CHAPTER 5 – When the breath grows heavy

It started with the bowls.

Harjin noticed it one morning in November when he came into the kitchen and Amaril's food bowl was almost full. Filled the evening before, unfinished through the night, untouched in the morning.

He squatted by the bowl and looked at the food.

Amaril stood by the garden door with her back to him.

Harjin took the bowl, poured out a portion, added a little warm water to make the food softer, and put it back.

Amaril didn't come.

Harjin didn't invite her. He took his tea and went to the table. He sat down, drank and looked at the spruce outside the window, at the grey November sky, at the needles that were darker than in summer and quieter.

After a while he heard footsteps.

Amaril came up to the bowl, sniffed it, and ate about a third.

Harjin made a mental note of it.

The next day the bowl was half-full again.

On the third day Harjin took a tin of different canned food from the cupboard—finer, without chunks—and added a little chicken broth from a jar to the food. The broth had originally been for himself, for another meal, but now it became clear why he had saved it.

This time Amaril came to the bowl on her own.

She ate more.

Harjin watched her from the sink, mug in hand, his back to the window. He watched her as she did it—slower than before, with breaks, stopping once in the middle to walk over, sniff a pillow by the radiator, and return.

She finished eating.

Harjin let out a breath.

The matter was resolved.

Or it had simply moved on.

The slowdown came imperceptibly.

Amaril had lived her whole life at a pace that was hers and hers alone. Not slow for the sake of slowness, but exactly as fast as a matter required. Earlier, that rhythm had been broader, more vibrant, with a greater range. Bounces in the grass by the Rokytka. Quicker sniffing. A sudden stop and an equally sudden step forward.

Now the rhythm was still precise.

But smaller.

As if the scale had drawn in toward the center.

Harjin felt it on the leash. Not as a pull or resistance—Amaril never pulled—but as something he used to adjust his stride to without thinking, and now did consciously. He slowed down on purpose.

One day they came to the viaduct and Amaril stopped at the entrance.

She stood there longer than usual.

Harjin waited.

He glanced at her—paws planted firmly on the ground, back straight, breathing a little faster than at rest—and then he bent down, scooped her up into his arms, and walked with her beneath the arch.

He said nothing.

Amaril didn't move in his arms.

She looked straight ahead, her chin lightly pressed against Harjin's forearm.

Beyond the viaduct, Harjin set her down on the ground.

She continued as if there had been no interruption.

But Harjin knew there had been.

The apartment had begun to change shape.

Harjin realized this too late, always only in hindsight, based on the things he did without thinking. He moved the pillow away from the radiator toward the center of the room, away from the draft coming under the door. He removed a box from the hallway that had been standing there for months without bothering anyone.

It hadn't bothered Harjin.

Yet Amaril walked around it with an unnecessary detour.

The box is gone.

The arch is gone.

Then he moved the water bowl closer to the basket so Amaril wouldn't have to cross the whole kitchen at night when she woke up.

He didn't even know when he had done it.

In the morning the bowl was somewhere else and Harjin only realized at breakfast that he had carried it over the evening before in a half-sleep. He had gone to get a glass of water, walked past the basket, seen Amaril getting up and walking slowly across the kitchen, and when he came back, he took the bowl with him.

The body knew before the head.

This was happening more and more.

He brought a softer blanket.

The old flannel fabric in the basket had lasted three years and was fine — it wasn't torn, it wasn't bad — but Harjin bought a new one. Thicker, with a higher pile, beige. It covered the whole basket halfway up and formed a warmer fold at the edge.

The first night, Amaril lay down and ran her snout over the new blanket.

Then she curled into a ring, laid her head down and closed her eyes.

Harjin stood by the basket and watched.

Then he turned off the light and went to sleep.

The vet's was in December. Harjin had the appointment in his planner — routine check-up, booster shot — and knew about it in advance. But sitting at four in the morning with Amaril in his arms, because he couldn't sleep and neither could she, it was as if the appointment had come from another world.

From a world where things have names.

He took her there on Monday.

