The Waterproof Bible by Andrew Kaufman Page A

did not know whether the dog could reach the alley, Rebecca closed her eyes and pretended she was wearing workboots. The workboots she imagined were tan. They were well worn and steel-toed. Silver lines showed through scuffs at the toe. The lines glinted in the sun as Rebecca lifted her right boot, pulled it back and swung it forward. Boot met dog. The dog’s head snapped back. Its lower jaw went left and its upper jaw went right. It yelped.
    Opening her eyes, Rebecca looked down. The dog took a half-step backwards and lowered its head. She walked directly in front of it. She reminded herself that in four steps she would be past it. Her feet felt heavy. She took three confident strides, but on the fourth shelooked down and saw black Italian leather instead of scuffed tan workboots. Her body tensed. The dog’s growl became a loud, angry bark. She heard the chain as the dog begin running towards her. Rebecca looked up. A string of drool hung out of its mouth. Its ears bent back. As its front legs left the ground, it opened its jaws. Squeezing her eyes closed, Rebecca crossed her arms in front of her face.
    Rebecca’s fear of dogs stemmed from a very specific moment, when she was eight years old and something had barked in her neighbours’ backyard. It sounded like a dog, but Rebecca couldn’t be sure. She stopped brushing her doll’s hair, sat still and listened. The fence separating her backyard from theirs was six feet tall, much too tall for her to climb. However, her house was in the process of being painted, and the painters had left a ladder leaning against the west side of the house. It was long enough that tipping it backwards would put the end of the ladder against the top of the fence.
    Rebecca’s father had warned her and Lisa not to touch any of the painters’ equipment, but when the bark came again, Rebecca became certain it was not the bark of a dog—maybe a tiger, perhaps a wild boar, but definitely something much more extraordinary than an everyday dog. It was something Rebecca had to see. Setting down her doll, she walked up to the ladder. She crawled underneath the bottom step. With her back against the wall of her house, she began to push. It was easier to make the ladder move than she’d expected, although it was also much louder when it fell on the fence.
    Rebecca looked up and waited, and when her motherdid not appear, she began to climb. Because the base of the ladder had remained relatively close to the house, the arc wasn’t steep. It was, however, very wobbly. Twice she almost fell. When she reached the top, she looked over the fence.
    The dog saw Rebecca before Rebecca saw the dog. She tried to pull away, but the dog had already jumped. Though she jerked her head back, it was too late; the dog bit into her throat. Or so she thought as her momentum carried her backwards. In truth, the dog had only managed to get hold of her T-shirt, ripping the collar. But Rebecca thought she was mortally wounded as she fell off the ladder, which jiggled, turned and then fell on top of her. She woke up in the hospital with her arm in a cast and a profound fear of dogs.
    Although Rebecca put the ripped T-shirt inside one of the growing number of shoeboxes under her bed, it did not trap her new fear of dogs, only her fear of this one specific dog: T-Bone. While it was true that no other dogs or people could feel her fear of T-Bone, this helped little with her fear of dogs in general. It was an important lesson for Rebecca: objects stored only kept the emotions specific to the moment.
    Keeping her arms crossed in front of her face, Rebecca heard the dog’s jaws snapping shut. But then, nothing happened. When nothing continued to happen, she opened her eyes. The dog’s leash was taut. It stood on its hind legs, with its face less than an inch from hers. Its breath was sour. It barked. Flinching, Rebecca took a step backwards. The dog fell to all fours, then jumped back up. It strained against its leash and