Marmaduke Saves My Arse

There are hot days in Missouri, and then there are days when the sun looks down at you and says, “You know what? I'm going to punish y'all like the red state I am.”

This was one of those days.

It was mid-July in Jefferson City, and the thermometer had reached 44 degrees Celsius. For my American, Yankee-doodle friends who still measure temperature in freedom (the US has freedoms?) units, that’s about 111 degrees Fahrenheit.

It was fucking hot, and I had no pals with air conditioning to run toward for refuge. I've always been the lone member of my wolf pack. Friendships came and kissed me on my "bye-bye!" cheek far too many times to count, and relationships?! Ha, a self-described hermit like me was too socially awkward for romantic crusades.

Also, I had no friends here because I only arrived yesterday. Me and my therapy dog, Marmaduke, had teleported to sprawling Jefferson City for the week, using her mystical Rottweiler powers.

She's always had the ability to whisk us away for a holiday or three, saving me a bundle on airfares. How the fuck does she do it?! Well, she simply howls into thin air, and a Rottweiler-shaped portal appears. Once we walk through and flounder in some cyclonic vertigo-inducing vacuum, we arrive!

It's a dizzying experience, a heady whizzbang for fourteen seconds, but I've gotten used to the disorientation.

It's never bothered Marmaduke.

Anyhow, I'm Barnaby; a Gawkish, single, middle-aged gent, with a penchant for watching horror films at 4 AM, curled up in the lap of my gentle giant. I mostly keep to myself. I'm a lifelong Western Australian native, and Perth is home.

Which is why today should've been a walk in the park. Perth routinely hits 44-45 degrees in Summer, thanks to its blistering desert location. Kinda' like Las Vegas sans cheap thrills and even cheaper showgirls.

July 7th marked the hottest day in Jefferson City's storied history of heatwaves, and I was laid out on the grass at Ellis-Porter Park, a couple of miles East of the city center.

"Fuck, Marmaduke, do you have any climate control powers?!"

Marmaduke cocked her head to the side; she was busy chewing on someone's leftover chicken bone half-wrapped in Denny's packaging. I forgot how shithouse the restaurants are over here, the bone looks like it was made of plasticine, and darn it, Marmaduke didn't seem overly bothered by this heat.

Nor did she offer any magical antidotes for this godforsaken situation.

My beloved three-year-old pet was a fearsome creature to behold. Her bark was thunderous, reminiscent of the rapture on occasion, yet she was my anti-anxiety canine. My heroine.

Just not today.

“Marmaduke,” I groaned from the grass. She looked down at me and tilted her head. “It’s too hot.” Her tail wagged. “No, seriously. I’m dying.” She continued wagging. “I am your human. Your human is currently being cooked.” She looked at me for a moment longer, decided I was still technically alive, and wandered off.

Oh, darlin. I love you, but for fuck's sake, this isn't a joke.

I had sunscreen on, of course. A ridiculous amount of zinc-based sunscreen, actually, as my regular usage of Drunk Elephant 1% retinol (I'm fancy!) had made my skin allergic to sunlight. Hives, rashes, and premature ageing followed if I forgot to slip, slop, and slap SPF50+ of a morning — or during said teleportation.

And that anxiety I mentioned? It's triggered by insufferable heat. I could feel my legs turn to jelly, and my attempts to stand resulted in stumbles toward a public water fountain. My heart raced, I was sweating from every orifice, and then it happened.

I collapsed like a bedraggled noodle.

Marmaduke vaulted into action, standing between me and the sun. Her enormous body cast a cooling shadow over my face and torso, and I felt some relief. I looked up at her, "You are my saving grace, I love you so much." She remained perfectly still, blocking the sunlight like a furry, panting eclipse.

“Good girl.” Her tail wagged. I closed my eyes. This was wonderful. For several glorious minutes, I was chilled and panic-free. Then she moved six inches to the left. The sun smashed me square in the eyes.

“Marmaduke!!!”

She moved back. Shade. Then she moved left again. Sun. Back. Shade. Left. Sun. Back. Shade.

"MARMADUKE!!!!!!!"

I eventually deduced what she was doing, or at least I think I did. She was experimenting with the precise dimensions of my shadow, but why? “You're not supposed to be analyzing my size,” I squealed. “You're supposed to stay put.” She stared at me as though I had just given her a quizzical task.

Then...she vanished? Whizzing off at the speed of light, I never saw her run, she was almost like The Flash; another Rottweiler power per chance?

