Bike instructions

’Twas the night before Christmas, and all through the house, not a creature was stirring except me and Mouse.
I sat in the middle of a lopsided circle of parts that spread out before me in a one-hundred-and-eighty-degree arc, glowering at an instruction manual. “Why do they bother putting the assembly instructions in twenty different languages,” I all but screamed, “and then just have a drawing with numbers and letters and arrows!?”
“Woof,” Mouse said, commiserating. He was more than two hundred pounds of patient grey floof and was better with people than I was.
I went back to trying to assemble the stupid bicycle. Maggie needed to learn to ride a bike. A lot of little girls would have wanted the pink-and-purple bike. But Maggie’s favorite color was red. She insisted that the red ones go faster.
“You need a degree and a NASCAR pit crew to do this!” I muttered darkly.
Mouse sighed. Then he nudged my hand with his nose until I dropped the part I was trying to assemble. Then he picked up a different part in his huge, patient jaws and handed it to me.
“What am I supposed to do with this?” I demanded. “Other than wipe your drool off, you moose.”
Mouse chuffed and nudged my other hand with his nose.
“I know you want to help,” I said. “But these two parts don’t—”
The parts clicked together and locked, easily.
Mouse’s tail went thump, thump against the floor.
“Nobody likes a wiseass,” I said darkly.
Mouse’s tail went thumpthumpthumpthump and he grinned a doggy grin at me.
“Are you laughing at me?” I demanded.
Mouse sneezed.
I sighed and ruffled his ears. “Fine. If you can’t beat them, join them.” I held up the paper so Mouse could peer at it. “Which one is next?”
Mouse selected the next part, and I started bumbling around with it until I got it right. Then we did the next one. The fire in the fireplace crackled and popped. It was the only light.

Battle Ground, Christmas Eve, Page 407-409