Patricia Ratto - Proceed with Caution - Stories and a Novella

One afternoon there was a meeting on the patio of the residence. It was a lovely day, and they had given permission to invite that girl who reads cards and entertains the women so much. I’m not a fan of that sort of thing: I don’t believe in anything, and in fact it bores me. But that day I was sad, because no one from my family had come to visit me during the week. I understand that there are so few of us: I’m a widow and I have no sisters; my cousin Agustina lives very far away and is worse off than me; my daughter and granddaughter work a lot and are always busy. But their visits, talking with them, does me good. And the truth is that they come very seldom and are always in a hurry. But I understand them anyway: when you’re young, there’s never enough time; when you’re old, time goes by slowly, it stretches out like an infinite jest. Well, the thing is, that day I went out to the garden and walked over to the table. The girl was reading Dora’s cards. I stood there watching, and then, suddenly, I discovered it—one of the cards had his picture on it. I adjusted my eyeglasses and moved my chair a little closer to the table. He wasn’t naked, of course; he was wearing something like a little skirt, and on top another garment that covered his chest, and a kind of necklace, but not with beads like the ones we women wear, but rather metal all over, with a design of kings or Egyptian gods or something, and some embossed bracelets. But what impressed me the most was that his body was just the same: skinny, kind of a broad back, but not too broad, and the head of a black dog. When the girl had finished, I asked her if I could take a closer look at the card. She explained what it meant and also what it was called: a name I forgot right away, and another one that’s like what I call him now, because—since he doesn’t talk—he never told me his name, and I’ve got to call him something.

I explain that he’s got to be careful with the security cameras at the residence. He just stares at me without even blinking. Then I go to the shelf and pick up the map I requested from the guard and left there, folded up. I told the guard that it made me feel safer to know where the cameras were located. I walk over to the table and pull out a chair. And I also told the guard that my daughter wanted to see a map or something with that information. The guard replied that he had to consult the administration, but early the next day, there he was, knocking on my door with a copy of the map in his hand. I sit down. My daughter’s the one who pays, so they couldn’t refuse her alleged request. I summon him over and he stops beside me, lays his dark snout on the table, observes the map attentively. Then, suddenly, he opens that big maw of his and, before I can react or stick out my hand to retrieve the piece of paper, he’s already grabbed it between his teeth, chewed it savagely, and swallowed it. I think I’m going to have to teach you good manners , I say. He lowers his ears and gazes at me with the most bewitching eyes in the world.

At this age, getting up and walking is no easy task. My body hurts. And it’s that pain, added to all the abilities that you start losing—becoming slower and clumsier—that gives the body an inescapable, sometimes unbearable, presence. When I was young, I used my body, though it was barely a body: I felt so healthy and light that I hardly ever thought about it. Now, on the other hand, in my old age, I am always a body, a body that hurts, a body that doesn’t respond, a body that my head always has to carry around on its back. A body that weighs tons, even though I’m as skinny as a wire.

One day—out of pure habit that remained from my time with Rocky—I had the idea to throw him a slipper, to see what he would do. First he followed its trajectory with his eyes without moving from his spot. But no sooner had the slipper hit the ground than he leaped toward it, picked it up between his teeth, shook it a couple of times, and suddenly gulped it down. I stood there, dumbstruck. I must confess I didn’t know whether to laugh or to start fearing him. It was then that I understood that he could eat anything. And that each time he came he was going to eat something, something that wasn’t dog food, but rather sustenance for a monster or a capricious god.

No, not the TV , I tell him, because then I’ll be bored . It’s not that I watch so often or pay too much attention to it, but I leave it on in the background for company. With the voices, of course, but also with that flickering blue glow that’s projected against the walls. He looks at me, not saying a word, but I know he understands me. He’s going to eat something else instead, that’s for sure. But I’m not complaining—what can I say? Life is a transaction, and we all know it.

I read less and less all the time. It gives me a headache; it’s hard for me to concentrate. Maybe I need to change my eyeglass prescription, but I’m exhausted by the mere prospect of having to go to the ophthalmologist, being examined, then getting the prescription, visiting the optician a couple of times, all of it depending on the availability of someone to go along with me both ways, considering how terribly slow and wobbly I am. I’ve always been a reader: reading was a refuge for me, but now I don’t know—I open a book, I start out eagerly, and soon I get bored, as if I can’t find anything interesting anymore. Maybe I’ll tell the cynocephalus to eat some books; if he leaves me just a couple, that should be more than enough.

Every time he leaves, I have to shake out the quilt a little. He’s developed the habit of curling up in a ball on the bed when I fall asleep, and I know for a fact that he sleeps there. I can’t catch him in the act, because he’s very clever and makes me believe, among other things, that he likes to lounge on the sofa. And yet sometimes, even though I’m half asleep, I turn around and feel his warmth nearby. On other occasions, I’ve stretched my legs and touched his loin or his back—I never know how to refer to him and his parts, like a person or like a dog. The thing is, when I wake up, he’s almost always gone. And there’s a hollow left in the bed. He’s really not all that clever after all . I smile as I shake the quilt to get rid of the hairs he’s left on top of it, before Amanda shows up to clean.

The first time he stood before me on two feet, I was so shocked that it left me speechless. In that posture he didn’t look so much like a dog, but rather like a person. On the inside, or what until that moment had been underneath, he was almost as hairless as a human being. I was used to my golden retriever, who was so hairy, inside and out, or on top and underneath, according to the angle from which you looked at him. Well, the thing is, the cynocephalus was not; he had no hair on his chest, or on his groin, or anywhere else… So he looked too naked. You can’t go through life like that, showing everything , I said to him. This time I realized he hadn’t understood me. Then I pointed out his parts to him. I must say, it had been many years since I saw such a large, youthful member. I explained that he had to get dressed, to wear clothes. Then, suddenly, it was clear that he had understood something, because he returned to his position on all fours. That way, with his hair (sparse as it was) covering his back and part of his limbs, he didn’t seem quite so bare. I walked over to the closet and took out a bathrobe. I pointed it out to him, showed him how to put it on, left it on the sofa. As soon as I turned my back on him to return to bed, he leaped over to the sofa and put it on; I don’t know if I’ve mentioned how tremendously agile he was. When I finished tucking myself in, he was standing upright again, but with the bathrobe on. And I must admit that it left quite an impression on me, because he looked very, very much like the figure on the Tarot card that I’d seen the girl in the garden holding that afternoon. I was also astonished by how beautiful he was.