A better world part 1
Part One.
For some reason, I was pretty casual about the food situation. I assumed I had enough food for three months or so - but - let's be honest, I'm not really good at figuring out that kind of stuff. I was pretty sure I had enough to get me through the summer . . . and then . . . after summer, what would happen? I should've felt a sense of urgency, a feeling of anxiety about the whole thing. I should've carefully counted all the food I had in the house, and I should've carefully counted everything that had been left behind in the abandoned village. Gods above and below, beyond just counting stuff, I should have also been _storing _stuff, hauling everything out of the empty village and into the house.
As it turned out, I got lucky. It didn't matter. My casual attitude, my lack of preparation, my lack of urgency - none of it mattered, because things didn't go the way I thought they were going to.
So, long story hopefully somewhat shorter, this is how my tale starts out. There I was, living alone in that big ol' house on the outskirts of the village. The house I'd rented from a distant aunt, someone I hadn't actually seen in years. She lived in California, and we'd negotiated the rental agreement over the phone. The house had flowerbeds in the front, and a garden in the back (but that garden had been empty and fallow for years). It wasn't a giant of a house - but it felt like a giant, because only I was living there. It was a house meant for a family of anthros, not just one. The first floor had a half bathroom, and a tiny bedroom which had been turned into an office. The second floor held two bedrooms, two bathrooms. The kitchen was vast, and I spent a good portion of my time there, sitting at the oak table, with the large windows wide open (and the summer breeze gently rolling in).
There I was, with a very casual attitude about my food situation -- and that was before I started sharing my food with a feral dog.
The dog started showing up maybe a week or so after the last of the surviving villagers left. He would show up, and just stand there, at the edge of the vast lawn that surrounded the house. The first day I saw him, I looked out the kitchen window, and I watched him for a bit. What was he doing? Why was he just standing there? Well, he, or she, whichever it was. Was it looking for food? Did one of the villagers leave it behind? After a while, he (or she) went away, quietly.
The next day, the dog was back, in the same spot. This time, it sat down, and stared at the house. I've never had a feral canine as a pet, so I don't know what is or isn't normal feral/pet dog behavior. Was this a well-trained pet, taught to sit quietly and wait for food? Or was this odd behavior? Had the dog been left behind by one of the villagers (either by someone who'd died, or someone who'd left)?
Was the dog hungry? I also wondered.
Feeling somewhat foolish, I stuffed a knife in my pocket. I felt foolish for believing I needed a weapon, but hey - this was, after all, a dog I didn't know. And I was a stranger to him, too - I was an anthro he'd never met before. I also felt foolish because -- because I didn't want the dog to see (or know) that I had a weapon. Silly, right? This was a feral dog, not an anthro - if he saw the knife in my hand, he wouldn't know what it was. Still, I wanted to hide the knife, and approach the dog with what I hoped would be good, peaceful vibes. I'd made myself two burgers for lunch, but lost my appetite after eating the first one. The second one sat, untouched, on the plate. I picked it up and carried it out to the yard.
When the dog saw me exit the house, he jumped up, and stood still, alert. His eyes stared at me. That's when I noticed, briefly, that he was indeed a he. I held out the plate, as I walked slowly towards him. When I got within maybe twenty feet, he started backing up, slowly . . . but his eyes began darting from me to the plate, back to me, back to the plate . . .
"Okay," I said, out loud, softly. "Okay. I brought you some food. Are you hungry?"
I suddenly realized I hadn't talked to anyone since the surviving villagers had left - since they'd all gotten into their cars, trucks, or campers, heading out for either family they had far away or for one of the shelters set up by the (crumbling) government. Obviously, there'd been no one around for me to talk to.
Slowly, so slowly, I knelt down on the grass. I set down the plate.
"Here you go, if you want it," I said, as I stood up. Still moving slowly, I backed away a bit. The dog, meanwhile, was again standing perfectly still.
I took a look at him. His fur was just a bit scuffed and dirty. I noticed he wore a collar, with a name tag (which I was too far away to read). He'd been someone's pet . . . before . . . before everything changed.
He raised his head and looked at me, studying me. Who knows how ferals see us anthros, right? What they think of us. I'm just an anthro Lion, average height, average build. Years ago, I'd tried - and failed - to build up my muscles in a gym (that was back when I was living in the city). And now, watching this feral/pet (former pet, I suppose) dog as he watched me, my feet were casually slid into beat-up sandals, and I wore a plain white tee and faded jeans. I had my mane pulled back and held with a rubber band. I assumed that the dog was trying to pick up my scent, and probably the scent of my clothes, too - and the scent of the food. I had just showered, and I probably still smelled like shampoo. The heat of the summer day hadn't yet made me sweat.
Likely, the dog was trying to decide if the food was something he could trust, and if I was an anthro he could trust.
I turned around and went back into the house.
**
Just before dusk, I went outside. The plate was empty - licked clean, too - and the dog was nowhere to be seen.
**
The next day, the same exact thing happened. The feral dog came back, and sat waiting, quietly and patiently. Once again, I brought out some food for him. Just like the day before, the dog backed up, slowly, when I approached. I set down the plate of food, and I returned to the house. I went into the kitchen and looked out the window. The dog had waited for me to go back inside before walking up to the food, which he was now sniffing at. Satisfied it was safe, he made quick and easy work of devouring his meal. Then, he licked the plate clean, and walked off.
I realized he was heading towards the village. Was that where he was sleeping? Spending his time? I felt a wave of sadness wash over me. Was he hanging around the house he'd lived in before the world fell? Maybe the house had a "doggy door" or something, or maybe the front door was just open, and the dog was able to get inside, sleep indoors, take shelter whenever it rained. Gods, what if the dog was waiting for his owner to return?
