Biscuit was a Basset Hound with a very important nose, ears that dragged along the floor like two velvet mops, and short legs that meant business. Tonight, he had one job. One. Single. Job.
Guard the birthday cake.
The cake stood on the kitchen table: five candles, blue frosting, magnificent. Biscuit planted himself in front of it, chest out, ears pooled on the cool tiles, eyebrows extremely serious. He was, he felt, an excellent guard dog. Sniff, sniff, sniff.
Then one ear twitched.
Cheese. Definitely cheese. Something sharp and crumbly, hiding behind the sofa. Biscuit's left ear lifted — just slightly — and sort of... pulled him sideways. His legs followed, because they always followed the ears. That was simply how Biscuit worked.
He pressed his nose into the gap behind the sofa. A cracker. One small cracker. He ate it in one slow, respectful crunch, then remembered the cake. He turned back. But his right ear had snagged on something crinkly — a curled ribbon, left over from the wrapping — and dragged it along as he shuffled down the hallway. Sniff, sniff, sniff.
The hallway smelled of cake and grass and something papery. Biscuit's ears swept across the floorboards like a slow, soft broom, collecting a streamer of pink confetti, then a slightly squashed paper party hat. He did not notice. His nose was busy with the grass smell, which was getting stronger, which meant the back door was open, which meant —
He was outside.
The garden was full of long cool shadows and the smell of cut grass and something else — something small and urgent, right inside his left ear. Biscuit froze. He shook his head. The something waved six tiny legs at him from inside a fold of ear-velvet. A beetle. A very determined beetle who had been trying to reach the party table for forty-five minutes and was, frankly, exhausted.
Biscuit looked at the beetle. The beetle looked at Biscuit.
Biscuit had no idea what to do with a beetle. So he did the only sensible thing: he turned around and lumbered back inside. His ears swept the garden path. His legs were already heading toward the cake, because the cake was where he was supposed to be, and Biscuit's legs knew this even when the rest of him forgot.
He stopped in front of the table. Sniff, sniff, sniff.
Then, very carefully, he lowered his left ear to the floor. The beetle stepped off, walked three dignified steps, and settled beside the cake stand like it had been invited all along. The ribbon and the paper hat slid off the other ear into a small, rather decorative pile. It looked, if you squinted, like someone had arranged them there on purpose.
The family came back in from the garden. They looked at the cake. They looked at the ribbon and the hat and the beetle. They looked at Biscuit.
"Biscuit," said the smallest child, with great admiration, "you decorated it."
Biscuit said nothing. He felt this was a reasonable conclusion.
He got a lick of blue frosting off a finger, which he accepted gravely. Then he turned three slow circles and folded himself under the table, ears spreading out across the floor like a blanket someone had dropped. One eye watched the last slice of cake. The other eye began, very slowly, to close.
The beetle stood by the cake stand, perfectly still, exactly where it had always wanted to be.
