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Nobody noticed the old grey-fur had died until, ten minutes after closing and a half-hour after last call, the college-aged waitress walked over to gently shake what she assumed was a very drunk Phil. The elderly mutt been a regular for years, well before she started working for the place to help pay her way through school. When she touched his shoulder, he didn't so much as stir, the expensive but well-worn and oversized wool coat deflating slightly as she pressed it up against his withered old shoulder.

When his head rolled to the side, loose on a nerveless neck, she saw his eyes were open, and that the bar's raised lights weren't reflecting off eyes dried by death. Jodie didn't scream, as some might have. Instead, her eyes filled with tears, as she leaned in to hug his slowly-cooling form.

The poor old hound had died the same way she'd always seen him, for the last two years; lonely amidst a sea of carousing furs.

He'd always been a good tipper, and had a kind word to say to anyone who bothered with him. Even her boss, who was a notorious asshole, had left the guy alone, though he'd sit there for hours taking up a seat in the busy bar, drinking his one beer a night and eating his one bowl of bar fries. His sad old eyes and droopy ears had made him seem pathetic but endearing, and Jodie had always made a point of trying to chat him up.

Only he never seemed to go much farther than talking about the weather, or complimenting her newest hair style. It was as if there was a well of feeling behind his eyes that his muzzle couldn't find a way to express. Like he was afraid the world around him was made of fragile glass, and that his trying to connect with it would just bring everything shattering down in blades of sorrowful awkwardness.

The one time she had asked him about his family, he'd just sadly shaken his head and changed the subject, to talk about how cold the rain was that morning. When she'd asked him if he needed any help getting home, he'd softly laughed and shook his head, and reminded her that the boss wouldn't tolerate the cat taking off time to help an old codger.

But she could tell, by the wistful way the words fell from his lips, and from the way his eyes wouldn't stay locked on hers, that he wanted nothing more than to accept her friendship.

Three days later, Jodie was startled when a lop-eared young bike messenger rode up to her outside the bar and delivered a letter in a fine linen envelope, asking her to stop by a crematory a few blocks away.

There was nobody else available to accept old Phil's affects.

Phil had lived. He had died at 72. Jodie cried at the thought that there was nobody else to remember him.

Ten years before his date with death in the bar, Phil Houser had been starting to feel his age. Fur that had once been a rich brown speckled with dollops of black had long since faded into soft shades of taupe and silver. His eyes, which for years had been sharp-sighted and discerning, had started to fade from the inside and out. Once the brown of chocolate, they'd seemed to become watered down, even as he'd found himself beginning to just not notice things around him. Things that would never have gotten past him were slipping by; numbers on spreadsheets blurred into one another; he'd lose the thread of conversation in board meetings and toddle off on tangents everyone else tolerated with that hidden grouchiness of people who valued their own time too much to be bothered but were too polite or afraid to voice their annoyance.

The day he decided to retire was the day he realized, looking at the HR ledgers for which his department was responsible, that nobody had bothered updating his copy in over a year. Mortified, worried that maybe he'd misplaced a more recent version, Phil spent the entire day speaking with section heads and accountants, trying to find out if he'd left a large leather-bound ledger book in any of their offices.

They were all vaguely evasive, as if there was something they all knew but were afraid to tell him. Phil Houser was their boss, the head of HR's book-keeping department, someone who was welcome in the board rooms and regularly shook paws with CEO's and CFO's, who knew him by his first name and shared old bad jokes with him while golfing. Years of profit-sharing and stock options made him a big enough stock holder that his technical lack of position on the board of top corporate officers made little difference.

As the sun set, Phil sat alone in his dimming office with a sense of powerful dread growing in a thick chest that had less run to fat and more sprinted to it. With his paws shaking, he rubbed his face, hit the button on his desk phone that had it re-route calls, and cried.

He had spent all day trying to track down a paper and pencil fold-out ledger. The company had switched to paperless computer-based ledgers eleven months before, and he had only then thought to look on his computer's desktop, finding the icon for that software glaring him right in the face.

Retirement yawned like an empty but inevitable abyss in front of his eyes, just as devoid as the empty home he shared with just himself and a whole lot of bric-a-brac of a hollow life spent saving for a day he kept pretending would never come.

He had to face the fact that there had never been a ring on his paw. That he had no children, no wife, no family he could talk to.

Ten years before, Phil had gone to the family reunion. He was the middle of three brothers, two years younger than the eldest and five older than the youngest. Their parents had seen his two brothers married with kids years and years before, and had long since given up on nattering after Phil. He'd always been the awkward middle, the mediator and problem-solver, never looking after his own troubles when someone else's were so much easier to deal with.

