A New Beginning A story By Charles Roberts

 

I will ask you to cast your mind back a few years, to 2008 in fact.  To the market in Arboleas village.  How full it was of stalls and people; well, it was the only decent market in the area on a Saturday.  You could of course go to the car boot behind the Bar International, but the village market was usually packed with people shopping, calling in one of the three bars for a coffee and a natter to friends they only saw down there to catch up on the gossip and news.  Of course, that was all before you had to sit outside to smoke.

There was a burger van who used to park in front of Café Maloan, he’d set his tables and chairs up on the street for folks to sit and talk whilst they ate their bacon butties, burgers, or hot dogs and drink tea.  Do you remember the pot-hole in the road in front of Café Maloan, the burger van used to park and set his tables up just passed that?

One market day in August, it was hot, about forty-five degrees, and dry.  I was curled up in that pot-hole and the people threw bits of bread rolls, or crusts, or bacon rinds to me.  I would gobble them up and then go back to my safe, secure pot-hole.  As the day wore on, it was getting hotter by the minute, the people started to leave the market.  The traders bagged up their stock and put it back in their vans and cars, then they took down their multi-coloured stalls, the burger man stacked his chairs and put them in the back of the van along with his tables.  Soon I was all alone on the street, the heat beating down.

I moved to the shelter of the café doorway, but had to keep moving every time someone went in or out.  I was hot and tired, so tired, I just wanted to curl up and sleep somewhere cool and comfortable.  My people had taken me down to the car park in the Rio about three weeks before and taken me out of the car, then they had driven off.  I chased after them, trying to catch them, but I couldn’t, so I went back to the car park and waited for them to come back for me.  I would hide in the scrub if anyone I didn’t know came, which was all of the people.  At night I would wander the village streets looking for something to eat or drink, I would find the odd scrap, but not much.

Then one day I was wandering about looking for something to eat and I saw a little dog being walked by a people, the dog looked happy skipping along on its lead.  I ran up to the dog and we sniffed each other, but I was weary of this people, but they didn’t chase me away and so I followed them back to where they lived.  I went onto the porch and the people brought out a bowl of food which it put down in front of me, that tasted so good, and a bowl of cool water.  Then another people put something on the back of my neck, I didn’t think much to that, but I was busy eating.  They went in the house, but left the door open, well I looked, but was scared to go in.  Instead, I walked back to the gate and crawled under it.  I went back to the car park in the Rio to see if my people had come back for me.

I was so, so tired.  I was tired of sleeping wherever I could, always being hungry and thirsty, the hot road which burned my feet and the hot sun on my back.  All I wanted was somewhere to go to sleep, somewhere comfortable and cool.  To sleep and wake up lying on a nice comfy bed with bowls of food and water all round me, but most of all I wanted my people to come back for me.  I waited and watched, but they didn’t come, and the sun got hotter, and the road got hotter and my belly rumbled more and more each day.

Then this day at the market, when everyone had gone and all was quiet, and I was trying to find shelter from the sun and heat in the doorway of the café.  I glanced up and saw someone coming to the café, so I got up and moved a little way, they went in and I went back to the shade of the doorway.  Then they came out again, so I had to move into the hot sun.  They sat at a table with a drink of something and kept looking at me, then they held something out to me, it was a meaty stick and it smelt good.  I went to them and looked into this people’s eyes and saw only kindness,

I snatched this meaty stick from them and went back to the doorway, oh it tasted so good after all that bread and bacon rinds.  The people held out another stick for me, again I snatched it from them, they tried to touch me, but I jumped away from them and went back into the cooler doorway.  All the time it was getting hotter and hotter, and I was getting more and more tired.  Then this people went back into the café, I had to move again.  When they came out, they bent down and stroked me, I didn’t have the energy to move by this time, so I cowered a little.

They picked me up, I was too tired to struggle, besides when I looked into their eyes, I could see only kindness.  This people started walking with me in their arms.  We walked down the street which a few hours ago had been packed with multi-coloured stalls and people.  We crossed a bridge and went down another road.  They put me down on the hot road, but I just sat.  They picked me up again and started to stroke me, that felt so good, I couldn’t remember the last time I had been stroked like that.

I was in the crook of their arm with their hand under my bottom and head resting against their chest, I fell asleep and I dreamed of a nice soft bed, in a cool room with food and water all round me.  When I woke, I was being put down on a comfortable bed, a bowl of food placed in front of me, I had just started to eat when the little dog I had met a couple of weeks ago bounded up to me, wagging her tail.  The people had to pick her up before she ate the food, once I had eaten, I curled up and slept, and slept.  For thirty-six hours I slept in that nice cool room on a lovely soft bed in my new home with my new people and new friend.