An untitled story

(Untitled)

Not far away from the barn door, on a huge pile of wet straw, Laris is cowering. His meagre grey fur no longer protects him from the nipping winds that prick his bony body. Laris can still see, but his eyesight sometimes deceives him these days and the picture he sees seems to come through smoke. Quite often he does not recognize the family and their friends and sometimes does not see what is rippling on the horizon. Now he is lying alone like a rotting log – neglected and forgotten by everyone. He feels that no one needs him anymore but even so, he does not give up and wants to be helpful. His hearing is not very good either. He cannot trust his ears that could hear the slightest rustle. Laris’s heavy lidded eyes with their sparse eyelashes droop; but he pushes sleep away and listens. While listening, he dozes; he hears a small rustling, as if someone were prowling. Laris gathers his strength rallies and unsteadily stands up barking in a husky, still half sleeping tone.

‘You old fool, won’t you stop? Can’t you even recognize your owner?’ Laris hears a familiar voice raging and at the same time he feels unexpected kicks to his muzzle and chest.

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Laris whines and collapses onto the chaff. The shrilling pain bristles his body from the pads of his feet to the last hair of his tail and takes his breath for a moment. Laris feels something in his mouth and spits it out. Big, lush, dark drops splash on the straw. Laris feels the same sour blood taste in his mouth as a couple of weeks before. His eyes brim not because of the pain he suffers, but because of shame and disappointment. Laris feels ashamed that he did not recognize his owner, but he does not understand why he was beaten: ‘Is it because I am old?’ ‘Is it because my eyesight is not as good as it was?’. Laris reminds himself that his master will have to deal with the same problems some time and will then understand, but his eyes continue to water.

It is not the first time that his senses have deceived him and made him feel ashamed. Occasionally, lying on the floor in the house, he dreams of a thief or a wolf, that he chased, when he was young. Then, Laris sees these enemies prowling again. He lifts his heavy head from numb legs and, in fright, accidentally barks.

Then, instead of a thief, he hears the indignant voices of the family: ‘Oh, that mutt! He’s completely past it!’. Laris gets up with his tail down and goes under the bench because of the shame he feels. ‘Hey, what are you doing? Get out!’. With his head lowered, Laris slowly creeps out through the door.

Now Laris is afraid of going even into the house. It is better for him to stay on a pile of straw, where he is no nuisance to anyone. It is really comfortive to lie in the house, which is warm and cosy, but unfortunately he is not welcome there. Laris cannot crunch bones anymore and he is not given any other kind of food. He must scrounge for something he can eat; food he has never looked at before but that is all he can manage. Sometimes, his master brings porridge for him because he feels pity.

And he was young once, loved and valued by everyone. Then he was overwhelmed with people’s attention – everyone wanted to play with him, soothe his velvety fur. Usually, he played with young children. In summer time – tag, in wintertime he was hitched to the sleigh and they raced from the top of the mountain. He was gentle with the children who hit him really hard, pulled his fur or even touched his whiskers. Laris always thought that children are little and they understand very little. Everyone called him and fed him bread and wanted him to go hunting with them. Everyone who came to visit his master brought something sweet and nice for him as well. His owner gave him lots of dog biscuits, so that he would protect his huge herds and would not run away.

He loved playing with the shepherds. They used to put a shirt on Laris’s head, and at that time one of them would hide somewhere and then Laris had to find him. And he always did, no matter where he was hidden, in the middle of the forest or in the highest fir. Laris could find his footprints very easily, then he smiffed around the tree, raised his muzzle and started to bark. He would not move until his quarry came down. As soon as he saw him coming down, he felt overjoyed, galumphing about and waving his tail in triumph. Then, he returned to other shepherds, lolling his tongue, and staring either at them or their bags: he knew that he would get some meat or bread. His sense of smell used to help him a lot, but at the moment it was completely useless. The shepherds had forgotten him as well.

Laris lies on the straw and dreams. He dreams that he is shooting with his master and the sky is full of ducks. As soon as he notices a duck coming down, he rushes into the reeds and after a couple of seconds’ returns with the booty in his teeth. There are so many of these ducks and all of them are so fat. Laris thinks about the luscious bones he will receive after dinner and more saliva runs in his mouth. Laris opens his somnolent eyes and yawns remembering these ducks.To his surprise, . in front of him he sees his owner with a gun on his shoulder. Perhaps he is dreaming him as well. He looks again, but the view has not changed and he hears clearly as his master shouts: ‘Come here, Laris, come!’.Laris wanders if his master mocking him because he can no longer hunt. ‘Come, Laris, come here!’ Laris gets up from his couch. He does not understand why his master is taking him somewhere when he can barely move. And especially on this horrible, sleety, windy autumn day. Laris grimaces as if trying to smile, but he can only whine. He follows his owner, but not as he once did when he was young and happy. Now he feels melancholy and his tail is lowered as if he is guilty of something.

His master goes behind the barn towards the forest and keeps shouting: ‘Come here,Laris, come !’ .