DEPARTED FROM PINE HEIGHTS

By Ben Greenman

from forthcoming collection, as yet untitled

Few dogs can claim to have “done their share” in the manner of Driver, a beagle who came to the Nash family in the Pine Heights neighborhood, from a nearby shelter, at the age of two, and remained there in continuous employment for fourteen years. Part companion, part guard, occasionally a teacher or a clown, Driver exhibited nearly all the traits desired by the Nashes, particularly the family’s young son, who was only three years old at the time of arrival. He departed from Pine Heights, and from the planet, after a morning incident in which a delivery man failed to close the gate in the fence surrounding the property, and Driver rushed out to bark at the man, who was by then returned to his truck. Only aggression was expressed in the transaction, and no visible injury was inflicted upon man by dog or vice versa, but the incident seemed to exhaust and sadden Driver, who went back inside the house, trotted upstairs, lay down on the small oval rug in the master bedroom, and silently expired. The Nashes’ son refused to comment on the matter, wiping tears even as he derided the situation as “sentimental in a way that prevents people from seeing the real emotions underneath”; he even refused to give his name. But canine longevity has only a relative significance in a society which considers a human still young at fifteen.