By Mac Mckechnie
Chapter 6
It started with a smell.
You wouldn’t notice it. Humans are… smelling challenged. But I did.
Mac always smelled like the garden. Earthy, warm, a little like old books and fresh grass. But that morning, he smelled wrong. Sharper. Hotter. Like metal and nerves and… something I didn’t have a name for.
He was slow that day. Slower than usual. Sat down twice just putting on his socks. Mo hovered near him, asking if he was alright. He said yes.
He wasn’t.
I followed him around like usual, waiting for breakfast. But I didn’t really want it. I kept sniffing the back of his hand. Something was off.
By mid-morning, Mac was on the sofa, white as the kitchen tiles, sweating. Mo’s voice got sharper. She was talking on the phone. Using words I didn’t like. Words like “ambulance” and “urgent.”
I sat beside Mac, refusing to move. He looked at me, tired eyes, and gave my ear the gentlest stroke.
“You’ll look after Mo, won’t you?”
I didn’t know what was happening. But I knew it wasn’t good.
The front door opened. Strange people came in. Loud shoes. Equipment. Voices too fast. They put Mac on a stretcher.
I tried to follow.
Mo stopped me.
“Stay, Daisy. Stay with me.”
The door shut behind them.
And Mac was gone.
The house went quiet.
Mo paced. Cried a little in the kitchen when she thought I wasn’t looking. I curled up on the mat outside the bathroom door and didn’t sleep.
I kept checking the door.
He didn’t come back.
That night, Mo left too.
She packed a bag quickly. “I’m going to the hospital, love,” she told me, crouching down. “You be good.”
She kissed my head.
I didn’t like it. I didn’t like her leaving. I didn’t like the house being dark and empty. I didn’t like my toy box being full and ignored. I didn’t like dinner being late.
But most of all – I didn’t like being alone.
I spent that night curled on Mac’s chair, surrounded by the faint, fading smell of him.
I didn’t move.
I didn’t chew a toy.
I didn’t eat the biscuit Mo left beside the bowl.
The house creaked in the wind. The radiator clicked. And I waited.
I heard a car outside and ran to the door, ears up.
Not him.
I heard a voice in the garden. A neighbour.
Not her.
Eventually, I dragged one of Mac’s socks from the laundry basket and brought it to the rug. I curled up around it. I didn’t sleep much.
If you’ve never waited in silence, nose pressed to the floorboards, ears twitching with hope—you don’t know what true waiting is.
The next morning, Paul popped round.
He came in with his usual energy, but his voice was softer.
“Hello, sweetheart,” he said, crouching down. “Holding the fort, are you?”
I wagged once.
He brought food. I sniffed it, nibbled half-heartedly. He made a cup of tea and left the radio on. It helped.
Mo came home that evening. She looked like she’d aged in a day.
She knelt and hugged me tightly. Too tightly.
“He’s very ill, Daisy.”
She said a word. Sepsis. I didn’t know what it meant. But it felt like thunder.
“He’s in hospital. He’s… he’s not himself. But he’s holding on.”
She stroked me for a long time that night. She didn’t sleep either.
The days that followed were all wrong.
My routines vanished.
No morning garden patrol. No “good girl” at 7am. No chair creaking under Mac’s weight. No grumbling about the post.
Mo tried. She walked me. Slowly. Short routes. She held the lead tightly and didn’t talk much. I stopped more often, sniffing the air. Looking around.
I thought maybe he’d be waiting around the next corner. Maybe he was behind the hedge. Maybe this was all a test.
It wasn’t.
On the fourth day, I tried to cheer Mo up.
I brought her all my toys. One by one. Laid them at her feet.
Kevin the Penguin. Squeaky Monkey. The plush slipper I’d stolen three months ago and hidden in a drawer.
She smiled. Just a little.
“Oh, Daisy…”
That night, I snuck into the spare room where she’d started sleeping and lay beside the bed. She reached down and touched my paw.
“Good girl,” she whispered.
I wagged once.
That was enough.
The day Mac came home was the strangest of all.
It didn’t feel joyful at first.
He was thinner. Paler. He moved like his bones were made of glass. His voice was softer, like it had been left out in the rain.
But it was him.
It was him.
When he walked through the door, I lost it.
I barked. I jumped. I ran in circles. I brought him a sock. Then dropped it. Picked it up again.
He sat down slowly. I leapt into his lap. He winced but laughed.
“Alright, alright, you little monster.”
He smelled like antiseptic and plastic and tiredness. But underneath it all—Mac.
I curled up and didn’t move for an hour.
Recovery was slow.
Everything changed.
Mac didn’t go to the allotment. Mo started doing the shopping alone. I stopped seeing Paul and John. I missed them.
Mac stayed home. Sat in the chair. Slept a lot. Mo made soup. The house was quiet even when we were all in it.
I noticed things.
Mac didn’t whistle anymore. He stopped mid-sentence sometimes and stared out the window.
He didn’t reach for the lead. Didn’t fill my treat tin himself. Just watched from the sofa while Mo took me out, wrapped up in her coat, eyes tired.
I tried to wait for him to come, like usual. Sat by the door.
He didn’t come.
Mo clipped on the lead.
I didn’t want to go.
“Come on, Daisy,” she said gently.
I looked back at Mac.
He smiled, thinly. “Go on. She needs the fresh air.”
So did he.
But he stayed.
I tried cheering him up the only way I knew how.
I brought him toys. Gave him my best tail wag. Climbed up beside him and licked his nose. He smiled more now.
Once, he pulled me close and buried his face in my neck.
“You’re keeping me going, fluff ball.”
I licked his cheek and settled in.
Slowly, things shifted.
He stood more often.
He walked me to the gate. Not down the street – but to the gate. That was enough.
He watched TV without falling asleep in five minutes.
He made Mo laugh again – proper laugh. The kind that crinkles her eyes.
And one day, the biggest surprise of all –
He reached for the lead.
“Just the corner,” he told Mo.
We didn’t go far. Just to the end of the street. He walked slow. I matched him step for step.
We sat on the bench at the end of the lane. He brought a small treat from his pocket. Gave it to me.
I didn’t eat it right away.
I leaned against him.
He stroked my ears.
We watched the wind move through the hedges.
Nothing dramatic.
But to me – it felt like spring again.
Life never went back to what it was. Not exactly.
Mac was slower. He needed help sometimes. Got tired. Mo worried more. She took over most walks. She was always checking him, like she was waiting for the next emergency.
I didn’t understand everything. I didn’t need to.
All I knew was that my humans were hurting.
And I was their soft, steady little dog. Their comfort.
Their watcher.
Their clown.
Their glue.
One night, months later, Mac sat on the back step. I sat beside him. The sky was clear. He had a blanket over his knees and a cup of tea.
“I wasn’t sure I’d be here, you know,” he said softly. “Thought I’d had it.”
I rested my head on his knee.
He looked at me, then reached into his cardigan pocket and pulled out a treat. Just one.
“Still here though. Thanks to a lot of things. Hospitals. Mo. And you.”
I took the treat gently.
Sat up tall.
Licked his hand.
He smiled.
“Come on, Your Majesty. Let’s go inside.”
And so we did.
The kingdom had changed.
But I was still on the throne.
