The Boy Who Ate Dog Biscuits (2 page)

“Oh, wow!” Howard whooped. “Let’s see if he can ride it. Hang on, Frankie!”

Billy wondered if it was a good idea. He didn’t say anything, though. Howard would call him a baby.

“Ride me,” Frankie giggled. “Ride, ride, ride!”

Howard danced around, shouting, “Count down! Ten, nine, eight—”

Just then the side door of his house opened. Howard’s mother came out. “What in the world is going on out here?” she asked.

“Nothing.” Howard tried to hide the electric opener behind his back.

Frankie clung to the door handle. “Ride me!” he shouted. “Up, down! Up, down!”

“Howard! Are you crazy?” Mrs. Rosa picked Frankie up.

Frankie kicked his legs against his mother’s side. His arms flapped in the air. “Up, down!” he screamed.

“All right. Let’s have it.” Mrs. Rosa took the opener. She pressed the button. The door groaned. It shook. It did not go up. “Well, that’s just dandy,” she said. “In the house, Howard Rosa. You’ll have to go home, Billy.”

“Ride, Mama!” Frankie cried. His face was all red. “Ride, Mama, ride!” he wailed as she carried him into the house.

3
  

“Inside, Billy.” Mr. Getten stood in the kitchen doorway. He was wearing overalls. There were little curls of wood in his dark hair.

“Do I have to?” Billy asked.

Mr. Getten frowned.

“But it’s not even lunchtime yet.”

Mr. Getten didn’t say a word. Billy got the message. He walked past his father into the cool, dark kitchen.

Billy’s mother was sitting at the kitchen table. She looked angry too. Billy knew it was going to be a terrible afternoon.

“Sit,” said his father.

Billy slid into a wooden chair. He looked
from his mother to his father. No one said anything. The silence felt scary.

“How could you do such a stupid thing?” Mrs. Getten finally said.

“What?” Billy tried to play dumb.

“You know what.” Mr. Getten’s chair scraped on the floor as he pulled closer to the table.

“Mrs. Rosa just called,” his mother said. “So we know what you were up to.”

“Oh.” Billy felt for the dog biscuit in his pocket. He fingered it.

“This is serious,” Mrs. Getten said. “Frankie could have been hurt.”

“It was his idea.”

“What do you mean?” asked Mr. Getten.

“We didn’t tell him to get on. He just did.”

“Frankie’s a baby,” Mr. Getten said. “He doesn’t know any better.”

Billy snapped the biscuit in half inside his pocket.

“Suppose Frankie had been hurt.” His mother shook her head. “It was very irresponsible of you two.”

Billy didn’t know what “irresponsible” meant. It didn’t sound like a fun word.

He leaned under the table, pretending to tie a shoelace. He popped the piece of biscuit into his mouth.

“Sit up, Billy,” Mrs. Getten snapped. “And stop fooling around.”

Billy held the dry biscuit under his tongue.

“The door’s broken,” said Mrs. Getten. “You’ll have to help pay for fixing it.”

“What!” Billy coughed.

“I think you should give your allowance to Mrs. Rosa,” said Mr. Getten.

“My allowance!” Billy choked as he swallowed.

“You have to learn responsibility, young man!”

“Boy, I get punished and it wasn’t even my idea.”

“Howard told his mother it was.”

“That rat!”

“Either way. You should have told Howard no.”

“Da-ad! He’d think I was a big baby.”

“Sometimes you have to be different from your friends.”

Billy put his elbows on the table, “But I need my allowance to buy dog biscuits.”

“You shouldn’t be eating those things anyway.”

Billy put his head on his arm. “Sarah’s doctor even said they’re okay.”

“He also said not too many.” Mrs. Getten frowned. “They’re meant for dogs. Not people.”

“But how can I teach Dr. Mike’s dogs any tricks if I don’t have biscuits?”

“You should have thought of that first,” his father said.

“Are you sure Dr. Mike doesn’t mind you playing over there?” asked Mrs. Getten.

“It’s okay. I checked,” Billy said. “Honest.”

“You’d better shape up, young man.”

Billy looked from one parent to the other. “If you’d just get me a dog for my birthday, I’d be real good.”

Mrs. Getten shook her head. “I think you should be good first.”

“You don’t seem like you’re ready for a dog, son.”

“Not ready? That’s all I ever wanted!”

His mother stood.

