Dog Days & Organic Decisions

THERE was a flat light to the sky that framed seagulls coasting effortlessly from one side of the Liffey to the other. Taking turns, they stopped to perch upon streets lamps to peer and poo on the bustle of people below. Don’t you dare, I thought as I crossed quay road that bordered the south side of the river and onto Grattan bridge, being well accustomed to shite dropping on me out of nowhere.

     Monotonously I snailed along with the morning herd over the water to the Northside of Dublin, the crisp air nipping at the tips of my ears. Stopping without warning I caused havoc as I felt a bump into my back and heard several curses follow. People walked around me, scrunching their faces as they looked back. A greyed haired man in an overcoat, a lady wearing a white denim jacket and loud high heels - I had done something unspeakably inconsiderate and challenged the flow of their morning march.

     A dog lay dead by the curb, in the gutter of the bridge. Its friend stood directly over it, almost on it really. As if to protect it from the cars that carelessly zipped and zoomed from one side of the city to the other, frantically trying to wake the body with a series of nudges and barks and whimpers that curdled in my ears.

 I stepped to the side of the pavement where a small collection of people were watching helplessly or curiously or both. Two young fellas with phones stood shoulder-to-shoulder filming the moment. Both wore black jeans too small for them and t-shirts too big. A woman was folded down on her hunkers. Her mouth looked as if she had tasted something sour, her eyes wide and soft. The crowd flowed by us like water as if we were branches caught clinging to the edge of a riverbank.

     I couldn’t hear the blaring inner-city sounds that I knew were there and my feet didn’t feel like moving. They were stuck to the concrete and the thought of going to work, plonking on my chair in my cubical and listening to the hum of my computer as it started itself put a strain through my heart. The dead dog’s nose looked wet. Its eyes, they looked startled and Its paws lay out towards the traffic. Something brushed off me once, and then again.

     Both of the dogs were long and skinny, rusty red and I think strays, partners on the run. Immediately Bonnie and Clyde popped into my head because that’s how I always think of things in life … what movie does this remind me of. Clyde let out another quivering whimper. When the woman stood up, extending her lower limbs like an accordion, she stalled for a moment before moving on. I felt control come back over myself.  I continued to stare as I took my first steps in what felt like an hour and thought a thousand times I should go over to Clyde and pet his wet head and call … somebody, to take care of Bonnie. Whoever you call to take care of a dead dog lying in the in the middle of Dublin. That’s what I wanted to do but I didn’t. And as I shuffled back into the flow of bodies, I could still hear that the dog was unable to accept his friend was gone.

     I made my across Bachelor’s Walk and over onto Caple Street. It wasn’t for about twenty minutes or so till I realized I walked straight past the office. For the second time that morning I stopped suddenly in my tracks. The Moore Street Market was nearby and a mesh of smells of fish and cabbage and squished fruit were being driven through the air. They were smells I knew from when Nan would take me there every Sunday to barter for supplies. That’s when I learned how tough Nan was … how the lady I went to visit was the nicest part of her, that deep down she was a capable a strong Dub who wasn’t to be messed with even if it was over the price of a couple of kiwi’s.

     There was a coffee shop. A nice one with touch of the hipster about it that I had seen before but never gone in. I moved inside like a boat slowly turning into shore, rowing myself up to the counter. I had my phone in my hand. I wanted to call the boss, explain why I was late, that there was some sort of mishap and that I’d be in soon.

      “We use organic milk”, said the cheery barista. Her teeth startlingly white against her tanned features, she was Brazilian I think. She wasn’t snobby about it. I think it’s a requirement that they announce this interesting fact to their customers.

      “Oh, that’s grand”, I told her with a bit of a flustered stutter. Honestly not sure I would notice the difference.

     As she handed me my change I kind of blurted, “if you saw a dog injured by the road what would you do?” She seemed quite disturbed and her smile disappeared and so I sidestepped away before she could respond. That really wasn’t the way to go about that at all, I said to myself.

     Less and less people walked past the window where I sat and I still hadn’t called work. I started to write a text a couple of times but nothing came of it. There was a strange impatient anger within me when I tried, when I thought about how I would lie. My organic milked cappuccino became a foamy puddle at the bottom of my cup and my tie hung loosely around my neck.

     When I pushed back my stool there was a loud yawp from it scraping off the wooden floor. I slid off onto my feet and back outside I went. As I paced past the Spire, the world’s costliest and largest toothpick, rain began to spit down which added a slippery gleam to O’Connell street. I walked back along the river. The rain began to really bucket down then and there was an infantry of cars lined up the quay road, their wipers swishing frantically against curtains of water from the sky breaking down on them like waves. Grattan bridge wasn’t much further though I still hadn’t a notion what I would do when I got there.

     Up along the balustrades that lined the bridge, soldiers standing to attention, I went. I wasn’t nervous that I hadn’t called work. It was actually kind of liberating and as I thought of that I found myself walking faster, my strides longer. As if at the center of the bridge I knew I would find some old and magical relic that I would hoist above my head like Indiana Jones and the world and all its fortune would shine on me … but instead I found the wind over the river cutting and spiteful. More to the point, there were no dogs. The rain beat me and the pavement with loud slaps and each side of the city that the bridge gripped appeared as dripping canvases of watery grey.

     I was soaked through by this point. My shirt stuck to me like wet tissue paper and a steady stream cascaded from my head down my face and neck in a perpetual baptism; under my collar and onto my body. I stood where the dogs had been. I felt the breathless hollow of a deep well forming within my gut … a kind of guilt as if I could have prevented the whole affair from happening but just didn’t get up off my lazy arse.  What happened next surprised me more than anything. Tears … my eyes swelled with them until I couldn’t keep them in any longer. I stood in the rain crying. I can’t remember the last time I cried and if I’m honest, and I don’t mean to sound cold hearted but I don’t think it was just for the dogs. My finders started to click … you know the way they do when I think or get antsy and all I could think at that moment was that I was an asshole and I wasn’t happy with what I was doing; with myself I mean … with my life. I just knew I wanted more and I felt like that every minute of the day without really taking the time to think about it. Normal wasn’t enough. I don’t wake up with a smile nor do I go to bed with one and I don’t need to win the lottery to do either of those things. And then there it was. A tired gruff bark from behind me, a nervous kind of hello.

     Clyde was tucked in by a bin against the balustrades. My fingers stopped clicking. I took short, slow steps towards him, his wet face lowered to the ground. He mustered up another weak bark but nothing else. He looked defeated, he looked sad, he looked lonely; he looked how I felt. I placed my hand gently on his collarless neck. I petted him. His head … his ears. With his face still down he raised his big black eyes to look at me and the well in my gut it began to fill. He nuzzled my hand a bit. Then so slowly and sloppily he dragged his tongue across my knuckles. The warmth sending a welcome jolt of heat through my bones.

     ‘And that was it. I sat with him for a bit, and then guided him home.’

     Paul stared at me a moment chewing his lip, eyes narrow as keyholes. ‘That explains why you didn’t make it to work and why there are barks coming from the bedroom. Not why you quit your job and not why you’re speaking like you’re Tony fucking Robbins!’

     I took an enthusiastic slurp of my steaming tea before answering. Paul has a terrible habit of acting like everyone’s mother.

      ‘Because I needed less shite to fall on my head, and he needed a friend. By the way … is this organic milk?’