Short Stories 2nd Place: Drowndead by Mauk Donnabhain

She rearranges the Staffordshire porcelain dogs and thinks about the sea at Vester Strand. It’s a horrible thing to remember, but the image comes back to her. Like a tide returning. Rattling rows, and a sound invading. Knocking on the door of her subconscious mind.

Knock, knock.

This is her real door. In the now.

Knock, knock.

The sound is familiar. When she moves into the hallway, she sees a small reflection in the glass. She steps forward and opens the door.

A boy is stood there, holding a dog, which is trembling. She hesitates before speaking. The words clamming in her mouth. She’s not used to this. Door knockers and telling.

The boy speaks,

‘Is this your dog?’

He has an innocent smile. He’s not one of the bad ones. Like the long-limbed boy who climbs over her back fence. Or the scamps who knock and run, fleeing like the cold light of the evening. He’s a nice boy. Makes her think of her son. It all comes together somehow.

The boy sits in her kitchen drinking tea. The dog with a bowl of water. When suddenly a torrent of sound flows out of her. She talks to him about Ærø. The glistering skies, and the fire tower at Skjoldnæs. Voderup Klint. Ice-cream on the strand, and her sister Barbara, always up to something. The dog had been so trusting. The wagging tail and expectant look that said,

What kind of fun are we going to have now? Stick-throwing? Wave-racing?

Burying in the sand. They’d packed it down good and tight, so only its head was showing. Tamped in with rocks on top, and a piece of driftwood to hold it in place. Some shells to decorate. They’d been lost in the task. Until she heard her name being called. Saw her father on the cliff shouting and waving. The sea had crept up. Purling in around them like a snake. They escaped in time, jumping over the stream that separated them from the main beach

‘But the dog? What with the dog?’

The boy watches her in silence, and this new dog sits quietly, listening with its head cocked. It wags its tail when she stops speaking. The same expectant look. Perhaps the dog has been sent to make her remember her guilt from all those years ago?

‘Sure I’ll see after it.’

The boy smiles, as though it’s all been planned that way.

‘I’ll come and visit every day!’

***

mammy woke me this morning

it was a cold day

we had a maths test at school and mrs linsey said whoever got twenty questions right would not have to do any homework

i got twentyfive

mammy wouldnt believe me that i had no homework to do but i played outside anyway at the back of the cottage

the bigboys made a hut and put a chair inside but i didnt go in there as it smells bad

i played a game instead pretending to be a spy like jamesbond

i hid behind the old car and watched out for robbers but there was no one

just a dog

i saw that dog before

he usually runs away when the bigboys try to catch him but it was just me there so he came over

i spent four minutes petting him

he is a great dog

i called him lassie because he is a lassiedog

i thought maybe he was mrs rasmens dog

maybe he got out of her cottage and she would be looking for him

i brought him around the front and knocked on her door

mammy says i shouldnt go near the cottage

mrs rasmen is from denmark

her son was killed and she lived in africa

when she answered the door she said she didnt know whos the dog was

she asked me in for a cup of tea and some biscuits

i knew i shouldnt go into her cottage but i went anyway

i wont tell mammy as daddy says what she doesnt know wont hurt her

mrs rasmen is a very nice woman shes not scary or angry like everyone says

and she has normal tea and biscuits like everyone else

she told me about the dog she had when she was a young girl in denmark

her sister buried the dog on the beach and it drowndead

it was supposed to be like a joke

maybe lassie wouldnt be safe with her but i didnt know where else i could leave him

mammy wont let us have a dog

she says they leave hairs everywhere and i am allergicked but i know its not true

i petted him for four minutes and nothing happened to me

i had more time today because i had no homework to do

i wonder if i will get another maths test tomorrow

***

The dog is good company. It must have had cruel owners before, as it cringes whenever she goes near it.

‘Pyt!’

She coaxes it with biscuits, and it licks her hands. The boy comes to visit every day, as he said he would. It gives her so much joy to have them both there. The boy petting the dog and watching TV.

She remembers what Oscar was like at that age, and her mind wanders. The reporters on her doorstep. That was in Guildford, where she’d settled after her son left. It was too much pressure. The public curiosity. People meant well, but she wished they would just leave her alone. Lebanon. Hostages. It had been all over the news. People said terrible things that she wouldn’t believe. They never found his body. He could still be out there somewhere. Maybe he would just turn up on her doorstep one day, like the boy and dog had done?

