The Dog With Magical Powers

The cool breeze ran through the bus... it was a Friday evening return from the school and laziness glued into the eyes of all the kids… tired, but thrilled about the plans for the weekend ahead, I just looked at the moving vehicles and running trees on the road…

“Shraavan……!”

Called out the care taker in the bus, as it turned towards my apartment complex… All the other kids had already lined up near the door to get down…

I got up and collected my bag from the overhead carrier… and slowly moved towards the door…

The bus stopped and the door creaked open… Kids rushed out with the thud sounds on the footboards of the bus…. They seemed to have started their weekend plans already…

I had no intentions to rush…!

I got down slowly and moved on to the footpath on the side… waited for the bus to leave… and waved hands at other kids in the bus as they passed by…

Stood there looking at our apartment complex that stood at the end of the road… though the gate stood in visible distance, my laziness to walk, made it look far away… !!

I slowly dragged myself along the footpath kicking and crushing every leaf on the path way…

Then…suddenly… !!

I froze for a moment… there was an obstacle in the pathway… a stray dog…!!

Though, I love to see puppies playing around, I have refrained myself from any physical contact with dogs… not that I hate them…! But I was always scared….!!

Now I have a serious situation… I need to bypass this stray dog lying on the footpath…! Though it looks like a small job, I took this as a challenge… And started strategizing my moves, as in a battle ground…!

I watched the dog for some time… it was sleeping… its stomach moving up and down in a rhythm… its eyes were closed… but still I dint want to take any step closer to it…

Then I noticed… there was something attached to its belly…. Shining…!

I take a few soft steps towards the dog to get a closer look… and it was a nail that stood pasted to the stomach of the doggie….

Confused… I stood there staring at the nail and took my time to get into a conclusion….

“Sure… this dog looks hurt…!!”

I looked around… the watchman at the apartment gate was in a visible distance… I was afraid to call out loud as that might wake the dog… !!

So, I stood there and started waving my hands high… One of the security man saw me and he stepped out of the gate… I signalled him to come… he seemed confused at the first place... but later he started running towards me... I think he felt that I was in some kind of danger…

When he came closer, I tried to draw his attention to the dog, which was still asleep… He looked at it and then looked at me… I whispered…

“Looks like the dog is hurt… there is a nail stuck to its stomach…”

He took a closer look… saw the nail… then he kneeled down next to the dog…

He slowly tried to pull it off…. But to our surprise… it just rolled on the stomach... but still attached to the stomach like a magnet…!!!

Now the dog woke up… and I jumped back a few steps to keep a safe distance…!! But the security man was calm… he patted and massaged the dog slowly and the dog stay still there…!!

The watchman patted the dog and slowly pulled the nail, the dog yelping slightly, but the nail was eventually off the stomach of the dog…! But the watchman grew suspicious and got the nail back, closer to the dog, the nail flew closer and closer, as if some invisible force was dragging it into the dog...!

My eyes rolled in surprise…!!

By the time this had happened, a small crowd had gathered around us… another person came closer and tried to keep his key chain closer to the dog and that also got pulled towards…!!

Someone from the crowd yelled… “It is a dog with magical powers…”

The kids from the group were excited by now… we went around trying to find all kinds of small objects that we wanted to try on the body of the dog… it included stones, wood piece and even the water from the bottles…!!

Few of those got stuck to the dog, while other objects fell of his body…

Now the dog was getting restless and the experiments were going beyond the limits of curiosity…. One of the elderly man from the group said…

“Please show some respect….!! Don’t make that dog a specimen for your curiosity experiments…!”

He turned towards the security man and asked him to call for a vet, to get the dog checked….. 

“Enough of fun… you all go home now…!” directed another elderly person from the group, to the kids…

We all left the scene with reluctance… pushed ourselves home with a great deal if excitement… And we, needless to say, narrated the story of the “Dog with Magical Powers” to everybody we could find on the way…

I reached home and told my mom also about this incident and she was also curious… we discussed more on this on our coffee in the evening, when dad walked in after his office…

I told him all the story in a single breath and he was listening to it while removing his shoe and tucking them in the shoe rack… then he slowly walked towards me and then sat on the sofa… and told…

“I also heard about this… it was just a magnet, that the dog swallowed, gave the dog, it’s so-called magical power…” and winks…!!

I stood still… letting the new information sync in me… then walked back to the balcony… smiling at my own silliness…!!

But the question remains… How did he swallow the magnet…?