“Oh, look! You get to write about that cute hat-hating dog,” Brisa said excitedly. “I wish I could help you, but we are making — what do you call it, Kennedy?”
“Catnip pouches,” Kennedy answered.
“Catnip pouches! So much fun,” Brisa said, pulling on Lety’s hand. “Where will you go?”
“I will start with Finn,” Lety said. “But I’ll go to the cat room later, okay?”
“¡Hasta luego, capitán!” Brisa said, turning on a thicker than usual Bolivian accent for extra drama. Lety giggled. Over the past three years, Lety had managed to lose most of her Mexican accent, shedding it as fast as she could, like it was an itchy polyester sweater. Brisa, on the other hand, clung to her Bolivian accent like it was the world’s softest sweater made from silky alpaca fleece. Once, when Mrs. Camacho corrected Brisa’s accent, Brisa quickly defended herself. She explained that her accent was her grandma’s accent and it was all she had left of Bolivia. She didn’t want to give it up, too. Mrs. Camacho smiled and nodded, “You hang on to that beautiful accent, Brisa Quispe!”
As the girls parted ways, it struck Lety that this was one of the few times this year she’d been without Brisa or Kennedy at her side. So far, all her summer days had been spent with them at Kennedy’s neighborhood pool. Brisa’s mom picked up Lety every day for the pool and camp. Now Lety was on her own. For a moment, she second-guessed herself, wondering if it would have been easier to have just avoided the competition with Hunter and signed up to be a cat hero with her best friends. Was proving she could be a shelter scribe and write as well as him that important?
“Everything cool, Lety?” Alma asked her. “You’re sort of zoning out.”
Lety looked up, surprised to find Alma there. She pocketed her list.
“I’m just thinking about what I’ll write for Finn,” she answered, followed by a nervous giggle.
“Take this for help.” Alma handed Lety a flyer with Spike’s picture on it. “Gaby wrote it. You can use it as an example.”
Lety quickly read it and laughed at the part where it said Spike disliked rainy days when he couldn’t go outside to chase squirrels.
“Do you think Spike will be back?” Lety asked, already missing sweet Spike.
“Definitely,” Alma answered. “He always comes back. That’s sort of the problem. People adopt him and then they say he’s too wild. I’ll never understand it. I love that dog, but I can’t have him because we have a cat now and they don’t get along so well.”
“Did you get your cat from here?”
“Yep! Her name is Feather. She’s a beauty.” Alma pulled out her cell phone. “Check her out.” Lety leaned in to see an image of a majestic gray, tan, and white tabby with bright green eyes.
“Emerald-green eyes,” Lety said. “She is so beautiful.”
“She’s the best cat ever, but she doesn’t tolerate dogs.”
“Can anyone adopt Spike?”
“Sure, as long as Dr. Villalobos believes that you’re kind and a good fit for Spike.”
“How does he know if you are a good fit?”
“Dr. Villalobos studies people. He watches their behavior. How they act and everything they say. He thinks I’m super awesome, so obviously he’s an excellent judge of character.”
Lety felt suddenly warm listening to Alma. She had a terrible thought: If Dr. Villalobos found out about the contest, would he think she wasn’t fit to adopt Spike? They were supposed to be working together. She thought back to what Mario had said earlier about Gaby almost being kicked out from volunteering at the shelter. Lety didn’t want to be kicked out. She wanted to be the best shelter scribe ever and help the animals. She also wanted to adopt sweet Spike.
“That was a joke,” Alma said. “You okay, chica?”
For a second Lety considered asking Alma if it was true what Mario said about Gaby being kicked out, but she shoved the idea away. Alma was smart. She’d start to wonder why Lety was worried about being kicked out and maybe bust them all. “I think you are awesome, too.”
“Thanks, chica,” Alma said with a big smile. “You’re not so bad yourself. Are you interested in Spike? Being his forever family?”
“Yes, but my mom has to talk to my dad about it.”
“Does he like dogs?”
“Oh yes. Very much. When we lived in Mexico, he used to share his breakfast with the stray dogs. He even once built a doghouse for a neighbor. We were going to get a dog, but then he moved here and we came later.”
“I know I just met you, but you seem like a good fit for Spike. Still, I’m not the one who decides. Dr. Villalobos is the one you have to impress.”
“I’ll try my best,” Lety said. “Thanks.”
She rushed off toward the Bow Wow Zone. When she arrived, Hunter was already there. He stood motionless in front of a cage, as if mesmerized by the dog inside. Lety passed behind him toward Finn’s cage, but Hunter never budged. He remained standing and staring at the large white dog. He didn’t notice her.
“Hunter?” Lety said. “Are you okay?”
Hunter snapped out of his daze and looked at Lety with sad, light brown eyes.
“He looks like my dog,” Hunter said, gesturing at the white Great Pyrenees/Labrador mixed-breed dog who was chewing on a squeaky toy. “I mean, she’s not my dog anymore. She …” Hunter’s voice lowered and drifted off like he wasn’t sure he should say any more. He continued to gaze at the dog.
“She’s not your dog anymore?” Lety asked softly. “What happened?”
Hunter shrugged.
