And dog makes three

Instead, Joe brought home Abbey, a 70-pound German shepherd "puppy" on a random Tuesday in April. She loped around like a CIA agent, suspiciously sniffing the floor and curiously eyeing me. I was fuming. How could Joe have brought something home I might not be able to love? The prospect of existing side by side with another living thing that I didn't connect with frightened me.

But Abbey and I actually became friends. She pulled me around the block every afternoon and curled in bed beside me when Joe worked late. I dutifully mixed her hard food, thawed beef pellets, and cottage cheese -- an essential combination to ensure her ears would not droop (a hot tip courtesy of German Shepherds for Dummies).

That's not to say we didn't have our differences. Abbey snuck into my bag, extracted my BlackBerry, and dislodged its tracking ball. She barked and lunged at my friends. She located my underwear in the laundry, chewing it to unrecognizable shreds. "She's smart," Joe said. "That's why she's so mischievous." I wasn't so convinced. But I'd made up my mind that if Joe loved Abbey, then I would, too.

By late spring, the three of us had settled into a rather peaceful domestic routine (dinner, walk, cuddle on couch). But I had begun to sense a change in our relationship. Whenever Joe and I so much as shifted toward each other beneath the covers, Abbey's howling would begin. "She's only a dog," he would say. "She doesn't know what we're doing." She sounded as if she were being tortured. Eventually, I couldn't kiss Joe hello without Abbey indignantly lunging between us.

Then there was our verbal communication. Our wedding was coming up in July, and you'd think that would be in the forefront of our minds. But Abbey's every move dominated our conversations: bathroom habits, dog-park play, various whines. During American Idol and True Blood, Abbey sat between us on the couch, panting at Simon Cowell and Southern vampires. "Abbey agrees with Paula," I'd say. "Abbey drinks True Blood," Joe would say. We laughed at our wittiness, at our shared obsession with this darn dog. But what had we talked about before there was Abbey?

Abbey curled between us, an iceberg of fur, I would wonder some fall nights: Were we losing our spark because of this dog? Surely two months of married-with-dog life wasn't enough to bankrupt our passion. I glanced at my new husband over her large ears. His eyes were stuck on the flat screen, intent on the news. Our levels of affection and conversational prowess had seriously waned. And if we couldn't survive an animal who couldn't speak, argue, or open drawers, how would our relationship ever survive a child?

But one late-October day, it was sleeting and gray out, and Joe and I both walked in the door from work in unusually crabby moods. We began a petty, nasty fight about nothing in particular. Abbey bounded into the kitchen, fresh from a nap, my pink-striped underwear hanging from her mouth. She lay down and rolled over, and the two of us just looked at her, shaking our heads. Eventually, we had to laugh. Our angry momentum dwindled, and we began to talk about the latest SNL skit on YouTube. Wow, I thought, maybe we're onto something.

Heated arguments about the holidays, taxes, and back-seat driving were also cut short by Abbey antics: the way she flew onto the bed, the way she burped, the way she watched Because of Winn-Dixie from start to finish.

In less than a year, I'd gone from thinking Abbey would be our demise to thinking she'd be our savior. I had sorely underestimated this huge mass of fur and teeth and mischief.

Jaime Heidtman Budzienski is a middle school teacher and writer. She lives in Watertown. Send comments to coupling@globe.com.

Story ideas: Send yours to coupling@globe.com. Please note: We do not respond to ideas we will not pursue.