The One With the Water Dog

Date: 5/31/2019

Renee and I meet up with Jordan and Autumn in someone’s driveway late at night. Autumn hugs Renee in the weirdest way, and then hugs me the like that as well (she barely touches me, and does something bizarre with her arms). I walk over to hug Jordan and awkwardly say, “Heeey.” We’re apparently going on a trip together. A woman (who is supposed to be one of their mothers) comes out into the garage with us carrying a stuffed animal. I say, “Oh my God, is that a Build-A-Bear?!” I remember that Jordan, Autumn and I had some weird thing about Build-A-Bear together (but we actually didn’t) ... I’m in a pet store with Brianna and Renee. We see a fish tank with a really cute goldfish in it, so I rush over to look at it. When I peer inside, I see a tiny, chubby black lab. I realize that this is a “water dog.” It’s super cute. A rainbow-tinted bubble appears around its nose and mouth as it swims up to the surface for air. I remember that mine died when I was little, so I’m a little skeptical about having one. I ask the storekeeper if they make good pets. He says that they do, and when I turn around to see baby otters in a glass enclosure, he says, “Those are the ones you’ve gotta worry about.” ... I’m in a huge gift shop in either Disney or Universal (or possibly a mix of both). Renee, Brianna and I have bought a bunch of pins. They leave me to do something, and I walk around the Harry Potter section of the store (which plays Harry Potter movies). There are scrolls and props and dress robes on mannequins. No one is around, and as I look at all the merchandise, I think about how people usually identify as Gryffindors and Slytherins because those are the two houses that get focused on in the movies. I think about how being a Slytherin isn’t that bad, and look down to see that I’m holding a glowing green orb. I decide to go through my pins, but I can’t find any of my own and I start getting mad. I pull out one shaped like a tiny digital camera with little safety pins on it and I know that it must be Brianna’s. There’s also a white Mickey hat that has something to do with I Love Lucy, and I get annoyed because I didn’t get a pin that really commemorated the trip for me. I realize that I’m in a gift shop and that I can buy whatever I want before we leave.