The chubby, middle-aged hound had spent most of the reunion avoiding his older brother. Markus had always been a prima donna, and that hadn't changed with age. Sure, Mark meant well, but he'd so heavily out-achieved his brothers that nobody could really suffer putting up with his lecturing for that long. And his wife, Stella, the brain-trust PhD in the family, was just insufferable with how she treated anyone less-educated than her with well-meaning benevolent contempt.

Instead, Phil spent his time with the younger brother, Rick, and Rick's wife, who had chosen the life of earthy ranchers, and, of course, everyone's kids. He even called them 'the kids,' which got laughs out of Rick and Kate. The kids were in their early and mid twenties at that point. Mark's oldest had recently gotten married, and had a baby on the way.

So it wasn't exactly a rambunctious reunion. Sure, there were toasts given to older relatives who'd passed away. There were jokes at the family elders' expense, most of which came from Phil's extremely elderly and feeble father, who liked to wave his cane at folk between taking puffs from his oxygen tank. The old mutt also liked to laugh his wheezy laugh, and chat with his grandkids, and complain with a smile about how old he felt, while Phil's mother puttered about in her fragile-as-glass but determined-like-iron way.

Nobody had ever convinced her to stop making food for a small army on Turkey Day. Phil hoped they never would. The food was the best part of these get-togethers. He didn't have to pretend to be making progress in his social life to a plate of sweet potatoes. He didn't have to pretend he was getting less shy with women, despite being a self-described dumpy boring old fart at the age of 52, when he was eating mom's delicious oven-baked turkey in turkey gravy.

He didn't have to talk about why one given family member or another hadn't been talked to in a decade, when he showed up every year to the Thanksgiving table, if he busied himself with looking after the kids, playing with the pets, or munching on buttered rolls. It was just too awkward.

He spent the whole event feeling like an utter shit for not talking to Mark and Mark's kids in eight years. They hadn't been to Thanksgiving in that long - Stella and mom didn't get along at all, except when they were too busy cooking as a team to snipe at each other. Stella had, about twenty years before, asked mom to fly out to Wisconsin, where Stella taught at the university, to look after the kids while she and Mark were out of town. When mom had disagreed with how the nanny was going about potty-training the oldest boy, Stella had called and shrieked at her on the phone, told her to go home, turned her out on her butt in the cold and threatened to have the nanny call the cops if she didn't leave.

Nobody really knew what had caused the utterly unreasonable blow-up, but that mutual hate had lingered for years, poisoning the family quietly, leading to the slow drift that had seen them not talking for almost a decade.

Still, Phil hung out with Rick, Kate, and their kids, and had a good enough time, even if he went home feeling depressed about how utterly lonely he really was. At least, he thought to himself as he pulled up the drive at his darkened home, he could contribute something to the family. He made a mental note to call his lawyer in the morning, and make sure his will left everything to the six youngest members of the family. Even though Stella and Mark's kids had no need of more money, with a father that was a successful investment broker and a mother with tenured professorship.

It was the closest he could handle coming to providing for children, since he'd never had any himself.

He also avoided telling his family about the guys he'd gone out with, slept with, made stunted attempts at romance with, never feeling like he could integrate the three different distinct parts of his life. Phil knew his family would never reject him over being bisexual. He just couldn't face the sheer awkwardness of giving them that revelation. Just one more thing, he figured, that he was too anxious to bother with.

At least, he thought to himself, he still had his work. Human Resources was an important division at the company, and he had just been promoted to leading the entire book-keeping section, corporation-wide. It was a responsibility he took to well, making sure everyone got paid on time, that people were actually given the raises they deserved, and so on.

He struggled to convince himself that $120k a year was worthwhile. Phil didn't feel as if he deserved to be paid more. He was just trying to convince himself that such a relatively hefty salary was an accomplishment in his mostly-empty life that was worthy of pride.

In his 30's, Phil had tried to date. He'd met wonderful people in his many travels, and corresponded with many of them. One, a friend from college, had even won his heart. She was adorable, funny, liked his quirky sense of humor and truly believed comic books were a form of modern literature. They could talk about anything, anytime - even the silliest of things, or the most serious of politics.

They had been inseparable, despite being separated by the continent. After college, she'd had to move back to Florida to take care of elderly family members. He had wanted, so very badly, to go with her. But he wasn't willing to risk their friendship on making strange offers that might come off as creepy. They'd never been romantically involved, even though he'd been in love almost since he'd met her at the campus cafeteria.

Rita was her name, and she was everything he'd ever wanted in a girlfriend. Only he could never bring himself to just ask her, not until she'd moved halfway across the country. In that long, sweaty-pawed phone conversation, she'd happily agreed that once they were back in the same place together, she'd be willing to give a relationship a try. It had been the second most courageous act of his life, in his own mind.

