WHAT WE CARRY
The ghost of his dog trotted alongside him, this their walk route for nearly thirteen years. He, bundled and hunched, would keep going, a ritual of sorts. When he arrived at the tree old Lola had liked to sniff best, he looked up, witnessed an unseen ribbon of wind whip through the November leaves barely hanging on. Two sparrows fluttered out from the very top, tweeting in flurried excitement. They landed on a powerline across the street, perched and watched him. He wondered what he must have looked like to them. So old, so alone, just pausing beneath their home. He remembered something his grandmother once told him. A bird’s eye view can help clear a mind. Something about trying to rise above your own thinking, trying to look down upon a busy world and realize we are all small and doing our best. He had been a child then and did not recall what had prompted her to say that to him. The worst of his experiences at that point must have been having to be coaxed to brush his teeth and feeling too tired to comply. Now, having lived through a war, a pandemic, the loss of his wife, and most recently, Lola, his grandmother’s wisdom finally resonated for him. Those birds had a view he could hold for a moment. He enjoyed the shelter of the canopy of leaves, swore he could still hear Lola sniffing around the bulging tree roots. The clouds crackled, the threat of the season’s first storm. Lola hadn’t feared them like most dogs as long as she could carry a stick or old toy for the duration. She just needed something to carry. He bent down, tough as it was with his knees screaming, grabbed a Y-shaped stick. He carried on walking, holding tight to the peeling Y, almost feeling the soft whish of Lola’s heft beside him, the jingle of her tags against her wiry chest. The birds flitted back to Lola’s tree, preparing for what was to come.
Nicole Monaghan’s fiction, nonfiction, reviews, poetry, and interviews have appeared in several literary journals, both online and in print. She is founding and managing editor of Nailpolish Stories, a Tiny and Colorful Literary Journal. Visit her at here.
OVUNQUE SIAMO 