Animality

“Wake up, Amir. Rise and Shine”

“But, but Papa it’s only 7 am at the morning” I said in an annoyed voice

“7 is a lot. The earlier you rise, the bigger the day becomes for you” he replied
“Yeah, yeah” I murmured, as I got up from the bed.

After I splashed water on my face and came outside in the porch to search for a towel, I saw my dad going on a walk with Snoppy.
“This man, I tell you” I uttered

Mr.Aziz Reza Chowdhury, my dad. The Mayor of this town, renowned and admired all over. I was famous at my school just for being his son. There wasn’t any boy in the class, who didn’t want to be my friend. Neither will you find any girl who didn’t try to talk to me. Besides being the local chairman, he was more famous for the passionate love he felt for the animals. He was known as the Animal Lover around the town.
You’ll be mesmerized if you come to our house. It is a mini-zoo around here. Not exaggerating a bit, we have more than a dozens of pets. Starting form Mr. Winchester the Beautiful green parrot with a blood red peak to Rubi the coltish sparrow we had a flock of birds. Other than the birds we had pair of Gold fishes and a moody tortoise. A bunch of rabbits known as the ‘Flash family’. Finally our dog trio Groppy, Nuppy the two German Shepherds and the cute fluffy Maltese Snoopy.

My dad used to get along great with all of them. He used to love the animals just as he loved the humans. A huge part of his day was spent taking care of them. Snoppy was the cutest of them all. Small, fluffy, soft and round like a cushion ball. Papa used to spend a lot of time with her. She always used to follow papa wherever he went.
“Well, my dad is totally an animal lover” I wondered
Well I got well with the animals too, but not like my dad. He had that different affection for them in his eyes. He loved them more than most of the things. He used to lecture me at times that why should we love them and care for them. That animal should be loved rather than being killed.
“Oh! Those boring lectures”
As I was having my breakfast, I heard Momin uncle, our animal keeper shouting my name from outside the yard. As I hurriedly went to the porch, I saw him all sweaty and panting. In that situation what he said was, Our Snoppy got into a fight with local a street dog and not to mention he got injured. Papa was really angry and told Momin uncle to bring him his Double-barreled rifle. As I bought Momin uncle the rifle, I joined him along the way to see the incident myself. I was a bit stressed myself too. The story what Momin uncle told me was quite something like this:
Papa was having his morning walk with Snoppy, while he met Jalal uncle our neighbor along the way. Now as he was talking to him for some time, he threw a piece of steak at Snoppy. Now, as he was talking suddenly a street dog of this town just came running and grabbed the steak and tried to run away but Snoppy wasn’t very happy about it, so she ran after him and unavoidably they got into a fight. Snoppy was eventually injured after consuming some of his bites and scratches of his paw.
Now, even I was angry. How dare that street dog, trying to steal form our animal and not just that, he hurts our dog in front of my dad the biggest animal lover around.
When I went to the place I saw my dad’s face reddish like the afternoon sun. He was really angry I could guess that. In front of him there was a skinny black dog. The locals gathered and surrounded him. Each of them had bamboo sticks in their hand. The dog was even afraid to move. I could understand that he already consumed a couple of hits of the bamboo sticks. I heard Snoppy was immediately taken to the local animal hospital for treatment. Papa looked so angry, he turned red. He came towards us and took the gun from Momin uncle aimed it for the dog. I could see his finger touching the trigger slowly, very slowly.
The dog was skinny, dirty and wild. He looked like a thief about to get punished. He was panting, keeping his tongue out. He was so skinny that his rib cage was visible and I could almost see his chest pumping. Just as I bought disgust on my face, he looked directly into my eyes.
His eyes were pale black and deep, very deep. His deep staring pierced through my heart. He let me see his family, his children, and the place where they lived, through his eyes. I saw him standing in front of people’s house in search of some food. Running fast in the cold rain.
I remember him standing in front of our house gate looking at us, begging for some food so that he could live a little longer. I saw him looking at Snoppy with jealousy when he was playing with my dad, wondering if he could get a master who would adore him. I remember seeing envy in his eyes as Snoppy and the others ate inside our yard and he starved for days. I could feel his hunger, his jealousy and his complains and cries to the cruel world.
What was his fault? Was it that he didn’t have a furry and fluffy shape? Was it he didn’t have an oily bright and rich skin? Or was it my dad, the animal lover?
I could hear his cries to live a few more days in this cruel world. I could hear him apologizing for his mistakes. But unfortunately it was too late. I could hear him when it was too late.
Just as all these were surrounding my mind, my dad pulled the trigger and “Boom”, the heavy 9mm bullet passed through his throat.
The black, disgusting street dog fell on the ground. But unfortunately, he didn’t die; he was breathing heavily and his chest pumping relentlessly. We could hear the gargles inside his heart. He was screaming in pain, but there wasn’t anything except the gargles because the bullet pierced through his throat. He was trying his best to breathe a little more oxygen for the sake of staying a little more in this cruel world. No matter how cruel this world is, we still like to believe that there is something good for us in here. For the sake of that good, we spend our whole life searching it.
The patience of the locals broke as he was still breathing. They charged him with their sticks abruptly. Hits after hits, his jaw broke into pieces; his ribs were turned into dust.
His head was cracked and tail was smashed. When the locals finally stopped hitting him there wasn’t anything left in him. All his bones were probably turned into dust.
I guess all the locals were extremely angry as he bit the animal lover’s dog. After a while my dad left the place and me and Momin uncle followed him. Momin uncle started talking, “How dare that dog hurting Snoppy”
I didn’t reply and kept walking.
“Your dad is an actual animal lover, no one would’ve cared so much for their dog like he did”
I nodded and kept walking silently. What could I say? Did he see what I saw inside that dog? Did my animal lover Papa saw that?
As I looked back when I was leaving I saw a bunch of purplish and healthy flies gathering and flying around that smashed dead body, I couldn’t stare anymore.

As we kept walking, I saw all the street dogs, cats and rats. I saw the crows in the sky.  All of them, staring at me in silence.
What were in their eyes?
Deprivation? Or Disgust?
Who were the animals?
Them? Or, US?