“Either he goes, or I do!” Belita bellowed.
I understood immediately that ‘he’ meant me. A lengthy silence followed, one my master should have broken but didn’t.
“Good grief,” I said to myself, my heart on my sleeve.
“My heart on my sleeve” is, of course, a figure of speech because I don’t have any sleeves nor any clothes, in fact.
I’m a dog.
Faithful by name and by nature, a most noble mongrel, a bit on the small side, a bit on the old side. Too old, at ten, to bother anymore with chasing balls or bitches, I’m content to simply lick my genitals clean, nestled up on the sofa next to my master as he reads and we listen to music.
He reads a lot, my master. Or rather, he used to read a lot because he doesn’t get much reading done now. All that peace disappeared the moment she entered our lives.
It’s well-known that we dogs are far more sensitive to mood changes in humans than they are to ours. One fine day, my master got home later than usual. I hadn’t seen him in such good spirits for a long time. He came in humming and smothered me with affection, but I had to go and find the leash to remind him to take me out. I understood that he was disoriented.
There was no more peace from that day on. My master appeared to have forgotten all the routines we used to keep. He’d get home late at night, by which time I was already suffering from my need to satisfy urges both big and small. He’d let the food supplies run out and then get grumpy at me as if it were my fault that he had to go out again in search of shops that were still open at that time of night.
And the telephone! Don’t get me started. If she didn’t call him, he’d call her, and they always spoke for so long. It was all ‘baby’ this and ‘darling’ that. It made me sick. But the most pitiful thing of all was when it was time to say goodbye. “See you in my dreams,” for example, as if we could make dreams on demand, and not only our own but other people’s. Or “Hugs and smooches,” which then became “Hugs and smooches you know where…”
At such moments, my master would adopt a sickly-sweet tone and lower his voice in an attempt to say something in secret. A futile endeavour since we were alone in the house and he, after all those years, had still not got it into his head that I understand human speech in both its Portuguese and Tsonga variants as well as all the other ones in the world.
We spent a fortnight in this uneasy state until one Saturday morning when he got up very early. How strange!
He jumped out of bed, warmed up the previous evening’s coffee and began tidying up. The apartment is indeed tiny, but it was so messy that any attempts to put it in order, which luckily were few and far between, were generally abandoned before long. He’d gather his clothes and stuff them into the drawers, but never bothered washing up the heap of dishes in the kitchen. If he did do the washing-up, he’d never bother emptying the ashtrays, and so on…
But that Saturday, he did a thorough job. He tidied, washed the dishes, and mopped up the entire apartment. He went to even more trouble in the bedroom, changing the sheets and going over to the window to shake out the carpet. He spent the entire morning and part of the evening doing that.
We always went for long walks on Saturdays. We’d walk out of the apartment, go down our busy avenue until the second set of traffic lights, take a left on the one-way street with old acacias, and keep going all the way to the park, where my master would sit down to read under the shade of the casuarina trees. That was my favourite moment; up there, with the bay at my paws and the sea breeze filling my nostrils with the smell of brine.
But he didn’t even respect this tradition that Saturday. We went out and then hastily returned after a quick tour of the block. To top it off, on two or three occasions, he pulled my leash before I’d even had a chance to lift my leg, and I ended up pissing all over myself. How humiliating!
We’d barely arrived home before he jumped in the shower, taking his sweet time and singing his lungs out. Then he set about looking for clothes, and I had to get up because I happened to be lying on the t-shirt he ended up choosing. He combed his hair (a rare occurrence) and shaved (an extremely rare occurrence) while he tested out expressions and poses in the mirror, each one dumber than the previous one, if you want to know my opinion.
Once he was happy with the way everything looked, he went to the lounge, turned on the radio and, at long last, sat down to read. But no. Every other minute he put down his book to check the time, impatiently tapping his foot.
It was almost dark when the bell rang.
My master jumped up and hurried to the door before stopping, his hand already on the door-knob and waiting a few moments to temper his spirits. But as soon as the bell rang again, he opened the door straight away.
She entered – smooch, smooch – came into the lounge and saw me snuggled up on the sofa.
It was the first time our eyes met and I could tell straight away that she didn’t like me.
“Have a seat, Belita,” my master said.
She looked at me and asked: “Where?”
