The clouds are rolling in
Big grey, white and silver gate crashers elbowing and shouldering
In through the front sky-blue door.
They’re drifting in like a distant herd of cattle, ignoring my sadness and me.
There’s a two-hour wait I’m told,
And we sit outside together alone, away from the sparkling wide TV screen.
My dog has a blanket
And I have her.
I’d forgotten about this part of dog ownership –
Micro chipped, de sexed, de flea-ed, on a lead, collar, tag, multiple shit bags, Yeah, I’m ready for that.
But not for this.
She’s shaking and so am I.
An old lady sidles up to me:
“I’ve got a staffie, rub her with horse liniment
That’ll fix her, they won’t tell you that,” she says.
After an hour and forty minutes I see a mountainous black cloud moving in.
Like some massive, magnified carpet bug
it sucks all the blue and white out of the sky.
Our names are called to room three above a whistling wind.
I carry her in my arms through the waiting room
past barking German shepherds
and the fanfare of a wrestling match.
The vet nods and injects the colour green
I hold her tight as smoky blue clouds her eyes and she is heavy.
They wrap her up for me in a royal blue satin bag with a pretty yellow rope tie.
My head up, I walk deaf through the crowded waiting room,
proud of my dead dog.
A tough young kid smoking outside looks at me awkwardly.
I lie my dog on the front seat, start the engine and turn off the radio.
It’s Sunday afternoon, and we’re together alone for just one more drive home.
Robert Lastdrager is a writer and children’s author from Melbourne, Australia. The watercolour painting of ‘Queenie’ was done by his daughter Saskia Lastdrager.
