Rex

by Cody B. Stewart

  TJ quickly wiped the thought from his mind. Think happy thoughts!

  That’s when he remembered a Discovery Channel special about a guy who lived with wolves for a few months. When that guy first introduced himself to the wolves, he made sure not to look them in the eye so they wouldn’t think he was challenging them. Unfortunately, TJ had never seen a special about introducing yourself to a dinosaur, so he’d just have to make do with the knowledge he had.

  He looked down at the floor and slowly reached out for the T-Rex.

  The thing’s breath was warm on TJ’s hand. Its razor sharp teeth were only inches away from his fingers, which he envisioned were like sausages being waved in front of a Rottweiler.

  TJ couldn’t help it. He needed to look.

  He lifted his chin.

  Slowly… slowly… slowly… until he was eye-to-eye with the Tyrannosaurus rex.

  Oh man, I’m probably breaking so many dinosaur etiquette rules right now.

  But the thought didn’t stop him. He reached a little bit further.

  And the T-rex leaned forward…

  There was a sudden knock on the bedroom door. The dinosaur leaped backward with a startled chortle and scurried under the bed. TJ quickly took an inventory of his fingers to make sure none had been bitten off during the episode. Nope. All five were accounted for. Whew!

  Ellen sounded way less perturbed than she did an hour ago. “TJ, everything okay in there? I heard a crash.”

  TJ poked his head into the hall. “Yeah, everything’s fine. Just cleaning up after the war.”

  Ellen tried to smile, but for some reason it just made her look even more tired. TJ realized he hadn’t seen a real, genuine smile on his mom’s face in a while. Longer than a while.

  “Mom, about that mess—”

  “I’m surprised at you, TJ. I mean, Lulu’s pie? Really?”

  “You don’t under—”

  She put up her hand. “It’s been a long day. I just didn’t want to end it with us fighting. I’d rather say goodnight than get into what happened.”

  TJ sighed. “Goodnight, Mom.”

  She leaned in, kissed him on the forehead, and walked back to her room. For a moment, TJ forgot about what was hiding under his bed and just wished he could make his mom smile, for real this time. But then—

  He turned around just in time to see a miniature T-rex flying through the air. It smacked into his chest and knocked him off his feet. TJ landed hard on his back and squeezed his eyes shut tight.

  This is it! This is how I die. Eaten by a baby dinosaur. It’ll look awesome on my tombstone, but I really wish I could’ve gone out in some way that didn’t involve being digested.

  Suddenly, a slimy tongue slid across his face, leaving a thick trail of dino drool from his chin to his forehead. TJ opened his eyes and once again looked at the face of the little T-rex. If he didn’t know any better, he’d swear it was smiling at him.

  Chapter Seven

  Sam couldn’t tell whether TJ was being serious or not. He might have been joking. She didn’t always understand his jokes.

  Step one: Determine the validity of his request. “Are you for real?”

  TJ looked past her, only occasionally meeting her eye. “Yeah, I just need a little bit.”

  Results: inconclusive.

  Step two: Determine his reasons. “Why do you need dog food? I’m pretty sure I once heard your mom say you could only get a dog if the dog knew how to drive and clean up its own poop.”

  TJ fidgeted with his hands, a surefire sign that he was hiding something. “I need some for an experiment.”

  “A dog food experiment? Are you trying to get Spike to grow? Or is it an offering to the ghost goblin poltergeist thingies?” She studied TJ’s face, fully expecting a flicker of a smile, but he just seemed nervous.

  Mr. Redfield poked his round face out a window of the shed at the edge of the backyard and called to Sam. “Hey, Peeper.” Sam winced at her nickname. She never liked it much. Who would? “Don’t forget, today is Doc day. Better get going soon.”

  An idea danced in Sam’s head. “Help me with my chores and I’ll give you some dog food.”

  “You drive a hard bargain,” TJ said.

  “Deal?” Sam asked, pinky extended.

  “Deal,” TJ sighed and they executed the pinky swear.

  Sam really wanted to enjoy roping TJ into doing her chores, but for some reaon, she didn’t. It wasn’t the same when TJ rolled over and played dead. There was no sport in it. She expected him to counter her offer, but…nope.

