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I didn't know it yet, but my diet had quite the opposite effect on my life than I'd intended. It, in fact, had set me on course to match with the very largest of dogs who lived in the yard. The humans never came out and said it (well, they might have, but we didn't understand it), but it was pretty clear to me and most of the other dogs beyond a few months of age that what they were looking for in the dogs here was a large surplus of extra body fat. The bigger the dog, the more likely he was to get extra attention. It didn't matter that often this attention came in the form of check-ups and physical examinations, the fattest dogs, for some reason got more attention. There was also a reaction to dogs who ate the most out of us, ranging from impressment to revulsion, but again, it didn't matter positive or negative. It was different, and that's what counted.

The subtle difference in the way the humans treated us mostly accounted for the fact that the heavier dogs tended to rank high on our social hierarchy, but it helped that the heaviest dogs were usually older and larger - in stature as well as sheer mass - than the rest of us as well. Their central location in the grooming circles was a privilege, even though they were receiving a quite necessary service. But it was more than that as well. The lab-shepherd mix, now fattest of us since the collie was gone all but strutted when he felt inclined to shift his growing bulk. Dogs got out of the way for him and he usually didn't have any problems getting the first pick of new toys. Food was strictly controlled by humans, but in all the other ways a dog can, he showed dominance, even to the point where he could command another dog to fetch things for him.

Despite the reality that a dog like the lab-shepherd couldn't run, couldn't jump and couldn't play for very long due to his weight, there was an association of size and power that we all had learned as ten week old pups looking up at the heavy dogs and realizing that they were the more dominant here. It went beyond a mere social construct. The rounder the dog, the bigger his waist and the fatter his chest the more regal and dominant he actually appeared. It was something I'd learned when I'd been learning all my other social skills, but like most social goggles, it was also something that was almost impossible to unlearn. Not that I had a reason to. To me, it always seemed right and proper that the biggest dog should rule. It just happened to be that the "biggest" dogs here were far more large in every direction but vertical than normal.

I was twenty-eight weeks old when the black lab told me that he thought I had potential to be the head dog of the yard. It began first with a simple story of the collie's rise to power which he was able to relate to me now that I had a better grasp of the past. I understood that the collie was actually considerably younger than the shepherd-lab. He'd possessed a fierce appetite from as long as the black lab could remember and he'd gotten very fat from an early age; the lab indicated this by shaking his own considerably fatty flanks with some pride. On another's advice, he'd stopped being as rowdy as well and so began to grow even faster. The lab people took an interest in him from an early age. The lab-shepherd didn't like this very much because his own mentor was the current fattest dog and he had thought he was in line to inherit that title for himself within the next month or two. And indeed, the fattest dog had become a "gone dog" in that period of time, but also in that time, the collie had grown substantially, until he massed about the same as the lab-shepherd.

The fattest dogs didn't usually fight, so there was confusion for some time over who would be Alpha-male. But in the end, despite the fact that the lab-shepherd had almost four months on the collie - and four extra months of growth - the collie simply possessed too much natural talent and it became clear who was the Alpha after a time. The Collie merely had to display his form and how much he could eat for the other dogs to bow their heads and avert their eyes, including the lab-shepherd. However, the black lab informed me that he thought I had even more potential than the collie had. On that matter it was hard to argue.

In the six weeks since my attempted diet, I'd put on quite a lot of weight. My frame was that of the seven month old pup that I was, but I was almost as big as a yearling and weighed twice as much. My sausage-like figure had blossomed significantly outwards, with wide round flanks and bulging pigeon chest. When I ran, I could feel a thick pad of fat jiggling above the base of my tail, and I was getting wide like the black lab. My belly had turned into a real paunch as well and I could feel it on the ground when I sat. As for my sheathe, it was sort of lost in the loose skin and fur and getting harder to clean with my tongue. I'd gotten barrel chested and was more aware of my own weight when I moved. Immediately, it was merely a hindrance and an annoyance, but I only had to think of the regal status and extra attention of the heavier dogs to remind myself that this was a good thing, basically a sign that I was growing up.

Measured against the black lab, I was still shorter and significantly lighter, but not by a whole lot anymore, I could see over his withers now just standing next to him. I was a big puppy, freakishly large for my age, in fact, but I didn't know that. However, when I finally got what the lab had been trying to relay to me all week, I outright rejected the idea.

I still remembered my past beating not two months ago. To do even more, to challenge the Alpha-male... it was unthinkable. I had decided that I didn't like fighting. I told the black lab no.

He reacted neither favorably or unfavorably, in the dog equivalent of a shrug. He didn't really care one way or another, but he also told me something else. He told me that it might not matter if I wanted a fight or not.

