Here
I lurched across the front yard, the flashlight still clamped in the hand that cradled his neck, throwing a beam that swept back and forth, up and down crazily over the front of the house, as if still searching for him.My legs gave way at the back door, and I slumped onto the steps. I cradled him in my arms, kissed his cooling black head, his muzzle, pressed the smell of him into me as if trying to capture it. I whispered my love for him, my anguish into his soft ears. I wanted him to hear the sound of my heart breaking, to know that he was loved enough to break it.
How long I held him like that I don’t recall, but the cold stickiness of his blood soaking my shirt brought me back. Moving him, my tight embrace of his broken body had made the bleeding worse, and I wore it on my shirt, my pants, dribbled onto my shoes and socks like an accusation.
Hours later, after he’d been buried by my friend Chris, whom I called that night, I looked at myself in the mirror, saw his dark, dried blood across my cheek, my neck, on my hands and arms.
I looked at myself in the mirror for a long while, knowing I should take a shower before trying to go to bed, as Chris suggested before he left; after he’d buried my dog, my friend, my companion. But I didn’t want to wash the last of him down my shower drain…didn’t want to lose the little part of him I had left, when the rest of him was already cold, already underground, already being rained on.
In the end, I took the shower, but threw the bloodied clothing into my hamper…and haven’t removed it since.
About me
This is me: home-writer, book-reader, dog-lover and occasional poet. I make this website to share my and my friends texts with You, dear Reader. Please: read carefully, don't be scary, upgrade your mood and be king and leave your comment. :)