Dragonfly by Jax Hill 

An old booze hound named Sig used to stumble out of a bar called Sharky’s some evenings and pass by Torstein and the rest of us on his way home. He was always too bleary-eyed to do more than blink and shuffle along on his way when Torstein offered him sunflower seeds. He had a little Jack Russell terrier dog that went boozing with him. The dog would sit outside the bar and wait for him. If Sig didn’t come out by closing time, the dog would go in and get him, guide him home.

It was a great dog — Sully used to play with it outside the bar. He tried to take it home, but the dog knew he had to wait for Sig. He’d play fetch with Sully and do tricks, but he wouldn’t leave with him, or anyone. Every once in a while, we’d see Sig and the dog, Tartan, on their way into the bar. Sig always looked a little shaky on his way in, but he was always blotto on his way home. Torstein asked Franz to find out about Sig. He was curious why anyone with such a good dog would be killing himself with the booze.

Franz was really good at that stuff. In a few days time, be brought us the most unlikely news: Sig was a policeman. Sig Scarr, a detective. He hadn’t found this out inside the bar — no one at Sharky’s knew who Sig was. Just some drunk as far as they were concerned. Franz had actually followed him. He took the dog to work with him! The dog would sit in his car while Sig was in the police station; Sig left the window open so Tartan could get in and out if he needed to. And the dog went on calls with him when he did his investigating. The dog had even been known to find evidence. Further, Sig had a family. He had a wife, a grown-up daughter, and a teenaged daughter about to graduate from high school. Not that he saw much of them. He seemed to spend most of his time at work, and at Sharky’s.

Now Torstein was really puzzled. Why would a man with a family and a really good dog be drinking himself to death? And why wasn’t he doing it nearer to the station than Sharky’s? There was a well-known hang-out for cops just about three blocks from the station where he could have been drinking with other law enforcement types and probably not having to buy but every third or fourth drink himself.

The next time Sig passed in a semi-sober state, Torstein said to him, “Evening, Detective Scarr.”

Sig stopped and stared at the man in the green coat who knew his name and that he was with the department. Clearly he’d gone to great lengths, drunk and sober, to keep anyone around here from knowing his whole name and his occupation. “How do you know my name?” he asked. Sully was there beside Torstein, and Tartan jumped high, up into the boy’s arms, and wriggled over his shoulder and ran down his back. It was a trick they did. This made Sig suspicious, too. “How do you know my dog?” he asked Sully.

Torstein laughed and offered Sig some sunflower seeds. “Sully plays with your dog outside Sharky’s some nights,” he said. “Why don’t you come sit with us instead of going in there, and Sully and Tartan can play in the park?”

This was the same little downtown park where we’d go for story time. Sometimes we’d sit on the benches when there was a crowd and we couldn’t all stay on the street without blocking the sidewalk. It was a little way down the block and across the street from Sharky’s. Sig looked up the way to his watering hole, then looked back at Torstein.

“The booze will still be there,” Torstein said.

Sig shrugged and fell in step with Torstein. Tartan trotted along beside him, little black and white dog on short legs, but with springs in them. He was the classic Jack Russell and could almost fly. When we sat down in the park, at a nod from Sig, the dog went bouncing away with Sully.

There weren’t too many of us with Torstein that night. Me and my brother, and another pair of brothers named Jack and Jazz. Bruiser was there, and Franz. Sig Scarr looked us all over with his cop’s eyes, nodded to Bruiser as if maybe they were old acquaintances, accepted some sunflower seeds from Torstein and said, “Why you always hanging out on the street?”

“I like to meet new people,” Torstein said. “Whenever we’re on our way to the park in the evening, we see your dog outside Sharky’s, or see you going in. You never would say hello or take any sunflower seeds ... I was curious why you were so intent on getting into the bar ...”

“You had my job, you’d be intent on that, too,” he said.

“You could go to Wired with the other policemen,” Torstein pointed out.

“No, I can’t,” Sig said. “I’m not like the other policemen.”

“Because you’re an alcoholic?”

Sig’s head flew up, and his eyes were bright. I thought he was going to protest. But when he looked into Torstein’s eyes, I don’t think he saw any judgment or condemnation there. Part of Torstein’s Charm was that he could say something like that, and people realized it wasn’t a judgment ... it was just the truth.

“Nah, not that,” Sig said. “I’m internal affairs. I track down criminal cops. The good officers don’t like me because they don’t see that I’m not after them, I’m after bad cops. They don’t think there are any bad cops. It was a promotion, moving to internal affairs, I got to be a detective. But I shouldn’t have taken it. If I were walking a beat, I’d still have friends.”

“You can still have friends,” Torstein said. “We’ll be your friends.”

“You can come here instead of going into Sharky’s,” Jack said. “That stuff is bad for your health, and it’s a depressant, too.” Jack was the youngest of us except for Sully. I doubt he was 20 years old yet, and he was one of those healthy kids who did mountain biking and roller-blading and ate only healthy food.

He was a nice looking kid, and he had a great heart. But he had no idea what it meant to be a guy on the downside of 50 with a job that gave you heart-burn and a problem with the booze.

Sig Scarr looked at him and smiled. “Thanks, kid,” he said. “Maybe I will.”