My Dog is Neither

A Story by .Mary-Kate

I usually write happy stuff.

               “I saved you,” she said proudly. “I saved you because you were both, like me!”
              “Are you an angel?”
              “No. Maybe.” She thought for a moment. “I don’t think there is a word for what I am yet.”
              “You let everyone else die,” I cried. “They were all drowning, but you took me.”
       The angel wiped the tears from my eyes and the snot from my nose. “You were the only one that was both. They were saying, “Women and Children First,” remember? And you were both. A woman and a child. A little girl, like me.”
              “I was the only one who was both,” I said, horrified. “We were both, both.”
              “That’s why. Because we’re both, both.”
              “You couldn’t have saved my dog?”
              “He wasn’t both. He was neither.”
              And I started to cry again, because my dog wasn’t neither. He was my dog.