My agents at the time wanted to throw a little congratulatory party celebrating a new deal I had signed. One of them was named John, and he was a rather unusually muscular gay man who lived with an even more unusually muscular gayer man and shared with him an English bulldog named Dudley.

Their house was in the Hollywood Hills and was decorated the exact way you would expect a couple of gay bear millionaires living in the Hollywood Hills to decorate: very masculine, very expensive, and a lot of lubrication.

The house was filled with beautiful art and had a very modern but luxuriously comfy feel. Like a resort. A resort with a prison shower the size of a mosh pit and enough waterfalls for a stranger to slip into another stranger's asshole without a moment's notice. In other words, the kind of spa two gay bears from the Hollywood Hills would like to run.

There were only about nine of us at the little soiree: Ted, two of my agents (John, Claire), my attorney (Jake), my partner (Tom) and his wife (Beth), and Eva, my assistant. I planted myself on the sofa and was talking to Beth and Eva when Dudley sauntered over with his ass in the air, the way only an English bulldog can do.

Dudley was a dick from the word go. He was sniffing around the hors d'oeuvres while simultaneously licking my uncovered leg, so I immediately gave him a fried ravioli. The setback occurred when Dudley thought the fried ravioli was accompanied by the black cocktail napkin it was on, both of which he demolished with little or no struggle from me.

I did make a moderate attempt to save the napkin, but after one overly aggressive tug from Dudley I decided it would make less of a scene if I just gave the napkin to him rather than get down on my knees and wrestle a bulldog. I felt I had maybe made the wrong decision when I looked at Eva, who was staring at the dog, horrified, as the last corner of the napkin disappeared.

"I think we should tell them that their dog just swallowed a napkin," she said, getting up.

I pulled her down to her seat. "No. It's fine. I give napkins to dogs all the time."

Ted walked over to us just as Dudley was ready for more, and I told him what happened. "Oh, he'll be fine," he said. "It's just a napkin."

"It was a four-ply napkin," Eva told him.

"Okay, cool it," I told her, glaring. "It's fine. I didn't know I had hired a vet," I mumbled loudly enough for her to hear.

"Those dogs can eat anything," Ted said, dragging me by my arm. "Come on, Chelsea. I found another waterfall."

Dudley, of course, was hot on my tail from then on, knowing he had found an ally. "I hope the dog doesn't throw up. At least while we're here," I told Ted as he pulled me outside into a scene out of a Costa Rican bathhouse, but classier.

"We have to get the name of their designer," he exclaimed with a little too much excitement. "This guy is a genius. You can put waterfalls wherever you want."

"Ted, we live in a condo. This compound is more along the lines of an anal jungle. We can't just rip out our roof and stare at the moon. I can find out where we can get those little glow-in-the-dark stars and glue them to the ceiling. Then you can go off."

"Well, we can think of something. This is amazing! What is that smell?"

"It's Dudley," I lied. "It's the napkin."

Actually I had farted, but I sensed an opening in my path, and, not yet knowing in which direction it was headed, I had to leave all options open.

"Is it okay to give a dog shellfish?" I asked.

"Is that what you gave him?"

"Yeah. That crab thing they were passing around."

"I don't know, but don't give him any more. I don't think dogs can eat crab," he said, grimacing at Dudley. "Come to the bathroom. I want to show you this bidet I want us to get."

"I've seen three bidets in fifteen minutes. I'm good."

"God, it reeks. What the hell kind of napkin was that?"

"The crab was wrapped in butter lettuce. Maybe that's it."

"Oooh, that sounds good. I'm gonna go grab one."

On the way home that night, I mentioned Dudley once more in the car and then let it go. I had to figure out my game plan of where I was going to take this little doozy of a story.

"I can still smell Dudley's farts," Ted declared as we descended a hill so steep that the only safe form of transportation would have been a rickshaw.

"It's not Dudley anymore. It's me."

"Was it you the whole time?"

"Yes."

"Maybe you're allergic to shellfish."

In the car on the way to work the next morning, I heard my phone ring and saw that it was Ted. I picked up and started wailing. "John's assistant just called. The dog died after we left last night."

"No!"

"Yes!" I heaved into my steering wheel, which I mistakenly believed held my speaker.

"Oh, my God, you're kidding me, right?"

"Do I sound like I'm kidding, Ted? I haven't spoken to him yet, but Eva just called me and told me his assistant called. She's calling everyone at the party."

"Oh, my God! Oh, my God! Do you think it was the napkin?"

"It had to have been. Or the shellfish," I reminded him.

"Oh, my God! Do not tell anyone that you gave him the napkin or the shellfish. Who else was there when you gave it to him?" he demanded.

"It was just Eva and Beth."

"Okay, just don't tell anyone else that was there. Do not tell anyone, Chelsea. Do you understand me?"

"I don't feel comfortable asking Eva to lie for me if I killed a dog."

"Did she sign her confidentiality agreement?"

"Yes, but she didn't see what I fed Dudley. She just saw the tail end of him eating the napkin. I'll say it was one of those raviolis."

"Okay."

I felt a new wave of fake tears ready to make their way through the phone just in time for me to explode, "I'm a murderer, Ted! I'm a murderer. A dog murderer! I'm just like Phil Spector minus the music career."

"No, Chelsea, you need to get ahold of yourself. You are not a murderer! This was an accidental dog homicide!"

"What if they find out?"

"No one's going to find out anything. Let me make a few calls. I'll call John to give my condolences and feel around to find out if he suspects anything. Stay strong. You did nothing wrong. This was an accident. Chelsea… I love you."

"Thanks," I muttered as meekly as possible, and then added, "His assistant said they were doing an autopsy."

"What?!"

"An autopsy."

"The dog is fucking ten years old! They said last night they gave him open-heart surgery two months ago."

"I know. That means they think something fishy happened last night. They're going to find out. I can't believe I killed someone's dog." We hung up the phone, and I spent the rest of my ride into work craning my head around trying to find out where exactly the speakerphone in my car was located. Ted's voice had sounded like it was coming straight out of the sky.

I had an extra bounce in my step walking into the office that day and headed straight into Tom's office, where he was sitting with Brad, one of the writers on my show.

"What did you think about that dog Dudley last night?" I asked Tom as I sat down on the sofa opposite Brad.

"I'll tell you what I thought of Dudley," Tom said, placing his morning coffee on his desk. "I believe Dudley is what two bears can produce when they fall madly, deeply in love under a waterfall. A cub in the shape of a bulldog that goes by the name of Dudley."

"I thought that dog looked like he could take a punch in the face. And I wanted to punch him, because he didn't stop farting all night."

"That was you, and you're a fool if you think everybody at that party didn't know it."

"That may be true, but that's not what I'm here to discuss. Let me tell you a little story about Dudley. Last night I fed him a ravioli, and he ate the whole napkin with it. For Ted's benefit I later changed the ravioli to one of those crab appetizers. I spoke to Ted earlier this morning and told him that Dudley passed away last night and they're doing an autopsy today at three."