Free Pet Disasters by Claudia Mills

hand. He wished a lot of things that weren’t going to happen.
    Mason slipped the bag onto his hand, the way his father and Brody had done. If they could do it, he could do it. But could he do it and still go on living?
    Okay. Okay
.
    With one quick, sickening motion, Mason reached down and scooped up the poop. An instant later, he had turned the bag inside out and tied it shut.
    He was still alive.
    At least Mason’s dad took the bag from him. But instead of carrying it himself, he tied it onto Dog’s collar.Mason would have hated walking around carrying a bag of dog poop around his neck, but Dog didn’t seem to mind. Mason had noticed that Dog sniffed as happily at disgusting things as anything else. In fact, one time when they passed something that smelled especially disgusting—Mason didn’t even allow himself to think what it might be—Dog actually tried to roll in it, but Mason yanked him away before he could get anything on his fur.
    At bedtime, Mason hesitated before shutting his door against Dog. But he had a feeling that if Dog slept with him once, Dog would sleep with him every night for the rest of his life, and that would be the end of sleep for Mason forever. He thought of Hamster’s noisy wheel, of Cat’s incessant meows.
    “Good night, Dog,” Mason said, politely but firmly, and closed his door.
    Dog didn’t complain the way Cat had complained. That was another good thing about Dog: Dog was happy when things were good, but Dog didn’t seem sad when things were bad.
    Ten minutes later, the first bolt of lightning lit up Mason’s room. A few seconds later came the first deafening clap of thunder.
    From outside Mason’s door, Dog gave one low howl. Apparently, Dog did mind when things were bad enough.
    The next flash of lightning was even brighter, and the thunder seemed to shake the house.
    Dog’s howl grew even louder.
    Mason didn’t like thunder himself. When he had been afraid of lightning and thunder, back when he was little, his mother had told him that thunder was the sound of the angels bowling up in heaven. Mason hadn’t believed her. He couldn’t picture angels, with their wings and halos, having a raucous evening out in a bowling alley.
    Crash!
Some angel somewhere had bowled another strike, or maybe the entire angel bowling team had bowled strikes in each lane simultaneously. Either that, or the lightning was about to strike Mason’s house and they were all going to die. The second explanation struck Mason as more likely, more in keeping with the laws of natural science.
    This time Dog wouldn’t stop howling. There were times when animals were smarter than humans. No animal would fall for a story about bowling angels.
    Mason climbed out of his covers and opened his door. He had thought Dog would dash into his roomand dive under the bed, but instead Dog leaped up on top of the bed, as if he knew that was where he was supposed to be all along.
    Mason crawled back into bed next to him. The bed was just wide enough for the two of them if they lay very close together. He hugged Dog tight.
    “It’s okay,” Mason told Dog, putting on his most calm and soothing voice.
    Actually, it
was
okay. Somebody who survived picking up dog poop could probably survive a thunderstorm. Especially if he had a strong, warm, smart, loving Dog there beside him.

10
    Sunday evening, Brody returned. The Baxter station wagon pulled into the driveway around seven o’clock. Brody dashed out of the backseat of the car, where he had been sandwiched between his sisters, and raced over to Mason’s yard to join Mason and Dog, who were sprawled on the lawn side by side under the shade of a big oak tree.
    Dog bounded up to greet him, and Brody was down on his knees with his arm around Dog, hugging him tight.
    “Look, Dog! I brought you some presents!”
    Brody picked up the pinecone and two sticks that he had flung on the grass when he gave Dog his hug. He held them so that Dog could sniff them.
    “For playing