Sometimes, the Best Excuse is the One with Wings
The dog attacked on the sidewalk outside Central Park, somewhere south of 82nd Street, south of the big stone steps of the Met. On the sidewalks underneath the branches bursting out of the park like, well, twigs out of a garbage bag, collecting all those leaves and detritus you raked up at the end of the autumn.
The worst part of it was that it was the dog he was walking that attacked him. He had named the dog Miffy in his head, but didn't dare call it that out loud. Not that he figured anyone would pay him any kind of attention, it was just that the off chance that someone did, well, he didn't want to be remembered by any piece of New York for having owned a dog named Miffy. Not that it was even his dog. But you know what first (and only) impressions are like.
The line of horse and carriages carrying a set of German businessmen enjoying a little sight seeing in their time off that stopped, pouring Germans onto the sidewalk like some sort of pirate siege, should the pirates be dressed as German businessmen riding horse-drawn carriages, was all the more embarrassing, as they encircled the dog and victim, who twirled on the sidewalk. It was like the time he'd been to an illegal cockfight in Texas, only less dusty, he was playing the part of the taller cock, and the dog was playing the part of the smaller one. And he wasn't drunk. He just circled the dog after it had yipped at him initially, looking for a tree to put between himself and the dog, which he couldn't, of course, because suddenly there were a dozen or more Germans standing around him, shoulder to shoulder, preventing any sort of escape.
When the dog pounced and the two of them spilled to the ground on a newly icy patch on the pavement, legs and leash akimbo, one of the more industrious Germans leapt in with his briefcase, nearly knocking the dog walker unconscious, as the edge of the leather, hard like a sackful of oranges is hard, swung and connected just above his left temple. The German, the police would learn later, was trying to bludgeon the dog, but failed, due to a combination of the icy sidewalk, the rolling dog and dog walker, and his inexperience wielding a briefcase as a weapon. If he'd had more experience on the subway in rush hour he'd, at the very least, have been better at subtly using the briefcase as an enforcer.
The dog walker (for want of a better name, as we've failed to provide him another) managed to squirt out of the mêlée, which had the effect of dragging the dog out of the pile of one German businessman, flailing around wildly with his briefcase. He leaned against the low stone bordering the park, eyeing the dog warily, testing for loose rocks to just out and out brain the thing into oblivion, should it attack again.
The police cars arrived shortly after, as he'd just about caught his breath, and located the source of the bleeding (the dog had bitten through the cuff of his pants, the soft leather upper of his shoe, his sock, and his ankle, in that order, which had generated a tiny trickle of blood down into his sock. They had originally arrived to get the horse and carriages moving again, which they did, as the horse drivers were only too happy to leave their (fully paid up) fares standing by the roadside, watching a dog, the dog walker, and one of their colleagues strewn about the sidewalk. But the sight of a man flailing around on the sidewalk while another bled into his sock and seemed to be cornered against the stone wall by a tiny dog led them to investigate further. Which is how the police got the statement of the intrepid German regarding his intent with his briefcase.
And when the former mayor, Rudy Guiliani and a New York Daily News reporter, walking arm-in-arm down 5th Avenue on this chilly early day of winter happened upon the scene, well, that was when the dog walker made the impression he had really been hoping to avoid making.
disclaimer:
So. We got nine words in the end of NaNoWriMo. We won't reprint them here, in case we decide to finish the novel. We wouldn't want to spoil the story or make you think you could afford to not buy the book, when and if it ever comes out.
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