The Badass and the Puppy

Prologue

Hi, the name's Rebecca but don't even think about calling me that. My name is Becca and that's that, got it? Good. 

It all started when I was three, my mom and I lived in Village Park. One day we were in our front yard when we saw a huge yellow truck drive into the driveway across the street. "Mommy, who is that?" I ask in my three-year-old voice.

"Oh, those are our new neighbors; we can visit them a little later to welcome them to the neighborhood." She says in that motherly voice of hers. I look back to the truck to see a little boy jumping out. Our eyes meet and he smiles, waving to me before his mom calls him into their new house. I smile and look up at my mom, she has this weird look in her eyes. "Mommy, when can we visit them?" I ask anxiously. "I guess we can go now." She says giving in. She brings me into her arms, walking across the street and ringing the doorbell of our new neighbors. Seconds later, a young woman appears with the boy behind her legs. As my mother speaks to the boy's mother, our eyes meet again causing us both to smile and stare into each other's eyes."Noah, sweetheart, why don't you go show Becca your t-." Before his mom can finish her sentence, he takes my hand in his and drags us into his playroom and immediately shares all of his toys with me. That was the beginning of our friendship. Fortunately for us, our mom's really hit it off and hang out almost as much as me and Noah. My mom babysits Noah nearly three times a week due to his mother's job as a nurse; she would often be assigned to night shifts. Noah was sad at the beginning from not being read to or tucked in at night by his mother. However, as we approached the young age of six, we were inseparable, spending all of our time together. Our mothers would even take us together to get our hair cut! His sadness started to fade at the lack of his mother's affection near bedtime as we began to enjoy many movie nights together in my basement. My mother would set us up with comfy bean bag chairs, a bowl of oh-so-buttery popcorn, dim the lights, and that is when we would commence a night of two movies. Often, sometime during the second movie, after a night of giggling, we would drift to sleep, our heads and/or hands nearly touching from across our bean bag chairs. 

Over those years, we had shared my brothers, friends, hobbies, and naps. We had grown into two peas of a pod and could not bear the thought of being separated even at such as young age. That is, until his seventh birthday. His mom had been picking up extra shifts at work so Noah had spent an even larger amount of time at my house. It is because of this that neither he nor I knew that he would be moving on such short notice. His mother had purposefully kept it a secret from the both of us. The day of his seventh birthday came and when I had woken up, he was nowhere to be found. My little heart ached, breaking into pieces before my mother's eyes. I had searched his entire house, not leaving any door unturned as I searched for my best friend. Tears steadily falling down my face hours later as I realized he was gone for good. Something inside of me awoken that day, I could feel a small pressure force its way into my mind. It had remained silent although, I could feel it grieving and practically mourning over the loss of our best friend Somehow the presence still managed to provide me with small amounts of strength to get through. I am plagued with this memory nearly every night in the form of a nightmare as I wake up sweating, silent tears running down my face for the first six weeks after his disappearance. My mother had picked up my crying form in her arms, carrying me back to the safety of our home. Memories of Noah and I flashed before my eyes, how dare he, I thought to myself. I was left broken for weeks, loneliness filled my being despite my mother's attempts to spoil me with ice cream, kittens, and all of my favorite things. Let's not forget my two older brother's endless efforts to make me laugh by tossing me in the air and making silly faces. It was not until two months later on the morning of my own seventh birthday that I woke to a strange feeling deep within me. My nose follows the scent of chocolate chip pancakes and orange juice, my feet carrying me down the many steps, my body clad in SpongeBob pajamas, I race into the kitchen, seating myself at our table that seated four.