Puppies

There’s a kind of madness that comes upon you if you live alone long enough.  I’m not talking about city living where you might return to your apartment and wonder if you should try and make the effort to have someone else there.  At least you go out, see people, socialize.

I’m talking about living in the cold north where you stock up on firewood for the year with a trailer and a chainsaw.  Where your roof, a stream and the wind provide the electricity and a satellite link your internet.

That was my life for a long time.

I got used to not talking, ‘cepting when I was calling people and that grew less and less frequent.

I worked on the novella.  Then the novel.  Then it turned into a Tome, a great masterwork.  It might have been a load of rubbish for all I knew.  I didn’t give it to my editor at all.  She called about once a month for a while.  Then once a quarter, and now I haven’t heard from her for a year.

I’m nearly finished.

The things I write about.  They’ve all been turning points, change.  You can make a movie out of them, but you can’t make good television, not that lasts.  Series like that mostly depend on lack of change, on how if you take the right actions everything stays essentially the same.  Change is gradual if you’re lucky, and if you’re a cartoon, then change is non-existent, no matter how long you run.

Living alone is risky too.

I’m two hundred miles from the nearest civilization.  My nearest neighbour is forty miles away.  I’ve splint my own leg before now because the snow has been so bad no-one could get to me, even by air.

That was six weeks of hell.

It’s not that things don’t change, it’s that the detail changes, not the big things.

A bear attacked me and I shot my rifle off a couple of times, but it must have been pretty desperate because it kept going for me and I had to kill it.  Sad and grisly.  No pun intended.  I lived on bear meat for a while and cured the hide because otherwise, it’s just dead bear and a waste of a life.

My dog died.  Georgie; logically the same thing should apply, but I buried him out by the creek and made a cairn.  I carefully labelled it George the Dog so anyone roaming around wouldn’t think they’d discovered a body.  I still have enough sentiment to not eat the remains of my old dog.

That’s how I know I retain some sanity.

Damn this book.  I don’t really pay attention to length when I write, God knows, but I hit three thousand pages and realized that no one, no one at all is going to publish a three-thousand-page novel from some barely known author living in the wilds of Canada.  It’s basically about my grandmother and what a bitch she was while she was a hero in the resistance.

She spent hours telling me her story when I was a child.  I have a good memory.  I promised I’d write it all down one day.

I’ve been working on it for ten years.  I’ve published a few shorter works, which barely keep me on their own, and I write some articles about living out here, which interests some people, enough for magazines.

Hardly anything changes though.

I take a trip into town every six months or so.  Spring and autumn.  Get supplies, see a few people, get drunk.

I generally go to the bar on Main Street when I get into town and this time was no different.  The barman, Barney, puts a beer out for me and a dish for George, so he noticed straight away.

“Something happen?” I shook my head and took a draught.

“Not especially, he got old.  It was his time.”

“Sorry, Greg.  Guess it comes to us all.  That one’s on me.”  I raised the glass again.

“Thanks, Barney.”  He looked thoughtfully at me.

“Old Mabel’s just had a litter over at Ginger’s place.”  A plate arrived from the kitchen with a steak on it that stretched from east to west, covered in eggs and fries and, damn it, even some vegetables.  I cut into it and chewed over the thought as well as the food.

“She ain’t young enough to be doing that no more,” I said at length.

“You know Ginger, she won’t be told, says Mabel’ll stop when she’s ready.  I reckon that new young gun next door’s the one’ll stop when he’s ready, and that ain’t gonna be anytime soon.”  Barney polished a glass, a sure sign of irritation.  I nodded, not wanting to feed this fire.

“Maybe I’ll go take a look, anyhow.”  Fred from the General Store came in and sat up at the bar next to me.  Barney placed a little mat down and nodded at the beer pump.

“No,” said Fred, sounding a little disappointed, “coffee.  I got a long drive later and I’d better not be fuzzy headed for it.”  He nodded at me.

“Greg.”  I looked over, but my mouth was full, so I just nodded back.  “No Georgie?” Barney caught his eye.

“Passed on.”  And he placed a large mug down precisely on the mat and moved the sugar next to it.  With the best will in the world, Fred was a big man, but he poured that sugar until I was pretty sure the coffee was saturated.  A mournful country and western track started to play out of the jukebox software Barney kept in the bar.

“Goddamn it I hate that, why does it always start with it?” And he reached under the polished wood bar and jabbed at his laptop.

“Git another tracklist, Barney.”  Said Fred, reasonably.

“Now, you know I can’t just do that, Fred.”  He took up another glass.  “Customers like it.”  Fred held up his hand in a sign of peace and jiggled the cup with his other hand.  “Man, I don’t know how you suck it down so fast.”

“Can’t git a hot one in the shop.”  Barney poured another from the rapidly emptying jug and then gestured at my cup next to my tankard, but I hadn’t touched it, so I shook my head.  There was only a little so he made to pour it down his bar sink so he could make a fresh jug, but Fred intervened.  “Don’t waste that, I’m right here.”  And taking a drink, he placed the mug down for another refill.

“Never gets old.”  Said Barney, emptying it.  He looked at me.

“You finish that novel yet?”

