Puppy Love

Can love from far be just as good close up?

It was the waiting time of year, when snow still clings and warm weather is but a fond memory. The days when skies are gray and the ground colorless. This year was harder than most. The pandemic had caged people, and humanity worried the bars until it bled. They bit and lashed, spread contagion along with disease. Perhaps the world was dim even when the sun shone.

Cassandra Green felt the grayness, but at thirteen it was hard to kill the color inside. She abhorred online school, longed for lunch breaks loitering around the school perimeter. She missed her friends, but she also knew her fortune. Her family was healthy, she had video chat, delivery services, and both her parents were essential workers. Life wasn’t awful, but it was lonely.

Like most days, Cassandra was alone. She wedged herself onto the kitchen counter, cross-legged, forehead pressed to the window. She studied the neighbor’s house, a rambling sort of place newly fixed up after being sold last year. That was another thing the pandemic brought. An influx of big-city folk, munching up real estate like locusts. A slap of paint and a for sale sign were blood in the water. None remained unsold for long.

The new neighbors were never seen, but Cassandra had noticed their dog. A larger sort of poodle, curly-furred and clear-eyed. Initially, she had heard it howling in the night. She had flown to the window, intent on disintegrating the causer of cacophony with her glare. However, seeing the canine alone, calling for its lost pack, she paused and instead gave a small howl back.

From that day forward, Cassandra watched the pup. She nicknamed it Solum. The dog practiced a precise schedule. Wake, sleep, poop, sleep, run, bark and at night, howl. As far as she could tell, the dog was seldom indoors, nor its masters out to play. Cassandra would sometimes stand on her back porch and toss lunch tidbits for him to munch with her.

Today, Solum was digging for dog treasure. Cassandra wiped her foggy imprint from the window. She hopped to the floor, brown hair swishing about her shoulders. It was early for lunch, but she was bored. Her texts were silent, and classes tedious. Cassandra headed out the sliding doors and onto the porch, chunks of bologna in hand.

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