Missing

Audrey taped the last flyer to a lamppost in the Lion and Lamb Yard as the sun was setting, wondering how long before it was removed. She had spread them along the length of Castle Street, and all the connecting alleys and roads. She hadn’t spied anybody taking them, nor following her. And yet for each ‘missing dog’ poster she placed, the one before had disappeared. 

She sat on the edge of the black statue, the cobbled yards namesakes, swishing the optimistically carried leash, listening to the bustle of human traffic heading home. 

Then the bustle stopped. She looked around, the courtyard deserted. The street lamp shone in the twilight, but lights from shop windows were muted, as though seen from much further away, or through much thicker glass. A single distant dog bark broke the silence. 

“Herbert?” She whispered. She hurried towards the high street. No people, no cars. Shop doors closed with drawn blinds and, when she looked closer, no seams in the walls. No hinges. No ledges or texture. They could be made out of paper, except for the fact she had always known them to be real. 

A wisp of blue light caught her attention. She didn’t feel afraid, perhaps strangely, but the wisp was far from her. She followed where it shone and then it darted ahead, appearing even further away, passing just around a corner. Again she heard the distant bark. 

She reached the meadows, where the blades of grass didn’t yield beneath her feet, yet the ground still felt soft. She crouched, testing with her hand. A huffing sound brought her head up, and there perched Herbert. Herbert made of silvery blue light, tail wagging, crouched in play. She laughed out loud and he dashed to her, licking her face, feeling more solid than the ground they played on. 

She threw the ball in her hand and Herbert chased after it. Again, and again, until she tired of the game and they set off to wander, reunited friends. 

They walked alongside the river under a bright moon, crossed the footbridge, pausing to play poohsticks. For Herbert this meant dashing off the bridge and down the bank, into the water and out again triumphantly as he shook his coat. She raised her arms to shield against the spray of droplets which failed to touch her. 

As she lowered them, she blinked in the dawn. The cresting sun illuminated the top of the Blind Bishop’s Steps, where she stood alone, flyers in hand. Leash dangling by her side. A cyclist from another time braked down the hill, not seeing or else not acknowledging her raised hand. She taped a flyer to the rickety fence. Just before the curve, where the verge lessened and the walkway came closer to the road, she taped another, next to a bunch of white flowers zip-tied to a post, above a photo of a girl long since ruined by rain. She looked back, and saw the previous poster had gone.