The Life of Todd

When my soul fainted within me I remembered the Lord:

And my prayer came in unto thee

Into thine holy temple.

They that observe lying vanities

Forsake their own mercy.

But I will sacrifice unto thee with the voice of thanksgiving;

I will pay that that I have vowed.

Salvation is of the Lord.

                                                                      -Jonah 2:7-9

This is how the dog died, or the way in which I found her already dead.

I knew somethin’ was wrong when I came down the stairs and she wasn’t curled up on her usual spot under the coffee table. I couldn’t see too well, because the lights were off, all except the television—I keep the television on basically all the time ‘cause it’s just me in the old house; nobody’s gonna break in if they think I’m watchin’ TV. The blinds were closed too. So I stepped down off the stairs onto that new tile floor my son, Ricky, put in with the cold goin’ right through my socks and I flipped on the light.

I thought I’d see her in my chair—she used to get in it when she was a puppy but I know how to train a labrador and she soon got better ideas and settled down under the coffee table. The television was showin’ the news so I took it off mute and watched a bit. They said that senator from Arizona was caught foolin’ around with the mexican woman that cleans his house. It never did make sense to me to live in a house that was too big to clean yourself. And that’s one way to get into trouble. That’s what politics have done to this country, makin’ sinners out of the young people. I ain’t no saint but I ain’t never been in debt to nobody and in all those forty-five years, I never cheated on Margaret but twice, at the beginning, during the war.

I crossed that ice-cold tile again to the kitchen but she wasn’t at her food bowl neither. Ricky said he’d come and take the paneling off the walls in the den and change the carpet on the stairs but after the tile, I told him I don’t need anymore white, cold, or hard in my house. Same reason I don’t plan on livin’ in a hospital.

So I checked her nest next to the washing machine—I swear she slept better than I do with all those blankets piled up. But it was good with her bein’ pregnant ‘cause she didn’t sleep very well up in the bedroom where it’s cold. It was hard for her at first to sleep downstairs all alone but I figured it was better that way ‘cause if anyone tried to break in while I was sleeping, she’d be sure to wake me from the dead with that howl. Plus, she snored like a hog.

I come in and out of the back door ‘cause it’s closer to where I park the truck; I realized I left the door open when I felt the cold air movin’ through the kitchen. Then I started cussin’ and I thought she’d prob’ly gone outside and couldn’t get back in past the screen door. But I should have known, cause it was all icy-quiet: no scratchin’ or whinin’.

There she was, lyin’ on the ice by the barbeque, her big brown eye just a marble in her head.

I didn’t think at first; I just pushed open the the screen door and stepped out onto the back porch. It was still snowin’ thick outside, with the clouds and the storm heavy everywhere. But the snow was meltin’ on her body and I knew she hadn’t been dead for long.

I bent over and ran my hand along her fur real light and whispered her name once and my eyes started waterin’ while I told her goodbye. Then I noticed that my feet were soaked and my knees were sore and I was about to go back inside to get my boots when the thought hit me square in the face: the litter might not be dead.

After that I don’t know that I thought much about what I was doin’. I tried to pick her up but even if I could bend my knees that far, I didn’t have the strength to lift her. So I pulled off my belt and I wrapped it around her neck and put it back through the buckle so that it cinched on her neck, and I started draggin’ her over the ice-covered porch to the back door.

I got her into the kitchen over next to the table and I sat down to catch my breath. Then I got an idea and I pulled her head up between my knees with the belt, after which I hauled her into my lap. I hooked my arms underneath her and pushed her onto the table.

That’s when I saw the side of her head that was crushed in. I don’t know how she got hit or why she was dodgin’ cars but I couldn’t bear to see the sight of her all mashed like that. So I grabbed half a dozen rags from below the sink and I used one to cover her head; the rest I laid out to soak up the blood. Her head wasn’t bleedin’ much—the snow took care of that—but I knew there’d be plenty of mess when I started cuttin’.

I used to help my granddad deliver calves back when I worked for him during the summers growin’ up so I got ready with my huntin’ knife and some shears. Then I opened her up and pulled the puppies out one by one, usin’ the shears to cut them off from their momma. It wasn’t pretty and the mess was awful but I got all six of ‘em in a bowl with towels. Then I rubbed them one by one with my hands until my arms gave out. When I looked up, it was dark.

The house was freezin’ by then—old windows don’t do much for keepin’ the heat in. So I got a fire going in the wood stove. I turned the blower on and set myself and the puppies down on chairs in front of it. I didn’t move for a long time; just stared at the flames, thinkin’ about the dog and the look that was gone from her eye.

Two of the puppies lived. I gave ‘em to Ricky; I know he didn’t want them but I couldn’t keep them myself. I’m too old for dogs.

Sometimes I’ll take a verse or two from the Bible and carve it into wood. I ain’t any good at poetry but I like how it looks and how it sounds when you read it out loud; I figure the best stuff came from God anyway. I read the Bible through once and now I read the good parts over and over, somethin’ every day.

The best story in the Bible is about Jonah and the whale. Far as I’m concerned, there ain’t no difference between gettin’ up-chucked by a whale and comin’ back from the dead. But I’ve been thinkin’ about it since and wonderin’ about how God sent the whale. Maybe he asked him. Maybe he starved him. I don’t know but it looks an awful lot like a hack-job to me. When Jonah jumped off that boat, did God have to improvise? Was the whale the best he had to work with? Or was that whale born in those waters knowin’ it was him that was s’posed to swallow the prophet of the Lord?

-Devon Cook