Bingley yawned, stretching his front paws out into the sunlit patch on the carpet. The sun spot had moved across the living room by several tail lengths, so he knew he must have taken quite a long nap. He smacked his jowls together, trying to shake the sleep from his head.
He glanced around the small living room for Jerome. There his person was, standing in the same spot since he had fallen asleep. Bingley’s tail involuntarily wagged at the site of his best friend, though he thought it strange that Jerome had not moved in such a long time. But then again, Jerome had been acting very weird for the past couple of days.
A small puddle of black liquid pooled at Jerome’s feet and Bingley watched as more of the dark substance dribbled from Jerome’s slack jawed mouth to form on the floor. Bingley got up and walked over to his person, sniffing at the puddle. Smelled brackish and old. Nothing tasty unfortunately.
He sat down and looked up at Jerome. The man’s face was a vacant expression. Nothing but an empty stare and more black spittle dangling from his stained lips. Bingley couldn’t tell if Jerome was happy or not. Something was definitely off.
Yesterday, Bingley could sense that Jerome was ill. He could smell the sickness coming off of him. Jerome had stayed in bed all day. Only getting up twice. Once to fill his water bowl and then his auto-feeder to the very top, which Bingley was happy about because Jerome spilled a bunch of free kibble on the floor when he did it. And the second time was when he raced to the bathroom and vomited till he collapsed on the floor. Bingley had laid beside Jerome the entire night on the bathroom floor when that happened. Trying to help his person as much as he could.
But the next morning Jerome was walking around the house. He still smelled weird. Not quite sick, but not quite himself. Bingley was growing concerned.
He licked at Jerome’s dangling hand. Jerome’s head wobbled uneasily and looked down at Bingley. More black drool. Bingley licked the hand again, this time nuzzling it a bit with his wet nose. This time, Jerome let out a deep groan and shifted his head to the right. Then stood still again, staring off into the invisible distance once more.
Bingley sighed. He trotted to the back sliding door, gazing out of the glass into his backyard. Right as he was about to slump down into a lazy heap, he saw something odd. One of the tree limbs that overhung from outside of the fence was shaking wildly about. Squirrels had often climbed into the backyard from that very limb and Bingley loved running out the dog door to chase them about the yard, but this was no squirrel. It was big and heavy. The hackles on his neck stood straight up. He began to give a soft growl. Ready for full chase mode to whatever this intruder might turn out to be.
A woman came into view on the tree branch.
What was she doing? Was she here as one of Jerome’s guests? Did he know her? Bingley thought.
Bingley looked over to Jerome. He had shuffled to a new spot in the kitchen, this time standing fully in the corner, forehead to the wall. Jerome didn’t act like he knew someone was here and normally guests came in the front door.
No sooner than Bingley had pondered that fact, the woman dropped into the back yard from the tree, just like the squirrels.
Danger. Every sense told him this woman was an intruder. Bingley’s first instinct was to protect his person. A deep bark bellowed from his lungs. The woman froze and looked towards the house. She looked panicked, half ducking, half ready to run. She eyed towards the fence. Bingley took off like a bolt through the dog door. He briefly saw Jerome move in his direction, but he had already bound through the door and had grass firmly beneath his paws.
The woman gasped. She froze for another second then looked about desperately in search for an exit. The fence was brick and tall, so tall Bingley could not jump over it. The woman sprinted towards it anyways. Bingley felt his jowls flapping at his speed as he closed the distance between himself and this unwanted stranger. The woman scrambled at the fence. Jumping for any sort of hold to pull herself up. She caught a brick edge with her finger tips and pulled, her boots scraping at the fence to gain purchase. But it was too late.
Bingley had closed the distance, a familiar run all those times it had been a squirrel. His teeth sunk into her pants until he felt the full ankle in his mouth. He bit. He pulled back hard until the resistance gave way and the woman toppled on the ground. She screamed, perhaps in pain, perhaps from fright, he didn’t know. He didn’t care. Bingley shook his head violently never dropping his grip on this intruder. She would not hurt his person. The metallic taste of blood began to trickle onto his tongue.
The woman clawed at the ground at first, trying to drag herself away, but it was no use. Bingley was a big dog. So she began to beat wildly at his face. The first punch missed and hit him in the ear, which did smart, but not enough to force him to drop his bite. The second however landed square on his nose. Before this moment, all Bingley wanted to do was protect Jerome. But now…now Bingley was angry. This woman hurt him.
