Free Dog Stuff by Kevin Richard WHite
I had last seen my neighbor Julie’s bluetick coonhound, Jace, a couple of weeks ago, struggling to make it down the stoop. I know Julie made sure that Jace had a good life. She never said what was wrong with her. Perhaps it had a heart condition or some kind of eating disorder. Glaucoma and arthritis maybe, human shit, now applied to your favorite animal. Either or, it hobbled to the cracked sidewalk and tried to see what it could.
I stood outside smoking a cigarette and watched the whole routine. I had been there not too long ago with my old cat. The dying and the bills. Hard thing to get over.
“I’m sorry, Julie,” was all I could muster.
She shrugged, tears in her eyes. “Fuck it,” she whispered. “Don’t bring it up.”
I couldn’t care less about people suffering, but it ruins my day when animals meet their end. Not that I’m a bleeding heart, but they never hurt anyone. They don’t deserve it.
The final time I saw Jace, I was driving past the apartment in the rain, hunting for a parking space. They were out there together, two wanderers in a fantastic landscape. One last adventure. The warm water coating skin. A free drink for a thirsty hunting dog. I was glad they were alone and didn’t have me around to say something dumb again.
A week after that, I came home from work and saw a cardboard box down on the side of the stoop. It had rained again, so it was full of dirty cold water and in danger of becoming broken. In Sharpie perfect cursive, it said “Free Dog Stuff.”
Tennis balls. The leash. Some toys way beyond their prime, a ripped bear and a chewed plastic bone. Next to the box was an old dog bed, deflated and out of stuffing. A sticky note attached read “puppy dog bed” with a smiley face.
I looked up at Julie’s window and saw a Polaroid a neighbor had taken of the two of them, with a heart and a date on it. I knocked on Julie’s door but she wasn’t around. Her mail was still in a pile outside the door, so I assumed she was floating around somewhere, remembering what she could. Smelling the smells, feeling the fur.
I picked up the box and cradled it as best as I could. I took it down to the dog park a few blocks away. Despite the weather, there were plenty of dogs running around in the mud. The box slipped out of my hands and finally broke, so everything tumbled onto the sidewalk.
I started taking the balls and toys and heaving them over the fence. One by one, toys landed in the mud and the dogs, confused, ran over and gleefully started messing with them. The humans stood puzzled, wondering what I was doing. But I didn’t give a fuck. Soon enough, everything was claimed, as Jace’s things took on new life by being taken over by the others.
Someone called out after me as I walked away, but I didn’t respond. I had started thinking about my cat. About how the night before, he climbed onto my chest when I was in bed and glared and I didn’t know it then, but he was telling me he was ready. As someone who has never been ready in their life, it froze me. But it wasn’t about me. It never was.
Kevin Richard White lives in Philadelphia.
