The Knowing

by Michele Rees

"That's not a dog! That's a dragon."

She fell to her knees in front of the greyhound who stood before her with worry in his eyes. She fell instantly in love with him. She reached slowly to let him sniff her hand and he took a step closer to her and then another and another until he loomed over her with his large black-brindle body. He was warmer than any other dog she had felt before. He fell as she did, placing his head on her shoulder.

Hours and days, months and years, they walked together, spent all their time together. They became a team. He had a job, He was the greeter at a salon and everyone loved him. He made his own impressions on people and they too fell in love with him. He was seven now and had grown to trust people again after being poked and prodded at the race tracks by people who just looked at him like he was money. But he knew. He knew even then that he was more, that life was more. He hurt there and so he stopped running until they threw him away. But in the throwing, he knew he would find the knowing.

He knew when their eyes met that this was his bonded. Then she called him Dragon and he left his racing name behind forever. He was by her side always.

She fell in love with him.

He fell in love with her.

It was night and after a wonderful day of walking and greeting, it was soon time for sleeping.

She let him out to the yard to watch the moon and secure the perimeter as he always had. He saw something from the corner of his eye, but she did not. She was taking eggs from the refrigerator upstairs.

He chased it.

He screamed!

She didn't hear him.

He lay there unable to move.

She came to the door, "Why are you laying on the wet grass Dragon? It's cold. Don't lay on the grass." she said as she was looking out of the back door at his body, barely visible in the dark of night.

She had returned. She always returned.

The doorbell rang

"Get that!" she yelled to her husband "Dragon is outside, I'm heading out."

"Hi. Sorry to bother you" the person at the door said. "I think something happened to your dog! I heard him scream!"

She was already flying. She flung herself down at his side, took off her housecoat, and threw it over him. "What happened, my love?" Her body trembled as she pulled him to her. "Dragon?" she looked around and into his eyes.

He trembled. Fear filled his body but she came. She always came to him.

"Dragon?" she shook her head in worry as the tears began. The knowing let the waters flow.

They carried him into the house, he was unable to move. He was paralyzed.

This was the end.

She reads to him still.

She still comes to him.

His body now ash held together by an urn that she carries with her.

She still comes to him.

She read once that a rider without a Dragon is dead. Was she dead now? She felt dead now.

She longed for him. Felt the emptiness of the loss of her Dragon. Would he be gone forever?

She waited.

She waited for him to return.

She didn't want another Dragon, not ever. She wanted to know where he was.

He wasn't in the urn. She knew that... but it was heavy. It was heavy which matched the feeling in her heart. She was heavy with the loss of him.

"Where are you Dragon?" she whispered the words as she fell into tormented sleep.