The Chocolate Dog by Holly Webb Page A

after school sometimes. She loved those. She always had to save one for Choc, though, otherwise he knew she’d had them – he had a nose like a sniffer dog. If she didn’t give him a shrimp, he’d sit there and howl at her until she said she was sorry.
    Amy had to be very careful what she fed him. Choc didn’t only have eyes like Maltesers, he’d happily wolf down half a packet of them too, and dogs weren’t supposed to have chocolate; it was really bad for their insides. Choc just didn’t seem to think so. Amy could understand why – after all, they had named him Chocolate, so why couldn’t he eat it?
    Mum and Amy and Lara had made an emergency appointment at the vet’s last Christmas, after they’d come down in the morning and found that Choc had eaten all the chocolate Christmas decorations. And the foil, unless he’d carefully taken it off and binned it. He must have climbed on the arm of the sofa to reach the top ones, Amy reckoned.
    The vet had said he thought Choc would be fine, he’d probably just be really sick, because milk chocolate wasn’t as bad as the dark kind. But Choc hadn’t even burped. He came home from the vet’s sulking like he always did (he would duck right down in the car and try to dig his claws into the floor of his car crate if they even drove past). Then when they got in the house, he whisked past Mum, who was trying to head him off into the kitchen – she would rather he was sick on a tiled floor – and back into the living room to see if the tree had grown any more chocolate. It hadn’t, so he had a peppermint candy cane instead.
    Choc was whining in his car crate now. He knew they’d stopped, and he couldn’t stand being shut up in the boot for much longer.
    â€œWe’d better get him out.” Dad took his seat belt off and stretched wearily. “Poor dog sounds as though he’s got his legs crossed. Why don’t you girls take him for a quick run round that patch of grass over there? He can have a proper walk later, once we’ve unpacked. I need to go and pick up the keys from the cottage next door.”
    â€œCan’t we go to the beach?” Amy asked hopefully, but Dad was already making for the next-door cottage.
    The beach was so close – just down a long flight of stone steps on the other side of the road. Amy could hear the sea, and see it. It was almost blue. Not blue like on a postcard, where the sea was a shiny jewel colour. More of a greenish, brownish, blueish thing, heaving up and down like a blanket someone was shaking. She wanted to go and stand at the edge of it. Dip her toes in it. And she could tell Choc wanted to do the same. His ears were blowing in the sea-smelling breeze, and he kept looking up at her hopefully. Every time they went to the park, he tried to jump in the duck pond, and this was the biggest duck pond he’d ever seen. Amy crouched down next to him. “It doesn’t have enormous ducks to match,” she murmured, running her fingers down the curls of his ears. “But there might be fish, I suppose,” she added doubtfully. “Oh, and seagulls. But they look mean. I’d leave them alone.”
    Choc quivered with excitement. He was quite well trained – Dad had taken him to classes – so he stayed sitting, but he was sitting and leaning forward about as much as he possibly could without falling over. His nose was stretched out towards those steps. It didn’t help that Lara was dancing up and down on the edge of the pavement, trying to get a better view of the sea. Her little sister wasn’t as well trained as Choc, Amy thought, grinning to herself. She needed a lead more than he did.
    Dad was coming back now, clutching a set of keys and a folder. Mum had been leaning against the front of the car, having a drink of water, but now she turned to look out at the sea. “Isn’t it lovely?” she murmured.