The Story of a Dog’s Body

This story is told from the point of view of a family dog who wakes up one morning in the grips of a debilitating depression. It can’t even look at the tinned dog food its owner scoops into its bowl. The thick pieces of jellified meat, once so tantalising, appear gross and unappealing. The mere smell of the stuff makes the dog feel nauseous, and he trudges away and slumps down in his basket in the corner of the kitchen.      

From this lowly vantage point, the dog observes the usual morning pandemonium as the rest of the household wakes up – the shouts up the stairs, padding feet on the landing, the sound of running water, the toilet flushing, the rumble of the boiling kettle, toast popping out of a toaster.

The family itself consists of a husband and wife and a young son. A normal, happy, functioning unit – the man and woman go to work each day, the son goes to school. Their lives are ordered, regimented almost, and this is perhaps (while not overtly stated) the root cause of the dog’s malaise, how each morning is exactly the same as the morning that preceded it, how he is expected to play out his designated role – scampering eagerly over to each family member in turn, jumping up, licking hands and faces, getting under feet, being lightly admonished, pushed away, occasionally patted, stroked, hugged. But today, he has not the energy or inclination to participate in this banal charade. He wants to do nothing more than lie motionless in his basket.

When it’s time for his morning walk, the dog fails to respond to the father’s calls, his usual breezy cajoling: ‘Come on, Bucky-boy, time for walkies’. In the end, the man has to literally drag Bucky from his basket, snap the lead to his collar, and tug him all the way out of the house. ‘Come on,’ he repeats. ‘Whatever is the matter with you?’    

Outside it’s a bright, warm spring morning; rays of sun cast a revealing light over the ugly suburban estate, the rows of identical red-bricked houses, well-manicured strips of lawn, shiny hatchback cars parked in each driveway, accentuating the grey, dull ordinariness of the scene. The conformity. For it’s as if each householder is taking the family dog for a walk at exactly the same time. Sing-song greetings are exchanged. The odd car engine rumbles into life. Reluctantly, Bucky allows himself to be pulled along the pavement to a grass verge at the end of the road, where he is expected to perform his daily functions, to expel the waste products from his body. With great effort, Bucky cocks his leg up against the street sign and forces out a sprinkle of urine. Far from satisfied, the man ducks down and grabs Bucky by the chops. ‘Is that it, Bucky-boy? No number twos? We don’t want any accidents in the house now, do we?’ Due to the strict uniformity of their daily routine, the dog understands exactly what is being asked of him, that this big lumbering skin and bone presence wants him to defecate on request, that he is actually standing over him, almost ordering him to evacuate his bowels. In vague compliance, Bucky assumes the position, crouching, squeezing his eyes shut, and forcing a small, almost apologetic sliver of faecal matter out of his rectum. ‘That-a-boy, Bucky,’ says the man, with an absurd degree of enthusiasm, as if Bucky has just done something worthy of the highest praise. Ducking down, with an old Tesco carrier bag covering his hand, the man scoops up the freshly laid dog turd, deftly fastens the bag up, with a neat bow at the top, and walks both it and Bucky over to the dog bin on the corner. ‘Come on, Bucky,’ he says, after dropping the package inside the bin, ‘let’s get you home’.

When the family finally leave for the day, Bucky returns to his basket. Such is the depth of his depression, he can barely muster the energy to swat away at the multitude of flies that land on his snout, body, hind legs. He can feel the delicate, ticklish tread of many tiny feet, but is indifferent to something that would’ve normally driven him to distraction, seen him jump up, shake his coat, head, wag his tail in a frenzy, do anything to startle the flies away. It’s as if his spirit has already left his body, as if he’s nothing more than a living corpse now.

A little later, Bucky rises from his basket and ambles through to the front room. At the back of the house, there’s an improvised cat-flap at the bottom of some French doors, allowing him to come and go as he pleases, allowing him to relieve himself in the back garden. Ordinarily, at this hour, Bucky would go outside and root around the abundant flowerbeds, he would chase after birds and squirrels, bark at the far-off sound of voices, cars, other dogs from other houses in other back gardens, doing exactly the same thing that he was doing now. When the postman delivers the morning mail, he would usually dash back through to the front of the house, and snap and snarl at the letters deposited. But not even the creaky sound of the letterbox opening and swinging shut can rouse his interest.