His father said, “If you’d help around here, maybe we’d consider a dog. But not with the kind of stunt you pulled this morning.”

Billy didn’t dare say what he was thinking. They really should have gotten a dog instead of a baby. What good was a baby? She couldn’t even run after a stick.

4
  

Billy used the shortcut through the empty lot to the next street. He stood at the corner and waited for the light to change.

How could he teach Dr. Mike’s dogs tricks without dog biscuits? Dr. Mike probably wouldn’t want him to come over without them.

The traffic on the street went by slowly. Finally it was safe for him to cross.

By the time he turned the next corner, Billy could hear yelping and barking out in the yard. The sounds made him feel better.

He cut across the grass and ran the rest of the way up to the blue house. It had a fence all the way around the backyard.

The sign on the lawn said:
DR. MICHAELS, VETERINARIAN
. Billy sounded the word out. “Vet-er-i-nar-i-an.” He liked the word. It was a pretty word, and a big one. To Billy it meant someone who liked to take care of dogs as much as he did.

Billy went through the metal gate. It clanged shut. Dogs of all sizes and shapes ran over to him.

“Hi, girl.” A fat tan puppy licked Billy’s hand. Her tongue was pink and warm.

“Hey, fella. Want your belly rubbed?” Billy scratched a spotted mutt’s stomach.

A small brown poodle danced around Billy’s feet. He nipped playfully at Billy’s laces. “What are you doing, Killer?” He patted the poodle’s head.

“Hel-lo, Billy,” a voice called through an open door.

“Hi, Dr. Mike.”

Dr. Mike came into the yard. She was short and blond and wore a blue lab coat. “Am I ever glad to see you,” she said. “A policeman just brought in another stray dog.”

Billy followed her into the animal hospital. They walked down a long hall lined with big green cages. There was a dog in every one.

The room at the end of the hall had more cages. Some were empty, and others had kittens or puppies in them.

Dr. Mike opened a cage. She lifted out a big gray cat. “Want to hold this guy?”

“Sure.” Billy took the cat in his arms. “Hi there, fella.”

The cat whined and squirmed. Billy rubbed his face in the cat’s thick gray hair. “It’s okay,” he whispered.

“He’s just a little nervous.” Dr. Mike moved toward the operating room.

Billy followed. “What’s wrong with him?”

“He needs a tooth taken out.” Dr. Mike sprayed the stainless-steel table with cleaner. Then she wiped it with a paper towel. “Okay, you can put him down.”

Billy petted the cat. Dr. Mike got ready to give him a shot. “Billy,” she said, “grab the scruff of his neck. Shake his head gently. That’ll distract him.”

Billy liked helping Dr. Mike. He always learned a lot about animals.

He watched her give the shot. “Can I stay?” he asked.

Dr. Mike smiled. “No. I really need you to run the dogs out in the back field.”

Billy wanted to tell Dr. Mike about the dog biscuits, but he didn’t. He could see she was busy. “Okay, I’ll be outside.”

“I’ll call you when I’m done.”

Billy hurried down the hall. The best part of summer was being at Dr. Mike’s. Everyone in town knew she cared about animals. The police and firemen brought her stray dogs and cats. She always tried to find out who owned the animals or to find them new owners. Often she kept the ones nobody would adopt.

Today Billy counted six stray dogs out in the back. He petted the big black mutt who was blind. Lola had been at Dr. Mike’s the longest. She sniffed his hand. Then she licked it.

Billy dropped on the grass and rolled onto his back. The mutt with no tail jumped on
Billy’s stomach and washed his face with a long, warm tongue. “Quit it!” Billy laughed. The dog kept right on licking.

After that Billy wrestled a terrier. When the dog was tired, she played dead. “Good doggie,” Billy said. “You remembered your trick
from last time.” He slipped her a piece of his only biscuit.

Next Billy played fetch with the two brown puppies. He loved to fool them by pretending to throw the stick across the yard. They would go bounding over the field trying to find it. Then they would give up and come running back.

“Got you.” Billy pretended to throw the stick again. They went chasing off across the grass.

When Billy saw Dr. Mike standing in the doorway, he crossed the field. He always did exactly what she said. Billy wanted to keep coming back.

“Where’s Howard today?” she asked as Billy came in.

Billy shrugged his shoulders. Howard’s name made him feel bad again.

“Something wrong?”