Arthur Graham’s Reviews > DoG > Status Update

the door banged open, and out stepped the Captain. He held a revolver in his hand, which he pointed at Worner’s head. Worner stopped. The crew stood silently as the two men stared at one another. Worner raised his hands and eased back a few steps. After a few moments, the Captain lowered his weapon and returned to the bridge. There was no more talk of a strike, much less a mutiny.

He tipped his hand down to allow the blood to pour onto the deck at his feet. The cut stung from the saltwater crashing onto the deck. Worner bent down to examine it. “You dumbshit.” This appeared to be the extent of his diagnosis. Worner wrapped an entire roll of gauze around the hand.

Culann’s seasickness had died down to a steady, low-level nausea over the next few days. His abdominal muscles ached, along with every other part of his body. He was covered in bruises of varying shades – the fresh ones came in royal-purple or charcoal-black while the older ones faded to diarrhea shades of yellow and green. He leaned against the railing to stretch his sore muscles in the warm air. It was four o’clock

“What’s up, Frank? Is this the pedophile?” “Nah,” Frank replied, “he’s a hebe-a-phile.” “What’s that?” the man asked Culann. “You like little Jews or something?” “The word is ephebophile,” Culann said. “It’s someone with a predilection for teenage girls. But I’m not an ephebophile.” “Predilection?” the man said to Frank. “Is this guy like a dictionary or something?”

Frank had a lucky rabbit’s foot, which was nothing like the fake rabbit’s feet I used to buy at the novelty shop. [...] The rabbit had evidently gotten caught in the trap, and then some other creature came by and ate the rabbit, leaving just its trapped paw behind. Why Frank would consider this lucky was never explained to my satisfaction.

The dogs are driving me crazy. I can’t take more than three steps without tripping over one of them. It creeps me out the way their eyes follow me whatever I do. [...] I can’t tell if it’s out of loving devotion, or whether they’re planning the perfect moment to leap on top of me and strip the flesh from my bones. I can’t get that image out of my head… I don’t know what I’d do without them.