The veterinarian was calm, precise, without unnecessary gestures. She ran her hands over Amaril's back, flanks, and under her chin. She lifted the upper lip, checked the teeth. She squeezed the paws. She listened to the chest.

Amaril did not move.

She was sitting on the stainless steel table with an expression Harjin knew.

The veterinarian straightened up.

„"She's older," she said.

„"Fourteen," Harjin said.

The vet nodded.

„"Her heart is working harder than it should. Her lungs are fine, but at the upper limit of normal for her age." She handed Harjin a piece of paper. "Try to limit stairs and longer walks for her. If her breathing gets worse or she refuses to eat for more than a day, come back."

Harjin took the paper.

„Is she cold?"

„Small bodies lose heat faster," the vet said.

Harjin nodded.

He picked up Amaril in his arms and left.

In the hallway, he stopped by the window.

Outside was a gray December morning, with fog hanging low over the rooftops. Amaril sat quietly in his arms, without tension, her chin resting on Harjin's elbow.

Harjin ran his hand over her back.

Her lungs are fine.

The heart is working harder.

The sentences had precise weight, and Harjin felt it in his fingers as he held the small body. It was no heavier than before.

He went out.

The mist slid down his cheek, across the tattoo, over the bare skin of his skull.

Amaril closed her eyes in his arms.

Harjin walked home.

The stairs in the house were there.

Harjin walked past them every day without thinking. Up, down, key in the lock, open, close.

Now he was counting them.

Amaril crossed them alone even in October. She slowed down, but she crossed them. Front paws on the first step, hop, front paws on the second, hop, up. It took a little more effort than before, but she managed it.

In November, she stopped. She came to the first step, stopped, touched it with her front paw—testing the height—and went back to Harjin's leg.

Harjin squatted down.

He picked her up and carried her.

From then on, that was how it was.

The stairs belonged to Harjin.

The flat surfaces belonged to Amaril—the carpet, the tiles, the garden, the wet grass.

Harjin didn't comment on it.

Not even for himself.

He just squatted down and carried.

One evening, Harjin's mother came.

She hadn't announced it in advance. The doorbell rang and Harjin went to open it with Amaril at his heel. She had risen from her cushion at the sound of the bell and now stood behind Harjin as usual—present.

The mother stepped into the hallway, put her coat on the hook, and looked down at Amaril.

„How is she?"

„Fine," Harjin said.

The mother bent down and looked into Amaril's face.

Amaril watched her with a dark eye.

Her milky one was half-closed.

The mother straightened up.

„She looks better than last time."

„"You weren't looking at her last time," Harjin said.

Pause.

„"I came to take a look," said the mother.

They went into the kitchen.

Harjin made tea. The mother sat down at the table and looked around the apartment in that way of hers — a survey that lets nothing slip by. She scanned the shelving by the door, the arrangement of the shelf, the spot by the window. Then she looked at Amarila's bowl by the wall.

„Eating?"

„Yeah," Harjin said.

„Less?"

Harjin sat down at the table with a mug.

„A little."

His mother folded both hands on the table.

„"You know what the vets say," she said.

„"I know."

„That at a certain age animals —“

„„She's fourteen,“ Harjin said. „I know what that means.“

Mother fell silent.

She ran her lip along the rim of the mug.

Amaril came into the kitchen and sat down by Harjin's foot. By Harjin's.

Mother looked at her in silence for a moment.

„How does she sleep?“

„In a basket.“

„All night?"

„Most of the time."

The mother nodded.

Then she got down to the reason she had come.

„Harjin. You could use —“ She hesitated. „If it gets worse, you won't be alone in this, right?“

Harjin looked into his mug.

„I'm on my own now.

„I don't mean —

„I know what you mean."

Harjin looked up.

„It's all right."

His mother closed her mouth.

They sat there for a moment — Harjin, his mother, Amaril at his feet — in the quiet kitchen air with tea and the gray December outside the window. The spruce behind the glass was dark and motionless.

His mother finally looked at the spruce.

„It's a big tree."

„Yeah."

„It makes it dark for you here."

„It suits me."

Pause.

„Me too," the mother said quietly.

Harjin translated it as translucence. A small spot where the otherwise glass surface proved permeable.

