Dog’s Eye
On our way to Quebec City, Alex decides to track down a friend from his past life so we turn off the highway and drive through the suburbs of Longueil until we find this guy’s apartment, off-white and dingy. Sylvain answers the door wearing a sagging wife beater and sweat pants, eyes half closed, lopsided smile on his face.
“Hé, ça fait longtemps qu’on s’est pas vus, man!”
I watch them shake hands like guys do, clenching each other’s fists and pounding one another on the back, hard and dry.
“This is Bridget,” Alex says. “Elle est anglaise.”
I flinch.
“Oh yes? You don’t speak any French?” Sylvain asks.
“I do, but English is better…Je me sens plus à l’aise.”
“Hé, elle est bonne! You’re good!”
In the living room a bearded dark-skinned man is slumped in a bean bag chair, Game Boy held up to his face. He does not look up when we enter and Sylvain does not acknowledge him. We sit. Sylvain pulls a bag of weed out from under the coffee table and begins to assemble a joint while Alex looks on hungrily.
“You smoke?” Sylvain asks me, and I shake my head.
“She doesn’t do anything,” Alex says. “She’s a good girl.”
From the hallway there’s a clicking on the tile floor and a small black form emerges from the shadows. A French Bulldog, panting cheerfully. I beckon to him, snapping my fingers, and he comes running towards me, tongue lolling out of his wide mouth, eyes bulging crazily from his head. His eyes –
“He banged his head. Right here.” Sylvain taps the corner of the coffee table. “Fucked up his eye real bad.”
The dog nuzzles my feet, my knees, looking up at me expectantly. His right eye is swollen and puckered, like an overripe grape, covered with a thick film. He wags his stumpy tail and rubs up against me, eager for affection.
“That’s nasty,” Alex says, holding his lighter up to the end of the joint. The dog’s ears perk up and he turns towards Alex, panting, drooling, hopeful.
“I’m not gonna pet you,” Alex sneers, grimacing as he takes in a huge cloud of smoke. Unfazed, the dog returns to my feet and I tentatively stroke his back, unable to look directly at him.
“Did you bring him to the vet?” I ask Sylvain, who is sucking at the joint with gusto. He shakes his head, coughing.
“No. Too expensive, you know?”
Smoke wafts over me, stings at my eyes. I keep petting the dog, hoping to convey through my touch that I’m sorry for all he’s been through and that it’s not his fault he’s repulsive and that even though I can’t look at him without gagging he’s a good boy.
Across the room, the guy in the beanbag chair has passed out, his Game Boy resting on his gut as he snores and wheezes. Alex gives Sylvain twenty bucks and Sylvain gives Alex a plastic baggie stuffed with weed. More than twenty dollars worth, but they’re old friends after all.
We don’t stay much longer after that. I scrub my hands in the bathroom before we leave, feeling somehow infected by the dog’s bad eye, needing to cleanse myself of its hopeless curdled gaze. The dog trots after us as we head for the exit, whining and yipping, desperate for a touch, a stroke, a kiss. I can’t bring myself to look down at him. Sylvain and Alex say goodbye in the doorway, smack each other hard on the back, then we’re back in the car, driving along potholed roads, the trailer behind us weaving and shaking as we make our way to Quebec City, to the home we will share.
Bridget Duquette studied English Lit and Translation at the University of Ottawa. Her hobbies include reading, writing, and watching her peers flourish in their chosen fields while she stares at the framed art degree on her wall. She can be found on Twitter @Bridget_Writes.