The cold snapped a long time ago, a huge and terrible snap. But it is only now that the trees have started to consider trapping glucose in their leaves and setting out to begin the great moult.
I run through yellows, browns and reds that match my darkening coat. It is the time for burgundy and caramel, the season of harvest and Halloween, the days where you feel an air of preparation constantly humming under the carpet. Acorns and minute cones get under my paws, I feel like I am running on marbles and I hurt from how many time I have just not but just quite rolled my ankles. The clip jingles as I leap and the unconcerned bird flutters from my path. The trainer pulls me along, making me match my awkwardly new long legs to her accord.
We aren't training for anything, us two; we are just exercising our heart and lungs in this early morning. I have nothing to say to the dogs that pass us by. I am running to a military gait while they lumber with their children and top hatted men, and I've got nothing to say.
I just can't think of a passing topic to bark about, they might start off with a "good morning" or "going to be a long winter", but I just can't hold up my end of the conversation anymore. It's evident that I feel different from them other dogs, because while they leisure on to their homes I shall be marched back to the kennels behind the police building. You see, this training, you are manipulated and cut into half. You're usually self and a professional side. As soon as the leash is bitten into my chain, the iron plated self of me wakes up and snaps into motion.
I feel separate and this is what the human's intended. So that when I am release to do my job proper, I am removed and professional about it all. They are sapping the curiosity right out of me, and I'm desperately concerned, because curiosity was what I lived by, that tickling that you couldn't quite scratch. The mystery you can't quite solve, the lesson you can't quite learn.
Through the park, down the sidewalk, across the hustling business district, to the police station, around the back of the building, to the left of the kennels and into the cage committed to just me. Spaniel cross, fly away haired, trapped in the system; this is me, rich puppy to mangy child who is now reformed into a growing canine of the government.
This is a big city, with thousands of cold streets, large families and endless places to search- all presenting countless issues when you're on the hunt for lost and promised to siblings. And maybe even, perhaps, making sure the fat dogs litter is safe, reacquainting with my parents and a new litter of unmet family. Would mother have given birth by now? How long does it take to grown puppies anyway? To approach the rose gardens of my beginnings, squeeze my muzzle through the gaps in the fence and shout Mother, Father!
Wouldn't that just be the grandest?
And so I settle back into my life of shifty shadows. My hessian bed, two metal bowls, concrete flooring and standard issue choke collar. I conduct myself upright and tell myself that it's fine, it's fine and I tell myself again, that it is fine enough for me right now, that I am privileged.
I go and lie in the sunlight, because it is warm, it fills me and knocks my muscles out with its lovely, massaging heat. It makes my mind disengage and the humming of day dreams takes over. I may be panting billowing clouds from the run, but still I feel like there are icicle gems beaded throughout my coat. I stretch out on my side and close my eyes, I am thawing myself out.
In the quiet of my isolated end, I can hear the lazy conversation and obtain new, muttered gossip from the dogs that sleep on the other side of the wall, with my eyes shut I listen to them joke and bitch about trainers. And I wait. Because that's what life has cracked up to be. It gives you quite a scare when you realise. You are forced into waiting your life away so that when humans want to waste a few seconds and make you rollover, you're ready and attentive like an obedient animal.
Because you are. You're the obedient animal, like it's an unknown policy you agreed to when you were still in the womb.
The worst part is that I am getting bursts of enjoyment. It makes me feel dirty, but I love the challenged they set up for me. I love discovering and learning about the scents and their meanings. I always have been like that, I suppose. I just get all hyped when the trainer comes for me and I am taken to learn, or rehearse for a show I know nothing about. To carry a note on command and what I should do when there is a sudden drop in the whooshing of a person's labyrinth of tunnels.
But there is something wrong, something that is making me bleed. Maybe it's the stock standard wild part of me, the one that made Scamp escape to the Junkyard dogs, maybe it's my father's street dog make up. Whatever it is, it's deep down in there and, as it feels, apparently tearing my blood vessels apart with quiet, uncontrollable rage.
I think it's because a dog needs a pack. I have nothing here. I have a pair of human legs, a steel cage and dry biscuits. I feel like a piece of property and it gets worse every day. Sometimes I just wish for another beside me, with ears splashed and tongue lolled as they lay by my side.
The smell of sweat and hot breath hits my sensitive nose. A trail of dogs is back from a marathon run, by the smells of it, it is the Fire Department's Dalmatians. They pant past as they trail behind their appointed horse; they must have been learning about how to run alongside the four hooved monsters.
One look over as me as they walk past, I can see the questions in her eyes. What is she doing alone? What job is she learning? Who is she?
It's annoying to see that these dogs' lives shall be so much greater than mine, because they're breed to run alongside and guard the valuable horses of the fire department. They guard the wagon inside the hectic fire zone and calm the horses through the long hours of waiting at the station and they fight off dogs and people that attempt to attack the wagon.
Horse theft is common in this age and the fire horses are a prime target, with their reputation as being immensely athletic and fine spirited. These spotted dogs are destined to live amongst sirens and adrenaline pumping chases, just because their breed has some unnatural calming effect on horses. I'm going to be trotting at the heels of the elderly and the most strenuous thing I have to do is bark loud enough for their deaf ears. My life will be in vain, I fear.
