My Dog Ate a Kid.

So, there are these kids that live down the street from us, and they're always walking through everyone's yards and leaving lovely stuff on everyone's doorsteps. Like sticks. And broken sheets of plastic. And dead bugs.

I got fed up with it. One of them was walking around and around our yard, and looking back at the oldest kid, who seemed to be egging him on, and so I opened the front door, and asked, "Do you need something?"

The kid opened his mouth to answer, and just then, my beloved and protective terrier, Rascal, squeezed from behind my legs and went to politely check the kid out.

The boy immediately screamed, and I yelled, "Don't run! He can't chase you if you don't run!" But the kid didn't listen. He screeched like a banshee and ran around in circles, which everyone knows is not the thing to do when you have a terrier with the legs of a stallion.

In the forefront of my mind, of course, I was running towards my dog and yelling, "Rascal! No! Bad boy! Come!", but in the background, I could hear the older kid, the one who had been egging him on, laughing his head off! He was cracking up while his friend or little brother or whatever was being attacked by a dog in a stranger's yard!

If it was my little brother, I would have run towards the dog, pried the hound off him, and yelled at the girl (AKA moi) about controlling her dog. I wouldn't be laughing and not doing anything but sitting on my expensive green bike.

I grabbed my dog and herded him into the house, dragged him to my room, and threw him in the crate. I then rushed back outside to see if the kid was okay.

He was wailing, collapsed on the grass. "Are you okay?" I said, approaching him quickly. "Did he bite you?" The kid on the bike called from down the street. The younger one saw me coming and scrambled up, crying and bawling.

He started for the older kid, but the boy on the bike got this weird look on his face and sped away down the street, threw his bike into the garage, and shut it from he inside. I didn't see him for the rest of the day.

Meanwhile, the littler kid stumbled up the street to his house, I guess. To tell his parents on the meany-pants stranger girl whose dog had practically torn his face off.

And so, I don't think those kids'll be loping around our yard for a while, even if Rascal chasing the kid around WAS an accident. Maybe they've finally learned a lesson.