Stick Dog

by Tom Watson

  Now, I don’t know if you know this or not, but dogs can’t climb trees.

  And this presented a dilemma.

  Do you know what a dilemma is? It’s when you have a choice among things to do, but none of the options is very good. Let’s see; let me think of an example. Okay, here’s one. It’s dinner time, and you have two vegetables to choose from: overcooked green beans or steamed cauliflower. And your mum says you have to pick one. You, my vegetable-avoiding friend, are now faced with a “dilemma.”

  Actually, I don’t mind cauliflower that much. Except it kind of looks like brains. And, let’s face it, that’s not something you want to be thinking about when you’re eating. I just ruined cauliflower for you, didn’t I? Well, enjoy your overcooked green beans.

  So Poo-Poo’s dilemma was this: he could wait for that squirrel to come down, which could take forever – or he could find a way up, which is pretty tough for a dog who can’t climb trees.

  After a few laps around that tree with his face contorted in deep thought, Poo-Poo stopped and stood before his four friends.

  “Does anyone here have a huge rubber band?” he asked. “About six feet long and really, really stretchy?”

  Stick Dog shook his head. So did Karen and Stripes.

  “Fresh out,” answered Mutt.

  “Why do you want one?” asked Karen.

  “Well, with all the trees around here, I thought I could string a giant rubber band between a couple of trunks to create a slingshot. Then I could shoot my way up there to get that whisker-twitching menace to society.”

  Mutt, Karen, and Stripes nodded in understanding. Stick Dog didn’t say anything.

  “How about a cannon? Anybody have a cannon?” Poo-Poo asked. “Same principle as the slingshot, just a different kind of shooting mechanism. Anybody?”

  Stick Dog, Karen, and Stripes shook their heads again.

  “Not with me,” replied Mutt.

  “Dang it,” Poo-Poo said. He began to tap his left forepaw against the ground in rapid taps. He was thinking hard – very hard. “I got it, I got it. Somebody here has to have a trampoline, right? You know those big contraptions with the springs around the outside and a big, rubbery circle thing in the middle? I’ve seen humans jumping real high on those things. Do any of you have one of those? Anyone? Anyone?”

  Stick Dog said he didn’t. Stripes and Karen did the same.

  Mutt splayed his legs and shook his whole body as if he thought there was a chance a trampoline might fall out of his fur. He studied the ground beneath him and seemed disappointed to find there was no trampoline. “Not today,” he answered.

  “This is great, just great,” Poo-Poo moaned. “Here I have this devious, conniving chatterbox practically within my grasp, and I can’t finish the job.”

  Finally Stick Dog rose to his feet. He knew the squirrel was not practically within Poo-Poo’s grasp at all. But he also knew they had to get to the park as fast as possible if they wanted any chance at a hamburger feast. Every minute of delay meant their hunger would grow more severe. It also meant the hamburgers might be eaten before they even had a chance to grab them. Stick Dog knew he had to act.

  He came to the tree, stood shoulder to shoulder with Poo-Poo, and whispered to him, “I see what you mean now. That acorn dropping on your head made it all too clear. It’s time to deal with this tail-twitcher.”

  Poo-Poo, clearly surprised, turned his head and stared at Stick Dog.

  “Poo-Poo’s right!” Stick Dog shouted up in the general direction of the squirrel. He couldn’t really see it, but that didn’t really matter to him. “I’ve had it with snivelling, tail-shaking chatter-mouths like you!”

  Mutt, Karen, and Stripes all stared at Stick Dog too, curiosity and surprise on their faces.

  “We can wait all week if we have to. No food, no water – no problem.” Stick Dog was doing his best to look as tough as he could. He squinted his eyes and tried to snarl. It was not something he was very good at. “Do you smell that hamburger aroma coming from the park, you fuzzy tail-shaker? Do you!?”

  The squirrel was paying no attention. It was digging the nut out from an acorn shell. The dogs, however, had rediscovered the scent of hamburger. Their noses were lifted in the air.

  “See how good that smells?” Stick Dog continued shouting. “Well, we don’t care one bit. Those humans can cook a million tasty hamburgers and eat them all! So what if we don’t get any?!”

