It must have rained cats and dogs the previous night. The puppies that fell from the heaven occupied every part of the road. When I say occupied, I don't mean they stood still in a place. Puppies are not cows and so they ran continuously across and besides the road. This made driving difficult. I would see a puppy running across the road and estimate its path of motion based on its current position and direction of motion. To avoid running over the puppy, I would gradually change the car's direction away from the puppy's estimated path. At that moment, a voice inside the puppy's head would announce "Hey, turn around. Go back to the starting point". The puppy being an obedient creature, would promptly turn around and run back. As a result, I would realize that the puppy's path would end under the right front wheel of my car. Out of desperation, I would be forced to swerve the car away. Most times, I was lucky not to cause an accident or run over the puppy in the process.
Such situations made me realize the positive aspects of the cow's placid nature. Like the puppies, cows too occupied every part of the road but unlike the puppies they did not run around. As a matter of fact, they did not even budge any muscle other than the one around their mouth and tail. When a vehicle approached them, they stood on their designated spots and stared at the headlights of the approaching vehicles. Cows loved the light coming out the headlights of the vehicles. In the mornings, they stared at the front of the vehicles and thought "Show me some light. Show me some light man." in a loop. In the nights, they stared at the lights and thought "I love the lights. I love the lights man." in a loop. They stood in this manner till the vehicle stopped a few centimetres from them. They then eagerly waited for the sound of the horn. As soon as they heard the car singing 'beep, beep, beep, beep', they slowly danced away from the spot. Though the slowness of the cow was maddening, I preferred it to the random motion of the puppies.
Suddenly, my attention was diverted to a realization. If it had rained cats and dogs on the previous night, where were the kittens. I only saw puppies and dogs; cats and kittens were nowhere in sight. I had heard that cats, like vampires, did not like sunlight. Maybe they were lying hiding from the sun in some shady spot. My thoughts on cats and dogs were rudely interrupted by a yelp that seemed to come from below me. My heart skipped a beat and I slammed the brakes. I got out of the car and looked under it to find a small brown and white puppy looking at me wide eyed. It gave out a shrill yelp when it saw me. The sight did not twang a string inside me. I shouted at the puppy "don't you dare give me that look. You are the one who ran across the road irresponsibly. Hey! Don't yelp at me. Come out of there now". The puppy seemed to have understood every word I said. It limped out from under the car and stopped in front of me. It looked up at me with sadness dripping from its eyes. Guilt and sadness clouded every part of my rational brain.
I made the biggest mistake of my life - I picked up the puppy. It wagged its tails and licked my palm. At that moment, I should have realized that dogs and their little ones were one of the most manipulative creatures on the planet. But I did not. I heard someone say "Awww!" in the head. I got into the car with the puppy in my hand. It was then that rationalism fought its way through the aw-ness. I realized I can't take the puppy home. I did not possess the puppy-loving material within me. I can never take care of this fellow. I opened the door and was about to drop the puppy on the road, when it looked at me and said "Eeeeeee hooooo ooooooo eeeeeee eeeeeeee ooooooo". As the sounds travelled to my head, they transmogrified into "will you do it? Please don't". I was shocked. Questions crowded inside my head - did it talk or was that only a series of yelps, am I going nuts or is this a special pup, what do i do now?
I decided to keep the puppy. I turned the car around and drove back home. As soon as I reached home, I rang my boss. As he picked the call, I faked two or three coughs. He asked in a concerned voice "What happened? Are you okay?" I responded "I have severe body pain and high fever". My boss quipped in helpfully "... and cough too". I humoured him with another couple of coughs before agreeing with him. I continued "I will take off today". My boss quickly jumped in "No no! Please take off the week. Take a test and come back next week only." I protested "It's ok boss. I will be okay tomorrow. I will be in office tomorrow." But my boss was vehement "Stay at home for the next week, ten days if required". I let out a sigh and agreed half heartedly.