The boy looks back at her and smiles, as though he knows that she’s thinking about him.

‘Min lille dreng!’

You can’t protect them. Not completely. All she’d wanted for him was that he would live his life to the full. With his photography. Travelling around the world. She’d been so proud of him. Too proud perhaps, and her father had always warned her against pride.

***

mrs rasmen said lassie tried to run away again

she said he needs a walk so i took him to the field in front of the tophouses

he was pulling on the lead so i could hardly hold him

mrs rasmen says he gets too excited when he is inside the house the whole time because he needs exercise

i promised to walk him every day after school but i have to go around the back way so mammy doesnt see us

i was so angry at lassie

he tried to run away when we got to the field and nearly knocked me over

sometimes he is bad like that but most of the time he is okay

mrs rasmen made me tea when we got back

she gave me a whole plate of chocolate biscuits and told me about denny cambell

he is one of the badboys and i told mrs rasmen now you be careful around him

its what mammy always says to me.

one time denny cambell smashed the window in the gallers car

he robbed music tapes and threw them everywhere on the grass and on the trees

mr galler called the guards but there was nothing they could do about it because nobody saw denny cambell smashing the window and robbing the tapes

but we all knew it was him

mrs rasmen said she saw him climbing over her back fence but he ran away when she banged on the window

i like it when mrs rasmen tells me stories about denmark

she talks about her husband but he is dead now

they lived in different countries

i never asked her about her son

it wouldnt be nice to talk about him but i saw a photo of him beside her tv

geez but mrs rasmen loves talking

i suppose she had nobody to talk to before me and lassie

***

She has been loved. And more than once too. People don’t see that now. All they see is someone beyond love. But if they look closely, they will see she has a slender face. That she is graceful, in her own way. Even now, if they try really hard, they will accept that she had once been beautiful. Now her hair has turned white, and her eyes have darkened with age, as though her being has settled into a gentler form of itself.

Rich was the only man she’d ever truly loved. They married young, honeymooned in London, and things had looked promising. Travel was expanding. They’d had opportunities that most people of their generation could only dream of. Luxembourg. Sao Paolo. Port Elizabeth. Rich’s work meant that they moved around a lot, but she loved that. Places that were a lifetime away from the little island she’d grown up on.

Then another man had come along when they were living in South Africa. He was her husband’s boss, and things were different back then. Women were expected to be more compliant. Less resistant to men’s words.

‘Food of my thoughts. Heart of my heart.’

She’d found the attention flattering at first, and of course she’d flirted back with him. She’d enjoyed the flirting, but it was hard to partition her feelings, after what came next.

‘Tag mig til dig …’

‘Nej, nej, nej, nej …’

The winter of her misery. It had ruined her marriage. Although they’d never spoken about it, she thought Rich must have known. Men talked about women in a different way when they were alone. There would be a comment here, or a snide remark there, she was sure of it.

In the end, the other man’s attention had been unwanted. Flirting and teasing comments had given way to a force of hands.

‘… og dig til mig.’

‘Nej, nej, nej, nej …’

But you didn’t talk about things like that in those days.

And they’d moved on. Cleveland. Nineteen fifty-five. She thought that having a child would save their marriage, but it only slowed down the inevitable. Rich no longer looked at her in the way he used to. He wasn’t unkind, but somehow it seemed as though he was no longer paying attention to what was going on in her life.

Whilst she was caught up in the world of her new-born baby, he was staying away more. Drifting. Until finally, he was no longer there at all, and she had disappeared inside her own skin. Peering out from beneath the surface. Cocktail parties. Weekends in Chicago. The booze. She wasn’t proud of herself. The Sixties and divorce. Marstal. The red in her eyes. Yellow beaches and green dunes.