  “Uhh, Stick Dog?” Mutt whispered. There was a look of concern on his face.

  “If we have to wait until we’re just skin and bones and barbecue season is over and we never eat again, that’s fine by us!” Stick Dog continued.

  “Stick Dog, could I have a word?” asked Karen. She appeared bothered as well.

  Stick Dog pretended not to hear her. He shouted, “Hey, you up there! I want you to know that I agree one hundred per cent with Poo-Poo. I’ll gladly sacrifice a chance at delicious, juicy hamburgers. So what if we haven’t had anything to eat since yesterday morning! So what if we never get another chance like this again?”

  “Excuse me? Umm, Stick Dog?” said Stripes.

  But Stick Dog went on. “I know that meaty juice and smoky flavour will be the best we ever tasted. And it would be so nice to have warm food for a change. We almost always find cold food. We never get warm food like hamburgers from the barbecue. But it doesn’t matter! We’re not going anywhere!”

  “Stick Dog?” Poo-Poo tried to interrupt.

  But Stick Dog kept going. “Just to show you how committed I am, I’m going to take a big sniff of the air and NOT leave. Are you watching?”

  Stick Dog took a huge sniff of the air, and as he suspected they would, the other dogs did too. The wind was drifting in the perfect direction, blowing the mouth-watering, hamburger-scented breeze right to them. He heard the slow, deep rumble of the other dogs’ stomachs. From the corner of his eye, he saw Poo-Poo close his eyes and lick his lips.

  “Doesn’t that smell extra delicious, Mr Twitchy-Pants?” Stick Dog called to the squirrel. “I can almost taste them. We don’t care though. We’re not leaving! No way!”

  “Hey, uhh, Stick Dog?”

  “Yes, Poo-Poo,” Stick Dog answered, not lowering his head yet.

  “I’m thinking,” Poo-Poo said, “that maybe we should go get those hamburgers and worry about proving our superiority to squirrels later.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “Stick Dog,” Poo-Poo declared, “I’ve never been so sure of anything in my life.”

  Stick Dog lowered his head and stretched his legs, preparing for the rest of the journey to Picasso Park. “If you’re sure that’s what you want to do, Poo-Poo.”

  Poo-Poo nodded quickly and wagged his tail. “What are we waiting for? Let’s go!” Without even looking up, Poo-Poo ran right past the oak tree – and the squirrel that was in it.

  Stick Dog smiled. “To the park,” he said to Mutt, Stripes, and Karen.

  And off they ran.

  It was about a two-mile run to the park. They travelled across a creek, up and down several tree-covered hills, and across a meadow. Picasso Park was surrounded by walnut trees, goldenrod clumps, cattail reeds, and honeysuckle bushes.

  The dogs settled in behind some of the shrubbery, safely out of sight of any humans.

  Mutt inhaled deeply, taking in the aromas from the barbecue on the other side of Picasso Park. “Welcome to Hamburgerville,” he said with a grin. “Population: Us.”

  Karen groaned and rolled her eyes.

  “Follow me,” said Stick Dog. “We need to be able to see a little better.”

  They flattened themselves against the ground and scurried forward on their bellies, pulling themselves with their front legs. Several small hills surrounded the park, and it was atop one of these hills where the dogs stopped beneath a walnut tree. All five dogs peered towards a gazebo on the other side of Picasso Park.

  A woman with a yellow apron was barbecuing. Two kids, a boy and a girl
, were kicking a football back and forth. And a man, presumably the father, was setting out paper plates on a picnic table.

  “This is going to be tougher than I thought,” said Stick Dog, peeking over the top of the hill. “There are four humans. That’s more than I’d hoped. I thought we could all run in as fast as possible— ”

  Stick Dog stopped talking. He didn’t stop talking because he had finished his thought. He stopped talking because Stripes had suddenly sprinted down the hill as fast as she could towards the smoking barbecue.

  “Where’s she going?!” asked Stick Dog.

  “I think she heard you say ‘run in as fast as possible’ and, uhh— ” Mutt lost his train of thought as he watched Stripes fly down that hill at full speed. She was a streaking black-and-white blur. “And, uhh, she, like, took off.”

