Chapter five: Butcher

We don’t go in the house through the front door. We don’t go in through the door in the garage that opens onto the family room, either. Not right away, anyway. First we stand on the threshold of the garage entrance, the three of us, huddled together, and my sister and I call for our dog in increasingly strident tones.

 

His name’s Rex. He’s a poodle who’s never passed up on the chance to run away. Never once. Now we’re asking him to run away, begging him, but he’s nowhere to be seen. We listen for the familiar clink of his dog tag, but the house is silent. So very silent.

 

We go in.

 

The heavy drapes drawn across the sliding glass doors give the family room an oppressive, funereal feel. I smell the ever-present stink of stale smoke and the mustiness of the boiled potatoes from last night’s pot roast. I feel sick, disoriented. My heart is hammering.

 

In the kitchen, I arm each of us with a knife. I take the biggest, the butcher, and lead the way into the entrance hall, where I open the front door and the storm door. We call again for Rex.

 

“Here boy!”

 

“Come on, boy!”

 

“Where are you?”

 

He trots into the hall, as if it’s just another day, and stops. His eyes cut from us to the open doors and back to us. He cocks his head.

 

Pointing to the outside, to freedom, I say, “Go on, boy!”

 

His nails clack-clack-clack on the hall tile as he runs in place for a second. Then he shoots out the front door like a black bullet. The three of us cheer.

 

I let the doors close.

 

Then, for reasons I will never understand, we turn toward the stairs, ours knives at the ready.

 

To be continued…

Done