  The Redfield home was, for lack of a more polite word, a madhouse. The five Redfield children, two parents, three cats, six dogs, and one parrot were loud, smelly, and all over the place. Most people needed to be conditioned before entering—it could be overwhelming for those who weren’t used to it. Not TJ, though. He loved it. He loved the noise. He loved the chaos. He loved when the dogs jumped up on him and tried to lick his face. He loved when one of Sam’s brothers threw another in a headlock because of some unspoken brotherly cereal box agreement. It was like walking through a strange, alien world—an alien world he wished he could visit more often. Or inhabit permanently.

  Sam tossed TJ a dog leash and instructed him to round up Hank, the beefy black lab, and the rest of the Redfield dog herd. It took nearly half an hour to find them all, hook up their leashes, untangle TJ, and get out the door.

  The dogs immediately tried to dart in separate directions. TJ’s arms quickly grew tired from having to control them, but his mood had brightened considerably. “Where are we going?”

  Sam steered the pack up a small driveway to a worn little house. “Right here.” The dogs pulled toward the front door, their tales wagging with such excitement that the combined force could send a moored boat back out to sea. The dogs yipped and howled, so Sam didn’t bother to knock.

  After a few moments, a man in his seventies with a head full of thick, glaringly white hair and dressed in a flannel shirt, opened the door to greet them. “Hello, all,” he said with a bright smile. “Right on time, as usual.” The dogs entered his home like they were prancing into a dog show, their heads held high.

  They followed the man into his living room and sat in a neat row in front of his fireplace. He pointed to a small tray of syringes sitting on an end table. “Give me a hand, young man?” he said and handed the tray to TJ. “You’re TJ, right? Ellen Beaumont’s boy?”

  TJ nodded.

  “Pleasure to meet you. People call me Doc.”

  TJ watched as Doc picked up one syringe after another and gave each dog their shot, astonished at how calm each dog stayed, with barely a whimper from any of them. “How do you do that?”

  Doc chuckled as he administered the last shot. He rubbed the spot on the back of Hank’s neck and scratched behind the Lab’s black ears. “It’s all about trust.” He handed TJ a box of dog treats. The dogs lined up in front of TJ, each with a paw raised. “They trust me not to hurt them.” Each dog took a treat from TJ’s hand. “And I trust them not to hurt me. All dogs are descended from wolves, you know. No matter how well you train them, they all still have that wild side to them. It takes a lot of trust to believe that side won’t come out and bite you in the rear.”

  An old mutt wandered in from the back porch. His age was evident in the graying tips of his ears and the slow waddle of his walk. He leaned against Doc’s leg and let out a low, rumbling sigh. Doc reached down and patted the dog’s side. “Now Rufus here was much more of a wolf than a dog in his younger years. Someone gave him a reason not to trust anyone. Once that trust is broken, it takes a long, long time to earn it back.” Doc stooped down so he was eye-to-eye, nose-to-nose with Rufus. “It took a while and a lot of work, but I earned it. Rufus is a dog again.”

  Sam and TJ rounded up the dogs. “Thanks, Doc,” Sam called as she herded them outside. She danced around and the dogs leaped around after her. If they were wolves, they’d probably think she was a deer ripe for hunting. TJ wondered
what it took to earn that trust, and if it was the same for dinosaurs.

  “So what’s the deal with Doc?” TJ asked. “How come he doesn’t have an office like other vets?”

  Sam stopped dancing. “Well, technically, he isn’t a vet anymore. I mean he used to be, so he knows what he’s doing and everything. And he only charges a little money. We wouldn’t be able to have all these animals if we had to go to an actual veterinarian.”

  “So he retired?”

  “No, I think he got in trouble or something. I’m not exactly sure. My dad never told me the whole story.” Sam closed the latch and let the dogs loose inside her backyard. They raced in circles and leaped over each other as if getting their shots had been the best thing to happen to them ever. She tapped TJ’s shoulder and gestured to the shed. “C’mon. I’ll get your payment.” She slid the door open and lifted the lid on the tub of dog food. “How much do you need for your experiment?”

