Mamma Dog

True story. In parts.

The young mother spied the soft toy lying on a bollard and she snatched it up.

“Why would anybody dump such a cute cuddly toy?” she asked nobody in particular in a loud voice.

“Some kid dropped it out of the buggy, probably, “ the young father said, “and someone put it here where the parents’ll find it when they come back to look.”

The young mother wasn’t listening though. In her eye was the glitter of the bargain hunter.

“Poor dog, lost and all alone.” She put on her special baby-talk voice. “Here, Poppy, will you look after Doggy?”

She held out the limp dog, splay-pawed and floppy-eared to the little girl in the pushchair. The child looked at the lolling soft toy and shook her head. The young mother looked at the young father in surprise. He stared ahead, his hands gripping the handle bar, vaguely annoyed at the hold up.

“It’s a lovely dog, Poppy. Give him a cuddle.”

Her mother pushed the floppy dog with the angry eyes at her. She shook her head. The toy wasn’t hers. She pushed it away. Her mother’s eyes went hard and glittery like they did when Poppy had done something mother didn’t like. Her mother pushed the toy into the buggy and they hurried home. Poppy could tell from the way the buggy bumped up and down the kerbs that her mother was annoyed. The toy dog snarled and Poppy hunched away from its fury, not taking her eyes off the unwanted passenger.

Back home, Poppy wriggled out of the buggy and toddled straight to her bed and pulled out Bear. Her mother followed with the new dog. Poppy hugged Bear tight. Her mother wagged the dog at her.

“Show Bear your new friend,” she said encouragingly. Poppy’s expression was blank, closed up and unsmiling.

“Just leave it, Jen,” the father said. “You can see she doesn’t want it.”

“But it’s brand new!” the mother protested.

“You don’t know where it’s been either. It could be full of germs.”

The mother wrinkled her nose. “Ew! I hadn’t thought of that.”

The dog was given a spin in the washing machine, dried, and pushed at Poppy again. The young mother was determined that this toy that she found ‘cute’ and ‘loveable’ was going to be a hit with her daughter. How could she not like it? How could their tastes be so different? She wasn’t going to let her daughter develop wayward ideas. Parents should guide and encourage. The future, the rebellious, angry future was many years away, hidden in a red cloud, but she guessed it was there. She looked at the small child with chubby legs planted firmly apart, her lips and jaw set in a determined pose, and she vowed she would change all that.

When she tucked Poppy into bed, she pushed the cute soft toy next to her pillow.

“All nice and clean now,” she said with a big smile. “What will you call your new dog, sweetheart?”

“It’s Mamma Dog,” Poppy whispered through clenched teeth.

“Aw, that’s sweet!” the young mother enthused, kissing Poppy on the forehead. She turned in the doorway and, tossing her daughter a last smile, turned off the light. In the pale glow of the nightlight she didn’t notice that Poppy’s eyes did not return the smile.

Later, screams woke the young parents. Without a word, they flew to Poppy’s room. The child was standing up in her cot, her hands over her mouth as if to stop the distress tearing out. She let her father carry her into the big bed, and she clutched him tight as he rocked her back and forth to calm her sobbing.

“Was it a bad dream, sweetheart?” her mother asked.

“Tell us what made you cry,” her father whispered.

Poppy gulped. “It’s Mamma Dog.”

“Don’t be silly—”

The young father interrupted his wife with a furious look. “What’s the matter with Mamma Dog?” he asked.

“She’s cross. She growled and bit.”

“Why did she do that?”

“She lost her little boy. She wants him back. She doesn’t want me. She’s his Mamma Dog.”

“Well, of all the silly—”

“We’ll take her back, Poppy. Don’t worry. I’ll tell her.”

The young father put his daughter back to bed. “I’ll take Mamma Dog with me. You sleep now. She’ll behave herself with me.”

Before he left the child’s room, with Mamma Dog tucked firmly beneath his arm, he turned the night light up a little. Poppy gave him a weak smile.

The young father’s dreams were dark. Swirling black mists filled with a child’s sobbing and closer, inside his head, the snarling of a furious dog.

Before he went to work, he took Mamma Dog back to the bollard where some more sensible soul had left her the day before. Vague snatches of his dreams came back, tears and the angry gnashing of teeth. He frowned and looked about, listening. Through the hum of morning traffic, the tapping of footsteps on the pavements, he thought he heard a voice, a thin, high-pitched cry.

“Mamma Dog!”

A stray sunbeam caught the dog’s glass eyes, making them glitter. He hurried away.