The mother finished her tea.

She stood up, got dressed, and gave Amaril a final look.

Amaril sat and looked back.

„Call me," the mother said by the door.

„Yeah," Harjin said.

The door closed.

Harjin remained at the table.

Amaril came over to him and lay down on his foot. Just like that. Right across the boot, with her chin on the toe.

Harjin didn't push her away.

He just ran a hand along her back.

 

Tarn was in the hangar.

Harjin arrived at Kbely in the morning with his head full of the bowl that had been left half-eaten. He carried the things from the sleepless night inside him like a scent.

Tarn was working by his machine.

Harjin took his coat, walked over to Gray — yet another problem, this time with the brake system — and began to work.

The hangar air was cold. A gust was coming in through the doors from the airfield, cold, with a hint of ice from the night frost.

Tarn brought coffee around nine.

Harjin took the mug.

They sat on a crate.

Harjin held the mug with both hands. Warmed his palms.

„Amaril is sleeping poorly," he said.

He didn't choose what to say.

The words just came to him like that.

Tarn drank.

Harjin continued.

„Or she sleeps. But differently. She gets up at night. She comes to me." He ran a finger along the rim of the mug. "It used to be like that before, too. But now it's different."

Tarn looked at him.

„How?"

„She used to sit," Harjin searched for the word. "Now she presses close. Against a leg, an arm. As if she needed closeness."

Tarn nodded.

Harjin finished his coffee.

„The vet said her heart is working harder." He set the mug down. "Whatever that means."

Tarn looked toward the hangar doors. Outside, a vehicle drove across the tarmac.

„My mother had an old dog,“ he said. „At the end, he didn't sleep. He walked all night. My mother thought he was restless.“

Harjin waited.

„Then she realized he was walking around the apartment because he was checking on her.“

Harjin didn't answer.

Tarn took both mugs and carried them away.

Harjin remained alone on the crate for a moment.

He looked at Gray.

The secondary brake circuit had a crack in it. It works, but not properly. You know that one day it will stop working.

He stood up and went to work.

Sleep grew shorter. The body began to feel lighter. Shallower sleep, more presence near the surface. Much like people who care for someone at night and keep a part of their consciousness awake even while sleeping.

Amaril woke up at various times.

Sometimes at two, sometimes at four. Harjin would recognize it by how the rustling of the blanket in the basket grew into the clicking of claws, how the claws crossed the room and stopped by the bed.

He opened his eyes.

Amaril stood beside him.

Harjin lowered his hand over the edge of the mattress, and Amaril met it with her chin.

That's how it worked.

For a minute.

Two.

Then she returned to the basket.

Harjin closed his eyes.

He slept on.

But lighter.

In the morning he went to work with faint dark circles under his eyes. Tarn noticed, but did not comment on it. He worked beside Harjin just as always—a tool, a part, a holding, a release.

Harjin took it as a kindness.

Christmas came quietly.

The apartment was decorated sparingly—a single candle by the window, pine needles brought from the garden, a twig on the windowsill where Amaril used to sit and now sat less often.

Amaril watched the pine needles with a certain interest.

She walked up to the twig, sniffed it, and walked away.

Harjin watched her.

It was like watching something slowly drawing in toward the center. A smaller radius. Less outside. More inside, more closeness, more warmth by the radiator.

Harjin added a blanket.

A second, light one, draped over the basket like a little roof.

Amaril settled under it without protesting.

Harjin's mother called after Christmas.

„How is Amaril?"

„He eats better,” said Harjin.

It was true. The new broth had helped.

„He sleeps more.”

„That is natural,” said the mother.

Pause.

„Harjin. Are you all right?

„Yeah."

„Do you sleep too little as well?

Harjin ran his hand over the table.

„I sleep.

„You're tired."

„Everyone's tired."

Mother on the other end of the line was silent in that way that was neither agreement nor disagreement.

„If you need to," she said finally, "call."

„Yeah."

He hung up.

Amaril came out of the room and sat down by his feet.

Harjin leaned over and stroked her behind the ears.

She sighed.

February was better.

