Bailey's Story Read Online Free Page A

he did seem to like it when I got up early in the morning to watch him eat breakfast. Of course I kept a sharp eye out for any scraps of scrambled egg or crumbs of toast that might drift down to the floor.
    But neither of them loved me like Ethan did. I felt adoration flow out of Ethan whenever he was near me.
    And that made sense, after all. Ethan was my boy.

 
    4
    Sometimes Dad and Ethan would sit together at a table in the evenings, talking quietly while the smell of something strange and sharp and eye-watering filled the air. Dad would let me lie on his feet. That was nice, since Ethan’s feet didn’t reach the floor.
    â€œLook, Bailey, we built an airplane,” the boy said after one of these sessions, thrusting a toy near my nose. I had to blink and back up a bit from the smell, so I didn’t try to take it or chew it. Making noises that sounded like the car when it went fast— “Vroom, vroom!” —the boy raced around the house holding the toy. I helped by chasing him.
    Later he put the toy up on a shelf with others that smelled the same, and that was the end of that, until he and Dad decided to build another one.
    â€œThis one is a rocket, Bailey,” Ethan told me, showing me a toy shaped like a stick. But what use was a sticklike thing that smelled too bad to chew? I turned my nose away. “We’re going to land one on the moon one day, and then people will live there, too. Do you want to be a space dog?”
    I heard the word “dog,” and it sounded as if there was a question, so I wagged. Yes, I thought. I would be happy to clean the plates, if that’s what you’re asking.
    Clean the Plates was a game where the boy put a sticky plate on the floor, and I licked it until it was shiny. It was one of my jobs, but only when Mom wasn’t watching.
    Mostly, though, my job was to stay near the boy. When it grew dark at night, he would carry me up to his room, since the stairs were too steep for my short legs. There was a box there with a soft pillow, and he’d put me into it.
    I understood that I was supposed to stay there until Mom and Dad came in and said good night. Then the boy would call softly to me and I’d scramble, with his help, up onto the bed. We’d curl up together. If I woke up in the middle of the night and got bored, I could always chew on the boy.
    During the day, Ethan and I often played in the backyard, where there was lots of room for the best wrestling and chasing games. And then one day, Ethan clipped a long rope onto my collar and introduced me to an entirely new place—“the neighborhood.”
    Ethan ran down the sidewalk, with me right at his heels, and soon we were surrounded by a bunch of other girls and boys, some bigger than Ethan, some smaller, all of them with their hands out, eager to pet me.
    I was happy to oblige. I leaned into their hands and lapped at their fingers and listened to their giggles.
    â€œThis is my dog, Bailey,” Ethan said proudly. He scooped me up, and I wiggled at the sound of my name. “Look, Chelsea,” he said, offering me to a girl his size. “He’s a golden retriever. My mother rescued him. He was dying in a car from heat exhaust-station. When he gets old enough, I’m going to take him to my grandparents’ farm.”
    Chelsea cuddled me to her chest and gazed into my eyes. Her hair was long and even lighter than mine, and she smelled quite interesting, of sugar and milk and flowers and another dog. “You are sweet. You are so sweet, Bailey. I love you,” she sang to me.
    I liked Chelsea. Whenever we were out in the neighborhood and she saw me, she would drop to her knees and let me tug on her long blond hair. I soon learned that the dog scent on her clothes came from Marshmallow, a long-haired brown-and-white dog, older than I was. When Chelsea let Marshmallow out of her yard, we would wrestle for hours, and sometimes Ethan would join us,