Song of the Firebird

One

It must be June.

The door was ajar, again. How did she manage to break into his bedroom, for a three year-old, was still out of his wisdom.

He slowly opened his right eye, trying to locate her brown blob. When he found none, he opened his other eye, ready to release a contented sigh. Today will be the day he will wake up before her.

He dreams of making fluffy pancakes with maple syrup, juice and some grilled sausages. They will both set the table, mostly he does this part. They will then sit in their seats, eat to their hearts content and take their bags and stride towards the car. Then comes the 20-minute ride to her school with some dad jokes and music. After dropping June, he will take a detour to his office on the Sorbet St., pick his coffee by his favourite little café near the convenience store. He will then fight the man-hiding pile of documents and hundreds of mail accompanied by nagging calls all day long with such a spirit that they will look like a piece of cake to him.

Not all dreams come true though.

Hmph.!

That moment, he felt that something was thrown at his face. He had this urge to throw it back to the sender. When his hands touched that thing, he suddenly stopped. He moved it away from his face and brought it to his point of sight.

There was June.

His cuddly-cute three year old, foster puppy. A Pitbull mix.

Six hours of uninterrupted sleep was not enough for Jay to recover from a thirty-six hour of problem solving task. This time, even the caffeine failed him. June was the only source from which he received energy and mental strength. Thanks to her, he is able to keep his sanity in check. If not, he will have to travel thousands of miles just by air, wasting away almost an entire month's paycheque on his travel expenses. He is the kind of person to mull over whenever he had to lift his ass from whichever cushion it is seated upon and make a trip even to a supermarket that is only a few kilometres afar. What would people like him do, when most of the population is trying and succeeding in making tasks short and simple? Praise and damn the science till we finish that last sip of our caramel macchiato.

Besides, there were other things to think about, like, for example, how to manage your dog when you make pancakes. Those sharp sense of smell and those sparkly, pleading puppy eyes had the power to throw away a crown.

Jay has had his share of sloppy kisses, picked up June and rushed out of the kitchen.

He thought that this life is just enough with June by his side. Too bad, he is just recovering from depression. Will he realise that there are a lot things that could help him heal apart from his Xbox and PC?

You see, depression is terrible. So terrible that it ultimately costs one's reason to live. There are many people out there with acute symptoms, left undiagnosed unless for some keen observation by the comfort crowd. Jay once tried to soothe his pain of being alone by diving into the reef without a proper gear and an instructor, when he didn't even know how to swim.

Thankfully, he hoped that he will not try the same stunt in the future. He will rather get knocked out by tequila shots and June.

Jay switched on the television after some moments in the toilet. All those stocks and their digits did nothing to lift his sleepy spirit. He, instead, moved to his kitchen counter with June on the tow.

'Give me twenty, June. Let me wrap this up', he told the hungry pupper.

Jay rented that studio apartment in that bustling town and his work was like an hour ride. He once watched a parade in that town in a TV programme and was amazed at the sight of so many happy faces living among six streets and two avenues, separated from the city by a desert spanning for about twenty kilometers. And, it really did give him an immense mental boost to set even a fraction of suicidal thought into motion.