Dead Dog in the Still of the Night by Archimede Fusillo

throat, tangy and sharp.
    ‘Shit!’ he hissed and searched around for something to cover the carcass. A light went on just behind the frosted imitation lead lighting of the front door.
    ‘Prims!’ Tone was waving at him to move.
    Primo heard shuffling behind the door, followed by the voice of a woman, irritated, her words unclear.
    ‘Prims!’
    Primo’s gaze switched between the dead animal and the front door. There was a shadow behind the glass.
    ‘Primo! Move your arse!’
    Primo jumped at the touch of a hand on his elbow. ‘Come on!’ Tone’s voice was a sharp thing amid the gathering noise inside Primo’s head.
    Half stumbling, Primo allowed himself to be dragged back into the street, careening into Tone.
    He was still looking at the house when Tone shoved him head first into the front passenger seat. Tone tossed the tarp in, covering Primo’s head as the hearse pulled out into the road.
    ‘It’s done,’ Tone said thickly. ‘It’s done so just get over it. Don’t go all soft on me now, Prims.’
    What sort of sick mind thinks dropping a stinking dead dog on someone’s doorstep is okay? Primo asked himself.
    He opened the window and heaved the soiled tarp out. It caught in the slipstream for an instant, ballooned out like a parachute, and then folded itself against the car before being torn away as Tone took a sharp right-hander.
    Primo turned in his seat and watched the tarp weave and scatter itself across two lanes of traffic, a kind of imitation bullfighter’s cloak that charged into cars blindly. Brakes squealed as drivers took evasive action a fraction of a second too late.
    When Primo swallowed, the vomit stung his throat and he dry-retched.
    They drove back to their own familiar turf just a few kilometres away, Tone steering with the casual ease of someone in his element. Primo fidgeted, moving himself back and forth, tugging the seatbelt, tapping his fingertips on the dashboard, and finally pulling out his mobile and dialling.
    ‘Ordering pizza?’ Tone said flippantly. ‘I know a place that does deliveries.’
    ‘Tell Ad it’s been taken care of,’ Primo said and held the mobile out toward Tone’s mouth.
    Tone hesitated and Primo snatched the phone back.
    ‘Ad,’ he said into the phone when he heard his brother’s voice. ‘Tone called. Said to tell you: Let dead dogs lie. No. I don’t know what that’s supposed to mean. You work it out.’ Primo hung up.
    He exhaled loudly and closed his eyes.
    ‘“Let dead dogs lie”?’ Tone parodied. ‘Where did you get that line from, a B-grade movie?’ He laughed. ‘You sounded like a wannabe, Prims. “Let dead dogs lie”. What was that?’
    Primo pushed the palms of his hands deep into the orbs of his eyes and sighed. An almost suffocatingly deep stillness inside his head had succeeded the clamorous noise he had felt at the woman’s house.
    ‘I’ll get my cousin to pick up Bambino’s door first thing in the morning. That okay with you, Prims?’ Tone asked suddenly.
    Primo nodded. Tone smiled.
    ‘I’m sort of glad we dug the dog up again, Prims,’ Tone said. ‘I wasn’t real comfortable about it being there with all those poor old people, you know.’
    Yeah, Primo thought bitterly. A rotting dead dog on a stranger’s front door is so much better, so much more comforting.

Santo found Primo in the garage by Bambino.
    ‘What’re you doing in here?’ he hollered. ‘You know Dad doesn’t want anyone touching the car. Dad doesn’t even want you moving the tarp. You understand, Primo?’
    Unnerved by his brother’s unannounced appearance, Primo didn’t answer. He glanced at the Fiat, satisfying himself that the dust cover was secured firmly enough that Santo wouldn’t spot the missing front door.
    ‘You listening to me, Primo?’ Santo pressed. ‘You’ve got no business with my car.’ Santo reverentially touched the dust cover that shrouded the little car. ‘And shouldn’t you be studying or something instead of