Going back through to the kitchen, he sniffs at the untouched bowl of dog food but still feels no appetite whatsoever. He laps half-heartedly at the fresh water his owner put down for him before leaving the house, but even in these increasingly hot, humid conditions, he has little or no interest in hydrating himself. Slumping back down in his basket, he falls into a fitful sleep.

At the usual time, the front door clatters open. Excited voices and tramping feet sound down the hallway. A moment later, the young boy bounds into the kitchen, making a beeline for Bucky’s basket. ‘Hello there, Bucky-boy.’ He jumps all over Bucky, stroking and tickling him, burying his face into the dog’s familiar furry coat. But it soon becomes apparent that Bucky isn’t interested in playing this afternoon. He just lies there limply, blinking his sad watery eyes. This confuses the boy. It upsets the natural equilibrium of his day. Playing with Bucky after school is a regular thing, part of his routine. When he tries again, when he attempts to engage Bucky in a play-fight, like so many times before, the dog only whimpers pitifully and pulls away. He resents the boy’s efforts. He doesn’t want to be a clown for these people anymore. He doesn’t want to roll over onto his back and have his tummy tickled, he doesn’t want to have to sit down and get back up again, sit down and get back up again, he doesn’t want to run and collect a stupid rubber ball, or wrestle around on the floor. When this finally registers, the boy calls out to his parents. ‘Mum, dad, there’s something wrong with Bucky’. When they come and investigate, they see the untouched food and water and exchange a worried glance. ‘What’s wrong with him, dad?’ ‘Oh, he’s just a bit off colour, son. I’m sure he’ll snap out of it.’

Later that evening, when the boy offers him food from the dinner table, chunks of prime meat glistening in rich gravy, the dog refuses it, turns and walks away. ‘Why isn’t Bucky hungry, mum? He always likes to share a bit of my tea. I always give him a little treat.’ ‘I’m not sure, love. But if he doesn’t perk up soon, we’ll have to get him checked out at the vets.’

But the dog is exactly the same the following day and the day after that. He shows no appetite for food or water. He is ponderous and lethargic. He barely responds to the calling of his name. ‘Why don’t we take him down the park, dad?’ says the boy, hopefully. ‘Maybe a bit of fresh air will do him good.’

While not particularly keen, the father agrees, wanting to do anything to cheer his son up, to allay his fears. But it’s a real struggle to get Bucky to leave the house again, let alone put in the requisite effort to walk to the park. What would normally have been a two, three-minute stroll full of excited chatter and the bouncing of balls, takes close to a quarter of an hour of tugging and pulling, stopping and starting, moaning and pleading, prodding and poking. ‘Come on, Bucky, pull yourself together’. In the end, the father has to pick Bucky up and carry him the rest of the way. But his exertions are wasted. For when he puts the dog down on the grass in the park, he is completely non-responsive. He ignores the other dogs dashing around him. Even when they approach, he displays such disinterest they quickly lose interest in him. There’s none of the usual sniffing and tail-wagging, the playful barking, the darting little runs, the expulsion of that mad doggy canine energy that is so endearing. ‘He’s clearly not right,’ father says to son as they walk home. ‘Maybe he’s eaten something that hasn’t agreed with him’.

Next day, the family take the dog to the local vet’s. After a routine examination, the vet can find nothing physically wrong with him. ‘He’s in perfectly good working order,’ he says. ‘That being the case, I feel that he may be suffering from a psychological disorder of some kind. Have you just moved house? Were there any other family pets that may’ve passed away recently? Anything that might’ve impacted upon the dog?’ ‘No,’ says the father. ‘Nothing out of the ordinary has happened. Bucky used to be such a lively, happy dog. One morning, when we woke up, he just didn’t seem to be interested in anything anymore, as if he’d had all the spirit drained out of him’. ‘Okay, I understand,’ says the vet. ‘If this behaviour persists, we’ll have to perform some more stringent tests’.

Nothing changes. The dog is still morose and lethargic. To all intents and purposes, it looks as if he has completely given up on life. He can’t summon the strength or enthusiasm to clamber out of his basket, to eat or drink. It gets to the stage where they can no longer persuade him to leave the house, where he just lays around all day, where he urinates and defecates indoors. Unwilling to pay another hefty vet’s bill, in what they now see as a hopeless case, the family decides to house Bucky outside. ‘We can’t have him inside if all he’s going to do is wee and pooh all over the place, love,’ mother tries to explain to son. ‘So your dad’s going to build him his own little kennel in the garden. Perhaps it might be the ideal tonic. Perhaps being outside might help him get back to his old self’.