He understood and quickly shooed me away. “Come on Fidel, what’s the deal? Move away! Can’t you hear me?”
Belita hurriedly brushed my hairs off the sofa and then sat down while my master made some shameless excuses.
“I don’t know what came over him. He knows very well he can’t sit on the sofa.”
Lie. That’s always been my spot!
Then he sat down next to her and they sat in silence for a few moments. On the radio, a popular singer was performing his current hit.
“Do you like this song?” my master asked, unable to think of anything to say.
“I love it!” she replied.
“Me too,” he hastened to agree.
Lie! He hated that song. He always changed the station when it came on.
“Would you like something to drink? I think I’ve got gin, whisky, vodka maybe…”
Another lie! He only had tap water.
Unfortunately for him, she asked for a gin and tonic. My master kept up the act. He got up and went to the kitchen. I took the opportunity to get a good look at Belita, a long-legged, skinny woman, with no arse or tits whatsoever. Worst of all was the hair, a shapeless blob that just cried out, “Wash me! Brush me!” I confess I was never wild about poodles, which was what she looked like. But then, each to their own.
My master returned from the kitchen and said, “Sorry, I forgot to buy tonic water.”
“Don’t worry,” she replied. “What can you do?”
Then they began to talk about politics, a topic I have genuinely no enthusiasm for. Unhappy in my corner, I rested my head on my paws, closed my eyes and tried to forget them. I must have fallen asleep.
I woke up when I heard the bedroom door opening.
“Bedtime! Great!” I thought and got up, very slowly indeed because my body was still asleep (I’m not used to sleeping on the floor). My master went into the room, with Belita wiggling her non-existent butt behind him, and closed the door! A trail of pheromones and the painful certainty that I’d lost my place in the bed forever lingered in the air.
I felt betrayed and humiliated.
I felt like shouting, “Piece of shit humans, fucking ingrates!” I’m certain that if I had done it, I would have been joined in solidarity by all the other mistreated canids, my brothers who have been similarly reduced to the pitiful condition of mutts, and our howls would have echoed throughout the neighbourhood.
“It’s over,” I thought, and I went to lie down alone in my corner (my corner, good God! What miserable, lonely words!), trying to impose some control on the whirlwind of emotions that was assaulting me.
“Easy, Fidel. It’s not the end of the world. He’s had others, as you well know, and in the end, they always tire of him.”
This thought did nothing to soothe my spirits. Okay, he’s had others, but he’s never shut the door in my snout like that. He always let me sit on the carpet, next to the bed… And usually, they didn’t mind if my sense of smell is to be trusted at all. But now he was shutting the door, excluding me. Things looked bad, no doubt, but hope, as we know, dies last. And so, confronted with this clear message, I clung to blind denial. Maybe it would only be a one-night stand; she’d leave in the morning and just like that, everything would go back to normal.
But the following night, Belita slept in our bed again.
And the next one.
Before long, she’d moved into the house with all her bags and her things, and like the lady of the manor, she began imposing her own rules.
Faced with an avalanche of instructions, my master tucked his tail between his legs and did whatever she said. The dishes were washed after meals (there were meals now), the bed was made the moment they got up (there was a regular getting up time now), and the lounge was swept every day. A good part of the instructions was addressed to my master, who now had to lift the toilet seat before urinating and stop using everything as an ashtray, that is when he did smoke, which he wasn’t even allowed to do anymore unless he did it by the window.
That was his problem! Who told him to let that floozy into the house? The worst thing was that this dictatorship affected me too, and then some! Belita formally prohibited me from shedding hair (she was allergic) and licking my testicles (“It’s so unsightly”). Outings were reduced to a quarter of an hour a day, God knows why, when all she did was stay at home chatting with her cousin on the phone. As for the Saturday walks, they simply stopped. They’d go out for a walk together while I stayed at home on my own. As he left, my master would give me a stroke, looking like a dog that had just pissed on the staircase.
“Behave yourself, Fidel.”
But she was calling him impatiently. “Come on Júlio. We’re late!”
And off he’d go, with a final comment: “Don’t lie on the sofa, Fidel.”
Okay, I won’t.
The moment the key left the lock, I went straight over to the sofa and curled up on it, ready for a nap tinged with the sweet smell of revenge. I lay there, in blessed peace, and only got up to go back to my corner when I heard the key in the lock again.