I cut the call and looked at the puppy with a smile. "So we get a week off little fellow. Let us see what we can do in this week." The puppy wagged its tail and licked my palm. I took the puppy into the bathroom and gave it a wash. It did not appreciate the process of getting clean and protested through yelp and shrill barks. At the end of the bath, I gave it some biscuits and milk. As I watched the puppy gobbling the food, I felt affection flowing through and around me. Soon, I realized I had to name it. "What shall I name you, puppy?" The puppy ignored my words and continued to eat. "Shall I call you Tommy?" The puppy looked up at me when it heard the name 'Tommy'. I remembered reading in a science magazine that the sound corresponding to 'Tommy' had been etched in the dog's DNA. As a result, one can call any dog ' Tommy' for it to respond. But I did not like the name and decided to look out for another one. I picked up the puppy to determine its gender. The puppy did not like being separated from its food and protested loudly. "Oh! You are a girl. So I can't call you Tommy anyway. How about Lucy or Susy? No. I should probably give you an Indian name. Hmmmmm! How about Savitri? Oh no! Not Savitri. If Savitri Aunty gets to know of this, she will create a scene. Damn! I don't know what to call you".
At that moment, a thought struck me. Many years ago, my uncle brought a dog home. I don't remember much about the dog. I can't even remember if it was a boy or a girl. I only remember its name and the sight of it lying dead. The name that my family assigned to that dog gave me an idea. The dog had a plate for food. When the plate was empty, the dog created a racket by playing with the plate. On hearing the noise, the members of my family shouted "Why are you making this loda-loda sound?" Thus, the dog got its name, Loda-loda. Dog and pet lovers find the name insulting but I can't think of a better name for that dog. It was to the point. I decided to find one such name for the puppy on my palm. I started talking to the puppy with the seriousness the topic deserved "Hey! Look here." The puppy turned her attention towards me. I looked into her eyes and said "Today's the 20th of April. This being the day of our meeting I shall name you after this day. You being a dog I will add the letter 'D' at the beginning of your name. It gives me pleasure to name you D-420. There is a hyphen between the D and 420 but as its cumbersome to call you D hyphen four twenty, you will be called D four twenty." I repeated the name D420 a few times while pointing at her. She licked my finger and wagged her tail. I placed her on my lap and in a few minutes, she started sleeping.
She slept till the evening and woke up as I was making coffee. She seemed to have followed the smell of the coffee to the kitchen. She gave a soft bark as she reached me. She licked my feet and looked up at me. I looked at her and said "D420! Do you want some coffee?" She looked at me confused. I continued "Maybe not! You are a Chennai-ite and you will only want filter coffee. Unfortunately, I drink filtered coffee and not filter coffee. So no coffee for you!" I don't think D420 liked what I said. She gave me a loud bark and ran away.
That night I wondered where D420 would sleep. I placed a pillow besides my bed and placed D420 on it. I got a towel and covered her. The setup seemed comfortable to me but she did not like it. She got off the pillow, jumped onto the bed and waited for me to join her. I did not have a choice but to let D420 share my bed.
The week has passed since then. D420 has spent the week following me while I spent the time trying to make her life comfortable. At the end of the week, it seemed to me that we had known each other for a long time. I realized that it will be difficult for us to imagine a life without each other.
But there is a problem!
I got a call an hour back from my boss. I did not remember to cough when I picked the call. He mentioned "Ah! You sound better." I was forced to agree with his observation. He continued "Good, good! We have that customer call coming up on Wednesday. So let us have a discussion on our plans first thing tomorrow morning, ok?" I responded "Sure!" through gritted teeth He cut the call after saying "See you at 9".
As the reality of my situation sunk in, I called out to D420. She looked up at me expectantly. I informed her in a gentle tone "D420, I have to go to the office from tomorrow. Hope you will be able to take care of yourself and the house alone. I will leave by 8:30 in the morning and will be back by 6:30 in the evening. Is that okay?" She wagged her tail and responded "Woof".
