Free Dog Heaven by Graham Salisbury Page B

we want so bad we can taste it.”
    “Like food, you mean?”
    “Could be anything. Like a skateboard, or a bike, like that.”
    Darci frowned. “But if you taste it, it has to be food, right?”
    “No. You can taste other things.”
    “That’s just weird, Calvin.”
    I shrugged.
    “I know what I’m writing about,” Willy said. “Cuttlefish.”
    Julio and I stopped.
“Cuttlefish?”
    “No, really,” Willy said. “I just want to
like
it, that’s all … like you guys do. Like everybody around here does. I feel weird being the only one who doesn’t. The problem is, cuttlefish isdisgusting. It stinks. It looks like long stringy boogers. What is it, anyway?”
    “It’s sort of half octopus, half squid.”
    Willy shook his head. “Totally gross.”

    I put my arm around his shoulder. “I got some bad news for you. You ready?”
    “Shoot.”
    “You. Are. Strange.”
    “Forget cuttlefish,” Rubin said. “I want a snake.”
    Julio scoffed. “Good luck with that. Snakes are illegal here, and anyway there aren’t any snakes in Hawaii.”
    “Oh yes there are,” Maya said.
    Rubin’s face lit up. “Really?”
    “Yup. Blind snakes. They eat ants and termites.”

    “How you know that?”
    “National Geographic.”
    Rubin rubbed his chin. “Do they bite?”
    Maya grinned. “Yeah, but only Japanese boys, like you.”
    “Really?”
    I laughed. “That was a
joke
, Rubin. Jeese.”
    We walked on.
    I thought: So what if my idea has a problem? It’s what I want, isn’t it? “A dog,” I said. “That’s what I want. A dog.”
    “But you can’t have a dog,” Darci said. “Stella’s allergic.”
    And that was the problem. “To cats, Darce, not dogs.”
    Stella lived with us and helped Mom. She was sixteen. Because she was allergic to cats, Mom thought she should stay away from dogs, too, just in case.
    “But you’re only writing about it,” Willy said. “You’re not actually
getting
it.”
    “Yeah, just writing.”

    When Darci and I got home we found Mom’s boyfriend, Ledward, in our driveway. He was hunched over our half-dead lawn mower. It was idling, and gray smoke billowed around him. The noise was as loud as a truck dumping gravel.
    The lawn mower gagged, spat, and died as we walked up.
    Ledward stood and shook his head. “Grass too long.” Heglanced toward our front yard, which sloped down to the river.
    I shrugged. It was too long weeks ago.
    Ledward was always telling me I should help Mom out more and mow the lawn, too. But pushing a lawn mower through grass that thick was like trying to ride your bike in soft sand. I hated that job.
    Darci went into the house.
    Ledward and I stood looking at the grass. The river was rusty brown. My red skiff lay in the swamp grass above the waterline.
    “You want me to help you cut it, boy?”
    Time to change the subject. “Did you ever have a dog when you were a kid, Ledward?”

“W ell, now,” Ledward said.
    He squatted on his heels and crossed his arms over his knees. I squatted, too, both of us facing the river.
    “I had about seven dogs, at various times. No, eight. Counting one that ran away.”
    He chuckled. “That one wanted to be hisown boss. These days I have four. But hunting dogs, ah? Not pets.”
    “There’s a difference?”
    “Sure. Hunting dogs you train to track pigs. They’re scrappy.” He winked at me. “Not good house dogs. Too nervous.”
    “I want a dog.”
    Ledward nodded. “Every boy should have a dog.”
    “Mom won’t let me. Stella’s allergic to cats, and maybe dogs. Her eyes get all puffy.”
    Ledward rubbed his chin. “Well … maybe you could keep it in the backyard. Or in your room, keep it out of the house.”
    That could work. My room was made of half the garage. It wasn’t really part of the house. Hey, I should put all this in my essay.

    “I’m supposedto write about it for school. I mean, how I want a dog. Mr. Purdy says I have to sell it to him … the idea, not a dog.”

    Ledward shook his