One day, however, I didn’t hear the key.
I only noticed them when Belita let out a cry of horror. This was the aforementioned incident, the time she said, “Either he goes, or I do!”
The following Saturday, my master put me on the leash and said, “Come, Fidel. Let’s take a walk.”
He had a suitcase in his hand, which I thought was strange. But I, fool that I am, still held onto the deluded hope that he had grown tired of her and was escaping from the house. Maybe we were going to go and live under a bridge or share a park bench. Whatever, it didn’t bother me. We’d be together again, through good times and bad.
But then Belita, that party pooper, appeared on the landing, lifted her snout even further and shouted down the stairs:
“Don’t be late, Júlio. We’re having dinner with my cousin.”
“Don’t worry, I won’t be late,” my master replied, meekly. “It’ll be in and out.”
And off we went.
Everything went as usual, although I felt that all was not well with him. He let me piss at leisure on several trees and posts, but it felt like he was just giving a condemned dog his last wishes. Then we walked towards the bay, to a large avenue full of hooting cars. It was getting dark and there were people everywhere, walking this way and that. I don’t like crowds. I hate the way they tread on my paws and don’t even say sorry because I’m a dog.
Luckily, we didn’t go far. My master hesitated in front of a very tall building, tied my leash to a traffic light post, placed the briefcase by my side and lit a cigarette. The two of us stood there in silence for a few minutes, minutes which felt like centuries. Then he took a deep breath and put the butt out under his heel. He stroked my head, tickling me behind the ears the way he knows I like it. I stared at him in silent anguish and he looked away.
“Wait here, Fidel. I’ll be back soon”
Hours later, he still hadn’t come back (he must have been at home, smooching Belita). I lay down and waited. What else could he be doing? To start with, I amused myself by watching the passing humans, so many of them, all so different yet all so absorbed in running about the place in such a frenzy that they didn’t even notice this abandoned being. Men and women, young and old, the whole crowd was oblivious to me as they hurried about their daily lives. From time to time, some street kids walking by while they begged for money would gaze at my master’s briefcase. But because they were scared of me, none of them dared take it, and they continued on their way.
After three hours tied up there, waiting for a fate I didn’t even want to imagine, I began to be tormented by thirst. And it was at this moment of supreme despair that he appeared to me. Like a guardian angel, I might be tempted to say, if angels weren’t always blond and always wore white togas.
I’d noticed him before. He was a security guard at one of those buildings, where he sat authoritatively in a chair that was clearly a creative product of recycling, not to mention an avant-garde sculpture in its own right. I had already caught him looking at me several times, doubtless intrigued by my situation.
Finally, the old bloke came over and stared at me, his huge eyes peeping out from underneath his cap. It was a look of curiosity more than anything else, but it wasn’t lacking in compassion, a virtue which is all too rare among humans. I felt – we dogs at least are still capable of feeling – that he wanted to stroke me. He hesitated and then suddenly made up his mind.
He strode off, returning immediately with a police officer who was keeping guard in front of a nearby entrance.
The officer observed me, then carefully observed the briefcase, then took a few steps back and said something I couldn’t make out. Then he left but the guard stuck around, curious to see what was going to happen.
Meanwhile, people began to gather around, some of them drawn in by the presence of the guard and then others drawn in by the presence of the first group. They kept a respectful distance as if they were afraid of something (what, I didn’t know) and couldn’t even understand that I was thirsty.
It’s during such times as this that I’d like to be able to talk (whereas the rest of the time I prefer not to take part in that hoax). I would have shouted, “Give me some fucking water,” or even “Give me some love,” or something similarly bonkers. But I didn’t shout because I can’t talk.
And even if I could shout, I wouldn’t have because by that time everything was drowned out by the hysterical howling of the sirens. Everything happened very quickly after that. The sound of boots stomping down the road could be heard, a bunch of terrified pigeons took flight and a group of police officers marched with determination toward the place where I was sitting.
The police officers shooed away the crowds, shouting, “Get back! Get back! Bomb alert!”
Bomb alert!?