  “I hadn’t finished my sentence,” said Stick Dog, exasperated. “I was going to say I thought we could all run in as fast as possible and grab the hamburgers, but we won’t be able to now because there are too many humans. If there was just one, or even two, maybe we could have handled it. But not four. We need to come up with something clever.”

  “Stick Dog?” Poo-Poo asked.

  “Yes.” Stick Dog sighed. He was frustrated that Stripes had zoomed off, and he hoped Poo-Poo might have a solution.

  Poo-Poo was looking up into the walnut tree nervously. “Could we move out from under this tree? These are really big nuts. If there’s a nasty, tail-shaking squirrel up there and he drops one of these walnut-bombs on my head, it’s really going to hurt.”

  Stick Dog closed his eyes for a moment. “Let’s not worry about that right now, Poo-Poo,” he said. “We’ll move in a minute. I promise. Right now we have to worry about Stripes running off by herself against four humans.”

  “Look! She’s almost there!” Karen exclaimed.

  “Man, she’s fast!” said Mutt.

  “I’ve seen faster,” said Poo-Poo, unimpressed. “She’s going downhill, and the wind’s behind her, that’s all.”

  Stripes was indeed almost there. She had begun to slow her pace and shorten her stride as she approached the unattended barbecue. None of the family had seen her yet. The boy and the girl were off in the grass on the other side of the gazebo, while the man and the woman were unpacking supplies from a wicker basket.

  Stripes slowed to a walk and then stopped. She hid behind a bench near the barbecue. It was only then that she looked around and realised she was alone. Her head jerked up and her eyes focused on Stick Dog, Mutt, Karen, and Poo-Poo, who were staring at her from the top of the hill.

  It was at this exact moment – when Stripes was looking away from the gazebo – that the mother unpacked a long, silver, two-pronged fork.

  When Stripes turned back around, there was the mother holding that long, silver, two-pronged fork. It glinted and shone in the sunlight as she carried it towards the barbecue.

  That was all Stripes needed to see. Any thought of trying to grab those hamburgers by herself vanished. She stared at the woman through the back slats of the bench. The woman came nearer, holding that fork, then snapped her fingers and turned around, returning to the basket.

  That was the split-second opportunity Stripes needed. She came sprinting back up to the top of the hill.

  “Get down! Get down!” Stick Dog said urgently to the others. “We can’t let them see us!”

  They all scooched back, out of sight of the family. It was only a matter of seconds before Stripes came hurtling over the top of the hill to join them.

  “What happened? Where were you guys?!” she asked, panting.

  “I hadn’t finished talking,” Stick Dog said. “I was saying, I wanted all of us to run in as fast as possible— ”

  “Yeah, yeah!” Stripes interrupted. “That’s what I did!”

  “ —but we wouldn’t be able to because there were too many people. You ran off before I could finish my sentence,” Stick Dog explained.

  “Oh,” Stripes said, and dropped her head a little, still panting. “Sorry about that.”

  “Just stay here with us, okay?”

  “Okay, sure thing,” said Stripes. Her voice turned deadly serious as she addressed Poo-Poo, Karen, and Mutt. “Listen, I’ve got very bad news. Those aren’t just normal humans down there. They’re like super-warrior humans or something. Very mean and very dangerous, I think. They have weapons.”

  “What do you mean?” asked Mutt.

  “That warrior-woman,” Stripes said, “has a double-bladed silver sword.”

  “That was a big fork,” Stick Dog said, but nobody heard him. The others were focused on Stripes. The fear and anxiety in her voice commanded all of their attention.

  “She was charging at me!”

  “She was walking,” Stick Dog corrected.

  “She was going to stab me with it!”

  “She was going to flip the hamburgers on the barbecue.”

  “Then she went back to that evil basket to get another weapon.”

  “She was getting salt.” Stick Dog sighed again.

  Mutt, Poo-Poo, and Karen didn’t hear anything that Stick Dog had said. They were starting to panic. Their fear made them back further and further down the hill, away from the park. And to Stick Dog’s dismay, away from the hamburgers.

