My master is an alien to this planet, so am I. People often ask him if I'm a breed they don’t know about. He tells them that I'm a mutt. But I'm the cream of the crop where I come from. I love my master and he loves me.

Things were going well until that day.

He came along.

We were walking in the park that day. I felt my master tense and I sniffed the air. Most of the odors I knew from our daily walks, but there was one new one. My master's scent had changed as well. I turned my head seeking the new person in the park.

Walking toward us was a human pushing something in front of him. When we drew close my master stopped.

My master spoke and the human answered him.

I pulled away from master to check out the thing that the man was pushing. Inside was a miniature human. It kicked its limbs and made cooing noises. Then there was a loud popping noise and a horrible smell came to me on the breeze. I jumped away and moved behind my master.

The small human began to cry and the other man bent over to jiggle the thing it was lying in.

He spoke to my master and my master replied.

The other man walked away and went to the building where humans go when they have to do what I do on every bush.

After that we ran into him almost every day. Most days the 'baby' didn't make those horrible smells. We started to spend more and more time on our walks. And we began walking with the man and the baby.

As she got bigger we would stop on the lawn and I would try to communicate with her as she pulled at my ears. When she wasn't messy she actually smelled pretty nice. And she couldn't hurt me no matter how much she tugged.

One day as she crawled up on my back and went to sleep, I saw my master touch the man on his arm. The two of them smiled at us. I couldn't believe how sappy they were.

****** 

Then things changed.

The man started to come to our house. Sometimes he brought the baby. Sometimes it was just him. When it was just him, they would go in the bedroom and lock me out. I hated that. I have my own spot on the end of the bed.

Then came a day when my master began to put things in boxes. I was very confused. And even more so when the boxes began being carried down and put in a truck. I ran from room to room, looking for all my toys, but my master had found every one.

I love riding in the car with him. He puts the window down and I put my head out to see the world rush by. It feels wonderful. It was a fairly long car ride. And we pulled up in a drive next to a big house.

He opened the door and I jumped out. The door of the house opened and the girl ran out. I stood still and let her hug me. Then she ran out into the yard calling to me. My master told me to go play.

We explored the yard. I found lots of new scents and interesting places to check out. It was a big yard, almost as big as the park. I decided I could be happy there, even if I had to put up with the man and the girl every day.

It was getting late when my master called me in. There was a new cedar bed by the big fireplace and I settled there. My master and the human talked until very late and when they rose to leave the room, my master told me to stay.

But the human walked over to me and rubbed my ears. He said something to my master. He stood and patted his leg in the signal to heel. So I followed him.

The room we entered had a bed even bigger than the one my master used to sleep in. I wagged my tail as I saw that my blanket from home was draped over one corner of the bed.

I jumped up, turned several circles and then settled down.

The human rubbed my ears again and then went into another room. I was sleeping when the bed began to jiggle. Lifting up, I could see them rolling together.

Humans look silly when they rut. But if my master was happy – I could get used to it.

The end.