The Hard Ground

 

Flies, ripe as raisins, lighted upon the neat piles of dog s**t, of which there were several. One, healthy and solid, and the last, still fresh, poor and runny. The dog, a terrier, lay in the corner of the living room across a cleft pillow, its stuffing hunched two-side, leaving the middle bare fabric and floor. His eyes were parched. He huffed shallowly, and the breath ran from him, fleeing the house. With the breath gone, the soul buried its muzzle in the carpet and swept it with sullen whiskers, whining. He dissipated to the far corners of young, fledgling memory: the place where he was dropped on his tail, where the cat’s claw stuck, where the meat spoiled. He would haunt as his ancestors had, holding to edges of firelight, eating scraps of fancy and fear. 

            At the far end of a connecting hallway, a door opened. A man moved into the kitchen and began brewing a pot of coffee. As the pot ticked and hissed he walked, hands apocket, from one room to the next until he came upon the terrier. “Tt, tt, tt,” he clicked, haunching down. “Sa-am.” He narrowed his face and attended to the dog’s white underside, waiting for a rise. He put his hand to it, and took it away. He stood, touching his brow, and went to pour his cup, adding cream and sugar. Biding the steam, he opened a spare fortune cookie left from the previous night’s meal. It read: “Flattery will get you far this day.”   

Returning to the dog, he took seat in a broken recliner, brushing a thin mat of dander from its cushion. He drank slowly, watching himself in one mirror of a row of four large slates spanning the length of the house’s back wall –his wife’s old touch. Receding into darkness, the immediate image assaulted his skin. He was pale; though small, red lines worked from the centerpoint of his face outward. From afar, the most prominent of these did not resolutely infer the others. But close-in, the lines worked in concert. One could easily trace those circuits and fragments that plagued him most. There was a particularly angry knot to the left of his pulpit’s nose. He scratched, and took another sip from his cup.

            The bedroom bore a resigned mark. The man’s wife, warmly clothed, lay in bed curled beneath a quilt. Looking in, he considered her blankly, then cleared his throat, “You look great.” The woman did not stir, hair like hay spilt strawpatch around her head. “You look great.”

She did not move.

“Dear?” A question, as he tightly recalled the dog. “Mmm-yes?” “I’m stepping out,” he said, “do you need anything?” She attempted to sit up, her eyes fluttering with effort. A low, rasping noise escaped her throat. “Hey? Anything?” She fell the distance back into bed. “Yes,” turning away from him, “a cruller (she pronounced it “crueler”). And my prescriptions.” “Of course.” 

Waiting for his wife to call about Sam, the man spent most of the remainder of his day in town. From the pharmacy he went to the barber for a shave and haircut; thereafter taking to the park. He walked along a gurgling creek, stoppered with ice. It sounded to him like choking. Two boys ran the fading lines of a ball diamond, pushing each other in the back. Eating lunch in one diner, the man ate dinner in another: open-faced turkey sandwiches. The young waitresses treated him with a rutted sense of duty. Infrequently, he cast their soft composites as genuine interest. But never did the man step out of turn. He sat and tried to recall the place of his shovel, wondering how hard the ground would be.