Things that go bump in the night

My mom's dog, Koko was a special needs dog with a too-long tail, an even longer tongue, and four rickety knees. Picture an alligator with the coloring of a Doberman then add some static electricity and a thick spray of Aquanet. That was Koko. She was the sweetest dog you ever met, but ferocious when guarding her squeaky toys. Chalk her temperament up to a hardscrabble puppyhood in Delta, Utah. More so, blame her rather unconventional parents. 

Ziggy and Muttley were my brother's two dogs—a brother and sister team who never could keep their dirty paws off of each other. Their trysts resulted in more than one litter of countless pups including Koko and Petey (the dog with no feety).

What would drive two mongrels like these into such unbridled lust? It certainly wasn’t a physical beauty that drew them together. Does chasing pheasants all day increase one’s testosterone level? Are the pheromones of wet dog so irresistible? Or maybe (short of the Snow Goose Festival) there’s just not a lot to do in Millard County in Early March. Whatever the reason, Ziggy and Muttley were in love. There was no denying or stopping it.

One night, Muttley lie awake at the foot of my brother’s bed with one eye open, one ear cocked—waiting to hear the sounds of snoring. That was his signal. Once the family was finally asleep he could make his move. Ziggy sat on the couch wondering what was on Nightline when the invitation finally came. 

Muttley leapt onto the couch and nudged her with his waffle-cone muzzle. Ziggy rolled her eyes and let loose with a sigh. The 10:00 news had depressed her—what with the war, the ports and all. He nudged her again and let out a whimper—that one that says “come on, just one more table scrap?” Ziggy caved. She gave him a nibble on the ear and they escaped through the doggy door into the cold country air. Their hearts raced. Their breath huffed clouds of anticipation.

Delta is quiet. Except for the distant sound of an occasional flock of honkers or the whinny of a horse a couple of acres away there’s not much sound. There’s also not much to see at that time of night. An occasional porch light isn’t enough to illuminate the barns, the tractors and the long stretches of desolate road. 

Maybe Ziggy wanted something a little dangerous. Maybe Muttley wanted it right there. Right now. Maybe it was both. They must have thought that a moonlit romp on back road in Delta was safe enough, but neither one of them possessed much in the good judgment category.

“Now!” Muttley yapped. “Huh?” Ziggy answered in that Scooby-Doo sort of way. “Now!” he yapped again. It was too much for Ziggy and he nipped her on the ear and scampered  around her in a circle. They stopped—frozen for a second or two, their eyes locking onto each other like two deer in the headlights. Then the teasing continued. Soon, this game of cat and mouse evolved into something right out of “Lady & The Tramp—The Director’s Cut.”  The couple became so embroiled, so entangled, they fused together as one and were eventually immobilized—in the middle of the road in the middle of the night in the middle of “It.”

There isn’t a lot of traffic in Delta, but whatever car there was that night barreled along the road past my brother’s house. The moon and the headlights tried their best to shed some warning, but two black dogs in one intertwined knot aren’t easy to see in the dark. The driver recognized too late what it was as the ker-thump under the tires jolted her back to reality and made her heart sink.

Ziggy and Muttley were dead. Canis interruptus.

It wasn’t until morning that the family learned of the tragedy. There was a note on the door. My brother broke the news to the family then gathered the dogs up in a box and buried them beneath the big elm tree by the shed. There, in the yard where they used to romp with the geese, where they chased cats and each other—they’d spend forever together.

Meanwhile, no one had the heart to tell Koko that she was now an orphan. Being a special needs dog she never took solace in knowing her mother/aunt and father/uncle died with smiles on their faces.