“Hitler's forces are pushing through Luxembourg, and are threatening to break through into Belgium.  Mass evacuation of Luxembourg’s citizens was attempted but airstrikes from the axis’s forces impeded Luxembourg's military force. If you are in Luxembourg seek allied forces and escape before it is too late. If you are in Luxembourg seek allied forces and escape before it is too late. If you are in Luxembourg seek allied forces and esca—” An empty can came flying from the corner of the room, knocking the radio over and silencing it, before rolling across the cement floor and stopping on the wall, revealing a tomato soup label, the color faded. In said corner of the room there was a dirty mattress laid across the floor, and across the dirty mattress laid a man, half sat up with one arm holding him up. He flopped backwards onto the mattress with a deep groan, as if the action of throwing a tomato soup can had deeply exhausted him, and flung his arm across his eyes, before bringing his arm back down to massage his forehead. There was dirt encrusted into the lines of his face and the joints of his fingers, his fingernails dark with something old. He had a light scruff around his chin that seemed to promise to one day be a beard, and dark circles surrounding his eyes. He looked down to the radio, which lay on its back, defeated; he looked up to the ceiling, where water stains had painted it a blotchy brown and beige, he released a hard breath from his nose. He looked down at the radio again, except now, instead of a radio, there was a dog, translucent in color and relatively large. It sat there, staring at the man, waiting patiently. The man, straining his neck to lift his head as the rest of his body lay on the mattress, grimaced, and collapsed back down again. 

    “Jesus,” the man sighed, rubbing his hands against his eyes and stretching the skin around them in various directions. “A dog?” he looked back to the dog, “Bloody hell. A dog.” He sat up, bringing his legs over the side of the mattress and scratching at his lower back where his shirt had ridden up, all the while looking at the dog. “Neva seen a dog before have I? No, no, I ‘aven’t.” He shook his head as if to clear it, and walked across the room straight through the dog—the dog dispersed in a burst of smoke, and the man began his day.

                                                   ———

    The shops were empty, the storekeepers and hurried citizens had wiped the shelves clear of any goods with long expiration dates and easily stacked containers, expecting a long journey in front of them. While correct in that assumption, and smart for assuming so, the man couldn’t help but curse all those that had left none behind for him as he ran his hand along an empty shelf. Dust collected on his palm and fingers, dirtying them more than they had already been. The town was deserted; the small population that had lived here packed there bags early at the threat of war and never looked back. He hadn’t been that smart, he had decided to be courageous. Courageous. Be brave for once in his life and sign up for the cause. He should have stuck to buying war bonds. Don’ t have enough money to buy war bonds is the issue. The man's hand fell off the shelf as he reached the hand, gray dust filling coating his palm. Courageous. His eyes followed his falling hand, and his falling hand followed the falling dust, down to the faltering dog, sitting there watching the man watching. The man stood there blankly for a minute, raising his eyebrows while keeping his eyes half-lidded, staring at the dog, before looking through the dog, and seeing an unopened bottle of whiskey. “Mother of Mary,” he exclaimed quietly. He quickly walked over to the bottle, which was hidden away at the back of a shelf, and through the dog, who dispersed once again.

