Samirah nodded and flung the front door open, and then without saying a word, grabbed hold of Cujo, making him instantly lighter in my arms. We walked like that down the hallway, and out into her practice. We lifted him onto the steel table and he flopped down on it like a sack of potatoes with a loud thud.
“Oh my God!” I gasped when his one eye started to close.
“How long has he been like this?” Samirah asked, placing a stethoscope to his side.
“I don’t know. I went to sleep. I . . . and then he made this noise and I found him like this. Is he okay?” I felt frantic. Hysterical.
“I’m going to take an X-ray and let’s see what’s going on inside.” And with that, she wheeled the great steel table out the room and around the back. I bit down on my nails as I paced the room a few times. A mass of feelings was building up inside me, consuming me . . . and I didn’t really know what they were, or why I was feeling them and I bloody wanted my mood-tracking app to tell me. I needed an emotive emoji face to explain to me my feelings, but in my haste, I’d left my phone at the hotel. My heart was pounding and the desire to check my heart rate and make sure I wasn’t having a heart attack was also overwhelming.
Samirah finally appeared around the corner again. “I’m going to have to operate to get the immobilizer out.”
“What?” I gasped. “You’re going to have to operate?” And then, like something I couldn’t control, I burst into tears. “Is he going to be okay?”
“He will be if I operate now,” she said, sounding calm but hurried.
I shook my head, tears streaming down my face. “You can’t let him die,” I gushed, so unsure of where this emotion was coming from. This wasn’t even my dog. I didn’t even like him. And yet, the idea that he might not exist in the world anymore was making me feel like I couldn’t breathe.
Samirah walked over to me, laid her hands on my shoulders. “Can I call someone to sit with you while I’m busy? This might take an hour or so and I don’t want you to be alone.” She sounded so concerned for me and this made me want to cry even more.
I shook my head. “There’s no one. I don’t have friends here.”
“Is there really no one?”
And then for some reason, and I don’t know why, maybe it was because he was the only person I knew, the only name I knew, I said it. “Mark. I don’t know his surname. I don’t even think he likes me, but he’s the only person I know here, other than you. From the video and music store.”
She nodded and smiled. “Sure, I’ll call him.” She reached for an old landline that was attached to the wall. “You can wait inside the house, help yourself to a cup of tea, I’ll be done as soon as I can.”
“Can I see him, before you operate?” I asked, tears streaming down my face.
“Sure.” She put the phone back and led me around to the back. Cujo was lying on the steel table, looking so lifeless and alone. My heart broke for him. I rushed over and grabbed his paw. He looked at me, one eye connecting with mine and I swear, he smiled a bit.
“Don’t die on me. Okay!” I squeezed his paw and he picked his head up with what looked like great effort and then he licked my hand. He was comforting me, even though he was the one who needed comforting.
“Okay, I’ll see you soon,” I said and exited, leaving Samirah to do her work. I walked out of the small cottage and into her house. I stood there in the middle of the passage and for a few moments didn’t know what to do or where to go. She’d told me to go into her house and wait there. Make myself at home. Was this small-town hospitality? So trusting of her, and she didn’t even know me. The gesture was both comforting in some way, and almost too much to bear. As if she had entrusted me with something I had no right to be entrusted with. And then, like some dull pain, it crept up on me again. The feeling that I’d spent my whole life running from. The feeling that I could usually swipe away with my thumb, that I could smile away with a selfie stick, that I could vlog away with my recorded words and likes and shares . . . Loneliness. Big and cavernous and so vast that it echoed deep inside me. It hurt.
I shook my head, physically flinging the thoughts from my mind. A photo on the wall caught my attention and I walked over to it. It was of Samirah and her husband on their wedding day. The two of them were standing arm in arm, smiling and laughing happily, as if truly enjoying having their photo taken. Not like when I took photos. Taking photos was work. It took effort and time. But this one seemed so natural and unrehearsed. You rarely see photos like that anymore. Photos that capture a happy moment and freeze it forever. No filter necessary. No Photoshop.
Honestly, I couldn’t really remember the last time I’d taken a photo like that. I turned away from the framed photo and walked into the kitchen and . . .
“Oh!” I said. A massive dog bed lay on the floor and it was filled, and I meanfilled, with five small dogs. I’d never noticed dogs here before. They all looked up at me, but didn’t move. I sat down at the table and laced my fingers together, and then unlaced them. I did this over and over again, thinking of the lick Cujo had given me.
Satan, Cujo . . .what the hell?The sound of those names in my head suddenly felt so wrong. Because he was anything but Satan’s Little Helper, or Cujo the horror dog. I’d been so wrong about him, and I vowed right there and then that as soon as the surgery was over, I would give him a proper name. A real name. I heard the bell ring, and I rushed over to the front door. And when I pulled it open, there was Mark.
CHAPTER 24
“You’re actually here.” I stared at the man standing there in what looked like clothes you would sleep in. A ruffled, old creased T-shirt that said Pink Floyd across it, with a neckline that had been stretched with what looked like years of wear and tear, and an old pair of tracksuit pants.
“Samirah called. She said I was needed, so I came.”
“Just like that. You came here?” I asked.
He nodded.
“Well,” I looked away, “thank you, I mean, I didn’t think you would really come. In the middle of the night and after what happened at the movie.” What I wanted to say was,After your mood totally changed and you turned your back on me, but didn’t.
“Are you okay?” he asked gently. His voice was full of warm sympathy, and it made me feel like crying all over again.
I nodded, and then shook my head. “I don’t know. I mean, I feel . . . I don’t know. He’s not even my dog and yet I feel . . .” I walked back to the kitchen. I could hear Mark following me. I stopped and swung around. “I don’t even like dogs. And definitely not that one. He is the ugliest thing I have ever seen and yet . . .” I lost the words and started walking again, and then stopped once more and swung around. “I should be pissed off with him. I mean, he hitched a ride with me without my permission and then swallowed my damn rented car immobilizer just as I was trying to leave this place. Like he knew. He knew I wanted to go and he did it on purpose and I should be so mad with him that I . . .” The words left me again and I started walking, then repeated my dramatic swing around. But this time, I pointed at Mark. “You know what? I am mad at him. So, so mad at him. Because now I feel like this, all worried and stressed and like I want to cry, and I don’t like feeling like this and he made me feel like this. So yes, I’m mad at him!” I put my hand on my hips and exhaled loudly. At that, a small smile tugged at the corners of Mark’s lips.