  TJ shrugged. “Gee, I don’t know. How much does Hank eat?”

  Sam filled up a plastic bag. “This much.” She handed the bag to her friend, but he was acting weird again. He began to fidget. “So, you gonna tell me what this is really for?”

  TJ opened his mouth like he wanted to say something but closed it before anything beyond a mumble came out. Anger welled up in Sam. It burned hot, like a volcanic eruption or a meteor exploding through the atmosphere or something. Once the flame died down, she realized the anger was wrapped around a little nugget of hurt. TJ was hiding something from her. They never hid things from each other.

  Never!

  She slid the shed door closed again and marched across the yard, whistling for her dogs to follow. “Fine,” she grumbled. “Whatever.”

  TJ was left alone when the pack bounded after her. He didn’t have a pack of his own. Just Sam. And he could sense that his secrecy had hurt her feelings. “Wait,” he said just before Sam disappeared into her madhouse. “There’s something I need to show you. You wouldn’t believe me if I told you.”

  ***** ***** *****

  Sam couldn’t remember the last time she’d spoken. In fact, she wasn’t sure she knew how to speak anymore. She’d tried a couple times over the last twenty minutes, but all she’d managed were some high pitched wheezing sounds. Maybe she’d stepped through a wormhole on the way over there and was now in another dimension where she could no longer speak and Tyrannosaurus rexes are a foot tall and ate dog food?

  TJ had been leaning against his bedroom door with his arms crossed and breath held, waiting for her to regain her mind, which she had lost. “So?” He tried to nudge her along.

  Sam swung around and the words flew out of her mouth before she had time to think about it. “So? There’s a dinosaur on your bed and you say, so?”

  TJ pressed into his door as though he wished he could pass right through it. “What am I supposed to say?”

  Sam did her best to keep from yelling. She didn’t know what a T-rex might do when it got scared or its environment became hostile, and she sure didn’t want to find out the hard way. “For starters, how about telling me why you thought feeding dog food to a dinosaur was a good idea. Or how come you weren’t going to tell me about this at all?” She pointed at the dinosaur, huddled strangely on the corner of TJ’s bed. “Or explain how it’s even possible that an animal that’s been extinct for millions of years is now peeing on your Star Wars sheets.”

  “What?” TJ pushed past Sam and saw the T-rex finishing its piddle. “Oh, man! Those were clean sheets! No, Rex! Not on Darth Vader!” He picked the small T-rex up and set it on the floor. It made a funny little squawking sound.

  Sam snorted and raised her eyebrow. “Rex?”

  “Yeah, so what? That’s his name.”

  “It’s a little on the nose, don’t you think?”

  TJ stripped the wet sheets from his bed. “On whose nose?”

  Sam sighed. “No, it means it’s too obvious. Like naming a shark Sharky or a bear Barry. You should call him Shredder or Chopper or Maximus Rex. Something intimidating.”

  “I don’t want it to be intimidating. He’s gonna be my pal. His name is Rex. Just Rex.”

  Sam shrugged and conceded defeat. “Fine. So what do you plan to do with Rex?”

  The wet Star Wars sheets thumped into the hamper across the room. TJ threw his arms up in celebration of his perfect shot while Rex declared war on the Lego village by TJ’s desk. He looked like Godzilla stomping through Tokyo. “Haven’t really thought about it.”

  Sam sat on the bare bed, arms folded, an accusatory look in her eyes. “But you thought of a name?”

  “Yeah, so?”

  “People drop strays off at our house all the time because they know we love animals. We never keep them because we already have so many, but we find them good homes. Dad always tells us not to name them.” She slipped into a perfect impersonation of her father, minus the belly and beard. “’When you give them a name, it just makes it that much harder to let them go.’” She wagged her finger. “You’re really going to keep him?”

  “Why shouldn’t I? You get to have all kinds of pets. Like you said, people just drop them off on your doorstep. Well, I found Rex. He was alone. A stray. How come you can keep strays, but I can’t?” He felt sorry as soon as the words left his mouth.