“Pretty close.”

“You were pretty close last year.”  Barney took the empty plate.  Fred looked at me over the edge of his mug and waggled his eyebrows.

“Pretty close the year before, too.”  He sighed a little.  “In fact, hate to say it, Greg, but you been pretty close for a while now.”  I considered this.

“Pretty damn close,” I said.  “Might even send it in.”  Barney stopped his polishing, and Fred stopped mid-drink.

“Well, that calls for a celebration, I’d say.”  Barney smiled and reached up for the good stuff.

“Just one, but damn yeah!” Fred exclaimed and gave me a chuck on the shoulder.  A voice sounded from the doorway, a feminine, long southern drawl surrounded by an angel with black hair and smouldering dark eyes in a summer frock that danced around her like a breeze giving it life as she walked over to the bar.

“I could celebrate.”

She placed a finger on Fred’s open chin and closed his mouth with it as she danced past and sat up on the other side of me and gestured Barney to deal her into the round.

“Here you go, Missy.”

Missy Elliot.  Femme fatale.  I looked at her, and I knew Fred was leaning out of his bar stool to see around me.  As a mercy, I leaned into the bar a little.

“And what are you fine gentlemen celebratin’ in the early afternoon that calls for the good stuff?” She asked.  While she was waiting for an answer she put the shot glass on one cheek, rolled it, downed it, and rolled it off the other cheek in one smooth motion.

“Greg here’s finished his book,” Said Fred.

“Pretty damn close anyhow.”  Contributed Barney.

“Is that right?” She said, holding my eye.  She arched an eyebrow.  “Your masterpiece.”

I nodded.  Remembering the quality liquor I was about to spill, I downed it too, which gave me a chance to break free of her spell for a moment.  It didn’t last long.  Her voice was husky, a hint of roughness and somehow liquid honey at the same time.  She could turn herself blonde somehow like summer corn, while you were watching her play with her jet-black hair, curling it artlessly around a finger.

“I read a book once.”  She said.  “I do believe I’d like to read another someday.”  She tapped a finely manicured finger against lips of deep, red, rose.  “And if I’m gonna go to the trouble of haulin’ around some great tome, I think I’d like it to be your great tome, Greg.”  She let her hand fall as if a leaf has blown in on the wind, to brush against my arm, for emphasis.  Fred piped up.

“This is gonna be his masterwork alright, Missy, he gonna be famous.”  He was nodding enthusiastically, I could hear the rubbing against the collar of his shirt.  She broke eye contact with me for a second.

“Fred, ain’t you got customers in the store and a truck to fill up for Greg here?” I heard him jump down from the stool.

“Hell yeah, I got shit to do, better be doing it.”  He paused, “Bye, Missy, be good to see you in the store sometime.”  And he scuttled off, as far as a man of his size could scuttle.

“Bub-bye.”  She said as he went outside.  She shook her glass at Barney.  “I do believe we were celebratin’ this good man’s book, Barney.”  He sighed and gave her a refill.  She locked eyes with me again.  “You done celebratin’?”

I held out the little glass for a second and Barney reached again for the bottle, but I put the thing upside down on the bar top.

“I’m done for now, Missy,” I said.  “I’m staying over a couple of days though, I think there might be more celebrating.”  I nodded at Barney.  “Usual place?”

He shook his head.  “Take the top suite, full up.  Same money for you though.”  I nodded again.

“Fancy.”  Said Missy.  “I’ve been in there.  Lounge and everything, for entertaining.”  She drawled.  I noted she didn’t say that she’d stayed.  I looked at her.

“I got shit to do now Missy,” I said, bluntly.  “But if you wanna cosy on up later then you look me up.”  I reached for my bag from under the stool.  “And if you wanna make it up to Fred’s wife for turning up during the early afternoon when he’s vulnerable to you, you should go buy her some pretty dresses from the store.”

“You’re a rude one, Greg.”  She said, archly.  “Maybe I’ll go play with Fred some more after all.”

“You do that,” I replied.

“Barney.”  He handed me a key, and I walked up to my room without looking back.

I didn’t spend long there.  It was plush, for one of Barney’s rooms.  I opened the doors to the porch, veranda, whatever he called it, and looked out over the town.

You could barely call it a town.  It housed maybe a thousand people and serviced three times that many who drove in.

There was basically a broad main street, with a few branching off.  It wasn’t unusual to see a moose wandering down the street, curiously looking in shop windows.  People didn’t bother them and while moose hunting is a thing, it didn’t happen in town.

The Sherriff spotted me.

“Hey, Greg!” She shouted up.  “You’re a week late.”  She said by way of greeting, covering her eyes against the sun.

“My dog died,” I said.

“Sorry to hear that.  Mabel’s got pups.”

“I heard.”

“We’ll get a beer later.”  I waved.

“Good.”

I went in a took a shower.  It was bigger and I stayed in there a long time.  It was hot and the needle-sharp pressure was good.  One of the great pleasures of coming to town.

I thought about it.  Maybe a puppy would be good.  Maybe I’d get two.

The more I thought about it, the more the idea appealed.  I really had nearly finished, and I could train them up together.

Yeah.  Puppies, good call.