CW: Animal death. [Author’s note: This is an old piece of fiction with nowhere else to go. I think a younger me could write more casually about death. Not sure if this piece would come out of me now, but there are elements of it I can appreciate. Maybe you will too. Thanks for reading.]
Cubby pushed the wheelbarrow up and over the small ridge of dirt that separated his yard from the expanse of woods that spread out beyond it. The sunlight filtered through the few remaining leaves in the trees and threw glints and shadows on the blanket of dead leaves that covered the ground. There was a slight chill in the air, the kind that made one appreciate what the sun had to offer, and Cubby did so for a moment, standing eyes closed in a bright patch next to a flaking birch tree.
When a bead of sweat took shape at his temple he started forward again into the woods. The terrain wasn’t easy to traverse with the wheelbarrow, but he was glad he had it at least. He couldn’t imagine another way to carry the load, and he was traveling quite a distance.
After an hour of struggle, he figured he had probably gone about a mile through the rough terrain. He had twice crossed a stream, not sure if it had been two different ones or if he had just crossed the same stream twice. He sat on a large rock and took a load off. He hadn’t brought any water but remembered a length of fruit leather wrapped in his trouser pocket so he took it out and ate a bit. The dried plum tasted tart and sweet and awakened his senses some. He rested for a moment more and then went on.
He tried not to look long at the contents of his wheelbarrow, but this was hard as it was a constant in his forward vision. The two big dogs seemed even larger in death. Gravity’s hold on their tangled and lifeless bodies made them seem caught in a frantic embrace, and as the wheelbarrow bounced and jostled over the rutted ground it almost seemed they were dancing. It wasn’t a pleasant way for the dead to travel Cubby realized. He wiped the side of his face against his shoulder and sighed.
The dogs had attacked each other in the night. They had always been thick as thieves and spent as much time near each other as they could, but lately the larger, darker one seemed standoffish and was ignoring her food. This made the lighter, smaller one irritable and agitated. Two days ago, the larger, darker one had snapped at the lighter, smaller one when he sat too close, causing him to bark twice and slink under a bush. The larger, darker one had just stared into the distance and emitted a long low growl. Things weren’t right and Cubby didn’t know what to do.
This morning when he stepped out into the early morning sun, he saw the lighter, smaller dog lying at the bottom of the back porch stairs. Blood matted the fur at his neck and his tongue lolled on the ground, a large almond-shaped leaf stuck to its tip. Cubby descended the stairs, his stomach sinking heart fluttering inside him. He knelt by the pup and touched his flank. The dog was dead. Cubby stared at the dog’s open eye and made a path
to his throat with his gaze. It had been savaged. The blood around the outer edge was dried and had made the fur it coated swirled and stiff. He had to look away. As his fingers left the dog’s flank, he briefly remembered its living touch under his hand just the day before and a sadness started in him.
He followed some droplets of blood and an intermittent whine until he was beneath the deck on the other side of the house. Slumped near the back wall was the larger, darker dog. He dragged her carefully into the morning light and saw that she was barely alive. She whimpered pitifully and made a futile attempt to fend him off by baring her teeth. The lighter, smaller dog had not gone easily. He had done extensive damage to his larger,
darker companion. He would not be able to save her.
It made him heartsick to put her down. He did it quickly with an old shovel that he hadn’t picked up in years. Afterwards he had lifted each dog lovingly into the wheelbarrow, the lighter, smaller one draped partially over the larger, darker one in order for them to fit. Their muzzles touched and they looked right together.
He went another half-mile and stopped at a sort of clearing. It seemed the proper place. The sun was high, and the lack of trees formed a column of light that had glowed from a distance, leading him here. He set the wheelbarrow down and rubbed his hands together, looking around. The dogs in the wheelbarrow sat half in and half out of the column of light as if they were perched on the edge of a cliff. It was mostly silent. The drone of a
chainsaw hung in the distance.
He took hold of the old shovel for the second time that morning and broke ground in the center of the small clearing. The ground was soft and steamy on the humid forest floor and he scooped out a clean unobstructed mound of dirt. He did this ten more times before the shovel jolted painfully in his hand as it struck something.
He stepped into the hole and squatted moving his hand tentatively over the obstruction that lay just under the soil’s surface. It riddled under his touch as he brushed the dirt away and after a moment, he had uncovered a hand. He thought about all the crime shows he had seen where someone discovers a body and their first reaction is to think it is a mannequin. A chuckle exited his nose. He had actually found a mannequin. He ran his fingers over the fingers of the fiberglass hand and brushed off a bit more dirt until he had uncovered a good part of the wrist and arm.
He noticed flies gathering on the dogs and took off his flannel button-down, laying it over them. It felt good in just his t-shirt, the shovel in his hand, and he started to dig again. After another half-hour he had uncovered the head, arms, and torso of a female mannequin, and what seemed to be the small arm of a child mannequin as well. He continued to dig until he had unearthed them both. When he had them laid out at the edge of the hole it occurred to him that it was a grave he was digging. Somewhere along the line it had turned into an archeological dig, but now with the hole empty it was back to a grave again. It was more than big enough for the two dogs and as he lowered them down into it individually, a bit of stiffness already setting into their corpses, he let the last bit of panic run out of him. The panic he had felt at finding things he held affection for gone in such a violent way. Now he just held sadness.
The late afternoon sun cast large shadows over the grave as he patted the last of the filled in dirt down. Except for the two unearthed mannequins it was just a clearing in the woods again.
After a moment, he put the mannequins gently into the wheelbarrow and left the clearing, starting his long trek towards home.