by Saachi Khanna

A girl named Susie was walking down the street in the country on a cold evening. She was all bundled up in coats and scarves. Still, Susie was very cold. Then out of nowhere a little puppy appeared. It was very cute and cuddly. She picked it up and it snuggled close to her. “I will call you Snuggles,” she said. Susie brought it home to her mother and asked if she could keep it. Her mother said yes. She gave it some warm water because it was shivering from the cold. Then she went to bed with Snuggles at her feet. That night Susie fell asleep smiling.

          The next morning when Susie woke up and saw Snuggles at her feet, she wondered what he was doing at her feet.Then she remembered. Susie carefully got out of bed without waking him up. Slowly she walked to her mother who had just woken up. “What should I feed him?” Susie asked. “Give him some biscuits,” her mother told her. So she went to the cupboard and took out four biscuits. A few minutes later Snuggles came out and whined for the biscuits.She gave them to him. Then she got dressed and went to take Snuggles out for a walk. Susie did not know what to use as a leash so she used her own jump rope and tied it around him. Out she went into the cold winter morning. Susie checked on Snuggles to make sure he was not cold.

The next morning when Susie woke up her eyes fell on Snuggles. He was taller than he had been last night, and she didn’t like big dogs. She shouted to her mother, who arrived in less than a minute. “Look!” Susie said. “I see.” her mother replied. When her mother left she quickly scribbled a sign that said: FOR SALE. Then Susie went outside to sell him. After a while some person came up to ask the price and Susie said that it was for free.The person took Snuggles and then Susie headed home feeling very upset. She missed her puppy but she did not want a big puppy. Big dogs did not look nice.They also looked kind of scary.

When she got home her mother asked her where Snuggles was.

“He got lost,” Susie lied.

“Oh.” said her mother.

Then she went to her room and slammed the door shut. Susie got a piece of paper and scribbled red crayon all over it, showing how angry she was at that moment. After a while Susie’s hand got tired of scribbling so she stopped and put on her jacket. Susie quietly slipped out of the house and started walking in no particular direction. A few minutes later a puppy appeared and started to run towards Susie. Susie  avoided it and it and the puppy ran away. She thought that this puppy would have the same problem. Then she went home and her mother scolded her for leaving the house without asking her first. “Sorry,” Susie said and walked to her room. She was not allowed to leave the house without permission. Susie felt very annoyed. She took out a book called Charlotte’s Web. Susie was on the part where they had to sell the tiny tiny pig. She read a few pages and then got very bored because she was reading the book for the fifth time. Susie flipped the book over and took out a piece of paper. She drew a picture of the tiny tiny pig from Charlotte’s Web. It looked kind of like a puppy. When the picture was finished Susie hung it on her bedroom ceiling. For that she used a step ladder plus a chair. Susie almost fell over but she caught herself just in time. She felt happy that her picture had turned out well because she was not that good at drawing pigs. Then she went to sleep.

The next morning when she woke up Susie realized that today was her birthday. She had forgotten. Nothing could bother her today. She ran to the kitchen where her mother was making a cake. “Happy birthday!” her mother said. Susie went to put her birthday dress on. That day Susie did lots of fun things. But best of all, her mother gave her a toy poodle. The smallest dog in the world!