5 AM: Oh hi, it’s 0-dark-hundred and the dog is whining to go out.
Tierce: OUT out OUT out OUT
Me: Fine.
Tierce: Yay!
Me: Just pee or poop and get it over with.
Tierce: Hey, did you know that there’s a hole in the fence?
Me: No, wa- Tierce?
Tierce: Hey, they don’t cut their grass at all.
Me: Tierce!
Tierce: Doo-de-doo-de-doo.
Me: (hissing) TIERCE!
Tierce:
Me: TIERCE!
Tierce:
Me: Shit.
Me: Mischa!
Mischa: What? Yeah? Yeah! What?
Me: The dog’s gotten out of the fence and into the neighbour’s yard!
Mischa: Shit! Did you call him?
Me: Of course I called him!
Mischa: Sorry, sorry. Just waking up.
***time passes, filled with hissed commands, Mischa jumping into the neighbour’s yard, finding Tierce on the *other* side of the gate that had apparently swung shut after he merrily bolted through it***
Me: I fucking hate that dog.
Mischa: You don’t hate him. You love him!
Me: Not anymore.
Mischa: You’re obsessed with our dog.
Me: I am not!
Mischa: Julie, he has his own Facebook page.
Me: Well, he goes everywhere else without my permission, why not Facebook, too? You see some of the things he writes about me?
Mischa: You post a picture of him nearly every day.
Me: It’s not nearly that often. I haven’t posted a picture of him since… Monday.
Mischa: You post videos of him playing with other dogs.
Me: He’s cute! I mean, ‘was cute’.
Mischa: You love him and you know it.
Me: We hurt the people we love. Believe me, I want to love him passionately right now.
It was an overnight conspiracy! My shiba decided that a quarter to 4am was a good time to cry to be let outside.