"What do you want?" I ask it.
"Arg! Arg! Arg!"
I groan. Dogs aren't my thing. They're really not. But just to shut it up I get off the hammock and pick up the nuisance. I get back on the hammock with the thing in my arms. It has to lay on me because he'd fall through the holes otherwise. He finds a comfortable spot on my stomach and sighs contentedly.
Against my better judgment, I find myself petting him. Even though he probably has fleas and other insects living off his body, he's soft and fluffy, like a down comforter.
"I-me!"
I look down and spot a cherubic face smiling up at me. It's my little cousin, Matan. He can't say my name right, he just calls me I-me. I think it's cute so I don't correct him.
Mutt jumps off my lap and I sit up. I see Matan has collected flowers in his chubby hands, and they're for me. My frozen heart starts to melt as he hands me the yellow, purple, and white wildflowers (or weeds, however you choose to look at them).
His smile widens when I take the flowers from him, smell them, and say, "Mmmm."
It's amazing how little effort it takes to make a child happy. Unfortunately, they all grow up and become cynical sixteen-year-olds like me.
Picking Matan up, I set him on the hammock next to me. He laughs as I swing the thing back and forth. I take one of the flowers and push the stem into his hair, the flower sticking out of his long, curly locks.
"Pretty," I say, laughing.
I know he doesn't understand a word of English, but he laughs back, then takes a flower out of my hand and puts it into my hair. We do this for about ten minutes, until we're both full of colorful wildflowers sticking out of our hair.
He speaks Hebrew to me and I speak English back to him. It doesn't matter that we're both oblivious to what the other is saying, we're having fun. And fun is universal in any language.
A lady who I haven't seen before comes up to us and says something to Matan. He jumps off the hammock and runs to her.
"Yucky left him with me, but he wanted to come see you. I hope it was okay," she says.
"It's fine," I say. "What does the name Matan mean in Hebrew?"
She looks down at my little cousin. "It means 'gift,'" she explains before leading him away.
He turns back, runs to me, and gives me a big hug. "Shalom, I-me," he says, then bounds off.
I give a little wave. "Shalom, Matan."
When he looks back with his hair full of flowers and furiously waves back at me, I realize I've just made my second friend in Israel (Mutt being the first).
CHAPTER 11
Don't trust males. Human or otherwise.
Going into the house, I take out my nail polish and hold it up. Cotton Candy is the name of the color. It's a bright, shiny pink that sparkles in the sunlight. I think it'll look great when the hellish sun reflects off of it.
I decide to paint my nails outside in the sun after I take the old polish off. Sitting down on the concrete in front of the house, I open the bottle. I feel better. I guess doing something I'm used to doing back home helps.
The mutt lies down next to me, using me as his shady tree. I let him, just because he'll keep bugging me anyway. I paint my toenails until I hear a sound coming out of the mutt's butt that sounds surprisingly like a fart.
"Eww," I say.
The dog doesn't get up, he just looks at me like I'm bothering him.
"Listen, if you're going to hang around me there's a couple of rules. Rule number one: bark like a dog. Rule number two: take a bath before you rub up against me. Rule number three: I don't want a dog, so go find someone else to bug. Rule number four, five, and six: no dog farts. Got it?"
Wouldn't you know it the mutt gets his lazy ass up and walks away. Did I say something wrong? Maybe I should go play with him later. Just so there's no hard feelings.
I go back to painting my nails when I hear someone walk up to the house. I look over and it's Avi, the last guy in the universe I want to see. And he's staring at me.
I dip the brush in the nail polish.
"Why stare? You've already seen me without my clothes on," I say, trying not to look in his direction. It's pretty hard, because he looks like an Abercrombie model.
But then I remember he saw me naked and I want him to be anywhere but in my line of vision. I can't walk because my toenails are wet and I don't want to smudge them. Anyway, why should I be the one to move?
Mutt decides at that moment to come back. I expect him to come directly to me, but instead he hobbles over to Avi.
Traitor.
"I wouldn't touch that thing," I say. "He's dirtier than my Uncle Bob."
Uncle Bob works in a factory. He cleans up okay, but no matter how many times he washes his hands, there's always this black, gooey gunk stuck under his nails.
Avi bends down and pets the traitor, who wags his tail so vigorously you'd think it was a flag in some parade. Then he looks at me. Not the traitor, Avi.
"You're not much for helping, are you?" he says.
I don't even have to try and sneer, his comment makes my lip curl on its own.
"Whatever," I say.
Then I go back to painting my toenails a second coat. But now I'm so pissed at what Avi said my hand starts shaking and I'm getting nail polish on my toe-skin. Each stroke now looks like a two-year-old kid had a field day with the brush on my toes.
The dog trots over to me and buries his wet nose under my arm.
"Go away," I say.