I Bet He Kicks Puppies for Fun

I call him Spot because I’m clever. And original. Spot has no spots. (Spotless Spot.) What he has is long, white synthetic hair (hypoallergenic), which streams down the sides of his small body in locks longer than my own. His hair is just long enough to braid and just short enough to never tangle in his wheels. When I touch him, he feels like wax paper.

If I roll Spot onto his back, I can flip a switch that makes his wheels start to turn. They sound like an electric hand mixer when Spot is upside down and like a rolling scooter when I turn him right side up. Back on his “feet,” Spot cruises across Grandma’s living room carpet like a Roomba without motion sensors. He bumps into things—the coffee table, Grandma’s reading chair, the ledge separating the living room from the dining room—and, unable to reverse, he gets stuck.

His wheels spin out, the front two levitating, head continually banging into the object in front of him. He lets out little mechanical woofs and bow wows as I call out, I’m coming, Spot and run to him. He is only two pounds, but when I pick him up, my arms are only just long enough to wrap around his frame. I have chunky pre-K arms that sort of balloon out at the joints. They are long enough to touch my toes but few other things.

I hold Spot for a moment longer, giving him baby kisses along his plastic spine. I sway him from side to side like my parents sway me when I’m fussy—slow and with a bit of bounce. I whisper, you’re okay now as I press my head into his, the side of my nose touching the tip of his ear. He smells stale, like cardboard.

Spot is my first dog, and Santa has brought him for Christmas. We have been getting along well since this morning when I rescued him from a box under the tree. He had been suffocating amid twist ties and cardboard when I found him and, with Dad’s help, managed to cut him out from his plastic prison with safety scissors and minimal fur loss.

Our first shared activity was breakfast. I had one of the glaze donuts that Grandpa picked up this morning from Oscar’s. He said it was lucky he got there when he did because they sold out two orders later. Spot didn’t have a donut, but Grandma let me feed him one of the decorative carrots she keeps in a bowl on the dining room table. Normally dogs don’t like carrots, but Spot didn’t mind his. All through the meal, he stared straight ahead with those big, beady eyes of his with such a determination that I thought we might have to supplement the carrots with ornamental pears.

After breakfast, we headed back into the living room. It was too congested and noisy in the kitchen. Grandpa had been watching Gunsmoke with the volume turned all the way up, and the rest of us were forced to shout our Merry Christmases and do you want bacon with thatsover him. This morning, Johnathan and I were loud too. We both squealed as we opened our presents until I unwrapped Spot and Mom told me that dogs have sensitive hearing. Since then, I’ve been quiet. I only wish Grandpa got the message too.

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The completed version of this piece will be made available upon request.