Original fic & feedback request

So here’s the deal: I’m doing a one-week writing class at Oxford next month, and wanted to have a recent piece of original fiction on hand before that starts, so I’ve been working on this. It’s about 5,200 words, about how one couple’s reaction to the financial meltdown all around them, and how they find their own way to cope. I’ve been debating a few titles -- Lie Down With Dogs is a current working title -- and if anyone has the inclination, I’d appreciate some feedback. Give it as critical of an eye as you’d like. I’ll be doing more revisions, and probably revising again and again.

Thanks.

Sample: “I thought you didn’t like dogs,” he said.

“I never said that.”

No, she hadn’t. But dogs shed, she’d said before, brushing off the golden retriever’s long hair from the sleeve of her dark wool coat after they left a friend’s house. Dogs need to be walked, she’d said. Someone would have to be home. They couldn’t just take off for weekends in the mountains or on the lake up north.

But there she sat, on the kitchen floor, next to two old plastic bowls -- one filled with dry dog food, the other with water. The dog sat on the floor by the cupboards, looking at her and at the room, and now at him. It wasn’t cowering, didn’t seem ready to attack. It seemed ... guarded. Unsure. Like a kid on the first day of school, trying to be good and obey the rules, but hoping his Mom comes soon to take him home.


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