I wrote this piece of Flash Fiction a few weeks ago.

The theme was Mad Dogs & Englishmen.

I tried to instill the idea that this gentleman was turning into a mad dog and his wife was fighting with him, like they were two dogs squabbling.

I hope that the allegory comes across well enough, it did not garner any comments on submission but I am still happy with it – feast your eyes below.

 

A Toast to The Old Ways (by David Ellis)

Some think of honour, valour, a stiff upper lip and of a gentle integrity when considering an Englishman but somewhere along the line I have managed to bypass all of these qualities and become something altogether alot more “unwholesome”.

I have garnered the nom de plume “Mad Dog” and justifiably so.

I was the perfect specimen of good breeding when I was growing up.

Loved the old ways, holding doors open for women, I behaved myself in a respectable manner at dinner parties and was loyal/obedient to those who I cared for.

But then one day, the slave outgrew the master and when her love for me died, something inside me died – this cold, restraining leash that she had on me cast aside and no longer strangling me, stifling me, preventing me from achieving my true potential.

She was surprised at the change in attitude.

We had got on so well with the neighbours before but now I had been become a bit of an irascible scoundrel, chasing both beautiful women and gambling pursuits with equal aplomb.

“I don’t understand why you are being this way, I told you that my feelings for you are different now and have been changing inexorably over the last few months that there was nothing you could do about it but you don’t have to take it out on me in this way!” My wife had begun to start whining at me all the time and it was making the hairs on my body tingle and stand up in anger.

I growled at her and she looked fearful.

“You’re becoming like an angry dog and I thought you were the perfect gentlemen!”

“The perfect foundations were there but you saw fit to dig them up and now you are going to have to live with the fact that this dog is now longer at your beck and command!”

In time, I lost interest in the beautiful women and the gambling but before I could reacquaint myself with the old ways it seems that my jealous wife saw fit to have me put down.

Every dog has his day after all.