  “Stop,” Stick Dog said firmly. “Everyone calm down. Come back up here. They’re not warriors with weapons. They’re just having a picnic, and they use that metal thing to cook the hamburgers. That’s all.”

  “They don’t use it to stab hamburger thieves?” asked Stripes.

  “Of course not,” Stick Dog said.

  “Are you sure?” Mutt, Karen, and Poo-Poo asked in unison, inching back up the slope towards Stick Dog.

  “I’m sure.” Stick Dog nodded. “Come on. Come look.”

  They all peered down at the gazebo. Sure enough, the woman was turning the hamburgers with the long silver fork.

  “I don’t know, Stick Dog,” Mutt said, still wary. “This might be too dangerous. Look at the two little humans. They look like warriors too.”

  “How so?”

  “Well, that girl can kick that black-and-white ball about a hundred miles per hour. And that boy – just look at him! He’s letting the ball hit him right on top of the head over and over again.”

  “That’s amazing!” said Karen.

  “I’m pretty sure that’s just how they play with that kind of ball,” said Stick Dog.

  “Are you nuts?” Mutt exclaimed. “What kind of creature would let himself get knocked on the head over and over like that?!”

  “Stick Dog?” asked Poo-Poo, looking back up at the walnut tree.

  “Yes?” Stick Dog answered, trying to keep his composure. His stomach now felt almost empty. And the smell of those sizzling hamburgers was drifting right up the hill at them.

  “Can we please move out from under this tree?”

  “Yes, yes,” said Stick Dog. “Follow me – nice and low – to that honeysuckle bush.”

  They all followed Stick Dog to the honeysuckle bush. Something about the sweet aroma of the honeysuckle flowers and Stick Dog’s soothing voice settled the other four dogs considerably.

  “All right. Time to make a plan,” said Stick Dog. “We’ve made it this far. We’ve found the hamburgers. Now we just have to figure out how to get the hamburgers.”

  “I’ve got an idea,” Mutt said.

  “Great,” said Stick Dog. “What’s your plan?”

  “There are four of them and five of us,” Mutt began. “So me, Stripes, Karen, and Poo-Poo each choose a person.”

  Mutt turned and pointed towards Stripes and Poo-Poo with his nose. Then he swivelled his head to the left and right a few times. He asked, “Where’s Karen?”

  Now, Karen, of course, is a dachshund. The top of her head is only about eight inches tall, and the top of her back is only about five inches off the ground. Stripes, Poo-Poo, Mutt, and Stick Dog had lost Karen before. Once when the lawnmower man a
t Picasso Park was on vacation, they had lost Karen in a patch of very thick, very tall grass.

  So there was no need to be alarmed.

  Yet.

  To avoid being overheard by the hamburger-barbecuing family, Stick Dog whispered low and hard, “Karen. Karen!”

  Do you know what whispering “low and hard” means? It’s the kind of whisper my mum uses when she discovers I’m chewing Bubble Yum bubble gum in the library. My favourite flavour? Original. Even though “original” is not technically a flavour, if you think about it.

  Karen didn’t answer.

  “She must be in the brush somewhere,” said Stick Dog, his stomach rumbling loudly. “Help me look around, please – quietly.”

  The four of them spread out and began using my mum’s you’re-so-busted-chewing-Bubble-Yum-original-flavour-bubble-gum-in-the-library whisper.

  “Karen! Karen!”

  Stripes searched through some cattail reeds. Mutt pawed through a bunch of leaves that the wind had blown into a pile. Poo-Poo stood on his hind legs and looked up into the top branches of a sycamore tree.

  Stick Dog called them back together. “Anything?”

  They all shook their heads.

  “This is awful,” moaned Mutt. “What could have happened to her?”

  “She was here just a minute ago,” said Poo-Poo.

  “I’m really going to miss her,” said Stripes. “I’m going to miss watching her chase her tail and not catch it. I’ll miss watching her try to jump high off the ground even though her legs can only push her about two inches in the air. She really was entertaining, you know. What a loss.”

  “And that tail,” said Poo-Poo, dropping his head and staring at the ground. “Whenever she was happy, that tail could really get wagging. I remember once, I was too close to her when she found half of a potato chip by her favourite garbage can at Picasso Park . . .”