The village had lost a few hundred of her anthros when the plague had hit. An awful number of fatalities, true, but the death toll had been higher in most other places. We'd been lucky, if you want to call it that. Lucky seems like an odd word to use, I admit. Had the dog's owner died? Or - worse - had the owner been a survivor, someone who'd left the dog behind? Thinking about the anthros who'd lived in the village, I couldn't recall seeing anyone walking this particular dog, or playing with him in the park.
That was no surprise, of course. I'd been something of a recluse. There'd only been maybe a handful of anthros I'd talked to, socialized with, on a semi-regular basis. And - no - that wasn't because I'd been the only anthro Lion living in a village whose population had been maybe eighty percent anthro Canine (of various kinds). Rather, it was because, well, I'd just sort of turned into a recluse. I'd left behind the bright lights of the big city, and I'd chosen a small, quiet village, a place where I could (mostly) be alone.
There had only been a few thousand anthros living in the village - surely, not more than 4,000. I had, at one point, known the exact number, but it's been gone from my memory for a while now. Of all those anthros, I think maybe half of them owned pets, either cats or dogs. That "half" is a guess on my part, but it seems like a good one. Who among them had owned this dog?
After the plague passed, all the survivors had left. Not all at once, no. The exodus had taken place gradually, over the course of maybe a month or two. Had the dog's owner been one of those surviving villagers? Had he or she left the dog behind? And, if so, why?
It made me sad to think about it.
**
The next day, the same exact thing happened. The feral dog came back, and sat, waiting, sitting down in the tallish grass, squatting on his haunches (the way that feral dogs do),
This time, I grabbed the binoculars and studied the dog, as I stood there perched behind the kitchen window.
Maybe a week ago, I'd driven myself nearly crazy, looking for the binoculars, by the way. I have no idea - I can't remember- why I'd been looking for them. Bird watching? Who knows. I'd turned the house almost upside down, only to later find they'd been sitting on the kitchen counter the whole time.
Gods, the things we do to ourselves.
Anyway, I got a good look at the dog. He was a mastiff, of some kind. (On my next trip to the village library, I'd consult a book, where I'd discover the dog was a bullmastiff.) He had a wide, thick neck, and a wide, thick chest. His legs were longish, and his ears were triangles that flopped down (rather than stood up). His fur was short and dense, and colored a light brown. The ears were a darker brown. His squat nose was black, as was his muzzle. The jowls were big, and meaty. His beautiful eyes were wide open, and they gave him a friendly, inquisitive appearance. The fur around his eyes was the same dark brown as the ears.
Suddenly, a bird flew very close to his head. Startled, the big bullmastiff jumped up, spun around. For a moment, he wasn't sure what to do - should he go after the rude bird? Where had it flown off to? For a moment, he stood still, weighing his options. Gazing through the binoculars, I was now looking at the dog in profile. His tail was long, skinny, and curvy. His legs looked muscular and powerful, now that he was standing on all four of them. And I caught a glimpse of, um, how shall we say this - his male parts - a furry sheath, thick but not long or overly large, and two orbs which lay behind it.
The bird was gone. The big dog collected himself and sat back down, and I went to find some food for him.
**
The routine of feeding the dog went on for maybe a week before it changed.
I had searched a few of the nearby houses, by the way, and I'd found some pet food. What's funny is, it actually took me a couple of days to realize - oh, right, a pet dog needs pet food (not anthro food, which I'd been feeding him). I know, getting pet food should've been the first thing I thought of. I never had pets before, however, as I might have mentioned. Once I did get some pet food, I still gave the dog bits and scraps of my own food. Like I said, I was pretty casual about the whole food thing - I believed I had enough for a few months, and I (stupidly) wasn't thinking about the future, so, I had no reservations about sharing my food with this big mastiff.
The change was this - instead of waiting for me to return to the house before eating whatever I'd brought him, the dog was now devouring his meal right away. He no longer cared if I stood there and watched him eat. As well, after eating, he would sit still for a moment, staring at me. If I tried to pat him, or touch him, he'd shy away. For me, that deepened the mystery of him. Was it simply a case of being abandoned? Or had he been abused in some way?
He seemed friendly enough, and he never barked or growled. He certainly didn't act with aggression, and he didn't seem dangerous. He was just really shy. I tend to assume that abused animals will either seem dangerous in some way, or they'll run from everyone. Who knows if that's true, but it's what I tend to assume.
It had taken him more than a week to get comfortable eating in front of me. Why was that? Yes - I understand that we had to build up a trust - I was someone he didn't know, after all. And I understand why he'd feel cautious about the food I brought him. But it felt like it was taking him quite a while to get past his shyness - was it shyness or was it distrust? Like I said, I make these assumptions - we all do, don't we? I'd always assumed that pet dogs were all, well, friendly and playful. Boisterous, I guess is a good word. Loud, friendly, playful pet dogs, as long as they weren't abused. I know. One shouldn't make assumptions. Not all ferals are the same, nor are all anthros. But it's much easier, right? There's less thinking involved. No wonder most anthros prefer to make assumptions, though we know we shouldn't.
No wonder the world is such a mess.
Anyway, this particular bullmastiff seemed so careful and shy. What exactly had happened to him? I wondered.
Another entire week went by before I could touch him. I held out my hand for him to sniff, and I tried to radiate good, friendly vibes. He smelled my hand, and then he actually stepped forward, got closer to me, so I gently patted his shoulders, and his neck, and I rubbed the top of his head. For the first time, it occurred to me to look at his collar. It had a tag which read Hunter.
"So your name's Hunter," I said out loud.
The bullmastiff looked up at me, his ears perked up, a look of surprise in his eyes.
For the first time, I saw his tail wag.
"Hunter," I said again, simply, my voice breaking the stillness of the summer air.