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THE PART IN THE MOVIE WHEN THE VOLUME GETS VERY LOUD Megan Lange There came a family with a fat white dog, and we thought it might be a wolf at first, because none of us had ever seen a dog quite like that, but it wasn’t a wolf at all. Its eyes were rounder, gentler, and its paws much smaller. Husky, we heard the little girl tell a visiting friend. We kept an eye mostly on the little girl as she was home during the day. Sometimes she rode the husky around like a horse. None of us agreed on how we felt about this, whether it was charming or cruel. The family was small and quiet. A mother, a father, an older brother, and a little sister. They walked around in silence, read books and did work in silence. The mother drew pictures of buildings. The father would leave during the day and come back at night. When he came back, he spent long hours in front of a computer. Sometimes he would type, but mostly he would read or watch. Screens were difficult for us. There was a space between us and it that distorted the writing, though we speculated about it. Every member of the home had headphones. When they watched television, it was on a low volume. The dog only barked or whined in moments of extreme duress, like when he hadn’t been let outside in too long. He began to whine when he noticed us and once or twice, he growled or even barked. This was of primary concern for the quiet family. “Maybe it’s a ghost.” The older brother suggested. The little sister quickly fell into line with the assessment. The mother and father rolled their eyes and said nothing. We sat at the extra seats around the dining table left for guests and did not weigh in. No one asked for our opinion. That night we followed them to bed. The dog was confined downstairs and watched from the bottom of the stairs, whining helplessly. Each evening we observed a different room of the house. Sometimes,
