There were posters all over the few blocks of houses surrounding my own. Each one begging for the same thing, bribing people with large amounts of my monthly pay to tell me where my dalmatian had gone. It’d been over a year and the posters were still there, still unanswered; still waiting for a reply. The money still sat in my account. I’d wasted some more of my money on laminating them all, desperate that they stay up as long as it took.
The pond in my garden had gotten bigger. It’d given me something to do—keep digging, keep digging, as if I would find him down there somehow. Eventually I’d lined it, filled it with plants, put a pump in, but I was never satisfied. I took it all out and started digging again. It was never big enough. Never enough.
The fish was in the bathtub, like he had been for the past year. Still swimming around lazily. He’d nearly outgrown it now. His fins slapped the side of the bath, whacking it with such ferocity that little cracks were starting to appear in the porcelain. I needed to get him out of there. Needed to let him swim outside in the pond that would never be finished.
I sat by him, bottle in hand, every night. The phone sat on my bent knee as I watched for any calls. I hadn’t given up on finding my dog yet. His excited bark still rang through my ears whenever I found the strength to smile. His bow, that he did whenever we played, was still visible to me when I walked by the park on the way to work. I pulled my coat around me tighter, my face bitter cold in the heat of the summer sun, and continued on faster. I was always early to work.
A friend gave me a lifeline. “I know you’ve been missing Dom,” she said as she handed me a new lead. “This is Berk. My friend’s kid is allergic so they have to give him up.”
He was cute, Berk. Brown. Furry. A little wet nose that snuffled around the carpets. He loved the fish. Barked at him playfully. The fish seemed to like him back. The smile was easier to bring to my face again.
There was a spring in my step when I went to work. The pond was nearly there, finally. I woke up excited every morning to hear Berk’s little bark from the kitchen.
But this morning it wasn’t there. Instead I heard a splash. I ran to the bathtub, panicking and feeling that same bitter cold hit my face. Two fish swam in my now overcrowded bathroom. I had to finish that pond. The crack was getting bigger every minute, daring to break and killing them both.
I collapsed to my knees, my phone fallen on the floor in front of me.
It rang and I grabbed it like a shark smelling blood.
The Literary Onion 