There is some authority in this. But the door was left open. He did not sleep. He always slept. Though he was not aware of having done so. Of sleeping, of having done it. It was a problem that he found hard to complain about. Which he never did. Well, sometimes. To no one. On each morning, as he was waking up, his eyes would close. And he would rest for a moment. His head on the cushion, the thing which had moved during the night, he was sure, while fighting off sleep and wishing to fall back into the moment, the moment before he had woken up. He wasn’t sleeping, he’d tell himself. Doubtless he thought so, just lying back a few moments. Letting time pass and letting it leave him, not wide awake, not sleeping. Just resting, really. Doubt whether he had slept at all — and sleep coming to him again, as he thought it over, once more, and overtaking him as if for the first time, or the last, perhaps even… As he thought about that low fall, and talking loudly, finally, to make sure he would not fall back into it, and still, it crept up just as he had woken up, then gone now, really gone, and never been. He wasn’t sleeping well. He had a good night’s sleep. Slept well, he’d tell people. He told others. This went on ten years. Not dog years. By the eleventh year, he was dead. Upon arriving in Paradise, he asked, (and then on endlessly, forever,) “Where the bed?” No one was answering, in any way respectfully, no one was there in any the mood for answering that particular question. It was too enjoyable staying awake, they told him. Sleep in Paradise was not seen as a good choice, they told him, “No need”, there, was there? “Was there now?” they said, watching late night TV on the sofa. Hard choice choosing which one to sit on. There were two, but sometimes only one. Spaces on the couch to sit on. He would stand, patiently, at the back, waiting for the commercial break so that he could speak, and by gaining their attention, by speaking loudly, let them all know that he now, above all, wanted to sleep. Hadn’t slept for a long time. His eyes would grow tired. “For that”, the one behind him smacking him hard on the head, a loud smack, to keep him awake, as the man in turn waited for his chance to sit, not lie, on the sofa, as they occasionally stood up and went for the fridge and came back, only to find their seat suddenly taken. By someone else. And they would pass their fetched drinks, or chips, to the person now seated, who would say “Thank you so much,” in response. This was Paradise, after all. You don’t need it, sleep, this Paradise, “And none needed it”, they would all say, but especially the one behind him, who kept a good lookout for any spaces vacant on the sofa, “Remember, don’t lie on the sofa, it’s rude, if you sit, someone else can fit next to you”. Quite comfortably. “And go to the bathroom only after a good solid watching of TV. Hold it in, as long as possible. There are others.” He didn’t want to sit. There didn’t seem to be too much space on the sofa anyway. “And it was never done”, the one present there with four others said, repeating, as she continued to watch Colombo. The sofa was never empty. So they told him. A savage act such as that, “Never”, the fool, well, keep on standing, do as you will, do you mind me going in front of you? “Is that OK by you? OK, fine. Thank you so much.” As Kojak came on. Within these walls, they told him, for it was not known to happen, and we will not hear of it, “It isn’t just done, you have to understand. There are limits here, even in Paradise”. Snoring. Sleeping. Any of the kind. As “I Love Lucy” finished. And then two further episodes of “Petticoat Junction”. When the eleventh part of the night came, eternity cutting out a larger slice of eternity, with the tip of sunrise coming on, perhaps just the tip of it, he left Paradise via a back door. No one noticed. Crawling into chaos and shame, he found a dirty blanket made of nothing, down deep, deepest down, at the back of the garden, that he found, no, further on, much further, past the fence and for hours of dark, walking, on some field finally, some kind of field, in the cover of it, until darkness and no light, ever appeared, a field of waste, of dark waste, he discovered, on the ground scrambling with his fingers out, he also found a perfectly usable ringing bell, quite small, which he daren’t ring, and a Hussar’s dusty jacket, best junk of some, mine now, he thought, left after the Napoleonic Wars, when, it was documented, the army had crawled into the cold Westward, waiting for the others who were waiting, the enemy, waiting near the East to surprise them. Disaster. And cold. And he used that as a pillow. The