Sure, he'd gone river-rafting before, hiked through the mountains, traveled along through Spain, and helped save a hare's life who was having an epileptic seizure by taking control of the scene and getting someone to call for help while he monitored the spasming, vomiting lapine. But asking her to consider a romance had made him shake every time the thought popped into his head, and feel like a ridiculous fool for being so scared. Her agreement, even enthusiasm, made his heart soar like an eagle on the highest updrafts.

He'd gone back to school for her, so that some half-imagined future children could be provided for. He'd tried everything to beat his anxieties, so she wouldn't have to coddle him. Phil had moved away from his parents' loving home, where he'd spent years spinning his wheels while trying to 'find himself,' all so he could learn to be independent for her. Phil found a house to rent with friends, making sure there would be a spare room available when Rita was ready to move back home.

Then years passed. First, Rita decided she wanted to stay in Miami until her extremely-elderly grandmother passed. Rita didn't want to leave her alone in her twilight days. Then, when the grandmother finally passed, Phil didn't want to pressure her. At first, he just didn't say anything about her moving back. They chatted about all the usual topics of politics, and the failing economy.

During the second year, he offered to pay her way back, but Rita said she didn't want to feel as if she owed anyone anything. She wanted to pay her own way back, but the economy was bad, and what work she could find didn't pay very well. Phil began to wonder if she was really coming back, but the fantasy of her love was too much for him to let go of.

By the third year of their separation, she had built up friendships with people she happily told Phil all about. He was glad for her, happy she was happy, even though it scared him to death that she was putting down roots over there. If she had just asked him to come to her, he would have in an instant. She never did. He always figured she didn't want to put him out. Rita knew how nervous the idea of big changes in life made him sometimes.

Sometime after the fourth year of separation, the calls just stopped. At first, Phil figured she was just busy. Rita had gotten a new job recently, that she really seemed excited about, and had been pouring all her energy into making the best first impressions possible. He admired that about her. He just missed talking to her.

Soon, he started trying to initiate the calls, where she had almost always done so before. At first, things seemed fine - they talked, laughed, joked, but never talked about their future together. Then, slowly, she started making the conversations shorter. Then answering less often.

Finally, one day, she picked up the phone sounding awkward and embarrassed. She told him that she hadn't wanted to hurt him - that she wasn't sure how to talk to him about this. Phil felt his guts tighten like he'd been punched, before she even brought up the name of her new boyfriend. He asked her if she intended to stay in Florida. At first she said no, that the new guy was just a temporary thing, some guy she thought was fun, and since she and Phil weren't officially together, wouldn't be a big problem.

Then, when he finally worked up the guts to do the single bravest thing in his life, things fell apart. He called her, upset, angry but fighting it, and tried to explain how much she meant to him. How, for the last four years, he'd put everything he was into this relationship. She reminded him, as gently as she could, that they'd agreed to try a relationship when she came back home. That they had never actually been together as a couple. She tried to let him down easy.

Phil felt like someone had ripped into his chest, yanked out his heart, laughed and kicked him, and shit in the hole. The big gentle dog raged quietly in his mind at everything he'd given up, though not in terms of physical things. He didn't care about the money he'd saved up, or the life changes he'd made for her. He cared about the fact that his love for her was unrequited, fake, a fantastical illusion he'd willfully let himself be lulled by for years.

Finally, after a few months of Phil trying to come to terms with how hurt he was, Rita just stopped talking to him. Try as he might, Phil was furious but also couldn't blame her. What kind of person would want someone like him, clearly obsessed and pathetic, dogging at their heels when they'd just finished building the life they really wanted for themselves.

He refused to go back to the deep doldrums of depression he'd lived in before meeting her. Rita had pulled him up from the depths, like a pearl diver lifting him towards a shining golden sun. Discarded, he didn't want to sink again. So he went off, looking for meaning in a world that seemed to close in around him in a wall of overwhelming impossibilities, unbeatable restraints, and painful awkwardnesses.

Phil got a mortgage on a crappy little fixer-upper he could call his own, knowing the market was depressed and it would one day be worth much more than he paid for it. The dog tried to repair strained ties with his parents, who had always loved him but never really understood his depressions and lackadaisical ways. A few years later, with his credit stabilized, he went back to school yet again, and got his MBA.

But he could never get over the idea that the one person in his life who had ever actually fully understood him, had known every little secret desire and embarrassing bit of his history, had thrown him away like a piece of garbage in the end.

