Victor Harper spots the little creature on the lane in October.
A shivering, tiny puppy curls up on the shoulder of the Aroad, rain slicking its fur, and watches the passing traffic as if its waiting for someone in particular. Victor is driving out to his country cottage to pick up some potatoes, brakes for a heartbeat, thinking hell just look. The puppy lifts its head, and the moment snaps shut. The potatoes stay in the ground for another week.
He names the dog Mars. The name comes from his neighbour, MrsMargaret Clarke, who sees the ginger, bigeared creature with mismatched paws in the hallway.
Redhaired, snouty, a bit clumsy, she says. Mars. It suits him.
Victor chuckles.
Mars grows fast. By spring he claims the entire left side of the sofa as his kingdom, and he believes thats perfectly reasonable. At first Victor scolds him, then he stops. Sleeping alone in the flat feels worse than sharing a bed with a dog that snores and occasionally drags a paw in his sleep.
Their friendship doesnt spring up instantly; it builds slowly, like the pace of people who have nowhere urgent to be. Morning walks, an evening bowl at seven, the television. Sometimes Victor talks aloud to Mars. The dog sits beside him, listening with a solemn expression, only yawning now and then, baring his teeth in a goofy grin.
Youre right, Victor says. Enough. He switches off the TV.
—
The accident happens in April as they return from an evening stroll. Victor cant recall the details clearly. The road is slick; his car slides onto the pavement around a corner. Mars is on his leash, then the leash snaps. Victor is thrown onto the curb, hit on the side, lies there for a few seconds, hearing only his own breathing and a distant shout.
When he pulls himself up, Mars is gone. The broken leash lies on the asphalt, its plastic clasp split in two.
He searches until midnight, covering three blocks, calling his name, asking passersby. They shake their heads. One person mentions seeing a ginger dog dart toward the railway crossing about forty minutes earlier, but saw nothing after that.
Back home, Victor sits at the kitchen table and stares at the empty bowl. He gets up, writes a notice, prints twenty copies, and the next morning pastes them around the neighbourhood. He also calls three veterinary practices and the shelter on Mill Street.
If a ginger mixedbreed turns up, please call me, he tells the person on the phone. Heres my number.
A week passes. Then a month. The flyers bleach under May rain, and Victor replaces them. He does it again in June. The vets stay silent. The Mill Street shelter calls twice, both times by mistakeneither dog matches.
In July, Margaret Clarke quietly asks from behind the door, Victor, maybe you could take another dog? The shelters got plenty.
No, Victor replies. She doesnt bring it up again.
The flat feels different without Mars. It isnt empty; the furniture stays put, the fridge hums, neighbours thump upstairs around half past nine as usual. Yet something has shifted.
Victor picks up an old rubber ball that Mars used to chase down the hallway, puts it on a shelf, then slides it into a drawer, then pulls it out again and leaves it on the shelf.
Each morning his hand automatically reaches for the leash hanging by the door. The leash hangs there, but theres nowhere to go.
He starts walking alone, the same route, the same time, just without Mars. He cant explain whyhe just walks.
In August his daughter calls from Manchester.
Dad, come and stay with us. You could have a break.
I cant, he says.
Why?
He pauses, then answers, Maybe hell come back.
She stays silent, then says, Alright, in that tone people use when they want to say something else but keep it unsaid.
Mars returns in October. Victor hears a scratching at the front door just after eight in the evening. At first he thinks its the wind or a draft, but the sound repeats, steady with pauses, as if someone knows the door will open and is just waiting.
He opens it.
Mars sits on the mat, older now. Some of his coat is trimmed where wounds must have been. His left side bears a faint scar. Around his neck hangs a leather collar, brown with a brass buckle and a small tag that reads simply Buddy.
Victor stands in the doorway, watching. Mars meets his gaze. A floppy right ear, a reddish starshaped spot on his forehead, the same amber eyes with dark rims.
Where have you been? Victor asks.
Mars steps over the threshold, moves down the corridor as if hes memorised every turn. He heads straight to his bowl, which sits where it always has, empty as usual.
Victor closes the door, shuffles to the kitchen, his hands trembling slightly as he opens the fridge.
Alright, he murmurs. Alright.
The next morning he drives to the veterinary practice. They examine Mars, give him the needed vaccinations, scan his microchip. Victor asks about the collar. The vet pulls the tag and reads out loud, Buddy. Is that another name?
Someone gave him a different name, Victor says.
He lived with someone?
For about six months somewhere. I dont know where.
The vet looks at Victor, then at Mars, then back at Victor.
It happens, she says. Dogs sometimes wander off and then find their way back, especially the clever ones.
Victor says nothing, watching Mars sit on the metal table, calm, as the vet finishes the checkup.
On the back of the tag they find a phone number. Victor dials from the car while Mars rests on the back seat, staring out the window.
After three rings, someone answers.
Hello?
Good afternoon, Victor begins. You had a dog, a ginger one. You called him Buddy.
A pause.
Yes, a womans voice says, a little older. He was ours. He left in September and weve been looking for him.
Hes with me now. His name is Mars. He went missing in April.
Another pause.
He lived with us, we fed him, treated his wounds.
Thank you, Victor replies. Hes a good dog.
A silence stretches.
Do you live far from here? the woman asks. From Birch Lane?
Another area, Victor answers.
Oh my, she sighs. He turned up by our fence in April, just lay there and didnt move.
Victor watches the grey, leafless park outside his windshield. The conversation ends on its own. He puts the phone away. Mars snorts softly in the back seat, his head resting on his folded paws.
Back home Victor removes the strangers collar, places it on the table, and studies it. Brown leather, brass buckle, the Buddy tagwellmade, not cheap.
The dog had spent about half a year with someone else, yet hes back. Victor thinks of the woman from Birch Lane, how she must have fed and petted him every day, then in September she woke up and he was gone. She must have posted notices, called shelters.
He picks up the phone again.
Its me again, he says when she answers. If youd like to visit, Im happy to arrange it.
A silence.
Really? she asks.
Yes, really.
She arrives on Saturday. Shes a sixtyfouryearold named Helen Pratt, wearing a grey coat and a canvas bag filled with apple jam and a sack of dog foodthe same brand Mars has grown used to over the past months.
Mars spots her from the hallway, doesnt bolt. He simply waddles over and nudges his nose against her hand, tail wagging.
They sip tea. Helen tells how she found him by the fence in April, took him to the vet, how frightened he was at first, then settled in. Victor recounts the crash, the broken leash, the flyers.
Mars lies between them on the floor, dozing. Occasionally he lifts his head, looks at one, then the other.
He chose us both, Helen says.
Victor looks at the dog, then at Helen.
Looks that way.
Victor puts the Buddy collar into a drawer, not discarding it.
Mars resumes occupying the left half of the sofa and chasing the rubber ball down the corridor at one in the morning. The flyers on the lampposts soak in the November rain and peel off on their own.
Helen visits every Saturday, bringing jam, sometimes asking for advice about blackcurrants; she tends a small garden on Birch Lane, and Victor learns a bit about gardening himself. They chat while Mars naps between them.
One evening Victor pulls the leather collar with the Buddy tag from the drawer, looks at it under the lamp; the metal glints.
Two leashes hang by the hall door: an old red one and a new blue one that Helen placed there on a recent Saturday, silently, without asking permission.