***

lassie always looks happy to see me

he wags his tail and barks but not in a bad way

mrs rasmen takes good care of him

sometimes i run to the shop to get messages for her or i help her by bringing coal in from the bunker

she lets me watch tv and talks about her son

mammy says mrs rasmens son was killed by badmen in the holy land

i asked her how are badmen let in the holy land but mammy doesnt know she just says thats the way it is

mrs linsey says the holy land is called isrel and that people called jooz live there

i asked Mammy if mrs rasmen was a joo and she laughed a lot when i said that even though it wasnt funny

she said sometimes your too smart for your own good

mammy saw me going over to the cottage after school and now she knows about lassie but she doesnt mind

she says i am to be careful and tell her if anything bad happens

she asks me lots of questions about mrs rasmen

daddy calls her a madoulwitch because she ran out of the house with a knife one time

i never saw her with a knife and shes never angry when i am there so its probably alright

mammy never asks about lassie so i tell daddy all about him

daddy loves dogs and i am sure he would let me bring lassie to our house if mammy didnt think lassie would leave hairs all over the place

she says that dogs smell but its not true

lassie is very clean and he always looks happy to see me

***

The porcelain figures had come into her possession after the death of her grandmother. They’d originally been brought over from England. A pair of Staffordshire dogs. Sitting on their haunches. Their lifelike eyes watching her. Patches of bronze. Smudge-nosed.

After her son’s disappearance, they’d filled her with dread. She’d turned them so they always looked outwards. So they wouldn’t bear witness to her grief. There was a tradition in Ærø that when the dogs were turned to face outwards, it meant the man of the house was at sea, so another man could come knocking and expect to receive a welcome. If the dogs were turned inwards, it meant the man of the house was back by the fireside. His wife in the kitchen again, preparing supper, as though no other man had sat in his chair.

The dog looks at her and barks when she laughs. She told the story of the dogs to her husband when they first met. They’d made a joke out of it. How easy it is to laugh when you’re in love. The dogs returned to looking inward. At the poverty of her living room. The black and white TV. Paper tucked under the cushions in her couch. The pouffe busted, and the carpet worn down in steps.

‘Hvor er han?’

Her mind is pressed. Floor creaking. The dogs staring and staring, so she wants to pick them up and smash them against the fireplace. But she can’t do it. She’s a coward, and the dogs continue to stare.

***

mammy was telling me about worldwars

she said i wouldnt have to go out and fight because i am an only boy

i did my homework for mrs linsey and then watched coronationstreet

mammy wont let me go to mrs rasmens house anymore because she is a stuckupoldcow and i am to stay away from her

its all on account of denny cambell

he was the one that robbed mrs rasmens house

he is always doing bad things

mrs rasmen said he smashed things and lassie ran out onto the street and wouldnt come back again

i miss lassie

mammy was being nice to mrs rasmen after that

she asked her to come to our house for a cup of tea

it was very kind of mammy to invite her to our house and i was excited as i never had a visitor before

i showed mrs rasmen my comics and the zx spectrum santie brought me

she said all those things were lovely but she was surprised that santie could afford to bring me a computer

mammy wasnt very happy about that

she asked me who does she think she is but i dont know what she means because i always thought she was mrs rasmen from denmark

sometimes i think that i am cookiemonster and all the girls in school scream and run away from me

***

Waking in the night, she imagines a hand on her throat. Closing her windpipe, and she is choking.

‘Jeg må ha’ vand!’

Mad March, after the act. Running down Castle Hill, past the Cathedral. Into Baakens Street. To the City Hall. She feels trapped. Suffocated. She needs to get out of the city. Back to a space where she’s meant to be. Her hand reaches out, and in the profound stillness, there is no one to help her.

Havnegade. Holding her sister’s hand. The dog drowning, and her father calling after them. Her life spooling, dreams turning.

‘Stop you my mouth …’

Wake up! Swallow!

‘… with still still kissing me.’

Day and night languished with horrors. Hand on her throat, but there is no one there.

In the end, she moves on without a fuss.

***

its the feast of ourladyoflourdes

i got mammy two packets of chewing gum for mothersday

she was really happy but said you shouldnt have

we finished the jigsaw and watched vforvictory

the aliens had locked people up for food

it was brill

its a week since mrs rasmen died and they still havent found lassie

he must have run away

mammy says if i study hard she will get me a pup

if its a lassiepup then i will call him lassie too but if its not a lassiepup then i dont know what i will call him

the bigboys say mrs rasmen drowndead in the bath

mammy says she never got over the robber coming to her house

everybody knows it was denny cambell but sure theres nothing we can do about it