Chapter 2
How About That?
“Stick Dog?” Karen whispered.
He smiled at her voice. He didn’t open his eyes. He just said, “Yes?”
“It’s me, Karen.”
“Okay, umm, thanks for telling me,” Stick Dog said.
“I just thought with your eyes closed and everything, I should, you know, identify myself,” Karen explained.
“We were just talking a few seconds ago,” Stick Dog said. He did enjoy his conversations with Karen quite a lot. They could be very, well, interesting. “And neither one of us has moved.”
“I just wanted you to be sure,” Karen said. “You know, that it’s me and my voice and everything.”
“I appreciate that,” Stick Dog said, trying to suppress the smile creeping onto his face as their talk continued. “But we’ve been friends for years now, Karen. We see each other almost every day. I recognized your voice. It’s quite unique—just like you.”
“What a nice thing to say, Stick Dog,” Karen said with pride. “Can I ask you a question?”
“Of course.”
“Could you open your eyes now?”
“Sure,” Stick Dog said, and opened his eyes.
“See, Stick Dog!” Karen exclaimed, and pushed herself up. “It is me!”
“It sure is,” he said. “How about that? It’s good to see you, Karen.”
“Good to see you too, Stick Dog,” she replied. “I didn’t take a nap after all.”
“I see that,” Stick Dog said. “What happened?”
“Well, I did what you said,” Karen explained, and began to pace back and forth in front of Stick Dog. “I imagined that Mutt’s rumbling stomach was a rainstorm and everything. And it was real peaceful and calm and all that. And, you know, the rainfall made that nice soothing sound and blah, blah, blah. All that stuff.”
“But it didn’t help you fall asleep?”
“No, not at all,” Karen said quickly. “Do you want to know why?”
“Sure. Tell me.”
“It’s because all that pretending and stuff made my brain keep going.”
Stick Dog tilted his head a bit to the left. He said, “I’m not quite sure what you mean.”
“It’s just that I couldn’t stop pretending,” Karen explained further. “So, I imagined the wind whooshing through the trees and then I thought some of the old branches and stuff would probably fall down. And I thought just how many branches would fall down in a whole forest. I mean, it could be millions and millions.”
“Umm, it would be a lot, I guess. For sure.”
“So, I imagined all those broken branches and sticks all over the ground in the forest,” Karen continued. She was happy that Stick Dog was following along, you could tell. “And then I saw myself going through the forest and stepping over all those branches and sticks. And I saw Mutt there. And Poo-Poo and Stripes. You were there too, Stick Dog!”
“That’s great,” Stick Dog said slowly. He wasn’t quite sure where all this was going. But with Karen, frankly, that was not an uncommon occurrence. “I’m glad we were all together.”
“And guess what I realized as I imagined all of us out there in the forest with those million and millions of broken sticks and branches?”
“What?”
“I realized how much I really, really, really love sticks!” Karen yelped and hopped up and down a few times. “I mean, sticks are awesome. You can chew on them. You can play fetch with them. And you can carry them around and knock into stuff with them. Heck, just having a stick—you know, like totally possessing it—is completely and totally awesome, don’t you think?”
“I, umm, like sticks too. You bet,” he said.
“Well, once I imagined all those sticks, there was no way I was going to sleep,” Karen said. “You know what I mean?”
“I understand,” Stick Dog said, and smiled. “So, would you like to go out in the woods and find some sticks right now?”
“Yes! Yes!! Yes!!!”
But they didn’t go find some sticks out in the woods right then.
No.
Mutt rolled over to face them.
“Did you guys say you want some sticks? I have some right here.”
And that’s when everything changed.