The Spectral Book of Horror Stories Read Online Free PDF Page B

as if the life had already gone out of it— already , that was what I thought—and then a nurse came in talking about changing the sheets, smiling at me a little too brightly, in a way that told me it was time for me to go.
     
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    Sandy greeted me when I got back to the house. It was as if he hadn’t seen me in years. I was surprised by his love. It was capacious; it was infinite. I imagined the look on Aunt Rose’s face if she could see it being bestowed upon me.
     
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    “He’ll understand,” she said, the next time I went to see her. I tried to tell myself I didn’t know what she meant, but I did.
    “They’ll think he’d jump all over me,” she said, “but he won’t. He’ll know. He’ll take one look at me and he’ll know.” Her head lolled, her gaze moving towards—but not quite meeting—my own.
    “He’s a smart dog. He always knew me and I knew him. He just needs to see me, so he knows—he knows I haven’t—”
    Abandoned him , I thought. In my pockets, my hands curled into fists. I’d spent the morning cleaning out her fridge. The smell had been indescribable. Then I’d started on the cupboards, but not before I’d walked the dog; her dog.
    He was too joyful a creature to be her dog.
    I told myself that Sandy wouldn’t give two shits if he thought she had abandoned him, not now, but how could I know that was true? A dog is not a person.
    A dog is not a person . I curled my fists tighter when I remembered what I’d found in the cupboard in the lounge. I scowled, just as I might have when I was five years old, but she didn’t notice.
    “I thought I’d have to make an awful choice for him one day,” she said. Her throat was working, as if she was holding back tears. “That’s the only thing that makes it bearable now. Going first, I mean. I know I won’t have to do that. I’ll never have to look at him while he goes to sleep. And he’ll forget, won’t he? After he’s seen me. He can move on.”
    You’re damned right he can , I thought. That morning I’d taken him to the park. He’d gone scurrying after all the sticks I threw.
    She grasped my hand again. This time her grip was weak. “Please,” she said. “If you do anything for me. Do this.”
     
    #
     
    That night Sandy curled up on the floor and stared up at one of the chairs. No one was sitting in the chair. I scowled at him. I went and sat in the chair. After a while, he came and sat at my side and rested his head on my knee. I whispered to him while his eyes closed and he slept like that, the breath catching noisily in his throat.
     
    #
     
    How easy it is for a dog to love you. How hard it is, for a person. Sometimes people don’t even love their own family. It just isn’t in them. It wasn’t in Rose’s small, wasted body; it never had been. I knew that from the letters I found. Not hers, of course; I never saw whatever answers Rose had sent, but I know we never received anything more than words.
    I always thought we’d got along all right, me and Mum. But I was a child, and children don’t always know. They aren’t like dogs. They can’t take one look and understand. I wasn’t even sure I understood after I’d read the letters I found stashed out of sight in Rose’s cupboard.
    He grows so fast , Mum had written. He already needs new shoes. The trousers I got him last month are too short already. He looks a bit like Dad, have I mentioned that? You’d love him if you saw him now. I don’t suppose you might be able to…
    But she never had, had she? Aunt Rose hadn’t helped us. She never helped her own sister. She’d read these letters and she didn’t love me. She’d seen me when I was five and she didn’t love me then and here I was taking care of her house and her dog and visiting her in hospital because that was what family did, and she hadn’t even noticed. Mum had been right, but she had been wrong too. The dog may have got me in, but I never had stood a chance, not really. There was only