Friend

Friend is my stuffed animal toy that looks like a pug. Friend has had many lives. The first Friend disappeared when I tried to take him on a walk. Other Friends have had their stuffing ripped out and their heads torn off. Friends often disappear out in the yard in the fall and are discovered in the spring, lying in a mud puddle. Friend has a doppelganger who lives at my grandparents' house. However, never in the many incarnations of Friend has Friend met his end in an unfortunate lawnmower accident. That is an honor belonging to Stretchy Dog, a dachshund look-alike toy who, as his name indicates, stretches out when you pull on him.

Today, Friend is lying in the exact, geographical center of the back porch. Both the porch and Friend are wet, as it has been raining. A squirrel crawls slowly toward Friend. From the squirrel's angle, Friend looks like another squirrel; he is roughly the same size as a squirrel, and has similar coloring. The real squirrel crawls closer, sniffing. Crawling is the right word, as the squirrel's knees are bent and its belly is dragging on the surface of the porch. He gets close enough to Friend to determine that Friend is not a dead squirrel. Then he runs away, around Friend, keeping a wide berth.