BY DEBORAH SALE-BUTLER
Copyright is held by the author.
YOUR BARKS are high and whiny in your sleep. Your feet paddle and your lips flutter raspberries through closed jaws.
I wonder what you’re dreaming. I hope you’re chasing squirrels, or playing tug with Sadie, the Bulldog.
But I worry you’re hopelessly calling for the transient man who abandoned you in his room until the housing authority found you two weeks later — skinny, but alive.
You still need to be no more than three feet from me at any time.
Since your first seizure, I pay special attention to your dreams, and call your name if I think you’re running too far.
***
Deborah Sale-Butler is a Portland, Oregon-based writer whose work has appeared in the Dead Girls Walking anthology, Flash Fiction Magazine, 101 Words, Etymology Press, Witcraft, Still Point Arts Quarterly, Mystic Owl, The Artisinal Writer, Underside Stories, and Greener Pastures.
Stirring piece, Deborah.