Perhaps not better, but differently. Amaril ate more, moved with less caution, and twice in one week came to the garden door. She sat by the glass just as she used to — her nose almost against it, her breath condensing into a small cloud.

Harjin saw it in the morning.

He stood by the sink, looked back over his shoulder, and Amaril was sitting on the windowsill.

He came to the window. A spruce, grey in February, with one branch weighed down by snow — one white shoulder, the rest dark.

Amaril didn't move from the glass.

Harjin went to make breakfast. But it was good. That February morning with Amaril on the windowsill was good. Harjin stored it in his memory like a pebble by the Rokytka — small, round, with a certain weight.

Spring came slowly. The snow disappeared. The spruce turned green. Amaril went into the garden again.

Harjin carried her out there for the first time in March, on that first day when there was sun and the air didn't bite your hands. He set her down on the tile by the threshold.

Amaril stood.

She looked at the spruce.

Then she walked—slowly, cautiously, but alone—toward the roots. She sniffed. She walked around the trunk. She returned.

She sat down on a tile by the wall and closed her eyes halfway.

The sun fell across the fence onto the tiles and warmed them. Amaril sat in a streak of light, and Harjin sat down against the wall next to her, coffee in hand, and looked at the spruce.

Ten minutes.

Twenty.

Amaril wasn't dozing, she was just squinting because the light was pleasant.

Harjin drank coffee.

The spruce whispered.

It was enough.

Then summer came. It came like summer — heat, rain, fireflies by the Rokytka — and Amaril went out into the garden, ate, slept. But in July she stopped going out in the morning.

Morning used to be the first walk.

Harjin always unlocked the door to the garden, Amaril came, sniffed the threshold, inhaled the morning air with her nostrils, and went out. A ritual. The foundation of the day.

In July, she stopped. She would come to the door, stand by the glass for a moment, and sniff. Then she turned and went back to her basket.

Harjin waited for a moment.

Then he closed the door.

He didn't push her.

She had to ask for things herself.

 

He kept going to Kbely.

Work kept him going — hands, oil, components, Tarn's quiet presence in the hangar. There was a world that functioned or stopped functioning and could be fixed.

Harjin needed it.

At least a part of the day in a space where repair made sense.

One July day, after the heat and a morning when Amaril ate only a third, Harjin came to the hangar and found he had forgotten his tool room keys at home.

He stood by the door, searching his pockets.

The keys weren't there.

He knew where they were. Exactly. By the Amaril basket, where he had left them during the morning feeding.

Tarn came over from the machine.

He looked at Harjin.

„The keys,” Harjin said.

Tarn reached into the pocket of his overalls and pulled out a ring. He ran his thumb over the keys, selected one, and handed it to Harjin.

„From me.”

Harjin accepted it.

„Thanks.”

 

They sat on a crate for lunch.

Harjin ate without tasting the food.

Tarn looked at his hands.

„How are they?" he asked.

Harjin knew what he meant.

„It's worse."

Tarn nodded.

„Eating?"

„A little." Harjin put down his bread. "He has good days and worse ones. July is worse."

Tarn wiped his hands on a rag.

„Veterinarian?“

„Next week.“

Tarn nodded.

He said no more.

But he shifted an inch on the crate, consciously or unconsciously, so that his shoulder was closer to Harjin’s shoulder, a mere silence apart.

Harjin felt it.

He didn't move.

He kept eating.

The vet was there on Friday.

This time there was a different female vet — the first one was on vacation — and the new one was also calm and precise, she just talked a bit more. She ran her hands over Amaril, listened to her, measured her blood pressure.

Then she turned to Harjin.

„It's progression," she said. "Heart failure. Age and constitution."

Harjin sat on a metal stool and held Amaril on his lap.

„How fast?"

„Hard to say exactly. Months. Less."

Harjin ran his hand along Amarila's back.

„Does it hurt her?"

The veterinarian thought for a moment.

„Fatigue, yes. Rapid breathing is often uncomfortable." She looked at Amaril. "Animals don't show pain in the same way humans do. But if you see that he consistently refuses to get up, stops eating, or breathes with effort —"

„I know," Harjin said.

