5October
I still remember the morning I first saw the little thing on the verge of the Aroad, slick with rain and shivering like a newborn lamb. The pup was perched on the hard shoulder, eyes fixed on the passing traffic as if waiting for a particular car to stop. I was on my way to the familys cottage in Derbyshire to collect the newlyharvested potatoes, when I slowed to a crawl, thinking I might just have a look. The moment the tiny head lifted, everything changed. My sack of spuds stayed buried in the soil for another week.
My neighbour, MrsMargaret Clarke, happened to be passing by and coined the name Mars when she saw the reddish, floppyeared creature wobbling into my hallway.
Redhaired, nosy, a bit clumsy, she chuckled. Mars it suits him perfectly.
I laughed at her suggestion, but the name stuck.
Mars grew at a startling rate. By spring he was hogging the left side of the sofa, treating it as his rightful domain. At first I scolded him, then I stopped it turned out sleeping alone in a flat was far worse than sharing it with a dog that snored softly and occasionally thumped his paw in his sleep.
Our friendship didnt blossom overnight; it unfolded slowly, like two strangers who have nowhere urgent to be. Morning walks, a bowl of food at seven oclock, the television flickering in the background. Sometimes Id speak aloud, and Mars would sit beside me, listening with a solemn expression, only yawning now and then, baring his teeth in a lazy grin.
Youre right, Id say. Thats enough. and Id switch the telly off.
—
The accident came in April, on the way back from an evening stroll. The details are hazy now: the road was slick, the car skidded onto the pavement, Mars tugged at his leash and it snapped. I was thrown against the curb, felt the world spin, and for a few seconds there was only my breathing and a distant shout.
When I managed to sit up, Mars was gone. His leash lay on the blacktop, the plastic clasp split cleanly in two.
I searched until midnight, combing three neighbourhood blocks, calling his name, asking anyone who passed. Most shook their heads, but one passerby mentioned seeing a ginger dog dart toward the railway crossing about forty minutes earlier, then losing sight of him.
Back home I stared at the empty bowl in the kitchen for a long while. Eventually I wrote a notice, printed twenty copies, and pasted them on every lamppost the next morning. I also phoned three veterinary practices and the animal shelter on Mill Lane.
If a ginger dog, mixed breed, turns up, please give us a call. Heres my number, I told the clerk.
A week slipped by. Then a month. The flyers faded under the May rain, so I replaced them, again in June. The vets stayed silent. The shelter called twice, each time by mistake it wasnt our dog.
In July MrsClarke, from the doorway, said cautiously, Victor, perhaps youd consider another dog? The shelter has plenty.
No, I answered. She didnt press the matter again.
The flat felt different without Mars. It wasnt empty, just altered. The fridge hummed, the neighbours above shuffled around half past nine as usual, but something was missing. I pulled an old tennis ball from the floor the one Mars used to chase down the corridor placed it on the shelf, then shoved it into a drawer, only to retrieve it again later and set it back on the shelf.
Each morning my hand drifted toward the hook where the leash should hang. The hook was still there, but there was nowhere to go. I began taking my walks alone, the same route, the same time, simply because I could not explain why else.
In August my daughter, Emily, called from Birmingham.
Dad, come stay with us for a while, have a break.
I cant, I said.
Why?
I paused, then answered, Maybe hell come back.
She was quiet, then sighed, Alright, in that halfhearted tone people use when they have something else to say but keep it to themselves.
Mars returned in October. I heard a scratching at the front door just after eight in the evening. At first I thought it was the wind or some stray noise from the stairwell, but the scraping persisted, patient as if whoever was knocking knew the door would eventually give.
I opened it.
There, on the mat, sat Mars. He was older now, his coat trimmed in a few places where old wounds had healed, a slight blaze on his left side, and around his neck hung a leather collar I didnt recognise brown, brassbuckled, with a tiny metal tag that read simply Buddy.
I stood there, stunned, as Mars met my gaze. His right ear dangled, a reddish starshaped patch marked his forehead, his amber eyes still framed by the dark ring they always had.
Where have you been? I asked.
He stepped over the threshold, navigating the flat with the confidence of one who knows every nook. He padded to his bowl still empty then settled down, waiting.
I closed the door, shuffled to the kitchen, my hands trembling as I opened the freezer. Alright, I muttered, Alright.
The next morning I drove to the veterinary practice on Oak Street. They examined Mars, gave him the necessary vaccinations, checked his microchip. I asked about the foreign collar. The vet took the tag, read it aloud: Buddy.
Is that another name? I asked.
Someone must have renamed him, she replied. Hed been with another family for about six months, Im not sure where.
She looked at me, then at Mars, then back at me.
It happens, she said softly. Dogs sometimes wander off and later find their way back, especially the clever ones.
I said nothing, watching Mars sit calmly on the stainlesssteel table, enduring the checkup with dignified composure.
On the back of the tag was a phone number. I called it from the car while Mars rested on the passenger seat, his head pressed against the window.
Hello? a woman’s voice answered after three rings.
Good afternoon, I said. You had a dog, a ginger one you called Buddy?
There was a long pause.
Yes, the voice finally said, a middleaged woman with a faint accent. He left us in September. Weve been looking for him.
Hes with me now, I replied. His name is Mars. He got lost back in April.
Another silence, then she said, He lived with us. We fed him, treated his injuries.
Thank you, I said. Hes a good dog.
She asked, Are you far from Birch Street?
No, a different area.
Oh my, she sighed. He turned up on our fence in April, just lay there and never moved.
I watched the grey, leafless park outside the windshield, the wind rustling through the bare poplars. The conversation drifted to an end on its own. I hung up, and Mars, still in the back seat, rested his head on his paws.
Back home I took the unfamiliar collar off him, placed it on the kitchen table, and stared at it. It was wellmade, not cheap. A halfyearlong chapter in a strays life, and yet he had found his way back.
I thought of the woman from Birch Street, how she must have tended to him every day, stroked his fur, fed him, and then in September she woke up to find him gone, searching, perhaps posting notices. I dialed her again.
Its me again, I said when she answered. If youd like to visit him, Id be happy to arrange it.
Silence.
Really? she asked.
Yes, really.
She arrived on Saturday a petite lady named Margaret, sixtyfour, wrapped in a grey coat, carrying a basket with apple jam and a sack of dog kibble that Mars had grown accustomed to over the months.
Mars recognised her immediately, not with a frantic dash, but by nudging his nose against her hand, his tail wagging gently.
They sat down for tea. Margaret explained how shed found him by the fence in April, taken him to the vet, how hed been frightened at first but soon settled. I recounted the crash, the broken leash, the countless flyers.
Mars lay between us, halfasleep, occasionally lifting his head to watch each of us in turn.
He chose us both, Margaret said softly.
It certainly looks that way, I replied, glancing at her and then at the dog.
I tucked the foreign collar into the desk drawer, not discarding it. Mars resumed his habit of occupying the left half of the sofa and darting the tennis ball down the corridor at midnight. The flyers on the street poles, soaked by November rain, began to peel away on their own.
Margaret visited every Saturday, bringing jam, sometimes asking for advice about growing gooseberries in her garden on Birch Street. I, in turn, offered tips about my own allotment. We talked while Mars dozed between us.
One evening I pulled the leather collar with the Buddy tag from the drawer, held it up under the lamp. The metal glinted softly.
On the hall wall hung two leashes now: a faded red one, the original, and a bright blue one that Margaret had quietly added one Saturday, no question asked.
The quiet routine of my life has settled back into place, but the absence of those weeks without Mars still lingers like a faint echo, reminding me how easily the ordinary can become extraordinary.
