Oye What I'm Gonna Tell You by Cecilia Rodríguez Milanés

Author:Cecilia Rodríguez Milanés [Milanés, Cecilia Rodríguez]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781632460080
Publisher: IG Publishing

LIKE A DOG

My dog is dying; he’s old—fifteen—and big—110 lbs., so nobody ever expected him to last this long. He’s a good boy. Of course, a member of the family—we got him from a neighbor whose collie bitch got knocked up by a roaming rottie or dobie (Buddy has the red/tan colors but his mama’s long snout and legs). I took Buddy with me when I left home—well, when I got kicked out. I was nineteen and mami thought I was freeloading because I wasn’t helping her out with the house but mostly because we got into a big fight.

“My nerves are shot since your father abandoned me.” Mami throws out that line with stunning regularity.

Well, technically he abandoned us. Furthermore, it was ten years ago but I don’t bring it up, again.

“I can’t go to work, take care of you three and the house and cook and everything. It’s just too much for one human being.”

This is when I started bowing the invisible violin. By then my sister, the oldest, a sous-chef, wasn’t even eating at the house and my brother, the baby, was still in high school and got away with murder just because he’s male. Me, I was in school, had a work study and part-time, paid my own car insurance, cleaned my room and did everybody’s damn laundry. But when she said that I should clean Dariel’s room, that was the straw that broke my back and went up my ass.

So I booked it and took Buddy, a sweet mutt everybody loved. She never forgave me for that. It’s probably why she’s giving me such a hard time now about his dying.

“Why don’t you put that poor dog down? Don’t you think he’s suffering?”

Buddy never complains, ever. This spring he slowed down, so instead of jogging together, we walked. Then he stopped eating his usual dry food. So I bought him canned food—different types to see which he liked. After a month or so he couldn’t swallow that, I lost it. I starting giving him soup with rice and malanga (the tuber that’s mami’s cure for everything). But this week Buddy isn’t eating anything and I was stupid enough to tell her.

“How can you let him die like that?”

“It’s nature. He’s going on his own terms.” I couldn’t stop crying and even when I wasn’t crying, big fat tears just fell out of my eyes. Plop, plop, plop.

“Are you going to do the same thing to me? What if I have a heart attack or something and get hooked up to a million tubes being kept alive? Are you going to let me suffer?”

“Don’t worry, ma. I will make sure to pull the plug.”

I lie down next to Buddy and wait.

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