Some hours later my trainer toddles back, my paradise island in the oceans of dead tingling's that follow you as you paddle above the glass waves. She takes me away from the quiet kennel, quiet but for the wind creaking it back on its haunches. I suddenly feel strong and mean; the snark professional that had grown inside me, she takes over and puffs up- she is in her element.
I am put through my paces and we train. I dance to her melody; today I am learning how to locate the medication. She hides it from me, in the dresser, the bathroom vanity, in a cupboard or from inside the bedroom. I love having to search and smell of the bag of medical stones. Then we go over the behaviours I know. Good O'! I love the thrill of preforming and the taste of the treat! I answer the doorbell, switch on lights, summon help and guide them to my "collapsed person" and providing an excuse to leave in embarrassing situations by nosing them and being a nuisance.
I do love my job, from bracing my muscles if the person need me as leverage to get off the ground, interrupting them at a certain time for medication, assisting them in emergencies, licking their face all over to awake them or save them from shedding tears while other people are around, but I know that this is only half of it so far.
Back in the first instances of training, there used to be yards full of us dogs in all our different breeds, rolling and playing together like waves along the coast, as we all learned to work to the human's tune, figuring out our sits from out stays. Slowly though, some dogs got taken out, groups started to peel away into their own specific projects and slowly I was taken away too.
There were wonderful friends, squirming warm bodies, full of so much fun.
I think of the Labradors and it saddens me to know that their breed is commissioned on purpose to die young. There is no such thing as an old retriever; death comes early because they are too stupid to know any better, like running under wheels or hooves, getting shot by their master because they are just too god damn persistent at chasing the chickens, barking at the mailman or jumping on the children. Retrievers were born high and meant to crash low; they are just born with too much energy for their shiny bodies or small brains to handle.
They were good friends, but soon they flayed off on their own way as well, to be dropped from boats in horrible circumstances, made to search for a possible drowning soul in waters that no human dare faces, no matter how much of a reward the act would constitute.
I think of the Collies and the terriers, the pit bulls and the shepherds and me, spaniel mutt who no one really remembers anymore, the one who no one really knows what she's for. There is a pack shaped hole in my heart and every time the life giving muscle beats, the hole tears a little wider.
Sometimes I can hear them, in the dead of a night like this one, when they are howling loudly at the moon. So many concrete walls and training yards separate us though, and even though I try my best to reply, my voice box renders me unable to match their distance.
There is too much and too many between us, for there are the golden Guide Dogs and the tracking Bloodhounds and the wheelchair assisting Doberman's, all those other hounds' to level out my friends' howls and my applies.
I don't see what's so important about my job; I don't see how it saves or affects anyone, this nature that the institute is grinding into me. Sure I serve and help, but every other dog's job has got a point, they all share their service along with someone, and they are all learning their tricks in groups. I've been isolated for over a month now, and I have started to gnaw at my leg in loneliness.
I'm being trained to bark when the whooshing in a person's blood becomes dangerous.
I saved the old ladies life with two acts; it is a terrible turn that only one got noticed, my whining and gloom that made the lady swallow her rock. No one ever learned about the heroic escape; if only they did, maybe I would have been placed in a more suitable job…guide dog or a signal dog or…something.
But still I learn their commands well, because my meals and basket rely on it and there is still that sickening thrill.
The winter morning blooms and generates some energy into the prison, taking over the crawling night. I heave myself out of bed, lick at my water and nibble at new burrs that are stuck in my coat. Life resumes and I wait.
The morning's rowdy football team noise starts up, I listen into snags of talk that are drifting from over the high walls, but none are clear enough for me to understand. In theory I should be able to hear with my doggy ears, but as I found out many months back, my hearing is dull, sacrificed- it seems- to make my nose more powerful than most.
When my cinnamon apple smelling trainer finally comes within seeing range… it's with a cargo booted human that is marching like he's on a campaign trail, these booted humans only train the military dogs. I'm surprised and scared that I might have been enlisted into the military, Mother always said to be careful what you wished for. Dear Lord no, I can't keep up with the muscle dogs with breed on their side, I don't have the bravery or the loyalty to run through shrapnel or hunt down a knife welding murdered- it's a whole different league out there in the law enforcement service.
Then I seen a bandage ravelled and nearly mummified German Shepard trailing behind the boots and my heart-stopping-mounting-in-panic moment ends.
It's a dog that I remember, Grady, he's wolfish and overconfident and falls over his feet far too much for his age. I jump up and run to the door, company, glorious dog gone company! No matter how sour and crude it is, I love this dog for visiting me. An old friend has returned- Wacko!
"Grady! You've grown huge now! What happened to ya? You look like you went through a mincer!" I bubbled with laugher in joy and start pouncing around, bowing and jumping. Conversation, friends, fun, games, someone to talk to!
"Let's go chase leaves! How have you been? Do you want to creep up on some squirrels? How's the police force been treatin' ya?!"
