Dog on a Balcony. No dog on a Balcony.

A storm causes accident and loss

My heart jumps into my throat and stays there. A slip, a scramble, two floors down, then crack, he hits the pavement with a yelp. The wind roars but the dog lies perfectly still — an off-white rug, tossed onto the street. Grab a jacket. Take the stairs two at a time. I push my way into the howl.

Our balconies line up perfectly, his across the street from mine. The dog has a big house, two girls that love him, and a marble patio table to shield the sun as he watches the street below. I live alone. My table has a cork mat under one leg. We have a connection, Cappuccino and me. He listens while I talk about Maria. We watch the weekend crowds pass with their bright blue coolboxes and beach towels.

My hand rests on his scruffy chest. “Easy, boy.” Up and down, up and down. Blood leaks from one ear. Rain and street water slick his fur. He’ll be cold. The impact punched his jaw to an ugly angle. Action. I get up and hammer on their door. No answer. The wind whips away my shouts and carries them out to sea. Two blocks to the vet. I roll him into the jacket and hoist him into my arms. He weighs more than the weekly box of vegetables Juanjo delivers, slightly less than my Maria at the end. “Easy, boy.”

The dog was there when we moved in. They left him outside as a puppy, even though he was small enough to fit through the bars. Maria named him Cappuccino because of his brown-white swirls. We never asked his real name. She threw him scraps of chorizo while we sipped coffee. When we finished she would tip the grounds onto a saucer and look for clues. “Oh, you have a big surprise coming,” she’d say. Then she would kiss me with her caffeine-stained lips.

My arms burn and the salt rain stings my eyes. I make it to the vet, panting. The dog whimpers under the jacket. The puny electronic bell sounds. Nothing. I press it again. Finally, a wild-eyed man in a white coat opens the door. “What a gale! . . . . from the balcony? . . . how nasty.”

The waiting room offers little to read. Screens replay scenes with happy dogs running through grassy fields. As I wait, my mind casts back to the hours spent holding Maria’s hand in the chemotherapy ward. She didn’t see that one in the coffee grounds.

The white-coat returns and says they’ll keep Cappuccino overnight. Nothing more for me to do. I nod gravely and go home to sit in my own waiting room. Outside my building, I discover my cup has blown off the balcony and smashed on the ground, its black grit seeping. By evening, the winds have died. Shutters roll up, cafes turn their signs to open and neighbours venture out onto their balconies to smoke and consider the brooding sky.

Later, my neighbour comes to offer his thanks. He thrusts a bottle of brandy at me. “Please, enjoy this. I’m not going to drink it, and it’s a good one.” I wasn’t even sure of his name. “And here’s your jacket back.”

“I don’t drink brandy,” I say. “I drink coffee.” What a ridiculous thing to say.

He takes a step back and lifts his gaze from the bottle to my weathered face.

“Thanks anyways . . .” I take the bottle and wrap it tight in the jacket. “What’s his name, the dog?”

“Angel.” The man shrugs. “My girls named him.” Strange. He’s not a graceful dog. ‘Angel’ rests his arthritic bones most of the day and barks like he smokes forty a day.

My neighbours keep him inside now, occasionally dragging him to the beach for some air. I drink coffee facing an empty balcony across the street. They put a tall plant out there, but it doesn’t survive the winds. The brandy lives in the cabinet, next to the good china. Every time I take a cup from the shelf, the glaring space left by the broken one seems bigger, more painful. Nothing but a ring of dust. Sometimes, I dream of hurling the other cups down to smash on the street, creating more space in the cabinet. Instead, I sit and wait for the next storm to come.

Originally published in the Sticks and Stones: an Oxford Flash Fiction anthology

Philip Charter is the author of two collections of short fiction and Fifteen Brief Moments in Time, a novella-in-flash. He likes crisps.