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I hear the morning song play and rush to the kitchen gate in eager anticipation.
My Papa will be home soon. He always comes home after the song.
Most mornings my Papa and I wake to the racket of the small black box he carries and stares at for hours. He lets me out, gives me breakfast and a treat and leaves me, and I wait.
And I wait.
And I wait.
Then the morning song plays outside, echoing, screeching notes that once hurt my ears and made me whine and hide, but now signal my Papa coming home.
I do not know why he leaves me in those long morning hours, only to return and sink once more into bed. He never seems to want to. On those few days his black box sounds after the morning song we stay cuddled together in bed for what seems like forever. Those are the days I like best, since my Papa rarely leaves me.
But today is not one of those days. Today Papa has left and will be back soon.
Soon.
Soon.
I can barely contain my excitement when I hear him walking up the backyard path outside, and by the time he turns the door nob my whole body is wiggling, my tail lashing, my feet stamping, as he comes through the door. My Papa.
All is right in my world once more. My Papa is home, and he lets me out after a few ear scratches. I rush to do my business so we can return once more to the warm, safe haven of bed for a little while longer.
Except.
Papa doesn’t go back to bed this morning.
I can hear the sadness in his voice when he calls me a good boy as I charge past him and back into the living room, and the odd baring of teeth he calls a smile is the same as the one he gives me when he leaves…only he has just gotten home, so I don’t understand why he looks at me that way.
He goes upstairs and I follow, expecting him to head to our room. I jump on the bed in anticipation of our morning nap but Papa doesn’t join me. He instead goes to the bathroom and leaves with a handful of alcohol pads, large bandages, and medical tape – things I have seen him use before to treat cuts and scrapes – things I know mean he is hurt, though I can’t see where.
He doesn’t wait for me as he goes back downstairs and sets the supplies on the coffee table. I watch through the lattice as he grabs one of his folding knifes, the kind I have seen him use to open boxes or cut through hard to cut things not like the kind he uses with peanut butter or food when he shares it.
I know something is wrong. Papa is hurt, all though I don’t know how or where, I do know what helps the most.
So when he sets the knife on the tables and sits in his spot on the couch, I come down the stairs and plant myself squarely between his feet and set my head on his knee.
He stays still a long time, and I stay pressed to his legs and wait.
Eventually, slowly, he wraps his arms around my neck and chest, squeezes me with his calves, and holds me against him. I can feel his heart racing the way mine does when wind and thunder shake the house, and just like he does with me then, I stay still and calm and let him press tight to me.
He whispers my favorite things to me, Good Boy, I love you, over and over again.
Then he pauses.
When he speaks again it is hesitant, and to himself in the voice he pretends is mine.
He says, “Don’t hurt my Papa. He doesn’t deserve to be hurt.”
He says, “My Papa deserves kindness and cuddles.”
He says, “My Papa is a good Papa. He tries his best and takes good care of me.”
He says, “My Papa protects me, and feeds me, and gives me cuddles.”
He says, “I love my Papa.”
I don’t know what all the words mean, but I know that I mean them, and that my Papa needs to hear them from me, so I let him hold me and tell himself the things he needs to hear in the voice that he pretends is mine.
He holds me until the hurt passes. His smile is still sad, but not quite so sad as it was.
“I love you, buddy, you’re such a good boy.” He tells me, and I wag my tail as I feel the worst pass.
I lick at his face, and press close to him, and in my own way I say, “I love you, Papa.”