Throw Away Teen Read Online Free Page B

again. Dogs couldn’t strip your flesh just by licking you, could they? “Uh, what’s his name?”
    “ Whatever you want,” Liz said. “I don’t see how anyone can get through life without their own dog.”
    “ You’re kidding, right?” I stared at her and then again at the puppy in my arms. I’d gotten along just fine without a pet for fifteen years. Seriously, what was up with these people? How did they know I could even be trusted with something so little? Weren’t they afraid I’d skin it and eat it raw or something? He didn’t weigh much, maybe five or six pounds. That could feed a whole family in Ethiopia for days. “I’m not really into dogs.”
    “ Have you ever had one before?” Liz asked, tilting her head to one side.
    “ No.” Why hadn’t I put this wriggly little mutt down yet? I just held him while he kept trying to slobber me with his stupid kisses. Honestly. He was like an anteater or that dog in the comics with the insanely huge tongue.
    “ You can’t be in 4-H without a dog.” Ringo showed up in the doorway of another room.
    More puppy kisses. I held the dog by his armpits so I could meet his beady little eyes. “Look, enough already. Where’s your dignity? You’re a man, aren’t you?” How did you check a dog for gender anyway? I cleared my throat, praying my face hadn’t just turned bright red. “Act like Bull. You don’t see him kissing all over me, do ya?”
    “ Good luck with that,” Ringo said, laughing. “You don’t train a dog by talking to him.”
    “ How do you know?” I said. “Have you tried it?”
    “ How’s the lawn?” Liz asked. “Done yet?”
    “ Almost.” Ringo grinned at her. “I’d better finish before Ted gets home.”
    “ Don’t let the dogs outside,” Liz told him, then turned back to me. “Come on, honey. I’ll show you the rest of the house.”
    “ Okay.” I put the puppy on the floor, hoping to make my escape, but he trotted behind me.
    I followed Liz down the hall. A living-room opened off to the right, a formal dining room with a huge table and matching wooden chairs off to the left. A third door led to a bathroom. At the end of the hall was a flight of stairs and we started up to the second floor.
    I was on the third step when I heard crying again. I looked over my shoulder. The puppy had his front feet on the step below me, whimpering while he struggled to follow us. “What a wuss.” I stomped back down and scooped him up. “Okay, but don’t get used to this, dog-breath.” He swiped at me with his tongue. “Cool it, will you? I really don’t like dogs.”
    I vaguely wondered what would happen to him when Liz and Ted sent me back to Evergreen. Not that I really cared, but no answers came to mind. The other dogs trooped along with us to the door where Liz and Carol waited for me. I watched the pack warily, but they didn’t seem interested in doing much other than traipsing along behind the humans. Maybe they found me as unappetizing as Jocelyn did.
    The huge bedroom was bigger than the one I shared with Irene and Terry back at the center. Lacy white and blue flowered curtains danced at the windows, the nauseating pattern spilling onto the comforter spread over the queen-sized bed. Oval blue braided rugs were scattered on the polished hardwood floor. I put the puppy down and he scrambled over to the small rug by the bed. He made himself dizzy tracing circles on the rug then promptly passed out in a little heap. His small chest rose and fell so rapidly, I thought for a moment he was hyperventilating.
    Carol walked across the room and pulled open the closet door. “A walk-in closet,” Carol marveled. “I wish my apartment had this kind of space.”
    I glanced inside the closet and a shudder ran down my spine. It was empty except for the usual shelves and rods and just large enough to be a cell. The closet’s light switch was located next to the door on the bedroom side. And why would you need to have a lock on a closet