“Don’t even think about it!”
Even before the words were out of my mouth, ears pasted themselves to neck and Dog was under the sofa, all staccato fur and scurrying claws. To this day, I haven’t figured out how he dragged that gnu under there with him, but I can tell you gnus shouldn’t be under sofas. They dislike confining, dark spaces almost as much as they dislike being wrestled to the ground by their throats. Not that Dog cared. He had captured the gnu fair and square, and he was keeping it.
“All right. I bow before the prowess of the great hunter,” I admitted as I flopped on the floor, prepared to haul Dog, the gnu and whatever else was under the furniture out by force if necessary. “The gnu is yours. Now please bring it out from under the couch.”
Two glittering eyes peered from the dark slit between the sofa and the floor. “Wildebeest,” he said.
“Wildebeest?”
“It’s a wildebeest,” he answered. “I’m surprised you didn’t recognize it.”
“Whatever. Just bring it out from under the couch.”
Dog inched his way out of the wilderness den without any sort of ungulate mammal in tow and shook himself vigorously.
“Wildegnu,” I reminded him sternly, pointing toward the bowels of the jungle. He cocked his head and observed me quizzically. “It’s a compromise,” I explained.
“Hey, I’m all about compromise — but it’s a wildebeest,” he insisted. “And it’s staying where it is.”
At great risk to my personal safety, I took a deep breath, reached into the Great Unknown, tentatively felt around until my hand brushed damp fur, and drew forth a lifeless body. Bits of popcorn and corn chips and great masses of Chihuahua fur clung to the battered corpse. “Jeez. You’ve shed a whole ‘nother dog this winter. Ew.”
Dog sniffed the carcass cautiously, then made a move to snatch it in his teeth and disappear again.
“Nope. Sorry,” I told him, whipping it out of reach just before the jaws of death clamped shut on the poor creature’s head. “The wildegnu is not going back under the couch.”
Two diminutive forepaws perched on my knee as Dog’s eyes narrowed disdainfully. Little tan brows added a dimension of malevolence to the expression on his dark face. “Oh, so that’s the way you want to play it, eh? Well, the next time you’re beset by a herd of wildebeests, don’t come crying to me.”
“Are we expecting bands of rogue wildebeests to rampage through the neighborhood soon?”
“You can’t be too careful,” he warned. “They’re treacherous. Just when you least expect it, they’ll sneak up behind you and stampede.”
I had trouble imagining a herd of any sort of hoofed animals sneaking up behind me on a hardwood floor, but I filed the warning for future reference.
“If you want to get technical,” I said, plucking bits of assorted refuse from the limp creature’s tangled fur, “it’s a stuffed squirrel.”
That did it. Dog began pacing agitatedly back and forth between me and the sofa, shaking his little head dejectedly. “All I do for this family, and all you can do is dis my accomplishments,” he whined. It was a strident whine, but it was a whine nonetheless. “You think it’s easy being the chief of security around here? You think I don’t get hoarse sounding the alarm at all hours of the day and night? You think I don’t make sacrifices to ensure you aren’t carried off by gypsies? And all I ask in return is just a little bit of praise for a job well done. Can you do that? No.”
He was winding himself up pretty tightly with record speed. “Just once I’d like to hear a bit of gratitude. ‘My, what a brave fellow you are! You laugh in the face of death with such savoir faire.’ ‘My hero! You saved me from certain doom!’ Do I get any of that? I didn’t have to give up a life of adventure to live in the suburbs and baby-sit you people, you know. I could have been the best in the business, but nooooo. I gave up a life of fame and fortune to slave away protecting a bunch of stingy ingrates who would have been somebody’s lunch by now if not for me….”
I shook the squirrel at him, pinching a spot near the tip of its tail. It let out an alarmed squeak and Dog leapt at it, fangs bared. I tossed it across the room vaguely in the direction of his bed and he ran to subdue it, growling ferociously. It took him a moment to get started because the hardwood floor didn’t provide much purchase for tiny claws, but once on the move he was like a small, hairy bolt of lightning.
The wildegnu barely had skidded to a stop against the bed’s ramparts before Dog pounced on it and gave it a vigorous shake. Satisfied with the kill, he trotted back across the distance and deposited the corpse before me with a great deal of pride in accomplishment.
“There. It’s dead now.”
“My hero!”
He squinted one eye in an annoyed frown. “No need to get snarky.” Just to be sure I got the message, he nipped at my knee. The maneuver wasn’t entirely effective as a scare tactic, because his teeth bounced off denim-covered kneecap harmlessly.
“You’d better save those razor-sharp fangs,” I told him, bending over to plant a kiss on the top of his head. “You never know when you’ll need them again to fend off a herd of marauding suburban wildebeests.”
His tongue planted a quick kiss on the tip of my nose. “You’re welcome,” he said.
“So what else have you concealed under there?” I asked, reaching into the Great Unknown again. I snagged another lump of fur and drew it forth. It was a rabbit. One of its ears was missing, and polyester stuffing oozed from the wound.
“So that’s where Bunny’s been!” The hole on the window seat left by his mysterious disappearance from the guest room had perplexed me for at least two weeks. There was no telling where the amputated appendage was, but at least I could give the majority of Bunny’s remains a decent burial. I resolved to say a few solemn words over him before ceremoniously depositing him in the trash.
“You can have that one,” Dog said, his tone unmistakably indifferent. “It wasn’t much of a challenge. Who knew badgers were such wimps?”
“That one, too,” he allowed as I dug out a porcine gray cat with leather ears. “The only reason to hunt lions is for the chase. They aren’t very tasty.”
“Such a discerning palate for wild game really is wasted around here, isn’t it?” I asked.
Dog ignored the sarcasm and sighed. “You know, it really is. But I deal.”
Next to emerge from the heart of darkness was a rawhide Chewgar. Before I saw him move, Dog had it in his teeth and was on top of the sofa determinedly poking it between the arm and one of the seat cushions. He scooted a throw pillow over the site with his nose, and just to make sure I couldn’t retrieve the prize, he planted himself firmly atop the grave and glared at me.
“OK — that doesn’t belong there,” I told him, dragging myself up from the floor and reaching for the pillow upon which he was ensconced. “Hand it over.”
“Surely you jest. You hide your valuables in the sofa.”
“If you mean the loose change I’m forever digging out of there, that’s more of an escape attempt on its part than an intentional incarceration on mine,” I explained.
“Back off, sister,” he warned, baring his teeth just in case I attempted to ignore him.
I flipped pillow, Dog and an unexpected cloud of dust in one swift move as my hand dove into the pit and captured the Chewgar.
“Hey! Give it back!” He bounced off the sofa and began energetically springing into the air to reclaim the trophy. “You can’t just steal someone’s dinosaur bone!”
“Dignity, thy name is Chihuahua,” I observed with a grin as I held the artifact just beyond his reach.
That stopped him. He ceased bouncing and sat with an embarrassed harrumph.
“All right, keep it then,” he said presently, popping to his feet and trotting away with a dismissive toss of his head. “But don’t say I didn’t warn you when that T. Rex’s mate comes looking for the missing father of her children.”
Southeast of Disorder 