My Sweet Annie

4

Porkie was not a scruffy black-and-white dog with playfully perked ears like the one on the front of the kibble bag. I actually had no idea what kind of dog he was. He had the smashed nose and curled tail of a pug, but his coloring was darker than I thought pugs typically were. He was also very short. Maybe that was a pug characteristic. I wasn't a dog person. I knew just enough about them to know that Porkie was hideous.

"He's been beside himself," said Edith, giving the creature a sympathetic frown. She placed a cup of coffee in front of me, then took a seat across from me, picking up her own cup with a sigh. "Poor thing didn't eat for days. I thought I was gonna have to take him on in to the veterinarian. He went to school here, you know. Lon Berger's youngest boy. He come back after college."

I raised my eyebrows and nodded as if I knew the Bergers. "Oh, really? That's great. Great when kids stick around in their hometown."

"It is. It is. So many of the younger generation are moving away. So many houses for sale. I just don't understand it."

"Well...I didn't even know Granny had a dog," I said. I slipped my fingers through the handle of the mug and cradled it, although Edith kept her house so warm I didn't know how she could stand hot coffee. I turned slightly in my seat and looked down at Porkie where he lay on a folded blanket, a makeshift bed.

"Oh, yes, yes," said Edith. "It's been a few months now since she brung him home. From the rescue, you know."

I nodded. "She mentioned she might go look."

"They got on famously. She used to bring him to bridge with her and he'd just sit at her feet and watch us play. And he's a good dog. Quiet. Good at making his piddles outside, you'll be glad to know. You're going to keep him, aren't you?"

I turned back around to regard my grandmother's friend, my stomach dropping. I hadn't thought that far ahead. I didn't even know how to handle my grandmother's house, let alone her dog. What would I do with a pet? I could hardly keep my shit together at the best of times.

Would I have time? Dogs needed a lot of time, right?

What is going to be eating up all of your time these days, Tab? Your boyfriend? Your job?

"Please tell me you'll keep him," Edith persisted. "Oh, Ruth loved him so much, and it would break her heart for him to go back to the pound. She chose him special because he's a senior dog. She didn't want him to live the rest of his days in a little cage."

"Of course." I sounded breathless, and I hoped it was not plain how overwhelmed I was at this new wrinkle in the balled-up newspaper my life had become. The thought of breaking my grandmother's heart by sending her frail, senior dog back to live the remainder of his days in a lonely cage at the pound was too much. "How could I not? Sending him back would be unthinkable."

Edith visibly relaxed. She slid her hands across the table and folded them around mine. My hands were cold; hers were warm, wrinkled, her fingers thin, her knuckles knobby and shiny. "Good. That's good. I would keep him, honey, but I just can't cope with the hair. I've run clear through two boxes of tissues since he's been here. I'll get you his things. I had to bring some of his food, and his toys and whatnot."

The way she said that last word—hhwatnot—reminded me of Gran, too. The whole place did, actually: I got the sense that Edith had lived in the house for many, many years, had lived a lifetime or two within its walls. Maybe she'd had children here, raised a family. Where were they, I wondered?

Had they left her behind?

She got to her feet. I slid back in my chair, uncomfortable. "Can I help?"