The black lab's comment worried me greatly for the rest of that day, but by the next, I'd largely forgotten about it. I was confident in the fact that if I kept my head down and my posture submissive, I wouldn't have to fight again if I didn't want to. It wasn't like anyone here of any notable size was particularly energetic or athletic. I let the matter rest as I had other matters on my mind.

One of them was the music toy which was still as lively and vibrant for me as when I'd first been shown what it could do. By this time, I knew all the buttons by heart and the black lab was letting me take turns at composition while he played the instrumental parts. My tunes were simplistic to an embarrassing degree, but I enjoyed them like I enjoyed little else. To build music out of repeating rhythms and notes, from a limited stock library and the barest tools necessary was a Rubik's cube for my ears. I was imaging music in my head now, fresh and lively rhythms I wanted to bring to life and share with the black lab for his approval. The puzzle was in trying to make the music toy sound like the music in my head. It was ever challenging and ever rewarding, even if I sometimes succeeded only on the most basic level. How I hungered for more.

Aside from the music toy, my past-times became few. My escalating weight was pressing me into a lifestyle more like the fattened black lab than I really cared for. But I got so tired chasing my smaller and even less obese brother who I towered over. When I looked at him, I felt old, and not even more mature. My belly was starting to itch a little from the stretch marks growing there, but my little brother, as I thought of him now, was more than happy to lick the skin there. He'd put his paws on my chest and smile at me. Some things were still good between us.

As for my brother, I'd been forced to move ahead in life, but he was also growing. At seven months of age, he was acting more mature now, although he was still rambunctious and required the slightest provocation to burst into a play run. He was where I should have been, were I not so blasted large. He was an infant no longer, but not quite in the lower echelons of the hierarchy yet, he behaved himself for the most part, but when he didn't he was tolerated... for the most part. Sadly our interests diverged. He loved the most social toys, the tug ropes and the bouncing balls. I was getting tired far more quickly than he was, and when I could play with him, I immediately overpowered him or he immediately out ran me. He didn't proposition me for play very much anymore.

Instead, he went about his business with his little team of followers. Spring pups, all slightly smaller than he was. They hung on his every move. I'm sure he must have seemed strong and powerful to them, little tykes. When my brother was around, they would often swarm me, tugging on my ears and tail and the fatty rolls at the base of my neck and tail. When I rose, my brother would call them off warm heartedly, but it was clear I wasn't getting any special treatment, not for a bigger dog. I wondered sometimes if that's how he saw me, just another bigger dog. I had time to ruminate because I spent a good deal of my time just looking out the fence and staring at the trees and the small creatures that dwelled there, wild and free beyond human control. I realized somewhere in my heart that I envied those small creatures, the birds and sometimes squirrels that were visible through the dense green leaves. My nose snuffled wetly when the wind would carry their scents in my direction. The black lab empathized with me and knew my troubles. But he had already made peace with the fact that our place was at a human's side, even under these conditions.

He seemed possessed with confidence that we were fulfilling our purpose by being here. "Why else would the humans keep us here?" he reasoned. I myself wasn't so sure, but the feeling passed, just as most of my more abstract thoughts did. I was never prepossessed by my philosophy, rather it was a treat to think about these things at all, given where I was coming from.

For most of my seventh month of life, as I came to terms with the fact that I was too fat to keep up with my smaller brother and yet too restless to adopt the black lab's life of endless ease and observation, I kept bouncing back and forth between the two ideals, trying to find my own balance. As for the other dogs, I knew them and they were my family, my pack, but also, I kept out of the way. I was an overgrown, stumbling puppy among more mature puppies still. I settled for cast off toys since I was too big to steal them unnoticed anymore. Some dogs were more sympathetic and I learned that not just the black lab was philosophically minded and willing to talk with me. There were other dogs who were friendly, but who seemed to lack some cognitive essence that made them more like my brother was, despite their advanced age. Other's just wanted to play - usually the submissives who never got extremely fat - while others still would growl if you didn't hold your head and eyes in just the right submissive posture. It may have been largely aesthetic, but the hierarchy was still core to our lives, and knowing who was above who made everyone feel less stressed, as if there was more meaning to life as we lived it; including myself. I stayed away from the lab-shepherd and his betas, however. His cold stares at me were anything but friendly.

I was eight months old when a squirrel appeared in the yard. I cannot stress enough was an event this was. The second it landed on the grass, it was as if a bomb had exploded in the yard. It was as if most of the dogs there weren't wearing 50 or so extra pounds each on their bodies. Any lethargy that had crept into our lives due to our physical burdens simply evaporated in a flash. We all ran and to hell with the blubber that weighed us down and the muscles in our legs that were far from well developed. We ran like the wind.