thisnewday

The day after it happened, I drove by the scene of the fire to see if I might encounter the ghost of the missing dog. But like the wretched stink that had permeated my clothes and later followed me across town and through parking lots and into stores before finally disappearing, overnight, the dog too was gone.

What wasn't gone, what will live with me until my own ragged ghost struggles upward in the sudden confusion of its release, is the face of the man who first caught my eye as the smoke began rolling, first through cracks and crevices in windows and doors and then in a burst of black and billowing madness as he stumbled out the door, his pant leg aflame, and his crazy slapping distracted dance as he tried to put it out.

That will live with me and so will the voice that answered the persistent, nagging questions asked by the 911 operator just, I think, to keep us standing there, to keep him frantically pacing in front of me as I relayed the questions, all of them annoying and useless and inane until the one that finally asked, "Is there anyone still in there?"

To which he replied, "My dog, my dog is still in there. Oh God, just tell them to roll the damn trucks, just tell them to get here."

And then he was gone again on another mad orbit around the crackling, billowing pyre of his life and dreams, including the one thing that he'd been able to declare, in the presence of these strangers, in the face of this horror, that he had loved.

"My dog, my dog is in there."

And so the next day I had to drive by the place to satisfy myself that the dog, in fact, was no longer there, that he had simply slipped out, like those first tiny whisps of white smoke, and drifted away...

LPK
LiveJournal
4.22.2011