***
Good evening, dear viewers. A bomb alert this evening has caused a great commotion on Julius Nyerere Avenue, stopping the flow of traffic and pedestrians for four hours. The discovery of a briefcase that had been abandoned in front of an embassy led to the swift intervention of bomb disposal specialists from the Anti-Terrorism Special Brigade, which has already ruled out the possibility of a terrorist attack. We go now to Julius Nyerere Avenue, where we can speak to Miguel Dimande. Good evening, Miguel.
Good evening, Sandra. I’m here on Julius Nyerere avenue, where the flow of traffic is slowly getting back to normal after the chaos generated this afternoon by a bomb alert that caused the entire area to be cordoned off. It was here
[Images are shown of the location where the briefcase and dog were but are no longer]
that a security guard found the abandoned briefcase lying next to a dog. This gentleman is with me and will now give us a first-hand account of the circumstances that caused him to alert the authorities. Good evening, Mr Matavele. Could you please tell us how this all happened?
Well, I just wanted to tell someone about the dog. The poor animal had just been left there without anything to drink even.
Of course, how cruel. But didn’t the briefcase catch your attention?
The briefcase? No, the briefcase was just there, that’s all.
Didn’t you suspect that it might contain a bomb? That a horrific terrorist attack might be imminent?
Not at all! I don’t know the first thing about any of this bomb business. I just do my job, that’s all. Sweeping the pavement, mopping the stairs, emptying the trash and keeping watch. That’s it. I don’t want there to be any confusion.
[Mr Matavele runs off screen]
Thank you very much, Mr Matavele. Now we’ll speak to Superintendent Silvino Maússe from the Anti-Terrorism Special Brigade, the man in charge of the police operation, and first, we’ll ask him for the latest on the situation. Good evening, Superintendent.
Good evening. The situation was brought under control through the rapid and effective intervention of the bomb disposal unit, thanks to which the circulation of vehicle traffic and pedestrians was brought back to normal.
Can you confirm, then, that the briefcase did not contain explosives?
Absolutely. All there was in the briefcase was a brush, a food bowl and a bag of dog food. That’s it.
The social networks are awash with rumours saying that it was an attempted bomb attack by Islamic terrorists, possibly linked to the group Al Shabaab or the Islamic State, to extend their activities from Cabo Delgado to the capital. Would you like to comment, Superintendent?
That’s just fake news. Any suggestions that this was an act of terrorism are completely mistaken.
Did you manage to find out who the briefcase belonged to?
The briefcase has been sent to our laboratory, where it will undergo several different detailed examinations aimed at answering this question. For the moment, I can’t say anything more.
And the dog, Superintendent, what will its fate be?
[The camera moves to the dog. The screen fills up with droopy ears and mournful eyes]
The animal will be sent to the municipal kennels, in fulfilment of the legal requirements. We’re just waiting for the transport to arrive.
Thank you very much, Superintendent Maússe. Now let’s return to the studio, where Sandra Guicossecosse is waiting. From Julius Nyerere Avenue, this is Miguel Dimande and Francisco Gove.
***
In the hours that followed, the channel’s main phone line was overwhelmed with calls from viewers who had been moved to pity by my situation and wished to adopt me. To cut a long story short, I ended up in the hands of Genoveva Cortinado, an old teacher who lives in an old building that looks out towards the statue of a man pointing his finger.
I can’t complain. Okay, she calls me Quotient, but she’s a pleasant, calm woman, with an orderly lifestyle that suits me. With her, there’s no risk of any sudden love affairs that could turn my life upside down.
My guess is she must have had a bad love experience – who knows? – some flighty boy who left her for someone else, many years ago. Perhaps she hasn’t forgotten him but has gotten used to living without him and is happy. Maybe she would say, “I’m not unhappy, but that’s not the same as being happy.”
When Genoveva comes home from school, all she wants is peace. She sits down in front of the television to watch a series or otherwise turns on the radio to listen to music.
Like my ex.
From time to time, I still remember him. Are they still together or has that hag already left him?
Why do you care about that, Fidel? Sorry, Quotient. Why do you care about that, Quotient? Aren’t you fine here?
I rest my head on Genoveva’s lap and she strokes my fur. Why did I have to think about him? By now he must have already forgotten our Saturday walks, our musical evenings and those nights (all those nights!) that we slept side by side. He’s sure to have forgotten me by now.
Translated from Portuguese by Rahul Bery.