Man’s Best Friend // Self-Para
The days had become mostly the same. Early summer heat had rolled in, and June Bugs pelted at the windows for a chance to escape it. Gatlin woke and rose and slept again in a way that made one day indistinguishable from the next. Sometimes, he ate. Occasionally, he showered. But the mansion was always empty—just him, the sun, and the walls. He never bothered to close the curtains, so day rolled into night and night into day, while he moved through time like a ghost.
Nausea rose in his throat as he sat up in bed, squinting the light out of his eyes. The sun had already dipped past its peak in the sky, and the shadows stretched across the room. Gatlin grabbed for the bottle of whiskey on the bedside table and took a swig to tamp down the feeling. He’d been warned not to let it become a habit, but habits were only problems when they got in the way of something, and Gatlin would be sleeping through the day if he was drunk or sober. He brewed a cup of coffee and slipped a dash of the whiskey into the mug for good measure, before he tucked the bottle away. When he was done, he ran cold water over his face and dug a clean t-shirt out to wear.
Gatlin’s hat still hung on a hook by the door—worn and frayed, and with a little dust on the rim, but he picked it up and placed it on his head. He walked out the door, not even bothering to make sure it was latched behind him, and he turned his keys in the ignition of his truck.
Gatlin didn’t know where he was going until he got there, but the farm looked the same as when he’d last seen it. It took walking around to realize how much the past few months had put wear and tear on the property. The fences all needed mending, a bad storm had damaged the side of one of the barns, and rats scampered freely without anyone to make sure the barn cats kept up their work. He’d never heard it so quiet before. Most of the animals had been sold, stolen, or had run away to try and fend for themselves. The few that remained were emaciated, and the sad looks in their eyes came like another punch to the gut for Gatlin. He didn’t blame any of the workers for leaving; they had families to feed too and didn’t know how to manage inventory or brokering deals with distributors. “I should’ve tried to get here sooner,” Gatlin whispered as his hand grazed the nose of an old palomino.
He kept walking out past the barns and pastures to where the satsumas grew at the edge of the property once owned by the Bowies. There was no one left to carry the name anymore, and instead, one more headstone added to the huddle, not yet weathered by passing time. “You’d fuckin’ hate the way this place looks right now. I’m sorry I let it go so long,” he told Marley—just another sorry in the string of apologies he’d given her since January, and he knew it was another apology that would only piss her off if she were still around to answer him. “I wasn’t home for a while, and I didn’t know how to come around after that,” he admitted, only to be answered by the wind.
Gatlin stood in the near silence for a while, listening to the ebb and flow of cicadas. A soft patter of feet on the dirt pulled Gatlin from his thoughts, and he turned around to see who was coming his way. “Fern,” Gatlin smiled and bent down to scratch the dog behind her ears. “You’ve been watchin’ the farm for us, huh?” He could tell the months hadn’t been kind to her either; her weight was down and fleas moved under her coat, but she was strong, and she’d be alright with a little bit of love. “We got some work to do before we go home, alright?” He told her, standing to look back at the farm and everything that would have to be done to save it. “Let’s get some fresh water in all the troughs and call in for a fresh order of feed. Tomorrow we’ll be puttin’ down rat traps and fixin’ up the fences around the east pastures. I should order some more chicken wire too, huh? We don’t need any more coyotes sniffin’ around.” It would be a long time before the Bowie farm looked anything like it once had, but it was a start. It was something more than waking and sleeping, and it was enough for now. “C’mon girl,” Gatlin called as he started back up the path, and Fern followed happily along behind him. “Good girl, Fern.”
