That dog was going to EAT Dwight.
Jeff jumped from the paver to the lawn, then sprinted to the front door. He pushed it open, giving Dwight a way to escape without turning around.
Dwight must have seen the movement in his periphery, because he half turned his head.
The dog attacked.
One head sank its teeth into the side of Dwight’s calf while the other went for the upper thigh. Dwight tried to hit it with his pole, but the angle was awkward with such a long pole in close quarters, and it bounced weakly off the dog’s rear end. The higher head snapped up into Dwight’s gloved hand, which he yanked back with a yelp.
Dwight dropped the pole and brought his elbow down hard on the dog’s skull. It snapped its jaws at his elbow, but it looked like it couldn’t get a good bite on the thick suit.
As the dog tried to find purchase on his elbow, Dwight reached behind his back with his other hand and grabbed a black rod hanging from his belt. “What is that…?” Jeff whispered to no one. With no conscious thought, he had backed away from the house almost to the sidewalk. Now he took a step closer to try to see.
Dwight whipped the black rod around, jabbed it into the dog’s neck and squeezed. There was a crackle, and the dog’s frame became rigid. A stun baton. Dwight jerked himself away, tearing his pant leg as it wrenched out of the dog’s mouth.
The dog convulsed and tipped sideways onto the floor, twitching. Everyone stood silent for a long moment. Dwight panted, staring down at the dog.
“Is it okay?” Jeff called.
Slowly, Dwight bent to retrieve his catch pole, which was under the still-twitching body. As he pulled on one end of the pole, the dog rolled onto its belly, and one head snapped forward at Dwight’s hand.
It was too much; Dwight turned and ran, slamming the door behind him.
Jeff ran back to the window, barely aware of his parents and sister rushing to help the bedraggled Dwight. As Jeff reached the window, he saw the dog rock itself forward, get its legs under it, then lurch unsteadily to its feet.
The dog staggered sideways into the wall and rested against it, panting. Then it sniffed its way to the door where it stood up on its hind legs and peered through the glass. Upright, it was probably as tall as Jeff’s dad.
The dog dropped back to all fours and looked around. Jeff stopped breathing as one head saw him in the window and seemed to focus. The other head swiveled around, and Jeff felt the laser intensity of the four eyes boring into him. Then in unison, the two heads gave out a roar that shook the windows.
It seemed to Jeff, as he scrambled away, tripping over the sidewalk and crab walking onto the lawn, that it was a roar to shake the earth.
SEVEN
“Hey Nacho. It’s Jeff.”
“Hey.”
“Hey. Do you have any steaks?”
“What?”
“Steaks, or like, any big chunks of meat?”
“Um, not on me?”
Growl. “No, seriously. Do you guys have any meat?”
“Probably. Why?”
“It’s kind of a long story. Or, well, I guess it’s not that long. This morning when we woke up, Dusty was gone, and there was a two-headed dog in our kitchen. The Animal Control guy freaked out and left, the police keep saying it’s Animal Control’s job to pick up animals, so they won’t come over, but Animal Control won’t come back until Monday when they have more people. They said we could call the National Guard. But I guess it’s actually kind of hard to call the National Guard, or maybe he was joking, and my mom’s about to lose it and murder someone, she’s so mad. And my dad keeps hinting that maybe we should ask my neighbor that’s a hunter to just come and shoot it. But I think it’s just really hungry, and that’s why it’s roaring and trying to attack everyone, and if we gave it some food, maybe we could lure it out of the house and make friends with it. And maybe like, you know... keep it. And then show it to everyone at school.”
There was a pause, then a flurry of questions, and Jeff ended up repeating the story at least twice, with many more details, before Nacho finally agreed to bring some meat.
Ten minutes later, Nacho was stepping off his bike in Jeff’s driveway, setting the kickstand down, then swinging his backpack into Jeff’s anxious hands. Jeff pulled the package out and frowned. “One chicken breast?”
“We didn’t have any steak. But it should work, shouldn’t it?”
“I dunno. It just seems like dogs like red meat.” Jeff saw Nacho’s crestfallen expression and added quickly, “But it should totally work. Dusty will eat anything. So will this dog. This will be great. Thanks.”
He glanced over at his parents, who hadn’t noticed Nacho yet. “Let’s go around to the back. We’ll get the dog out of the house, and we’ll start getting it used to us so we can train it and show it to everyone. Come on.”
Jeff peeled open the cellophane on the styrofoam deli tray, then set it carefully at the end of the back patio. Some twenty feet away, he could see Nacho standing at the open gate, ready to swing it shut once Jeff was safely through.
Jeff tiptoed to the back sliding door. Inside, he could see the dog’s tail; it was still in the kitchen, pawing through the overturned garbage. Jeff took a deep breath and held it.
He jerked the door open, then
