She and Dog by Al Faraone

She thinks the universe is mostly errands. Dog thinks it is mostly smells. This seems like a disagreement, but it works.

At Edgewater Park, the lake is doing its big quiet pretending-to-be-calm thing, which makes her trust it even though she knows better. Dog trusts nothing that doesn’t move or try to escape, which is how he keeps his heart.

She tells Dog, out loud, that she is afraid of choosing wrong, of staying too long, of leaving too early, of loving things that cannot love her back in the way she would like, with a calendar and a plan. Dog responds by stopping completely to investigate a very important stick that has been here since before regret was invented.

They continue.

A man jogs past with headphones, a woman pushes a stroller with a coffee, geese hold a meeting about who gets to be mean today. Dog would like to attend the meeting. She would like to be mean less often but does not know how.

She tells Dog that sometimes she feels like a background character in her own life, the one crossing behind the hero with groceries. Dog looks at her like, absolutely not, you are the whole parade and also the snack afterward.

The wind lifts her hair and for a second she believes in forgiveness, not the big ceremonial kind but the small everyday kind, the kind you give yourself for being slow, for forgetting names, for still wanting things you already had.

Dog pulls toward the water. She pulls toward the path. This is their religion: gentle argument, shared direction.

When they reach the bench, they sit. Dog does not wonder what it all means. She does. The universe, noticing this imbalance, gives her a warm dog body leaning into her leg and gives Dog a bone shaped biscuit treat from her pocket.

This is how it stays fair.

They go home knowing everything they need: that love is a leash you both hold, that time is just a long walk with interruptions, and that nothing terrible is happening right now, which is, statistically speaking, a miracle.

Once I wrote a darker version of this, then a funnier one, and one grittier, one more cigarette-and-coffee drenched, same park, same woman, same dog. Same stars, planet, and people. 

---

AL FARAONE — Al, a.k.a. EnoaraF, created art for Frigg for over 20 years and now returns to writing.

Art by SCOTT TIERNEY — Scott writings include the novella Kin, and the comic book series Pointless Conversations. His short-stories have been published on Liar’s League, Bristol Noir, After Dinner Conversation, and HumourMe. Examples of his art can be found on his Instagram page (instagram.com/scotttierneycreative) with more on his website (www.scotttierneycreative.com).