a pet resemblance

We have an eight-pound Chihuahua, the runt of the litter. His white coat is marked with miniature continents of black, like a Holstein hide. The spawn of a cow and a sea monkey, I tell people. He loves the street but is frightened of most objects we come across – hula hoops, recycling bins, shopping bags. Strangers call him “killer” and ask whether he runs on batteries. I smile like I’ve not heard these jokes before.

At night, he burrows deep under the comforter, along with several toys. Whenever I lift the covers, he’s in a different position – curled into a ball, stretched like a pork loin, upside down on his side. Each time at different spot on the mattress as if moved by some unseen force, a cosmonaut free-floating through space. His miniature tennis ball and stuffed bone orbiting him everywhere he goes.

I was like him once, decked out in another animal’s clothes, in love with streets that frightened me, seeking out the dark under blankets. But I never mastered tumbling through space. Only down sidewalks I no longer recognized, hand shaped like a bottle, satellites long since spun away.