Chapter 3 - Manhattan Chase

Chapter 3 - Manhattan Chase

The young dog was refreshed and warm by the rays of the sun, in which she lolled with relish on the green, fragrant lawn of the garden.
In the past four weeks she hadn't even left Chris's side, the fear of losing him had been too great. The two did everything possible together and Tyla found it to be one of the best times of her life so far. She had the feeling that she only really got to know him during this time. She met pages about him that she had not known, that he had kept hidden from her, like from everyone else. In addition, Tyla hoped that her pounds, which she had lost as a dog with all the exercise, would also be lost as a person. It was the first day in weeks that he didn't go out with her, which was probably mainly due to the fact that the big trip to New York was imminent. The flight should leave in two days.Nothing else has been spoken of for a week now. Chris' father in particular was very upset and stressed, because there was still a lot to do for him before he could leave for his mother in New York with a clear conscience. Tyla cleverly stayed out of all this stress. As lazy as she was by nature, she was dozing in the garden and had been for hours. She was firmly convinced not to have to worry, she just had to get up on the day of the flight in time so as not to miss the departure.
The morning passed and the afternoon passed without Tyla Chris seeing anything. The horizon engulfed the sun and the sky was bathed in a delicate orange. Very slowly and cautiously, Tyla got up, she lifted her four legs and when she stood she stretched with a satisfied yawn.
Strolling towards the house, she took one last look at the driveway, but Chris was still not in sight and so she slipped elegantly through the narrow opening of the patio door.She continued her way through the house, up to the room, where, obviously exhausted from the long walk, she let herself fall into the basket. Tyla waited in this basket, hour after hour, but from minute to minute her fear increased. She turned from side to side and was unable to take a brief moment of calm. Only when the front door was opened and slammed at around 10 p.m. was she released from her fears. Devoured by curiosity, she jumped out of her basket and ran down the stairs, when she saw that it was actually Chris, she added another tooth and jumped on the penultimate step, straight towards him. He greeted his little friend no less happily. With that done, he gave Tyla the order to sit in the hallway and then head into the living room himself. Tyla heard Chris talking to his father, but didn't care, because she was sure it was about the trip again and she had more than enough of it by now.It didn't take long for Chris to come back and without paying any attention to Tyla he went up the stairs. He'd never acted so strangely, not even when she was human. A little confused by his behavior, she wasn't sure how to behave and since she had to decide something, she stayed where she was told to do so for the time being. Since Chris didn't call her and also disappeared into the bathroom, Tyla seemed to have been right to stay seated, but since she was getting uncomfortable, she allowed herself to lie down. The big clock in the hall struck half past ten when the bathroom door slammed loudly. As if struck by lightning, Tyla jumped up and looked puzzled up the long stairs.
"Damn it! Sira, on foot !!" shouted an extremely angry Chris.
Deeply shocked, Tyla winced, she had not the slightest idea what Chris should be so angry about, because never before, in the 12 years since they had known each other, had Chris behaved like this and used such a tone.A little scared and confused, Tyla crept up the stairs.
He was already waiting for her with an angry expression and in no way restrained the tone he roared:
"You always have to leave your rubbish lying around here. Is it that difficult to put the stuff back in the basket? Come on, move on, but quickly!"
Tyla looked at him in horror. Suddenly he was like a stranger to her. He had never shown this way before, to no one. He had never been so excited and certainly not because of such a triviality. She padded past him somewhat sullenly, but did not look away from him for a moment. The fear and amazement could be read quite openly in her eyes and it was this look in her eyes that brought Chris back to his senses. He whispered regretfully:
"I'm sorry little one! I am just getting overwhelmed and my best friend disappeared for four weeks and should I go to New York now?"Right now, she knew very well that I wanted to see her again before I left and then I have to hand you over to the neighbors, it can't all be true. "
Horrified, Tyla looked at the completely distraught boy in front of her. It all seemed incredibly close to him, countless times he ran his hand through his blond hair, as he always did when something bothered him. His eyes glittered watery in the light of the lamp and the look on his face made Tyla catch her breath. She felt how she was trembling with fear, actually trembling. Everything suddenly seemed lost, nothing made sense any more, all hope up and away. How the hell was she supposed to save the one she loved above all if she wallowed thousands and thousands of kilometers away from him at the crucial moment and that as a small, insignificant dog.