At the age of 13, Phil had almost kissed his very male and somewhat homophobic best friend. They had been inseparable for years, the two geeky D&D-loving nerds that everyone else ignored or poked fun at. He and Gregory had the house to themselves all weekend when Phil's parents were out of town, and they'd spent it rolling dice, killing giants and dragons, and watching an ever-so-precious VHS of illicit hentai that Gregory had somehow gotten from parts unknown.

Sitting there in the cramped little bedroom, watching flailing tentacles and copious goo that was more funny than arousing, Phil felt immersed in his larger friend's lupine musk. He wondered if the stiffening in his pants was from the movie or from his best friend, and couldn't come up with an answer. The dog asked himself, whether he was okay with the idea of hitting on his best friend.

He hadn't been raised to think gay sex was bad. Quite the contrary. But he knew society in his day and age hadn't made up its mind. Then again, he was less worried about that than whether or not Gregory would freak out, tell him to get away, leave and never come back.

So, he never made a move. Never said anything. Just smiled, did his best to have fun, and let the whole thing go by, lonely and unnoticed like a ship lost in the night.

When Jodie arrived at the crematory's drab grey exterior, it took her two circuits around the block to realize the place was her destination. With her beaten up Vespa sputtering, she pulled into the parking lot, doffed her helmet, and made her way inside what looked like nothing but a beaten-up old house with some oddly-shaped chimneys.

She'd gone home after meeting the messenger, changed out of her work clothes for something that felt more suitable, though for what exactly she wasn't sure. Jodie had also called the lawyer who's number was on that note, and let him know when she would arrive to receive Mr. Phil Houser's effects. She also mentioned being confused about why she of all people would be the one to do this. Not that she minded, of course, but it just seemed strange.

Didn't Phil have any family?

The lawyer had assured her that Mr. Houser had left a specific request in his last modification of his will and testament. And that there was a note that would explain everything.

After greeting the tall, aging rat who she'd spoken to over the phone, Jodie was directed into a chamber filled with shelves, each covered in unused urns with price tags on them. The whole building smelled like old books and desert dust, and as the lawyer led her through the shop and into the operational area of the facility, Jodie couldn't help a shudder at how empty, dead and sorrowful the colorless structure felt.

There, on a simple and unadorned metal table, sat what could for all intents and purposes been a sealed paint can. It wasn't fancy, or even ornamental, looking like nothing more than a Folger's coffee tin with the label carefully removed, leaving no sign of the glue that once held it's purpose pasted on its face.

Mr. Gries, esquire, handed her a simple white envelope that had her name paw-written on it in gold ink. Then he gestured to the pot, and to a small bin that held a ring of keys, a wallet that looked like it was three or four decades old, and a cheap gold watch. The lawyer departed, after telling Jodie that these things belonged to her now. He'd read her the will later, if she liked, but since it didn't even mention anyone else, there hardly seemed a point except as a formality.

A bit stunned, Jodie opened the letter.

"Dear Jodie,

I know this all must seem rather strange to you. If you've received this letter, it means I am dead and cremated, likely sitting in front of you within whatever tin or plastic receptacle the crematory uses while trying to sell you something more decorative and overpriced. First off, don't fall for it. I don't want my ashes to sit in some creepy little shrine on a mantelpiece. If you would be so kind, please spread these ashes somewhere that plants grow. I can at least return something useful to the earth.

With that said, I want to thank you. My life has been a long one, mostly empty, my hours filled with numbers and date stamps, keyboards and bank accounts. I haven't had many friends. Yet despite my shyness, you have always been kind to me, reached out to me when I seemed to be in need, though I was too embarrassed to accept company I desperately wanted.

My brothers' children have no need of what they would inherit from me, so don't worry about them. I want you to take whatever's left in my bank account and use it on getting that PhD you talked to me about. My house is a bit beaten up, worn out and old, full of memories, just like me. If you feel a need to keep it, I hope it gives you happier times than it gave me. The place is fully paid off, unless some medical expense has cropped up unexpectedly before I finally kicked off. My car is a piece of junk, but it has to be safer than that poor old Vespa of yours. My bank account information is in the wallet, and Mr. Gries will sign all of it over to you shortly.

Your decency, your smiles, gave me moments of joy in my last few months. That's worth at least the price of this inheritance.

All I ask is that you make something of your life. Not like I did. The world has plenty of chief-officer-of-this-or-that. Do what you love. Don't be afraid to talk to people for fear of how strange they might think you are. Be you. You are beautiful.

Yours,

Phil"

Jodie choked as she finished reading, carefully folding the letter back up before she could stain something so precious with tears nobody else would shed. When they were done rolling down her face some time later, she gathered his things, and his remains, and left the crematory.