  Sam was no stranger to arguments. Not a day passed in the Redfield home without a tiff, spat, or full-blown shouting match. So she knew when to fire back and when to back down. “I’m not saying you shouldn’t. All I’m saying is that the neighbors might notice when you take your pet dinosaur for a walk.”

  TJ slumped onto his bed, his longing gaze fixed on Rex, who was now demolishing Lego Tokyo. “I know it’s gonna take some figuring out, but I’ve always wanted a pet. And this is the coolest pet ever.”

  Sam knew how long TJ had been begging his mom for a dog. And she saw how heartbroken he was every time she said no. She sat next to TJ and put her arm over his shoulder. “Ok, so we’ll probably need some kind of disguise or something. Or maybe we can pass him off as an iguana. A very big iguana.”

  A smile spread across TJ’s face. “You’re going to help me keep him?”

  “Well, it is your birthday next week. Consider this my present to you.”

  Chapter Eight

  “I can’t believe it’s TJ’s birthday next week,” Ellen groaned as she counted her tips. “I don’t have a clue what to get him.”

  Lulu went over the receipts at the register, preparing to close the diner for the night. “How ’bout one of them video games kids are always glued to nowadays?”

  Ellen winced at the thin wad of bills she slid into her pocket. “He’s not much for video games. Don’t think I’d be able to afford one anyway.” She untied her apron and tossed it on the counter.

  Larry Doyle, the only customer still in the diner, sipped his coffee. “I always believed that one man’s trash is another man’s treasure. You should swing by that pawnshop on Maple on your way home. They got a lot of nice things in there.”

  Ellen considered it, surprised at how not crazy the idea sounded. “You know, Larry, that’s actually not a terrible idea.”

  Larry perked up. He didn’t often have ideas that people didn’t think were terrible. “Know what else you should do? Swing by the swamp. Lots of military vehicles still buzzing around over there. Friend of mine says they’re conducting some kind of experiment in the old Nike missile base.”

  Ellen rolled her eyes and pretended not to hear. Now that’s a typical Larry Doyle terrible idea, she thought.

  “It’s been abandoned since the Cold War ended,” Larry continued. “Perfect place to conduct secret government tests.”

  Lulu shooed him away from the counter. “That’s enough conspiracy theories for tonight.”

  Larry downed the rest of his coffee and shuffled out the door, muttering about aliens and Area 51. Lulu handed Ellen a paper bag with two meals inside. “Don’t you worry your head over birthday presents. You’ll find somethin
g. That boy of yours doesn’t seem too hard to please.”

  Ellen chuckled to herself. You don’t know him as well as I do. Only way she could think to please him for his birthday would be to bring home an entire pet store. It got harder and harder to say no every time TJ asked for a dog. But when she thought about the extra cost, the extra work, the extra mess…she just got more tired than she already was.

  She climbed into her truck, rubbed the tired from her eyes, and made for home. She turned onto Maple Street and instantly saw the neon glow of the pawnshop’s sign. Couldn’t hurt, she thought. She pulled into the parking lot and took another look at the thin stack of tips from her night’s work. She wouldn’t be able to afford much, even if it was another man’s trash.

  Suddenly, she was struck with an idea that made her heart both leap and sink at the same time. She took a small, metal container from the glove box, unlatched it, and removed her most treasured possession: a vintage Kiss music box. A mini statue of each band member rocked out on the top, which looked like a stage. She lifted the lid and listened to a jingly round of “I Want to Rock ’N’ Roll All Night.”

  The box had belonged to Ellen’s older sister, Sarah. Ellen used to sneak into Sarah’s room every night when she was thirteen and play it. When she was sixteen and Sarah was heading away for college, she gave Ellen the music box. Inside it were the keys to Sarah’s beat up Honda. Ellen’s first car. Her first taste of freedom. She’d kept the music box in the glove compartment of every car she’d owned since.

  Ellen tucked it under her arm and entered the pawnshop. A small bell announced her arrival. The pawnbroker, a round, sweaty man standing behind a screened counter, looked up from whatever he was doing and smiled at her. Ellen returned the smile then began to browse the store.