Marmaduke returned a few minutes later dragging a wet towel. She dropped it on my chest and resumed blockading the sun. It was cold. Fucking cold like iced gold! “Marmaduke,” I said, suddenly impressed. “You're a genius.” She sat beside me, slowly licking my flushed face.

"Watch the sunscreen, sweetheart, otherwise daddy will resemble a wilted prune by day's end."

I placed the towel over my entire body and experienced perhaps the first moment of serenity since we'd arrived in Missouri's capital. The cold towel was pure ecstasy. The shade from her body was wonderful. The grass was splendid. Marmaduke was to be commended.

Then she dropped another wet towel on my stomach with a THUD.

I lifted the towel and looked at her. “Where are you getting these?” She wagged her tail. “Marmaduke, have you been stealing towels?” Another towel landed on my legs. Then another. Then a small blanket. Then, inexplicably, a giant beach towel featuring a cartoon shark.

I stared at the growing pile around me. “Marmaduke, where did you get all of these?” She dropped another wet towel. At this point I stopped asking questions.

I simply accepted that my therapy dog had somehow organized a towel-smuggling operation in a national park. Ha, no fucks given, the heat's not playing fair so neither is Marmaduke.

Within minutes I was buried beneath a mountain of wet towels with only my receding hairline sticking out. I looked like a damp human burrito. Marmaduke sat proudly beside me, her long tongue hanging out, she looked exhausted. It was like she'd just completed a zigzagging course in emergency human care.

I mean, she practically had.

Things escalated when my beloved Rottweiler decided the cavalcade of towels wasn't enough. She disappeared behind a cluster of trees, and I heard a strange metallic scraping noise. At first, I assumed she had found more chicken bones from another Denny's (or worse, Chick-fil-A), then the scraping became unmistakably louder.

There was a rumble, and Marmaduke came charging back toward me with what appeared to be a giant, pink sprinkler. When I say giant, I mean the hose was the width of Hulk Hogan's biceps and the sprinkler stake was bigger than his ripped (cough, fake tan overuse) body.

I don't know if she stole it from the park maintenance shed, negotiated downtown with a city employee via her varied assortment of barking tones (she's superb at imitating words), or simply used her zany teleportation abilities to acquire it from another city.

Mysteries aside, she dropped it beside me and somehow activated it with a sequence of pawing and gnawing. Water immediately sprayed everywhere, and I mean everywhere.

Water ricocheted in a 100-meter radius, it even doused nearby parkgoers. Marmaduke jumped directly into it and began leaping in circles. I stood up and walked into the full force of the spray because, at that point, dignity had betrayed me.

Plus, the mountain of wet towels had turned crispy. The sun was frying EVERYTHING.

Soon we were both completely soaked. Marmaduke was having the time of her life, while I knelt down in surrender to the potent jets pumping aqua vitae.

I looked like I'd just backstroked my escape from Alcatraz, Clint Eastwood-style. Did I give a shit? Fuck no. The sting of the sun was only getting worse as time ticked past 3 PM.

People stared in droves. We were nestled far from the cobblestone walking park, though they strayed onto grassland to catch a glimpse of us. One bespectacled elderly man slowed down, looked at me, looked at Marmaduke, looked at the sprinkler, the towels, and then continued walking. Never saying a word.

Marmaduke suddenly became sleepy and cuddled beside me, snoring contentedly. I'm still aghast at how she can tolerate this heat and humidity.

“You know,” I said, turning my head toward Marmaduke, “you teleported us here.” She opened one eye. “You could teleport us somewhere cooler.” She blinked thrice. “Canada.” Nothing. “Alaska.” Nothing. “Antarctica.” Marmaduke rolled onto her back.

“C'mon, baby girl. I'm not asking for much. I just want to experience a temperature that doesn't flamage my internal organs.”

She scratched her left ear with one big, beige-colored foot, and went back to sleep. I couldn't be angry with her, she'd saved my sanity, perhaps even my life, and as it neared sunset and the temperature waned, I was grateful.

“You know,” I said, “you're actually pretty good at this therapy thing when you sense my distress.” She opened her eyes again and winked, before sneezing directly in my face. “Thank...you?” I uttered. “That was precisely the refreshing experience I was hoping for.” She wagged her tail.

I wiped my face with the corner of the shark-printed beach towel.

Wait, how the fuck did she find a beach towel inland?! Sigh, Questions for another day.

For now, despite her thievery (and probable violations of several local municipality laws RE sprinkler), and as I grabbed my waterproof iPhone to check tomorrow's weather, I was interrupted by a thud on my back...followed by a chasmic chill as icy water trickled down the crack of my sagging bum.

Marmaduke had found another wet towel.

(c) Edward Swafford 2026