I kept giving Mister Mosely his medicine exactly like the vet said. But it wasn’t working.
I knew it, because after a while just going out to the front yard and carrying the paper back to the bottom of the stairs was too much for him. Some days, like when the paper came early on Saturday morning and it was cold, Moe couldn’t even stand up. He’d keep trying though and he’d be whining and whimpering all the time and he’d only stop when someone went and got the paper and showed it to him. I guess then he knew his job was done.
One Saturday when I was in the kitchen making myself some toast I heard Mister Mosely whining, so I went out to see what was wrong. He was at the bottom of the stairs. The big Saturday newspaper was on the step in front of him. It was the first time for ages that Moe had tried to bring the paper around.
I helped him back to his bed and took the paper up for Dad. He was making a cup of tea. I was just giving Dad the paper when we heard Mister Mosely whining again. This time we found him up a few steps and trying to climb higher. He was all shaky and almost falling over. Dad had to take him back down before he hurt himself.
But Moe just wouldn’t stay there. As soon as we got back to the kitchen we heard the whining again and then we heard a big thud and some scratching too. Dad and I ran out the back. Moe had fallen over and his legs were going everywhere and he was trying to stop himself from sliding down the stairs. Dad grabbed him and Mum came running out because of all the noise.
Dad said, ‘Don’t know what’s got into him, but he wants to get up to that porch. Haven’t got a clue how he expects to get back down.’ Mum just looked kind of sad and said that maybe he wasn’t worried about that any more. I wasn’t sure what she meant.
Anyway, we didn’t want Mister Mosely to keep hurting himself trying to get upstairs, so Mum made a bed for him on the porch just like she did way back when he was a puppy. When it was made Dad carried Moe all the way up. I got his bowls for him – his water bowl and the big silver one that Dad wrote his name on. We gave him some dry dog food and leftover gravy, but he didn’t eat any of it.
Mister Mosely stayed there in his old spot all afternoon. When it got dark Dad carried him downstairs so he could go to the toilet if he wanted to and to see if maybe he would go back to the laundry. He wouldn’t. Every time Dad started to go upstairs Mister Mosely tried to follow him. That made Dad a bit cross and he called Moe a ‘stubborn old coot’, but he carried him all the way back up to the porch just the same.
That night Mum let me sit outside with Mister Mosely way past the time I usually went to bed. Moe didn’t look as big and strong as he used to. I guess I was getting bigger too. It was funny thinking how I could ride on his back when I was little and how he would drag me along on my cardboard sled. But he was still the same old Moe. I put my finger on the black tear spot under his eye and I traced around the wonky heart shape on his chest, the one that Mum said was there because Moe’s heart was too big to all fit on the inside.
I stayed up so late I fell asleep on Mister Mosely and Mum had to wake me up to go to bed. I remember how I patted Moe and gave him a bit of a hug and how his big tail thumped a couple of times on the floor. I left him there waiting on the porch just like always.
Only I found out it wasn’t any of us that Mister Mosely was waiting for this time.