Old Dog

There’s an old dog in the neighborhood. He comes by our house once in a while. His fur is matted. Me and the boys never thought much of him. We’d be drinking in the backyard or playing stumps, and the old son of a bitch just shows up.

It was a nice distraction at first. A break in the script, so to speak. An animal rambling down the alleyway and peeling off to check us out. No one ever wanted to check us out. Except for the cops when Mrs. Flanigan calls them.

The old dog would swagger up to the property line and eye us. One of us would notice him and call him over.

“Hey, the old man is back.”

“Look who decided to show up.”

“The old boy lookin’ for a new home.”

We’d call him over. Whistling and patting our thighs. To be honest, we probably looked downright scary to the old dog. But not as strange as he looked.

There was something about his eyes. So opaque and cloudy that you couldn’t tell if anything was going on in there. He’d just pant and stare. Pant and stare. A strand of drool would reach for the ground from his jowls. Pant and stare.

And all the while, we’re hollering trying to show him we’re good. We’re nice folk. We’d never hurt him. Just because Jamey lost a couple of fingers and teeth at the mill, doesn’t mean we’re bad folks.

Most of the time the old dog would turn and trot down the dirt alley. If we were really quiet and it was a weekday, we could hear his feet crush the pebbles and sand on the road. And if the air was heavy, and the heat oppressive, we could hear him panting at the empty lot next door. Staring into nothing.