A dog named Rex

Days have passed since I joined kindergarten. Since I started to go to that place, I've made lots of friends from there that we now hang in the village from time to time. Well, mostly on weekends or before seventeen o'clock, going to an improvised village playground for little kids such as me.

Now, on a weekend, a sunny one of November, I was playing football with a few kids from the village, on an improvised football terrain, the one with the kick, not the rugby or the "American football". The kids were Amadeus, Alexander, Daniel, Urluescu, Ioan and Răzvan. All six are my classmates from the same kindergarten, all of us are neighbours into this village located far from Pitesti, one of the main cities the Arges county has to offer to Romania.

As we were playing a good game of football three versus three, I was put on the bench because I am bad on playing on the field, but I am more reliable in football when it comes to goalkeeper. So, I stayed on the bench, and waited until someone gets injured or someone gets tired of playing as goalkeeper.

I looked on the football field. I've seen how the friends I've met on the kindergarten are running with the ball, kicking hard to the goalposts and sliding to take the ball. These guys sure like to play rough, but what can I say, we were all kids back then and don't really know the rules of football. Back then we were playing this sport because there were a lot of girls coming when the big boys were coming to this football field on nights and watched them as they play football. I wasn't interested very much in girls unlike my friends, especially Răzvan and Daniel, who are one year older than us, but they ended to enter kindergarten later for some reason I don't know to this day.

We played this game for a while, then something has happened. Urluescu kicked the ball to hard that is send it far from the football field. It landed near a dense creek. The kids were looking at Urluescu, but then they observed I am off the pitch and they told me to go to that creek and take the ball. The reason they've thought of me was because I am faster than Urluescu, who at that time was fatter than any regular kid on the kindergarten I've known.

Without saying anything, I've raised on my feet, and ran to the creek to take the ball from the creek at a few meters from the field. When I entered the creek, I am looking everywhere, and I see the ball has landed into a bush. I am looking through the bush, and I saw the football ball in the bush, but I also observed there was something moving the bush.

Because this creek was dense, the sun was about to go down and couldn't see much of the creek. He sees the thing was moving in the bush a little, and was taking out weird sounds, like a crying. I wasn't unsure if it was a dog or something else, so I take the ball, and get out of there. But not even taking three steps, the thing that was in the bush, gets out of it. And the thing I saw was a normal puppy.

The puppy that was in the bush is having black fur and black eyes. The puppy is walking on its four pawns toward me. The puppy whines and whimpers as he gets close to me. When the puppy came close to me, I try to walk further, but the puppy continued to follow me outside of the creek.

When I get out of the creek, and I kicked the ball to the football field, the kids from the game saw the puppy and they've dropped the game. All are looking at the puppy, hold him and try to play with him, but the puppy wasn't to fond of them. The puppy was always going after me, not paying any attention to the other six kids.

All were looking at me, asking me if the dog is mine, but I told them I just found it in the creek as I was searching for the ball. The kids were telling me that I should keep the dog or give it to them. And to be honest, I didn't even know what to do at this moment, I was looking at him and at how adorable he was, I was keen on the idea of keeping the puppy to myself and trying to negotiate with my parents to keep the puppy.

Later, I came home with the puppy, who followed me the whole road to my house. Once I got to my house gates, my mother, who was tending to her flowers, she sees the puppy, then looks at me with wonder.

"You got a new friend?"

"Can I keep it, mom?" I ask my Mother directly. "Please."

"Sure." says the mother approaching the gate, and looking with a smile at the small black puppy. "What's the name of this little puppy?"

"It's… I don't know. I've found in the forest."

The mother opens the gate, letting me and my little puppy in the garden. As I entered the garden, and I was walking toward the door, I immediately shouted something.

"Rex!"

"You are calling him Rex, hon?" asks the mother of Tudor, half not expecting that shouting. "Why?"

"I think it fits." I say to my mother.

To be honest, I did not even think a bit of a dog name. I just remembered of a dog named Rex I saw a few days when I was walking back home with my Mom. I knew the name of that dog because the dog was having a red collar with a golden imitation plate that was written in Romanian letters "Rex", and my Mom told me the name of the dog because I didn't know to read at that time. I was only a three years old poor boy from a village in Romania, not a genius from a rich family.

The dog liked the name, stayed with me for a while and helped me become a better person with a job that helps me be an important member of the society.