When the Man comes to the door, the dog lets out a low growl and stands in front of her, guarding her small body. The dog doesn’t like the Man; he smells sick, like burnt sugar. She puts her hand on the dog’s head to quiet him, so he swallows the snarl held in his throat. She always knows best. She also smells like burnt sugar, but there are other smells on her too: wet trees, smoke, lemon. She lets the Man in, they hug, and she laughs, briefly.
She and the Man leave. The dog can hear his car engine rev as he pulls away from the house. While they are gone, the dog drinks and drinks from the bowl of cool water left for him on the kitchen tile. The dog gets unreasonably thirsty after seeing the Man. He sniffs around her piles of clothes until he finds his favorite sweatshirt. He turns two and a half times before settling into the warm smell of her, and falls asleep.
He is surprised awake when they return. He jumps up and begins to bark after she has opened the front door to come back inside. The Man is laughing as she leads him to the kitchen. The Man is not afraid of the dog in the slightest. The dog is ashamed, imagines his teeth piercing his fleshy calf. The dog decides to stay in the living room and chew on his own front paw. She would yell at him if he bit the Man. He chews and bites until flecks of blood appear, his feathery white fur turning to wet rust.
He hears the two of them go into the bathroom. He stiffens, anticipating the door closing, but it doesn’t. He relaxes—she is still within reach. He could still go to her and put his head against her body until she rubs the tips of his ears.
But he waits, he listens. She does not like it when he goes to her while she and the Man are in the bathroom. Soon the Man will leave and she will come to the couch, tilt her head back, and fall into a place that is neither sleep nor wakefulness. The dog will lie down, push her body into the crevice of the couch so he can stretch out beside her. He will put his wet nose on her chin to check her waning breath. This is what happens after her trips to the bathroom. He knows this.
The dog grows bored waiting for the Man to leave. He looks out the sliding glass doors at the stretch of field behind the house. Just beyond the field are woods, full of moss, birds, and endless miles to run. He likes to run. Sometimes, even though he loves her, he leaves. He runs despite her shouts and pleas for him to return. He runs until he cannot hear her voice or anything but the flapping of his ears in the forest air. He runs away from days spent on the couch, her waning breath, this Man, all the men.
There is a noise from the bathroom: a strangled cough followed by a wet gurgle. The dog runs from the glass doors toward her just as the Man exits the bathroom. The dog catches only a glimpse of her: she is sitting on the bathroom floor, her hand weakly outstretched, the gurgling noise coming from her throat and lungs. He can smell vomit and blood. She is looking right at him. He holds her gaze, running to her, but the Man closes the door too quickly. The dog snarls at him, bares his teeth, and lunges. The Man kicks the dog away, swearing, then darts to the front door.
The dog turns his attention to the bathroom. He can hear her, hear the sounds her body is making, the waning of her breath apparent to him even though his wet nose is not pressed to her chin. He howls, using his paws to claw and tear at the door separating them. He barks, frustrated that he is not strong enough to break through the wood and get to her. He hears her body slide and hit the door. He becomes quiet, pressing his belly to the floor and pushing his nose to the crack between the door and the tile. He whines into the crack, begging her to make a noise. He stays there, willing his breath to travel to her mouth and make her alive. He lies there until he falls asleep.
The smell is unmistakable when he awakens. Still, he calls out to her. He is desperately thirsty and drinks from his water bowl until there is nothing left. He shits in the corner of the room, far away from the smell of the bathroom and the pile of her clothes. He eats and eats and then returns to the crack in the door.
There is no more water or food. He has been unable to tear down the door, so he has ripped up the couch, peed on the carpet, pressed his paws to the glass doors leading to the field, and cried out. He has turned over the trash can, sniffing through the garbage to find anything to eat. At one point, he heard the mailman come to the door and knock—he barked and barked, but the mailman left. The dog’s throat is sore, his paws are tender, his stomach aches. With his teeth, he pulls her sweatshirt gingerly from the pile of her clothes over to the door. He buries his head in the smell of wet trees, smoke, and lemon.
The boy comes home. The dog runs around the house, howling her name and crying for help. The boy opens the bathroom door, and despite trying to get to her body for the last four days, the dog turns away from the sight of her.