Molly in Tow

It was 5:00 AM when she found his contorted body at the bottom of the basement stairs – his eyes wide open and empty of light.

She recollects hearing a tumble and thud in the middle of the night, waking momentarily before dismissing the sound as a fleeting element of a fading dream.

So, she went back to sleep.

She was so startled upon discovering him that she almost fell herself. 

Now she stood frozen in the doorframe, unsure what to do. 

This situation was a first. 

There was nothing from her past to draw upon that might guide her.

She fumbled around the pockets of her bathrobe for her phone while staring down at the crumpled and twisted body of the man she had spent 50 (mostly good) years with.

The gravity of her loss began to rise from within, and she felt rubber-legged and light-headed. She grabbed the railing of the stairs to steady herself.

She entered the security code for her cell, opened the phone app, and stared blankly at the number pad.

“Fuck” she whispered to herself.

Who to call?

If there had been any signs of life, this wouldn’t be a question.

But the 911 emergency had passed — her husband was dead.

She dialed her son, with no idea what she would say when he picked up, so she panicked on the third ring and hung up the phone.

“FUUUUCK!” she screamed, her voice so loud she reflexively looked down at her husband, thinking the sheer amplification of sound might snap him out of his death, which it did not. However, she did wake her dog, Molly, who now stirs upstairs.

Her phone rings. It’s her son. She bursts out crying as she hears Moly coming down from upstairs.

“Pull yourself together,” she commanded before answering the phone on the tenth ring.

“Mom, is everything okay?”

“No. It’s not. I’m sorry I hung up on you!” sobbing uncontrollably.

“Mom, what’s wrong!!??”

Your father fell down the stairs. I think he’s dead.

She knew he was dead.

She wasn’t sure why she said, “I think he’s dead” – maybe she was trying to protect her son from the devastation she was feeling? Was a fifteen-minute drive with false hope better than one with the hard truth?

There was a prolonged silence, followed by “I’m on my way.”

She still hasn’t found the courage to go to him. She’s still at the top of the stairs, and he’s on the cold basement floor.

Molly sits at her feet, wagging her tail, looking up at her and wondering, “What are we doing standing in the doorway? 

She pats Molly gently on her head and says sadly, “Daddy’s gone.” Her moment with Molly is abruptly interrupted by the crunch of car tires on the gravel driveway.

She hears the car door slam, followed by a rapid knock on the front door.

She glances again at her husband before heading to the living room with Molly in tow.