This is a story about how fate, circumstances, whatever you wish to call it, can take a hand in your life and set off a course of events from which you will never again be the same.

In a longer work of fiction, there is generally a premise, an execution, and a resolution. There is an answer to a question. In a short story, there are often times more questions than answers. This is one of those!

This is the story of an ordinary working man who’s just trying to get his job done, make a living, and have a life. Things aren’t really going that well for him and then one day fate takes a hand and things will never quite be the same again.

The following is a brief essay, more like a thought process, on how a written story is constructed. What is read depends on what is written. What is written depends on the story to be told. While that sounds completely circular, read it, and see what you think.

This is a story about my dog, Isabella. She was a rescue dog that my mother adopted in what turned out to be the last year of my mother’s life. I then inherited the dog. She was really shy and had never been outdoors. She continued as an inside dog, but I introduced her to walking in the outside world. Now we go out three times a day. Isabella is much more social, although she is still very attentive and will probably always be a cautious dog. With that in mind, it took her awhile before she told me her story. I’d like to share it with you.

This story came to me in a series of dreams. I was writing down fragments of different ones and all the pieces started to fit together. It feels a little like an episode of the old Twilight Zone TV series. It’s about a man who is given a second chance.