Dying.
He reached for his last morning sunrise.
His lower body paralyzed, dirty, wet from the sprinklers. He tried to drag himself across my backyard, back to before, when he was healthy, fast, feared.
He didn’t look anything like the propaganda on pest control trucks. Soft gray fur—the same shade as our dog, Raindrop.
Petite. Pink paws. Teeny claws, all the details they’d include in a Pixar movie.
“Oh, God,” I said. Way better than calling him a rat.
Still dying.
There was some blood. But Google said he was probably poisoned. That he wouldn’t live much longer.
I couldn’t leave him in the backyard, my dogs prowling nearby, him pawing at nowhere.
I crumpled some paper towels and lined the inside of an old Amazon box. I gently shoveled him inside. His whiskers twitched. He pushed and pulled at breath.
I put him in a safe, shady corner of the yard. I covered him with fabric we use to protect plants from the sun.
He scratched at the cardboard.
“It’ll be okay,” I told him.
The plan.
I wondered if this is what I would want for myself—to let my mortal machine run its course in safety and shade of a sunny morning.
I’ve heard of putting a critter out of its misery. But, yikes. Google said letting him pass on in the shade is better than how most people might treat him.
I’d give him time to pass away in peace. Then I’d toss the Amazon box. And it was trash day, so that was convenient.
I’d work the day away, collect him, take the trash out, and go to a special screening of the RuPaul movie Stop That Train—a friend of mine was doing a Q&A.
The problem.
When it was time to end the day, get ready for the screening, I went to the backyard, to the box.
My little gray friend was still pawing. Still breathing. Looking at me, wiggling those cute ears.
“Goddammit!” I said. Then, “Sorry. I know this is your life. I’m not mad at you. I’m mad at the situation.”
