The fact that the dog always dies has been drilled into Marrok's brain since his mother used to read him to sleep. He remembers her reciting Stone Fox, her voice growing fast and quick as the action rose and peaked, the bursting of the heart, the collapse, the horrible, heart-clenching ending. Old Yeller was required reading in 5th grade. Sounder and Where the Red Fern Grows followed after and only strengthened this upsetting, yet ineffable, pure and true fact.
The dog always dies. The one creature who has worked the hardest, loved the most, and sacrificed everything will be cut loose at the end.
"It's just the way things are." His mother had said, tucking him in, the book a loose object in between her fingers.
Young Marrok dreamed of barking and howling and running, wind whistling past his ears, running rivulets into his coat, the squishing squelching feel of mud in between his toes. He was free and he was young and he was thrumming with the word 'alive'.
**
Marrok returned to his old town with a drawn, tired mask for a face and the shuffling, meandering step of a person without a dream. It was dusk and the sidewalks were deserted of people, which suited Marrok just fine. The sound of his feet striking the sidewalk provided him with was a steady percussion line that he was avidly concentrating on, head bowed as if any second he could fall off step and ruin the piece. There was the rumbling, whirring noise of a car on the road and Marrok's shoulders perceptively hunched. His feet quickened a half step.
He tried not to flinch as the car blew past, lighting up his body, ruffling his hair and settling the heavy scent of machine, oil, and petrol around his body like a shawl. There was a brief moment where he appeared to freeze, but it was broke as his chest expanded. He breathed. An inhale and an exhale, a rumbling growl echoed in his head, and then his feet were stumbling with a new found urgency. The growl started again, deeper, then cut off in a soft whining noise.
Marrok was only 4 blocks away from his apartment, the one he wasn't going to be able to keep on his dying pension. His face dipped into a frown. He was going to have to do something about that. The home he had grown up in with his mom and dad had burned down years ago, his parents dead, and the only money he was currently receiving was from his army pension, which was pitiful
It was in an old area of town and the looming rough, brick buildings gave him a sense of comfort, where their alley ways were perfect refuge from the sickly lighting of the street and provided an urban jungle.
The dog always dies. The one creature who has worked the hardest, loved the most, and sacrificed everything will be cut loose at the end.
"It's just the way things are." His mother had said, tucking him in, the book a loose object in between her fingers.
Young Marrok dreamed of barking and howling and running, wind whistling past his ears, running rivulets into his coat, the squishing squelching feel of mud in between his toes. He was free and he was young and he was thrumming with the word 'alive'.
**
Marrok returned to his old town with a drawn, tired mask for a face and the shuffling, meandering step of a person without a dream. It was dusk and the sidewalks were deserted of people, which suited Marrok just fine. The sound of his feet striking the sidewalk provided him with was a steady percussion line that he was avidly concentrating on, head bowed as if any second he could fall off step and ruin the piece. There was the rumbling, whirring noise of a car on the road and Marrok's shoulders perceptively hunched. His feet quickened a half step.
He tried not to flinch as the car blew past, lighting up his body, ruffling his hair and settling the heavy scent of machine, oil, and petrol around his body like a shawl. There was a brief moment where he appeared to freeze, but it was broke as his chest expanded. He breathed. An inhale and an exhale, a rumbling growl echoed in his head, and then his feet were stumbling with a new found urgency. The growl started again, deeper, then cut off in a soft whining noise.
Marrok was only 4 blocks away from his apartment, the one he wasn't going to be able to keep on his dying pension. His face dipped into a frown. He was going to have to do something about that. The home he had grown up in with his mom and dad had burned down years ago, his parents dead, and the only money he was currently receiving was from his army pension, which was pitiful
It was in an old area of town and the looming rough, brick buildings gave him a sense of comfort, where their alley ways were perfect refuge from the sickly lighting of the street and provided an urban jungle.