Something is terribly wrong. He doesn't talk to be; he doesn't dare look at me. Something is wrong; I used to play Catch My Tail with this dog back in the early stages, sure he smells full of new puberty pulsing hormones and prickling sexual frustrations, but he was talkative and loud back in the months before, what is going on?
We are chained and lead along through the compound, him purposefully looking ahead and labouring away to keep up with his terrible limp. And me? I'm purposefully staring directly at him.
I was relieved that I had taken after my father in height; it made these dark, hairy monsters easier to confront and confer with when you were able to look them in the eye without craning your neck. I started with the weather, to ease him into a conversation.
"Handling the cold?"
"Yeah…sure." Yes! Response! And whoa, is that your voice? It's so deep and gravelly and…
That's when I discover that I am just as young and overflowing with chemicals as him. I dwell on that through for a while; I am growing into an adult, turning out to be a full and healthy bitch. Life sure has a way of surprising you. How truly entertaining.
"Too tough for the cold then?" Play it cool, don't let on that you haven't have a conversation since forever.
"Sure." He sounds really angry, and my muscles instinctively contract into fight mode… no, I trust this dog… its fine… you've just been isolated for too long…you're imagining things.
So I continue on, but a little more carefully now.
"You look rather injured there, run into a bramble bush?" I chuckled at the end in earnest, and child myself mentally for not being carefully at all, where is your sensitivity young lady?I can just here my Mother saying.
It was meant to be a tease, like we used to always do…did we? But he didn't take it that way, the part way grown dog snapped his head around and glared at me.
"If he went for your neck instead, you would be dead, lap dog. Oscar's come out just as bad, don't you go lording because you've got nothing to hold over me…" He was starting to bear his fangs and I in turn beared mine. What the hell was going on in the police dog compound? Where they infighting? This meeting was yielding some very interesting results.
"Got into a fight, hey? What'd you do?" I smirked wickedly and he started at that. I was reminded of how I had grown into a more acidic and sassy animal. Damn aging process, making my personality shift. He hadn't expected me to be like this, he remembers somedog different.
He looked at me for a long moment, than instead of continuing the wandering conversation- he attacked me.
No, I insist, full on lunged and grabbed my scruff in his massive jaws. The humans jolted and started yanking at our leads, like knights dangling at the necklaces of dragons. I could feel my skin being torn as he clamped and shook on my neck. Shit, shit, what the hell is going on? Pain, pain. I twisted around and lashed at his shoulder, feeling blood splash over my lips as I returned the favour, bandages unravelled as I sliced through them, trying to convince the brute to let me go, stop, stop, stop!
And pain gripped as we spin around and tangled up. Once again I was glad for having grown into my father's image, while my mother had teeth, my father had jaws. We are matched in height and length, but he is heavier and trained. Quickly I'm on my back and the humans only just manage to save me from being gutted by a breath. I watch him be pulled way and thrashed by the cargo booted man.
It's the first time I actually see a human hit a dog. I'm revolted and taken aback. But then it keeps going and going, and each blow is harder and harder. My cinnamon roll lady does nothing, just screeching on about "this is a tremendously valuable animal of the American Delta Convention" and "that filthy Shepard, bash him dead!" I do not inspire to remember any of this, so I blank it all out and glaze over in shock. I think I might have collapsed, but I'm not too sure.
Later when I am smeared up with every which cream and wrapped all up in bandages much like Grady had been, later when everything has stopped and a still, quiet night has fallen, I tentatively explore my feeling on the experience.
I spewed my guts out.
Grady is removed the next day and never returned, but I had sensed what was going on inside him, I had sensed the way the grieving and confusion chemicals were stimulated during those last moments of peace between us.
It had something to do with his fight with Oscar, the nearly pure black Shepard that was rather steady and quiet. For a power hungry dog like Grady, to be dominated in a fight by a hound like Oscar; it would have been a massive source of frustration and shame. I had also smelt since the beginning, the fear of me. Not me exactly, more of what I could result in. More of what Oscar could do if he was caught doing something out of line; more of a recently over thrown Alpha Male actually, who was not used to being dominated and was scared of stuffing up. What had that lazy Oscar pup grown into?
So I sat in the yucky smelling vet room as I recovered and healed my tattered flesh. I could just not figure it out. But fate has a way of working for you at times, because if not for that fight, I would have never been sulking in the vet cage, and if not for me staring idly out the window, I would not have seen a certain dog walk by.
He was brown and limping with past injuries, terribly, terribly wrinkly and horribly, horribly familiar.
"Uncle Trustee, Uncle Trustee, Uncle Trustee!" I howled and howled and never once allowed myself to stop, because that had been Uncle Trustee who lived beside my old home- gods, home- who told us stories of his grand pappy Old Reliable over and over again. ("I don't recollect having told you about my old Grand Pappy Old Reliable." "No Uncle Trustee, you haven't".) Gods, gods, a thundering wave of nostalgia is drowning me.
"Trustee, Trustee, Trustee, Trustee, Trustee,"
A head came back around the corner, blinked once at me, then blinked again. Then absolutely lit up when he realised who was howling his name from through the window.
"Why, what are you doing there Miss Annette Ma'am?"