Chris literally spoke from her soul, everything was getting too much for her. It spun in her head and her thoughts began to tumble.Tyla didn't want to have anything more to do with all of this, shortly before the total collapse she dragged herself into her basket and let herself fall like a wet sack. Almost in sync, Chris threw himself on his bed.
Tyla stared at the ceiling all night long. Desperate and with fear on the back of her neck as a means of pressure, she looked for a solution to the problem. She had to get on that plane somehow, no matter how. But no matter how she turned it, she just didn't have an idea that was realizable. She glanced at Chris, who had long since fallen asleep and was lying across, thrown down the covers, on his bed.
"How am I supposed to do that? How am I supposed to protect him when fate inexorably gets in my way? I could cry. What am I doing? What am I doing? What ...? You're welcome!"
Hours went by in which the little puppy turned back and forth, sleepless, but at some point the tiredness triumphed over her too.She hoped to get the answer to her questions in her sleep, this naivety that everything would be fine again, let her draw new hope, but only minimally, because she knew exactly what was in store for her.
The loud, nerve-draining ringing of the alarm clock literally threw Tyla out of her basket. Everything was still very blurry in front of her eyes and the tiredness was still deep in the bones, but Chris wasn't feeling better either. Shying away from the light, he groped blindly for his alarm clock, throwing books and a vase from the bedside table. Despite the excruciating tiredness, Tyla stood up. She was still looking for a solution to her problem, but her head was empty.
The bags and suitcases were packed and ready in the hallway, just waiting to be loaded into the car. Chris's bag was also standing in front of his room door, filled to the brim. The little dog was sitting right in front of the bag and broodingly realized:
"I have no choice but to crawl into this pocket.I just have to trust my luck! If I'm discovered, it's just bad luck, then I've lost, but what else can I do, just hope that I will survive that too. "
Tyla knew that she didn't have much time left until Chris father would bring the bags into the car and so she started her work. It was easy to open the zipper of the large travel bag, so it was a lot more difficult to get Chris's clothes out of the bag into the bathroom. From the countless conversations about the trip, Tyla knew that the flight should leave at 9 a.m., meanwhile it was 6:30 a.m. and the time was pressing. Finally finished with her rather desperate action, she slipped into her pocket. She pulled the zipper shut from the outside so that she could just about pull her head back into her pocket, from there she pulled the zipper closer and all this with her teeth. As soon as the bag was closed, Chris's father came out of the bedroom.As Tyla assumed, he took the bags standing around and hurried down the stairs. Tyla felt sick from the swinging back and forth. Then on the last steps, he tripped over his own feet and the bag used by Chris as a shield he crashed into the wall in front of him. Tyla was just barely able to suppress a pain-driven scream, but judging by her feeling, several bones had to be broken at once. As if nothing had happened, he went on out into the courtyard to the car. He rudely tossed the first bags into the trunk of the car; to Tyla's greatest relief, her bag was on top. Inwardly cheering she exclaimed:
"Finally I'm lucky, too, if it just lasts. Hopefully there won't be time to look for me. As I know Chris father, he'll forbid him to look for me when time is so short."
Amazingly, she turned out to be right, Chris was completely upset, downright hysterical, when his father explicitly and imperiously ordered him to stop looking for the dog.Chris should hire one of his friends to do the search and when he got to New York, he should inquire. Of course, that was totally unacceptable to Chris, but he had no choice but to bow to his father.
Tyla was almost bursting with happiness when the car finally started moving. The drive to the airport was long and extremely grueling for Tyla, but just as exhausting for Chris. He hadn't said a word and the anger was written on his face. Even when she finally got out of the car, Tyla's hope did not fade, she had such an unfounded feeling that her help was given from above and she was not completely wrong about it. Chris picked up his bag and followed his parents for a check-in. As was customary,