Dear Zackie,

It’s been awhile since I sat down to write a letter. In that time I’ve taken a long vacation, been hobbled by a stress fracture in my leg, dealt with the loss of a close family friend, and even the loss of one of my dad’s ex-wives. It’s been a tough month. But, Zackie, of all the things I could write about, from a personal perspective or one of the many stupid things the world has produced since my last letter, I feel that other people have paid far better justice to those things than I, a pale imitation of a writer, could ever do. Plus, I need to make sure someone hears your story. I know I’ll never forget that event, and I want everyone to know what kind of hero you were on that cold, dark night. Zackie, please allow me to tell the tale of Friday, January 30, 2015.

Like most Fridays, the wife and I were trying to decide if we wanted to put on non-work clothes and have a fun time with friends in a social setting or if we should cave in to our natural desires to divest ourselves of societal concerns and instead get into our PJs before 6 o’clock and binge watch TV. On this particular occasion we chose to go out. There’s a new wine bar close to our house and we decided it was our civic duty to help a local business succeed. After all, if active members of the community didn’t support businesses like these, we could hardly complain that there weren’t options for new and exciting things to do in our tiny town, could we? The fact that they are located less than 500 feet from our backyard certainly didn’t hurt. Nor did the rumor that they were also going to start serving pizza from an Italian, wood fired brick oven. So I washed my face, changed shirts, and then sat down to play video games for the couple of hours I knew it would take my wife to complete the same task. During the gaming session, the pretty princess dogs spent most of their time wrasslin’ and basically making a mess of the house, whilst Brownie sat on the couch next to me, intent on making sure I employed the best possible tactics in my quest to end Corypheus‘ plan to end the world. Zackie was nowhere to be found, but this didn’t trouble me. He often disappeared for hours at a time, only to be found standing under the computer desk because he went under there and then couldn’t find his way back. He was very, very old and his time with us would not be much longer. I had been a proponent of ending what I perceived to be his suffering for months, but he was my wife’s dog so the decision was not mine. Looking at him filled me with sadness and humor at the same time because he really was a funny dog.

Finally, my wife emerged from the bathroom, looking radiant and beautiful and smart and definitely amazing [EDITOR’S NOTE: We’re pretty sure Eli’s wife doesn’t read Dear So and So, but we agree with and support his choice to play it safe]. I saved my game, stood up, and took the few steps towards the XBox to turn it off. I kissed my beautiful, loving wife and then ushered the girls into their crates (they chew absolutely everything if they are left to their own devices). We went ahead and fed them so Brownie was sequestered to another room to eat his food and not scarf down all of Zackie’s grub. As we were about to leave, our front door exploded violently inwards and two brigands came storming in, brandishing guns. Caught off guard, but trained by hours of Halo, I leapt towards the first attacker and punched him as hard as I could. In the ear. His compatriot responded by smashing the butt of his pistol into my nose. Dazed, temporarily blinded, and disoriented, I was lucky to have fallen on the couch. My wife was at my side instantly, bravely fighting her fears to attend to my wound.

Brigand 1: Okay. Now that Mr. Bronson has learned his lesson, let’s all stay cool, huh?

Brigand 2: My god, that hurts! Were you aiming for my ear? Why would you punch someone in the ear?

B1: Will you shut up, Tommy? Man up. We don’t have much time before Skinny P picks us up.

Tommy: Oh, great, why don’t you just give him my home address as well? We made up code names for a reason you idiot!

B1: Oh. Yeah. Sorry about that. Night Hat.

Eli: *through the blood coursing down his shirt* Night Hat?

B1: Yeah. Night Hat. You got a problem, tough guy?

E: Yed. Ith a stubbid codename.

Tommy/Night Hat: Just let it go, man.

B1: NO! We spent hours planning this raid and even longer choosing code names! You think you could do better?

E: Yed! Whadabout Black Hat? Sounds like a mysterious hacker or summing.

B1: *blank stare*

Tommy: Yeah man, that’s pretty cool. Plus, I’m kinda a hacker already. Remember that time I programmed your mom’s new thermostat?

B1: IT DOESN’T MATTER! YOU SHUT UP AND SIT ON THAT COUCH!

E: Soddy.

B1: Just tell us where the money is!

Eli’s Wife: Money? We don’t —

E: Honey, he asked us to shuddup.

B1: Yeah! Shut your mouth!

E: Don’t talk to my wife like that, please.

B1: *blushing* Sorry, ma’am.

EW: it’s okay.

