By Parshu Shrestha
At half-past six that evening, I was at the tea-table of my bedroom, kneeling down. I was preparing to take Ayurvedic medicines for asthma after dinner. Pabitra, my wife, was doing dishes in the kitchen sink, and my mother had just switched on the TV in the drawing-room. Prakriti, my daughter, and her cousin were in the room opposite mine, perhaps busy in their study.
Clink… clink …clink…
The beep of several notifications from the mobile apps dragged my attention. My mobile phone was in front of me, on the table, connected to the charger. I picked it up to check the messages because the Covid-19 lockdown had been imposed only the previous day and there could be breaking news.
I opened the Facebook messenger app. One of my office colleagues had sent a message with a link to a website with free online materials for SEE preparing students. I called Prakriti, who was preparing for SEE, immediately and told her to bring her cell phone so that I could show her how to open the links.
Prakriti had just entered my room when she screamed, “Peku’s about to vomit on the rug!” When I turned back, I saw our six-month old puppy apparently choking. There were some small sharp pieces of chicken leg-bones scattered on the rug. He was hunching on the rug with his two forelegs straight up and was frantically struggling to cough out the bone stuck in his throat. I was unaware of all this taking place at my back!
It was an unexpected situation for me. I could not think properly what I should do. Hurriedly, Prakriti knelt down and picked the puppy up with her both hands. Then she rushed out to the porch. She held both his hind legs and pulled them up so that he could cough out the bone-piece stuck on his throat. But the puppy snarled ferociously and bit Prakriti on the fingers. Luckily, the wound was not very deep, though a little blood dripped.
Prakriti did not give up. She tried to hold Peko for help again, but the short-tempered puppy was not grateful for it. Prakriti had already got a web of scratches and marks of his bites on her both hands. However, she felt the need to help him in his struggle for life. She told me to immediately search for a video on the YouTube about helping a choking dog. Luckily, the Wi-Fi network was not slow that evening. I found a short video related to our situation. It showed that if the choking puppy is small, one should lift his rear part up holding on his hind legs, as Prakriti had tried to do, so that its mouth would be towards the ground. Then, one had to shake the puppy vertically so that the bit of the bone stuck in his neck might drop down due to gravitational pull. In case of a big dog, one could put one fist under his stomach and create a jerking motion with another palm covering it.
I was nervous. I felt pity on Peku’s plight. I gently thumped my right palm on the joint of his shoulders. The streets were guarded by the police who were hitting the pedestrians with batons. They would interrogate and charge anybody. Would they allow me to take my puppy to a vet’s? The vet would also not be ready for his service at the time when the casualties and infection cases were growing fast.
Pabitra phoned a Veterinary doctor she knew. He said there was little hope for the puppy in that situation. In the meantime, incidentally, Peku stopped coughing and sat on hunching position quietly. Pabitra took him in her lap and caressed him, but he did not react. He used to pretend biting her hands before, otherwise. But now, he was not coughing or choking!
Peku usually enjoyed sleeping with Prakriti in her bed. But that night he did not go to her bed. Instead, he climbed onto our bed silently and lay prostrate on one side. Whole night he kept changing his position from one side to another.
Early next morning, Peku jumped out of bed while we were still half-asleep. He wanted to go out for defecation, so I opened the door for him.
At around ten in the morning, Prakriti and Prashika took a short break from their study and came down to their bedroom. At the same time, I took out wet clothes from washing machine and went to the porch in front of the study room. As I was hanging them on the string, I heard a strange noise that came from the study. I went in to see and found Peku sitting crouched on the divan, looking towards the door. The strange noise I had heard a while ago was Peku’s. He might be calling for sisters out of loneliness. He shook his tail a little and closed his eyes in sleeping position.
With a hope to get help for Peku, I came back to my room, phoned a friend whose home was next to a veterinary doctor, and took the Vet’s mobile number. “Look, it’s a difficult time,” the vet said on the phone, “just wait and see if any miracle happens.” Then we felt helpless for Peku.
Peku remained calm and asleep the whole day. He did not show any interest in food. He did not come near to us as before either, sniffing our food plates full with his watery nose. He did not beg for food with me, standing up on his hind legs and resting his fore legs on my thighs. He simply ignored us and remained asleep a little away from us.
I was not interested in having a pet, a dog, at home. But one evening Pabitra returned home from Dharan with a small fluffy white puppy in a carton. I became enchanted the moment I saw his bright-blue eyes. After that, he became an important member of our family.
Pabitra and I would usually come home at around 7 or 8 in the evening. Peku would always be standing by the gate, waiting for us. As soon as he heard or saw us, he whined and ran towards us. He licked our faces, wagging his tail. He looked happy to welcome us home. He enjoyed being carried in our arms and playing with us. He always helped us relieve ourselves from the work stress of the day.
But Peku had been silent since the previous day. His silence pinched my heart. Not only me, Pabitra, Mom, and Prakriti were also much worried about him. We called him for food repeatedly, but his eyes full of pain just followed us silently. Mom was much regretful all the while because she was the one who had given the chicken bone to him.
We had snacks at around 4 in the afternoon. I was so sorry for him. As our last straw, we decided to use some force on him to open his mouth and see if any piece of bone was stuck inside. The plan did not go well as Peku showed his usual bad temper and bit mom’s hand. Luckily, her hand did not bleed though it got a deep crevasse— Peku’s teeth-mark. Moreover, he kept walking around the room to avoid us. Mom had prepared a potion with some medicinal herbs supposed to heal the wound, if there was any, inside Peku’s mouth, but we could not force him to drink it.
After about fifteen minutes, I was reading a book in my room. Mom was softly coaxing Peku to eat something in the kitchen corridor. Suddenly I heard Peku’s loud wrangling voice. I stood up to see what had happened to him. Exactly at this point in time, the veterinary doctor whom we had contacted the previous evening called back and asked our location. He was ready to visit us for Peku.
I felt happy and grateful to him, and rushed out to tell my mother and my wife about it, but what I saw made me happier. Peku was sitting on the table in a crouched position and licking some fried rice from Mom’s palm. It was such a lovely scene for me that I could not believe my eyes easily.
Peku was eating fried rice hungrily. His stomach had gone down into his ribs. We were jubilant to see him eating again. He was eating almost after twenty-four hours. Mom had tried to force him to eat, but he attempted to bite her hand in anger. In that effort, his snarl helped him to swallow the bone stuck in his throat. Now he was happy with her.
I called the veterinary doctor immediately and told him to cancel his house call. It might have been a surprise for him.
[Parshu Shrestha (b. 1981) completed his master’s degree in English from Mahendra Multiple Campus (Tribhuvan University), Dharan, in 2007, and started teaching English for living. At present he teaches at SOS Hermann Gmeiner Secondary School Itahari and Vishwa Adarsha College, Itahari, Sunsari. He has passion for writing short stories, both in English and Nepali. He has got his stories and articles published in many national dailies.]