Autumn Days

The pavement is pied with amber, russet, browns of every shade, its dirty grey now pooled with rough edged warmth, papering the fissures in rain slick copper and bronze. Our feet upon it step in time, the rhythm of many years of walking side by side, on spring bright grass, on summer scorched earth and on autumnal mulch, layers of leaf mould soft and giving beneath us. We have matured together, stride for stride, and delight in this easy symbiance even as we take it for granted now. Weaving our bodies, more stiffly that when our spines were fresh and sinuous, around the wooden kissing gate and into the glow of the wood at the end of the lane, we both start to listen for familiar sounds, the soft curring bass of the wood pigeons, the liquid treble of the goldfinch, the shrill pips of the robins, but always, the soft footfalls of the other, the shifts in attention, the breath, the ever present breath.

It is early yet, and the sun is still low, rays of light slanting through gaps between trunks and branches, illuminating the thinning canopy from below. The rain clouds of the night have emptied and moved on, leaving a clear, light blue sky, and a dazzling shimmer to every rain slicked surface, picking out each leaf, each bough, each gleaming moment in this too bright, too real, utterly unmuted world. I feel the gathering sting of my eyes and I close them against this wave for a moment, hearing your head turn as my pace slows a fraction. I open, and meet your eyes in reassurance. I’m alright, we’re alright. Yet we keep the slower pace.

The path dips, a wide descent towards the muddy stream that only flows in wet weather, and I remember how we bowled down this slope scuffing leaf litter three seasons deep in little explosions behind each racing foot, flying to the bottom, and you, always first, plunging into the stream, mud or water, before I could catch you, sitting there, cool bellied and happy while I admonished you from the bank. But my heart was barely in it. Watching you, I could feel that cool oozing into armpits and groin creases, the raw pleasure of the moment, consequences be damned. But you hated the consequences, all the same. The cold water hose on the grass when we got home did not hold the same delight as that forbidden stream, did it? Today, though I wait a moment on the bank, you stand by my side, and listen for the creak in my hip as I recollect myself, so that we step out again in perfect time, old soldiers still in sync.

We cross the bridge together, and I slow, to allow you to pass gingerly over the slatted planks, both of us recalling the day your paw slipped into a gap and snagged, the yelp of shock and pain you threw out to bounce back at you from tree trunk and earthen bank and from my own throat as I turned, how I held you and you stopped fighting, let me take your weight and reach between the slats with my free hand to re-angle and gently, cautiously, withdraw the paw. How I carried you then, back across the bridge, back up the slippery bank and only on flat ground placed you down to test the leg. How at first you nursed the paw, held it flamingo like, tucked to your chest, looking to me for reassurance. How confidently I looked back, urging you to try it, and how tentatively then, you placed that paw to the floor, and limping, covered the five feet or so I had placed between us, and then how as we walked on, the limp eased itself out and was forgotten completely when you broke into a trot after something that had piqued your interest. How then my own knees had buckled and I sat, cross legged on the forest floor, tears flowing in relief and spent adrenaline. How you came back to me, left the rabbit trail or rustle in the bushes, to snuffle and lick at my ear, until I returned the favour, ruffling your own ears and inhaling that sweet musk from where the hair grew haywire behind them.

Today we clear the bridge and take the valley path back upstream. A jogger passes, and we nod good morning, he and I. I smile at a young mother, her arm stretched to pull on the hand of a child trailing a stick along the leafy ground, watching the line he leaves behind him as he goes. An ordinary morning, bathed in extraordinary golden light, sharpened to a mirrored shard, shattered from the whole.

We are slow as we reach the top of the gentle incline. You would keep up, I know, but I have heard your breath come harder as we climb, and without the interference of conscious thought, I have held back, so you don’t have to. I didn’t bring a lead, I haven’t for many years, not to these woods we know so well, and as we re-join the pavement, you take the inside, me the kerb, as we always have. This stretch, frequented by so many dogs, used to take so long, as you stopped to sniff the latest news on every corner brick of every wall, but now you’re not so worried about the goings on outside our daily patter, and it is a short walk, back to the bay windowed bungalow where your bed, and your bowl, and your grey fleecy blanket lie waiting. Outside, the vet’s van is already parked, and I stop when I see it, the tears coming quickly, unexpectedly, to push against the backs of my eyes. I feel sick, but I hold my jaw, clench my teeth, and you do not turn to me, but look away, as if you hadn’t noticed. I feel the urge to go back, to plunge once again into the beckoning wood, where life brings death back blazing, and death is nothing but life reborn, but I walk on, knowing you will follow.

All has been arranged and there is no need to repeat the choking, staggered conversation of the previous night. I had shut the door on you, tried not to frighten you, but you had lifted your head, when I came back, thumped your tail on the floor, offered yourself as reassurance, as if it were I who needed it most. Offered me comfort, when it was my work to give it. We go in the house now, through the front door, the last time through the front door, you leading the way, me, hanging the collar on the hook, and oh! My hand stops with the collar still in it, poised above its place, and I think for a moment that I cannot move, that I will be stuck here and only when it is done, and she has squeezed out behind me with her bag and her papers, only when the door is closed and the van is gone and it is silent, only when I hear at last that there is just one breath now in the void of this house, only then will I be able move again. But I hear your nails against the hard floor turning back for me, wondering what has kept me, and the moment passes.

You drink, and check with your tongue around your bowl, the remnants of the roast chicken I made for you still flavouring the metal. It upsets your stomach, roast chicken, but that hardly matters now. Silently, I sign a form, and we wait, her patience touching me, as you make your final checks around the room before laying yourself in your bed. The painkillers are strong, and deceptive, and I wonder, at this last moment, whether perhaps I am wrong. On cue, I see you wince, your shoulder spasm, as you adjust yourself seeking comfort. I glance at the vet, try for a smile, but my lips contort into a ripple of pain. It is enough, and she prepares the needle. I lay down on the floor beside you, trying my best, my very, very best, but it is not enough and my nostrils flare and my eyes scrunch as I hold the tears from coming, and lying there, eye to eye, you stretch out a painful joint, reach out a tired paw, and rest it on my chest. I place my arm over yours, my hand on your shoulder, your rough fur beneath my palm. Thank you. You look at me, your deep brown eyes, seeing in mine that something is wrong. I had promised myself that I would be strong, but the tears will not stop flowing now, and I want you to know that I love you, I want you to know that you are safe, that I am here, that you are held in love and gratitude and unadulterated acceptance. I want you to feel that and I try, with everything that I am, to radiate that, to push that into your body from mine, but I cannot stop crying and I am failing you, and my face is twisted in pain and anguish and it is you who is bathing me in love, in gratitude, in acceptance, it is you who is giving me strength, as I feel your heart start to slow in your chest, as I watch your lids droop, flicker, then close over your eyes, as I sense the warmth begin to ebb from your skin. Now I do not move. Cannot move.

She leaves me there, accustomed, I suppose, to raw grief. Lets herself out. I register the door clicking shut, and then I am alone.