“Stop it! Stop it!” he pleaded with the dog.
But the dog paid him no attention and did a graceful spin in the air like a ballet dancer. The neighbor quaked with fear when he realized he might not be imagining this dancing dog. The thought scared him. It gave him a bitter taste in his mouth when he reluctantly concluded that the dancing dog was real.
The neighbor knew there was only one thing to do. He stormed into the house and went into the bedroom to get his gun. I must kill this dog and stop this nonsense at once, he thought. He was convinced that the dog was purposefully trying to drive him crazy and ruin his peace of mind.
The neighbor thought he was too intelligent, had too much business savvy to let a stupid dog put a strain on his mental health. While loading the gun with bullets, he seethed with anger on how the dog next door would always bark at him. Why doesn’t that dog like me? I tried to be nice, but it always wanted to bite me when I tried to pet it a couple of times! The neighbor began to suspect that the dog next door was having a bad influence on his two English Boxers. They haven’t listened to my commands as well as they used to, and it seems they have been barking in the middle of the night about absolutely nothing and waking me from my sleep! The neighbor thought he was too busy to be bothered by a stupid dog. There was a business to run, a house to upkeep, and a woman to love and live with. He was certain without a doubt that the dog’s death would bring him peace. It was the dog and only the dog, he reasoned, that caused a problem in his life.
The woman who loved and lived with him came into the bedroom to tell him that his breakfast was ready when she saw him with the gun. With her hands to her cheeks, she asked him who he was planning to shoot.
“I’m going to shoot the dog next door!” he raged. “It’s been making a fool out of me for too long now!”