The vet paused.

„Do you have an idea of how it works? The euthanasia?"

Harjin nodded.

The word had been hanging in the room the entire time. Full and precise. Like a part laid out on a table, which everyone knows what it belongs to, but no one wants to pick up yet.

Harjin didn't pick it up.

„Yes," he said.

The vet nodded.

„When the time comes, call. We also do house calls. If you'd prefer it to be in an environment he knows."

Harjin took Amaril from the stainless steel table and pulled her to his chest.

Amaril rested her chin against his collarbone.

She looked straight ahead.

Harjin left.

Outside, it was summer.

Direct, hot, smelling of grass and heated asphalt. Harjin stood on the sidewalk in front of the office with Amaril in his arms and narrowed his eyes. The sun struck his tattoos, his bare skin, his eyelids.

Amaril exhaled in his arms.

Harjin exhaled too.

Stáli tam chvíli.

Pak šel.

It was four stops to home.

Harjin sat by the window on the bus with Amaril lying across his lap, held securely by his hands. People around them looked for a moment and then stopped. Harjin didn't even notice them.

He looked out the window.

Hloubětín was getting closer.

The word the vet had said went with him.

Like a weight.

Euthanasia.

Mercy.

A thing a person does not want to know until they need to name it.

The bus stopped.

Harjin stepped off.

He crossed the street, past the linden tree, to the spruce—to the gate, into the small garden, to the door.

Key.

Lock.

The apartment welcomed him with warm air, the smell of day and night, and a silence that belonged to this specific apartment.

Harjin put Amaril down on the floor.

She stood sniffing the air, taking in Harjin's arrival into the space.

Then she walked slowly to her basket.

She lay down.

Harjin sat down on the floor by the wall.

He rested his back against the cold plaster. He stretched out his legs. He folded his hands in his lap.

He looked at Amaril.

She breathed.

His chest was rising a little faster than in January. With a slight effort that wasn't directly visible, but was present in him. In the movement of his ribs, in the pause after exhalation, in how long it took for his body to rise again.

Harjin sat and listened.

The bowl was closer to the basket than before.

There was more than enough blanket.

The stairs outside belonged to him.

The broth was waiting in a jar in the fridge.

Everything was shifted.

Everything was adjusted.

And yet she was in the room, with nowhere else to be moved.

Harjin closed his eyes.

I won't let you go.

That sentence was still inside him. Since the first night. Since the indentation in the grass, since the silver dust on his hands, since the small body pressed against his chest.

Now that sentence was heavier. Harjin felt it in his hands, which lay in his lap holding nothing. He felt it in his shoulders, in his back pressed against the wall, in his eyes, which he didn't want to open right away.

Amaril flicked her ear.

Then she swiveled it back.

She kept breathing.

Harjin opened his eyes.

He stood up slowly, walked over to the basket, and squatted down beside her. He ran his fingers across her back — once, slowly — and felt warmth and breath beneath him.

Amaril did not raise her head.

But the tail—small, delicate, beige at the tip—moved once.

Almost imperceptibly.

Harjin felt it beneath his palm like a vibration.

He stood up.

He went to the kitchen and prepared some broth.

He warmed it over a low flame, added a little meat, and waited for it to cool to the right temperature. He brought the bowl over to the basket.

Amaril raised her head.

She sniffed.

She stood up, slowly and precisely, and walked over to the bowl.

She ate.

Not everything.

But she ate.

Harjin stood and watched.

Outside the window, a spruce rustled.

A bird flew off a branch — Harjin heard it, a flash of movement in the needles, a quiet flight over the rooftops.

Harjin stayed by the basket until Amaril finished eating.

Then he took the bowl, washed it, and put it back in its place.

He walked over to the window.

The spruce was there, as always.

Green.

Motionless.

Old.

It holds the house together, said the real estate agent.

Harjin thought about it.

About the spruce.

About the apartment.

About the basket.

For the broth.

For the stairs.

For palms hanging down at night over the edge of the bed.

For everything that holds the day together, as long as it holds.

That day will come.

Harjin knew it.

But not yet today.

Today was summer.

And Amaril breathed.