Story by Jay Abington
I grew up in the mountains of CA. On my tenth birthday my mom got me a Shepard pup I named Shad. He grew to be quite large and was fully devoted to me. This particular day Shad and I walked to the store a few miles away to get a soda. We were sitting on some crates outside drinking my soda and this truck pulls in with a man and a woman in it. I noticed they were arguing. The woman gets out of the truck and starts walking to the store. Then the man gets out slams his door and starts to go after her. Well, shad just bolts from my side and runs across the parking lot and gets between the man and the woman and stops then turned to the guy who had stopped.
As soon as he took a step, Shad showed his teeth. The guy then went to take a step and go around and Shad took a step towards him. I was calling him the whole time but he ignored me. The woman kept walking and got on the pay phone. I wasn’t going to go near them cause I figured if I got any closer Shad would go after the guy and I told him so.
The guy finally got in his truck and left.
The woman came over after she got off the phone as did some other customers to say thanks to Shad. It was then I noticed how beat up the woman was. Looked like she had been crying for a long time and she had bruises on her arms and neck.
A few minutes’ later three sheriffs pulled in. The woman got in one of the cars and they left. I was so proud of Shad but I had never seen him show his teeth before and it was scary.
When I got home that night and told mom what had happened and she knelt down and hugged Shad saying “good boy Shad good boy.”
Then she said kind of in his ear, “I knew you would keep an eye on my boy for me.”
