Off

I called Ken, in search of information.

Shane: I hear that you had a visit from the police.
Ken: Yeah - very strange - they thought I was a dog kidnapper. Dognapper? Is that a word?
Shane: Emma said you did kidnap a dog.
Ken: No I didn’t. That’s not what I said! Is that what she said?
Shane: That’s what she said.
Ken: She said that?
Shane: She said that.
Ken: Just, no! I took Caroline’s aunt’s dog for a walk – I was pissed off and… my former Belgian friend thought that I’d taken the mutt as some act of aggression.
Shane: Mm.
Ken: What do you mean, ‘Mm’?
Shane: Dog-walk to dognap – something of a dramatic twist there, perhaps.
Ken: I know! What kind of nutcase do you have to be to imagine that someone like me would do something like that? I mean, what?
Shane: So why did you take it?
Ken: I took it back! I just took it for a walk!
Shane: Yeah, sure, but why?
Ken: We were in some horrible leafy estate in a strange city, I thought I’d look less conspicuous walking the dog.
Shane: (restrained) Why would you have looked conspicuous?
Ken: There are some places where you just know you’re gonna stand out.
Shane: Ye-es, still, bit of a leap between dog-walk and police whatever.
Ken: Tell me about it - fuck knows what the Belgian bitch – forgive my French - had told them, but they sent some bloke down to ask me questions about ‘a string of animal thefts in the north Norfolk region’. I think he was from the Department of Clutching at Straws - it was ridiculous.
Shane: Yeah, sounds it. He came to the flat?
Ken: Yeah, landed at 9:30am last Friday. I was in my dressing gown –
Shane: Not the –
Ken: Yeah – the zebra print one.
Shane: An offence itself.
Ken: Jealous.
Shane: Or, in fact, not jealous at all.
Ken: Mm, anyway, it was all a bit novel.
Shane: No doubt about it. What, er, had you been arguing about?
Ken: (sighs dramatically)
Shane: You’re sighing dramatically.
Ken: Ye-es. Turns out she’s had an ‘on-off’ boyfriend since before I met her.
Shane: Ah, right. (Pause) And they, er -
Ken: They’d been ‘on’ the previous evening.
Shane: Oh dear.
Ken: Mm.
Shane: How was the dog?
Ken: Not well – it had diarrhoea – and there are some places where you just know you’re gonna stand out, if you’re a pissed-off bloke with a load of piercings and a dog that’s shitting for England - or Belgium.

It felt like an answer, of sorts.