Page 77 of Karma Kitty Christmas
“And I never will,” he said now, holding her tighter. “It’s not nearly as important as you coming here today.”
She might have pressed the matter then—he knew it—but they both heard the noise at the same time.
“What the…?” Mari said, peering into the kitchen and frowning. “Julia, quit that with the dog bed. What are you…? Oh.”
Milo looked too and was surprised.
“What does she have?”
Julia trotted back to the couch where they sat, very pleased with herself, and Mari started laughing.
“Oh,” she said, clearly surprised. “It’s… see, I got sort of a new-dog bundle? You’ve got a plastic container of food and a list of vet’s appointments and a bed and blanket for her, and I put that cat toy she liked and a few other dog toys in the bed, and it wasundersome stuff, and she dug it out. Wow.”
“Wow what?” he asked as Julia began to gnaw at the bright yellow, soft-plastic thing in her mouth, her movements getting more and more gleeful as it made more and more noise.
“I’ve never seen a dog that into the squeaky toy. I mean…lookat her!”
Shake-shake-shake-shake-shake! She was growling and shaking, and then to Milo’s delight, she rolled over to her back and pawed the air, the squeaky still squeaking as she indulged in an ecstasy of “kill the squeaky!”
“Julia,” Milo said with authority. He’d never owned a dog, but he assumed they responded to their names. “Julia, come here. Give me the squeaky!”
She did.
Mari burst out laughing, holding her hand to her mouth. “Oh my God! Lookit her! Throw it!”
The living room had a little bit of length on it, but with a turn, he could get the thing down the hallway from where they were sitting. He put a bit of spin on the thing, and it bounced off the hardwood floor in erratic loops as Julia—
Vroom!
“Wow!” he laughed. “Wow.Julia,wow!”
She wassofast and muscular and happy and excited to chase that wobbly, oddly shaped squeaky piece of rubberized plastic. She brought it back to him, and he went to take it, but she growled playfully and shook her head. He tugged on it, and she tugged back, and in a moment they were wrestling over the squeaky toy like they’d been wrestling buddies their entire lives.
“C’mon,” he begged. “C’mon, girl. Give it back. Give it—”
“Drop it!” Mari commanded with authority, and Julia let go immediately, then sat back on her haunches, gazing hungrily from the squeaky to Milo’s face and back again.
Milo turned for the windup, Julia got into position like a race car, and he threw it again.
Their sad, tired conversation forgotten, Milo and Mari threw the squeaky toy to the joyful dog for the next hour, until she didn’t bring the thingbackbut simply dropped it in the middle of the living room and stretched out at their feet.
“Wow,” Milo said, staring at her.
“I’m saying,” Mari echoed. “I-I mean, I had dogs all my life, but I’ve never seen one so… sodedicatedto the squeaky toy.”
Milo stared at her and smiled. “She’s got a one-track mind,” he admitted, but that was fine. He felt like he already knew this dog.
He felt like they could be friends.
MARI HADto leave shortly thereafter, but not before they both ate leftovers and she wrote out a schedule for him so he could take care of the dog and then come back and work and then take care of the dog and himself some more.
“She’s going to ruin your stuff,” she warned. “She’s going to chew on your coffee table, your shoes, your rugs, your furniture. You are going to have to figure out when to put her outside to poop in the backyard, but go out with her first or she might escape.”
He held his hands to his heart. “Escape,” he breathed. “But she just got here! Iwanther here. How do I stop that from happening?”
“Take her out on the leash at first,” Mari said patiently, “then take her around and look for hazards. Where can she get out? Where’s the dirt soft? Where are there gaps? She’ll probably tell you where the worst ones are, but use your imagination. Pretend you’re a dog whose sole obsession is a squeaky toy, and that uses up your walnut-sized brain.”
“Oh…,” he said uneasily. “Mari, my brain isn’t much bigger.”