jacket. It smelled of sweat, and fake blood, and “a good many” petard blown, explosions, shouted commands amongst the terrible tragedy and slaughter, and good working buttons too. He used a bad mattress which he also found, found by chance near a freshly dug hole, there buried long ago by, for a dog named Rus, who had died, some time ago. The owner who had owned the mattress, found it useless through overuse, and gave it to his dog, which or who was more correctly called Robert (Bob or Robert or Rob, don’t know, he’s dead) who had died, and this was a coincidence, again, by the twelfth year when, in the same twelfth year when, it was suspected, his heart gave out, and this is true, it was cut out and lifted gently out of the cage of his tender breast and measured, and measured to be true, broken, well truly broken, and then buried quickly before it smelt, with the rest of the carcass once owned by the dead dog, smelling the same though as separate, the two carcasses, one large and broken, one small and broken too, while wrapped up in his own dearly beloved blanket, or coat, smelling of spit and bone by now, by his own chewed rags, by his own bones now matted with fake blood, which were in shreds or splinters as he loved chewing them dearly, all the time, and fought bitterly when you tried to take the jacket off him, or the bones, either his bones or an old Hussar’s jacket, now worn and wearing of old buttons or smelling of cleanly rubbed, spat on, shiny buttons, sweat, and dog’s blood, matted into the fabric, all now in a dug hole, by the master, done quickly, for it smelt, his hands even now, as he bludgeoned the dog, which wailed, of tiredness, the hole now near his old owned mattress, which stunk of dog, which no human could ever use again, for it smelt too. Memories for a while, now forgotten. Only a slight memory when he saw another dog. Remembering the dog that once the dog was, that he had. Only his bones, which were measly, of which he was fond of chewing, in the dark, in the hole, dug there and put in, by the master, again in the darkness, swiftly, before sunrise, filled with dirt and trodden on, in there, a few feet underneath, sticking out of the dirt and chewed rags, skinned out, stinking out the place, and put quickly and forgotten, only to be remembered by the smell. Even the dog’s name. Forgotten. In the hole to be dug, so that, to be seen and counted, in the future, the bones, if they were ever to be dug up, for they would eventually be counted and reburied by those bone counters, those who came down from Paradise, just for that job. Just for the night. After Hill Street Blues finished, perhaps. They would help dig it all up, collectively. And count each gone and label accordingly. Those bones were gone now, no matter for the bones, he thought, looking at the ground, sleepy, his head on the wrapped Hussar’s jacket, nearly now, falling asleep. Only the flat earth now, resting, for him to be looked at dreamily. Looking at the spot where the dog was, deep underneath, perhaps sleeping too, or the sky, black as earth, no stars, where the sunrise was over the other side, waiting patiently to appear. Settling in some dumbfounded corner of chaos, shame and sleep, all you find, really, trust us, all muddled up, inside the hole aforementioned, and under there, and he finally found sleep, he thought, and now forgot about it. Paradise where the dog was not allowed, or sleep, any sleep at all by anyone, which was not accepted, really, just old TV shows, and after each half hour, ads where men held up cans of dog food and talked, smiling, very loudly exclaiming the worthiness of the dog food, about the efficacy and deliciousness of the dog food, but no dogs about, on the set, in front of the camera, to eat the dog food, never present. And He, the Master, smiled at the camera as the music rose up, and then back to Bonanza or bowling finals, or documentaries about the Napoleonic war, where they travelled East and died. And the people who lived there, dreaming, while the commercials came on, closing their eyes and seeing the next show that came on upon opening their eyes, because the ads had just then finished. Dreaming. In their minds. Collectively. There is some authority in this. We say. But the door was left open. Finally, now. The bell. He stops and hears a ringing bell, to remind him, that it’s now time to wake up. He looks up. It’s still night. No morning. He looks up, the dog barks, in his hole. And there it goes again, he thinks. That very same dog. And there, in the peace of his own belonging, dawn rose by the window, with half-breath, only with half a breath. A tepid light. Nothing more. Done.