Papa Pete dropped me off in front of my building, and as I got in the elevator, my fingers were itching to press the six button instead of ten. Six is Frankie’s floor, and I really wanted to check in with him and tell him the story of The Spider Who Ate My Birthday Party. When you have a best friend, there’s nothing better than being able to share a great adventure, even if it turned your birthday party into a bad horror movie.
I didn’t press six, though. I had made such a big deal about giving myself my own birthday party and not needing any of my friends to be there that I felt I should finish the day out all by myself. I mean, either you’re an independent party giver and goer, or you’re not. Right? And that’s same reason I didn’t push the fourth-floor button, which is Ashley’s floor. So my thumb had no choice but to find its way to the tenth-floor button, which would take me home.
“Rosa, I hope you’re thinking about what you just did,” I said to her as we rode up the elevator. “I really had a great party planned, and it did not include you doing the backstroke in a bowl of minestrone.”
Rosa just sat there, hanging on the side of her tank, pulsating. But her body was turned away from me. I don’t think she could look me square in the eye. She knew. I truly believed she had learned her lesson. And I didn’t want to punish her. After all, she’s just a baby.
“Hey, everyone, I’m home,” I called as I walked in the door. Silence yelled back at me. The only thing that broke the silence was Cheerio, who scampered down the hallway and, as he always does, slid the last seven feet on the slippery floor.
“Hey, boy,” I said, scratching him behind the ears. “At least someone’s glad to see me.”
I decided to put Rosa’s tank down on the coffee table in the living room, so she could have a look around and get used to that room, since she hadn’t spent a lot of time in there. Then I went into my bedroom and tossed my jacket on my bed instead of hanging it up right away. I made a mental note to hang it up before my mom saw it. I looked around for Cheerio, who usually follows me wherever I go, so that I could have a friendly boy-dog wrestle, which is our tradition when I come home. He wasn’t there, but I heard him growling in the living room…a low growl that came from the bottom of his throat. This was definitely not a Cheerio sound.
I raced into the living room and found him standing on the coffee table, crouching like a lion and inching himself toward Rosa’s tank. He had his head down and his eyes never left Rosa’s tank. He was definitely giving her the evil eye. Wow, my little Cheerio suddenly looked like one of those hunting dogs that you see on Animal Planet.
Rosa wasn’t taking it too well. She was hunched in the corner of her tank, hanging upside down off the upper corner next to the lid. She had made herself into the smallest ball possible. Seven of her legs were wrapped around her body, and she was using the eighth to hang on for dear life. I could tell she was trying to make herself invisible, and I couldn’t blame her. I mean, to her, Cheerio must have looked like a T. rex about to gobble her up for lunch.
“Cheerio!” I said in a voice so harsh it surprised even me. “This is completely unacceptable. Get off the table this instant.”
Cheerio looked at me and growled.
“Don’t use that tone of growl with me, young man,” I said. “And get off that table immediately. You’re scaring your baby sister. You should be nice to her.”
Cheerio only did half of what I commanded him to do. He did jump down off the table, but instead of being nice to Rosa, he started to run in circles around the table. He usually chases his tail around in circles just as his hobby, but now, it seemed like he was running in circles to keep me from getting close to the table.
“Cheerio, sit!” I said. “And I’m not kidding.”
I must have had that “you better listen and listen now” tone to my voice that my dad is so good at, because Cheerio’s bottom hit the floor at lightning speed. The truth is, and I don’t mean to insult Cheerio, when you’re a dachshund with those short legs, you don’t have far to go before your butt is introduced to the floor.
“That’s more like it,” I said to him. Then I reached out and grabbed Rosa’s tank. She was still curled up in the top corner, although the motion of me lifting the tank made her sway from side to side like she was on a swing.
“You okay, girl?” I said to her. “Cheerio didn’t mean to scare you. He’s probably just jealous of you, because you came to the party and he wasn’t invited. It’s hard to have a new baby in the house.”
Whoa, suddenly it hit me like a sack of cat’s-eye marbles. Cheerio had the same feelings that I was experiencing. I mean, he had always been the main dog in our house, and my favorite pet. We had a special relationship, him and me, like Batman and Robin. Now that Rosa was here, he was scared that he was going to lose his place with me.
Wow, did I know that feeling.
I put Rosa down behind me, out of Cheerio’s sight. Then I kneeled down right in front of him and scratched him on his favorite spot. I started at his ears and worked my way down the sides of his mouth, ending up at his nose. I could tell that this was a super deluxe scratch treatment for him because he got a faraway look in his eyes, and his back leg—do not ask me, because I don’t know if it was his right or his left—started to scratch the air like it does when he’s over-the-moon happy.
“Don’t worry, Cheerio,” I said. “I still love you and I always will.”
Cheerio put his head in my lap and made a sound that I swear sounded like, “I’m sorry, Rosa.”