off, Bailey pulled the blankets off her bed and threw them in a