                                                   ———

    The fire crackled a soft sound as the man shifted the thin logs with a thinner stick. He took a swig from an already half-empty whiskey bottle. He looked up to the stars, which were barely visible through the clouds, he took a deep breath, raising his Adam's apple up and down, before looking back down again. The dog was there. It sat there, transparent in the night light, waiting. The man,  now with the courage and slipperiness of whiskey on his tongue, spoke, “you know, I’ve neva’ seen a dog before.” he tilted his head to the left, and leaned his body forward, “I’ve seen people…loads of people, but I ain’t neva’ seen a dog before.” He looked back to the dog, who sat there still, patiently waiting. The man looked away again, this time to the right, putting his hands in between his legs. “The first one I eva’ saw was my maw, she got herself killed in a factory accident.” the man put his right arm out in front of him, “Arm got stuck in one those pressing machines, crushed her arm all up. She would’a lived but the nearest hospital was thirty miles away and we didn't have no car or nothing. Died from blood loss on the bus.” He put his arm back down and looked into the distance, dazedly,“ I didn’t see none a’ this, but I saw something else. I saw her ghost. I was climb’in this one tree in our yard, it was a real nice tree, it had smooth bark that didn’t scratch ya’ and had good branches to grab onto. I was in it, and, now, it wasn’t a tall tree, more like the size a’ apple tree, but I was up there at the way top and I look down and my Maws there, lookin’ up at me.” The man twists his face into a grimace and brings his finger up to point at something, “And she said,” the man swayed forward, then back, “She said ‘Jonathan Smith, you get down from that tree right now or you're gonna get the hot shoe’ ” The man moved his head this way and that, obviously drunk. “Now the hot shoe, you…you didn’t want the hot shoe,” he closed his eyes and chuckled, shaking his head in recollection, before opening them again, his expression gone sour. “Now, here's the thing, it was my Maw, but it wasn’t her, her arm,” he gestures to his left arm, “it was all twisted like someone had taken a steak and let a dog chew it all up. And I could see right through her, just like you.” The man brings his hand from his arm to point at the dog, swaying dangerously forward. “Just like you…” The man brings his head down, and shakes it slowly back and forth, his shoulders following the same path. “Just like you. And Roney. And Paw. And Marcy. And Don…and…and…” He turns his head to the side, thinking, “there's gotta be more, I know there's more, theirs…theirs…Luane…and….and…” The man's shoulders slumped, he buried his head into his chest and brung his hands to clutch his head. 

“Yes.” The man's head whipped up, turning this way and that and craning his torso to see who had just said that, before his eyes settled again on the dog. The dog sat there, waiting no more, “Yes.” the dog said, “There is one more.” The man stared at the dog, his jaw going slack and his shoulders slumping. The dog stood up, walking through the fire to the man, its steps slow and deliberate. It walked all the way up to the man, who by now had leaned all the way back he could in avoidance of the dog. The dog sar, once again, in front of the man, waiting patiently again. The man's chest went up and down with the breaths he took, his mouth still open in shock. His eyes flicker right, then left, then back to the dog, he licks his lips, he closes his mouth, he braces himself. 

“Who?” The man asks.

“You.” The dog responds. 

“Oh.” the man says. The man blinked several times, staring at the dog, which was wagging its tail very softly back and forth.The man took a breath in, and opened his mouth, then paused, trying to find the right words.. “You’ the devil?” the man asks.

“No,” the dog says, “I’m a dog, Johnny. ” The man continued to stare at the dog. The dog continued to speak, “You can’t just do whatever you want, Johnny, you are very good at evading death, but it comes for all.” The man tilted his head back and forth as if doing that would help him process what is being said to him. The dog waits.

“So, you're dDeath here to take my soul?” The dog stares at him, its big brown eyes catching reflections of the fire behind them. Showing something deeper within.

“No,” the dog begins, “I am like an owner, coming to collect a lost dog and giving it a home.” The man blinks, then he blinks again, then he sighs a deep sigh, closing his eyes as he does so. He scratches the back of his head and sits up fully. Opening his eyes to look at the dog.

“How’d I die?” 

“You starved to death.” 

“But,” the man objects, he pauses, trying to recollect what he had eaten, “…I had tomato soup.”

“Yes,” the dog begins, “Five days ago.” The man raises his eyebrows, and sighs yet again, looking off to the side for a second, before preparing himself. He stands up, sweeping dirt off of his dirt encrusted pants, before putting his hands on his hips. looking down to the dog. 

“Ok death, where we goin?” The dog looks up to him, its big brown eyes conveying an emotion beyond comprehension, and begins to walk away from the fire into the inky darkness. The man watches it, then follows it, wrapping his jacket around him to ward off the chill. His figure fades away, and for a long time the only thing visible is the fire, slowly dying out, casting stark shadows on the ground around. Then, muffled from within the man's backpack, the radio begins again, static fills the silence before a message comes through. 

“Escape before it is too late.”