Oh my Riley...RIP

The crisp call of my best friend woke me up from the usually 10-hour sleep that i took on Sunday mornings...He knew I needed a walk a day, to keep the doc away. So, pulling my trainers on, I stepped out of my house into an air-conditioner... The chilly mist slammed at my face, driving sleep out of me, for the day. I was one of the lucky few, to have my houses away from the heart of the city, to enjoy the diminishing landscapes around me in my daily morning walks. I enumerated the trees, with uncut heads, as i jogged by, with my friend at my side. The trees were silhouetted against the Bluish-Orange sky, waiting to receive the Sun as a part of them.

We finally reached the beach an hour later. My mate started panting with the vigorous exercise and started protesting for a cool lay in the golden beach sand, I couldn't but agree with him. For half an hour, we lay there, taking in the separation of the Sun from the horizon. Finally it was time to go home and pick my newspaper and enjoy that one day of incessant freedom. I waited for my friend Riley, to return from the shore. It was quite a while before I went looking for him. And when I did, I had my heart ripped away from me.

He was dead. Dead and lying orphaned on the shore. Incomplete sentences filled my throat and tried to force their way through my mouth. I looked around desperately for help, trying to behold a sympathetic soul who had a cellphone in their hands, but in vain. Only the gravity of the situation could have left me immobile, and my thoughts, frozen. I touched his skin. The velvety touch of his skin and the wetness of his tongue, the feel of his paws and the rolling of his belly, all came to my mind, along with the crashing reality that he had departed from me. I was not able to wash my hand of his blood though the water had cleaned it again and again. I pleaded the sea, to bring him back to life, for it had taken my Riley away from me.

I collapsed on my knees and broke down completely, and put my head to his heart. The cold waves dappled my feet and soiled my hair. I was oblivious to the salinity of the sea water and the gathering cloud above me. It rained heavily. I was glad that the rain disguised my tears, tears of separation. I carried Riley on my arms. People were wondering why I was carrying a Pug in my arms. I reached home from my walk, alone, for the first time, and started digging the wet earth. With every dig, the spade went deeper into the earth and He went farther away from me. Finally I placed him in his newly dug grave, and caught a glimpse of his brown nose and the thin eyes, on the corners of which were wonderfully shaped ears.

I finished closing the grave of Riley and put a signboard on his grave, which contained deeply etched words on it, and my heart. It said,

'Here lies a dog, who was a part of me for a decade of my life. It is a part of me that I have buried in this grave today.'

I then, closed the door of my courtyard and went to the balcony to don a fresh pair of clothes and cleaning Riley's food tray.