Talking dog

I do want to have a dog anymore.

I used to have an Irish Wolfhound named Rusty.  He loved playing Frisbee in the clover field behind our house.

One day I threw it really hard.  It soared all the way up to the top of the barn next door.  A man was working up there.  He threw it over the trees and onto the freeway.

It landed on a big truck.  Rusty chased after it.

I heard screeching tires. 

He got hit by a cement truck.

We had a funeral for him, out in the clover field. My dad made a cross.  I cried and cried.  I vowed never to have another dog.

Then I met a talking dog. He was a shar-pei. One of those dogs that looks like a rumpled rug. I later named him Filbert, because I like picking filberts. He was standing over by the bank here in Trenton, Missouri. He had on a dog collar with what looked like diamonds on it. When I was looking at the dog collar, he said, “Are you trying to steal my collar?”  He sounded mean.

I looked around, scared. There was no one else around.  I thought it was one of those ventriloquist people.

Then he said, “What, never seen a talking dog before?”

“You’re talking!” I said.

“Well, yeah,” he said.

I ran away.  But he followed me home.

One reason I had a problem with the talking dog is because he told my mom that I want a baby brother. 

After I got home, I decided to keep him. I sneaked him into my room.  Before school the next day, I took him out and then put him on a blanket under my bed.

But my mom came in because she heard someone talking.  He was saying poetry.  He later told me she screamed when he talked to her.

“I’m going to go get Joshua’s father!” she said.

But he ran out in front of her and sat up on his hind legs, begging. Like Rusty used to.

“If you let me stay, I will tell you a secret about Joshua,” he said.

She stopped.

“He wants a baby brother. He told me so,” Filbert said.

She swooped up Filbert in her arms and kissed him.

When I got home, I was really mad. Mom said I could keep Filbert. But I was afraid he would tell more secrets.

Then I had an idea.  Each day I went out in the clover field and put a four-leaf clover under Mom’s pillow.

I still don’t have a baby brother.

But I have Filbert.

–Third grade class