That Saturday, the father builds the kennel. A skilled weekend carpenter, he takes real pride in his work, constructing a spacious dog house from the finest materials. The whole family join in, handing him different tools, making him cups of tea, helping him hammer in the last remaining nails. When the main structure is complete, the boy brings Bucky’s basket and food and water bowls out from the house and places them inside, making it the perfect little home.

But this alteration to his living arrangements has negligible, if any effect. The dog’s behaviour remains unchanged. He still spends whole days curled up in his basket, only inside the kennel now rather than the house. By this time, Bucky has lost a considerable amount of weight; his ribcage protrudes through a once shiny coat that has now started to moult. A horrible smell of decay, of rotting from the inside out now pervade, not just the kennel, but the whole patio area, the neatly tended back garden space, with the wooden table and chairs, gas barbeque, the small landscaped pond, home to four impressive coy carp.

The family don’t know what to do, so they do nothing. Each morning, they go to work and school respectively. Each evening, they cook and prepare their main meal, watch television, go to bed, and then repeat the process the following day.

Unbeknown to them, however, something sinister is now afoot in the garden. Everyday, after they leave the house, a grey squirrel, an unrepentant scavenger known to plunder seed from the family’s bird feeders, once a sworn enemy of the old, rambunctious Bucky, has become increasingly drawn to the new kennel. No doubt attracted by the smell of decay, of impending death, the squirrel has taken to creeping over and ducking its head inside, going so far as to prod the slumbering, barely breathing Bucky with its claws, testing the fading canine out, trying to get a reaction. In the past, the dog would chase the parasite out of the garden, barking, growling, attempting to clamber up trees to get at his adversary, but now he is not even a shadow of his former self, and the scavenger intends to take full advantage of this.

A week after the kennel was erected, on a rare occasion when Bucky drags himself outside, the squirrel strikes. Leaping down from a tree branch, it attacks the dog, using its sharp claws to slash Bucky’s throat, to incapacitate him, sending him slumping down wheezing on his side, choking on his own blood. With a surgeon’s precision, the squirrel proceeds to completely eviscerate Bucky, tearing him to pieces, scooping out and feasting upon his major organs, draining his blood, tearing at the soft flesh around its haunches, greedily gnawing away at the prime meat, until all that is left is a fur and bone shell.

When the boy comes home from school, he dashes outside to find the twisted remains of Bucky’s body, the patio awash with blood. He screams. ‘Mum, dad, Bucky’s been…’ Hearing the distress in their son’s voice, the parents rush out of the house. ‘My God!’ cries the mother. ‘William, please,’ she says to her husband. ‘Cover it up. Get rid of it.’ ‘Rid of it?’ he repeats, confused, shocked, put out, knowing how much effort it will take to jet-wash the blood from the paving stones. ‘The body, the dog’s body. We can’t just leave it there, can we?’ ‘Erm, yes, of course’.

While mother cuddles son, whispering soft, practised words of reassurance, the father digs an old hessian sack out of the garage, and with the aid of a spade, shovels what remains of Bucky’s body inside.

After much debate, he decides to dump the body in the woodland surrounding the local park. ‘It’s the best way,’ he says, ‘hand’s-free, will save us the hassle of having to dig a big hole in the garden’. To be safe, he waits until its dark before leaving the house with the sack. But no sooner has he dumped the body deep in the woods than he hears a rustling noise in the undergrowth, panting, scampering feet, which startles him half out of his wits. And although he pretends that he hasn’t heard anything as he moves swiftly away, his flashlight bobbing up and down in the darkness, he knows that an animal, maybe a badger attracted to carrion, has pounced upon Bucky’s corpse, and is now stripping the remaining flesh from the dog’s body.

When he gets back to the house, he goes upstairs to his son’s bedroom. Still distressed, the boy is laid out on his bed, sniffing and sobbing. The father perches himself on the edge of the mattress and brushes a few stray hairs from his son’s face. ‘It was the most sensible thing to do,’ he says, wanting to both comfort the boy and teach him a valuable lesson about life, ‘– dumping the body in the woods like that. It’s nature, Ronnie. Big things prey on little things. It’s part of the food chain. I know it sounds horrible, but that’s just the way the world works.’