He dropped the ankle from the sharp pain, but with renewed vigor pounced on the woman now trying to scramble to her newly freed feet. Her arm raised, protect herself from an instinctual place. Bingley bit down on the presented limb with all his might.
The woman screamed in pain this time. A guttural wail of prey fear. More blood gushed into his mouth. Bingley began dragging her towards the center of the yard. She tried digging her heels in, gaining some purchase to be able to kick with her feet towards the attacking dog. Bingley saw this and mentally prepared for her incoming kicks.
A flash of motion came from his left, towards the direction of the house. Without dropping her arm, he yanked his head so he could see this potential threat. It was Jerome.
Was he okay? Was he mad? Was he in trouble? Bingley wasn’t sure what to expect. He had never done anything like this before, but he thought it was right. Wait, did Jerome come through the dog door?
Jerome wasn’t yelling. Or hurt. He was staggering over to the woman with pace, mouth still open like before, hands outstretched to her, reaching.
The woman saw Jerome and screamed for a third time. This time it was pure fear. It startled Bingley so much that he dropped her arm. The woman began to crab walk backwards trying to scramble away from Jerome, but once she put weight on the arm Bingley had bit it gave way and she crumpled to the ground. The grass and dirt clung to her wounds.
Jerome closed the same distance as Bingley had done. Though not as quickly, but this time his “squirrel” was wounded. Bingley’s eyes darted from the stranger back to Jerome. The was a part of him that kept waiting for Jerome to give him some sort of cue that this was friend or foe. But he never did. Jerome just kept shambling forward. Black slobber dribbling from his chin.
The woman had finally managed to pick herself up off the ground. She stood one legged, wounded arm hugged tightly to her body, blood seeping into her t-shirt. She reached for a wooden tree branch on the ground, wobbling, then raised it.
Weapon! She wants to hurt him! Bingley’s eyes bulged at the new dangerous information unfolding before him.
Jerome did not stop moving towards the woman. Gathering all of his strength, Bingley leapt as high as he could. It was enough. He felt the rough bark of the branch in his soft mouth. He bit and held tight as gravity brought him and the other end of the stick to the ground.
“Fuck! Fucking dog!” The woman cursed at the top of her lungs.
She tried to wrestle her weapon away from Bingley’s mouth. But Bingley knew this was a tug of war she would not win.
Bingley watched as her face contorted from anger into a shocked horror as she had forgotten for a split second about Jerome just as he tackled her to the ground with his full body weight. Bingley held tight to the branch. The woman tugged at it for another second, then released trying to use both of her arms to free herself from Jerome.
Then Bingley watched Jerome do something odd. Something, he had never seen his person do before. Jerome started biting this woman. His human teeth ripped into her flesh how Bingley tore into a couch cushion when he was a puppy. He had gotten in so much trouble for tearing up that pillow that he never did it again. But this wasn’t a pillow. Instead of white fluff bits of bloody flesh spilled out from the spot where Jerome was gnawing.
The woman screamed a lot at first. Arms and legs thrashed about. But after awhile, she calmed and then lay very, very still.
Jerome knelt over her eating for a long time. Bingley waited patiently. Still a bit perplexed by what his person was doing. He saw a squirrel run on the edge of the fence. He eyed it with intensity but it eventually hopped down on the outside of the fence. Away from their yard.
The sun was dipping low in the sky. Its golden light cast long shadows in the yard. Finally, Jerome stood up and let out a deep moan. Blood mixed with the black bile the constantly oozed from his mouth. He took a few stuttered steps and then stood still again. The woman lay in the yard, pieces of her strewn about just like that couch pillow.
Bingley stood up too and walked over, nudging Jerome’s hand with his nose. A soft, low moan came from Jerome’s throat. Noticing the dirt and blood on Jerome’s hand, Bingley licked at his person’s fingers gently. Jerome looked down at Bingley and the two stared at one another. This time, Jerome gave a raspy, gurgled wheeze and his fingers began to twitch. Bingley pushed his head into Jerome’s twitching fingers and calmed, enjoying the warm feeling of his person petting him.
The sun dropped lower in the sky. Bingley knew for this moment, at least, his person was happy. That was all Bingley wanted. And that made him happy too.