At this point there was an awkward silence, wherein B1 did his best not to make eye contact with me, I did my best to bore holes into his skull using laser vision I hoped to develop spontaneously, my wife continued to coo and cluck over my shattered nose, and Tommy the Black Hat began inspecting our programmable thermostat. He began to press buttons when the inevitable happened. All four dogs finished eating at the same time and realized there were unwanted people in the house. Brownie began barking with his Big Boy Voice, so-called because if you can’t see him it sounds like one of the Dire Wolves from Game of Thrones is about to chew out your throat. The girls began whining and wagging their tales ferociously because there were new people to pay attention to them, and Zackie walked calmly into the living room, seemingly oblivious to everything around him. The brigands were taken aback, to say the least.

Tommy the Black Hat: Dude. Do you hear that dog? We should get out of here before that thing comes through the door and chews out our throats!

Brigand 1: Whatever. I ain’t afraid of no dog. It gets through here and I’ll put a few slugs in it. Then I’ll take care of these whiny beasts. Then I’ll take whatever I want from this house!

TTBH: What about that little dog over there? *points to Zackie*

B1: Him? Ha! I’ll drop kick him in to the Ohio River!

Zackie: U WOT MATE?!

At this point, I feel it is necessary to point out that everything you read from here until the end of the story is 100% true. There have been no embellishments, exaggerations, or artistic licenses taken. At all*.

Zackie: What’s this, then? You think you can come in ‘ere, wave your li’l pea shooters round my home, smash my butler’s face in, and then threaten me?

B1: I’m the one with the gun, aren’t I?

Eli: So, we’re all just going to ignore the fact that this old dog is standing on his hind legs and talking with a cockney accent?

Z and B1 in unison: SHUT UP!

E: Sorry.

Z: Now then, I suggest you and Mr. ‘Acker ‘ere toddle off right back to the disease infested basement you came from, and you make it quick, yeah?

B1: I’m giving the orders here you old mutt. You do what I say, you hear me?

Z: Boy, I don’t fink you quite unnerstan the world of pain you’re currently entering. I survived the Battle of Somme back in ’16. My boys and I fought toof and paw in the trenches to defen this world against punks like you. I’m not about to take orders from some young pup don’t yet know which end his tail is. HAVE AT YOU!

Zackie was suddenly wearing an old leather jacket and beige breeches and moving with the speed and grace of a much younger dog, attacking the brigands with a fury and gusto that my eyes have never seen before and will likely never see again. Occasionally, between grunts of surprise and exclamations of pain from our would be robbers, Zackie could be heard shouting things like “THIS ONE IS FOR OL BERTHOLD!” and “YOU’RE IN DEEP RUBBLE NOW BOYS!” When the dust settled the brigands were hogtied on the floor, greatly chewed tennis balls forced into their mouths as gags. Zackie, undressed again and once more walking on all fours, calmly walked up to the apparent leader of the pair and looked him dead in the eyes. They stared at one another for a few moments before Zackie made a sniffing noise, took a couple more steps, then calmly hiked his leg and peed all over the face of a young man who really had no idea what kind of world of pain he was going to enter when he woke up that day.

We called the cops and, after making up a story about how I was able to overpower the two robbers despite suffering from a few blows myself, they were hauled away. We never found out what happened to Skinny P. After the police left my wife and I just stood in the living room, staring at each other. Me, with two black eyes and a broken nose, shirt covered in drying blood and mucus, her with those angelic eyes and the face of a Greek heroine, looking for all the world like a living statue of Michelangelo. Zackie came sauntering back in to the room and, as if it were a perfectly normal thing to do, stood up on his hind legs and proclaimed, “I showed them, yeah? I ‘aven’t felt this alive in years! I’m gonna pop ’round the pub, knock back a few pints of the regular, and maybe see about ol’ John Skinner. You pups don’t wait up.” He walked out the door and down the street. My wife and I watched him walk away.

I cleaned myself up as best I could and my wife cleaned up the mess made in the fracas. We did our best to wait up for Zackie, but he never came home. After fighting through the horrors of the first world war and bravely defending his home, Zackie was finally felled in an alley knife fight following an argument over a rigged dice game. When they found his body there were four other dead assailants surrounding him, plus three more wounded that were tracked down and brought to justice, all with numerous, small bite-sized holes taken from various parts of their person. The coroner’s report showed that Zackie wasn’t actually defeated in the fight, but died due to asphyxiation. Apparently the last of the gangsters to flee the scene was wearing fine dress and as Zackie took a bite of the man’s wrist he accidentally inhaled the cufflink and choked.

Thank you for everything, Zackie. You were a good boy.

Love,

Elijah

Little Lord Zachariah Fauntelroy Charleston Chew Bebout III

RIP

*Many exaggerations, embellishments, and artistic licenses have been taken. In fact, this isn’t how things happened at all.