Disclaimer: Mark and Roger and any other rent persona aren't mine.

Two: Roger

August 13, 1985

My uncle Rob kicks me off the farm in Pennsylvania two weeks before school starts.

He kicked me out for setting all the dogs free, and for not feeling even a little bit bad about it. I mean, why would I feel bad about it? For the first time in two and a half months, I could breathe right.

Uncle Rob owns a chicken farm, but he keeps these small, fast dogs (not sure of the breed) for two reasons. Officially, they're to scare off foxes and other things that would eat the chickens. Unofficially, they're for racing. Rob makes a lot of money (but loses more) betting on dog races down by the slag heap.

Don't get me wrong, I didn't let them go on the basis of living on some moral high ground or anything. I have no moral high ground. If I have any morals at all they live in the low ground. They live in a swamp. I don't care if Rob gambles or drinks or shoots heroin or amphetamines or any of that stuff. Nor do I have anything against chickens either, in case you're wondering. I didn't let the dogs go to give the foxes a fighting chance at those idiot birds.

No, I let the dogs go because of they way they were kept. See, Rob keeps his dogs in these tiny little kennels in his back yard. They're raised above the ground on four foot stilts and they're just big enough for the dogs to curl up in. They can't stand up without hunching up, they can barely turn around. They certainly can't move enough.

See, from the second I saw those kennels, I felt like I couldn't quite breathe. Like someone one had stuffed up my nose and I had to do all my breathing through a straw or something. Seemed like I couldn't get those dogs out of my head. Rob made me feed 'em and clean out their kennels and stuff, and I hated it. Not because it was gross or anything, but because they were so cramped. They were trapped, held in. They were frustrated and stuck and so unhappy and I just didn't know what else to do except set them free.

So one night I let them out in the yard around the chicken coop to do their thing like always, but the next morning I didn't round 'em up. The dogs weren't stupid, either, they dawdled for about five minutes before they got the picture and ran off. I felt fantastic for the rest of the morning.

Unfortunately, Rob didn't. He called my dad and his wife, Sylvia, and the next morning saw me on the first bus out of Somerset County heading back to Scarsdale.

A/N: thanks so much to the people who reviewed!!