All That Is Left Behind

I took my dog in my arms, and I made my way to the boy. I was no older than four of five, and there was absolute distress written all over his face.

I made sure to have a good grip on my dog as he could get exited easily, and I knew a lot of people, including children, are easily intimidated by dogs, especially the overly expressive ones.

“Hey there,” I said.

The boy didn’t even look at me.

“Are you lost?” I asked him.

He didn’t turn around, but I knew he heard and understood me as he pointedly put his back to mine. There were silent tears in his eyes, but contrary to most children I’ve encountered, he wasn’t expressing his sadness very openly, which I found quite strange.

“You see,” I began. “My dog is named Miki, and he kept asking me to come around here. I really don’t know why. Do you? Maybe there’s a tennis ball hidden here somewhere. Would you help me look?”

He finally turned around, but his eyes were automatically drawn to Miki.

Miki gave him a doggy grin and waved his tail so hard, his little booty went side to side in my arms.

The boy had brown hair and gorgeous large brown eyes. He was wearing good clean clothes too that fit him perfectly. And he looked at the dog, hypnotized.

“Do you want to pet him?” I asked.

He said nothing, but I knew he heard me. He didn’t look at me, still glued to Miki.

“Here, let me show you how.” Then I spent the next minute showing the boy how to pet a dog.

“Do you want to try?” I asked him.

It was brief, and he returned his gaze automatically to Miki. It gave me the strange vibe you get with autistic children. He had problems looking in

kid and spook him, whom eventually caved and gave the first

and he did more

given how he ignored me when I started with this line of questioning, I decided

was pretty rudimentary, but at least it

more and more with the dog, his expression

is your name?” I asked him.

he

I’m Mila. I live with Miki not far from here. Miki

thought that if I shared information first it could make me sound more trustworthy, but I wasn’t

next to my drawing pad, I found a little

and suddenly ignore the kid and turned to

I took a treat out slowly, making him sit.

hardly contain his excitement and sat, shaking his

held the treat above his head and made him lie down. I had to say it twice until,

looked at this scene in pure

want to try it?”

He nodded.

an internal ‘yoop’ as I managed to make the kid say something. Silently, but still, it’s an

I said as Miki was now back on his paws going in circles and then sitting,

to finally make the kid talk. I guessed that if he was more

minutes for him to get the gist of what had to be done, but he worked it out faster than I expected.

He ended up feeding five treats in a row to

feeding, but it was working really well, and I had heard the boy say at least four words now, and they were not as hard to get

treats were all gone, he looked at me expectantly.

“Do you know what Miki