Lety had only been at camp with Hunter for two days now, but she noticed he shrugged a lot. Brisa had already nicknamed him Mr. Shruggy Llama. The nickname made Lety laugh, but now she recognized something hidden behind Hunter’s shrugs. Something so sad that not even words could express it. Lety was good at reading facial gestures, body language, and tone of voice. For her first year at school, these clues guided her and helped her learn English. She knew that Hunter’s shrugs were meant to express that he didn’t care or didn’t know, but the shrugs were also replacing something that he did care about. Lety was certain it had something to do with his dog that wasn’t his dog anymore.
Hunter stayed silent, not answering Lety’s question. She decided to try one more time.
“What was your dog’s name?”
“Gunner,” Hunter answered, still focused on the dog in the cage. Lety glanced over at Finn, who was wagging his tail and looking up at her with golden-brown eyes. She gave him a quick wink to let him know she’d be back. As she joined Hunter in front of the furry white dog’s cage, Finn whined.
“Gunner,” she said. “That’s cute. Am I saying it right?”
Hunter nodded. On the cage was a sheet of paper listing some facts about Sawyer, the white Pyrenees/Labrador. Lety looked over his age, breed, and intake date, which was the date he was brought into the shelter.
“Poor Sawyer. He has been here since March. Five months! Why hasn’t anyone adopted him? He is so cute.”
Hunter shrugged.
“People are dumb,” he mumbled.
Lety wondered if he thought she was dumb. She clapped her hands at Sawyer, who immediately dropped his toy and walked up and pawed at the clear plastic barrier between them. “Hello, sweet boy!” She squatted down to be at eye level with him. “You’re a pretty boy! Yes, you are!”
Hunter squatted down next to her, and Lety noticed light brown freckles scattered over Hunter’s cheeks like a connect-the-dots game.
“He’s just like my dog, except that Gunner was a full-breed Great Pyrenees,” Hunter said. “She had a few little gray strands around her face, but mostly she was fluffy white like this one. I got her for my fifth birthday. She was just a puppy.”
“How cute.”
“She looked like a white bear,” Hunter said with a nod. “She was smart, too.”
Lety liked the way Hunter talked about his dog. When he spoke about her, his voice became as soft as Sawyer’s white furr
y coat and his brown eyes as glossy as Sawyer’s wet nose.
“Do you know what you’ll write?” Lety asked.
“I’ve got some ideas,” Hunter said. He opened his notebook and uncapped his pen. Finn let out a long impatient whine, and they both laughed.
“Sorry, Finn! I’m coming!” Lety yelled, and stood up. Now Sawyer barked, as if pleading for her to stay and call him sweet names. “Sweet fluffy boy, Hunter will stay with you. He’s going to write you an awesome profile.”
A faint smile crossed Hunter’s face. Lety walked back to Finn’s cage and jotted down notes on her small notepad. She stopped and glanced at Hunter. He remained on the floor across from Sawyer. His notebook was open and his pen raced across and down the page with furious speed. She envied how easy it was for him. She wondered if Hunter could really read at a high school level and if she’d ever be able to write as fast as him someday.
“It’s amazing,” Kennedy said, after reading Hunter’s animal profile for the large Great Pyrenees/Labrador. The next day, the profile was already printed with a photograph of Sawyer and pinned up on the bulletin board in the shelter’s reception area. “But there’s no way I’m telling him that.”
“He used ‘beckon,’ ” Brisa said softly. “Maybe he writes at the high school level like he said? ¿Qué piensas, Lety?”
“I think maybe he does,” she said, taking a deep breath before reading the profile.
“It is good,” Lety said. “It sounds just like Sawyer.”
“Mario told me that Hunter is almost done with Scout’s and Kenzie’s profiles, too,” Kennedy said. “How far along are you?”
Lety’s head swirled. So far, she had only started Finn’s profile.
“I’m going to finish Finn today, and then I’ll move on to Bella’s profile and then the cats’.”
“You have to get more done before the weekend. Weekends are big for adoptions. It’s your best chance to win,” Kennedy said. “Can you get at least three done? You could complete the last two over the weekend at the pool with us and have them ready on Monday. What do you think?”
“No pressure!” Brisa joked.
Lety swallowed hard. Dr. Villalobos suddenly called everyone to take a seat.
“Today we’re going to watch a film about dog aggression and how to behave if you’re ever confronted with a hostile dog.”
Lety scooted her chair next to Brisa and Kennedy. She glanced at Hunter. From under his baseball cap, Hunter gave her a quick smile. She smiled back.
Dr. V. folded up one of his long sleeves and went around showing everyone a bite-sized scar on his arm with the date of 08/16/97 around it. “See this scar?”
Some of the kids made yuck noises at the scar, while Mario rolled up his pant leg to show off his own scar.
“Skateboard injury,” Mario explained. Dr. V. grimaced and told him to use kneepads. Everyone laughed.
“I got this scar when I was in college,” Dr. V. said. “I was on my morning jog when a full-grown Doberman jumped out at me. Luckily, he just got my arm, and I was able to call for help and get free with no more than this ugly gash.”
“Did it hurt?” Kennedy asked.
“Oh yeah! It hurt like the dickens!”
Lety and Brisa passed each other clueless looks. They had never heard of anything hurting “like the dickens” before. Lety hoped she never felt anything that hurt like the dickens. It didn’t sound good.
“Animal shelters like ours are full of fluffy sweet kittens and playful adorable dogs, but unfortunately not all dogs have been socialized to be good dogs. Some dogs behave aggressively because they’ve been neglected and abused or raised that way by humans. If ever you’re confronted with one, I want you to know what to do,” Dr. Villalobos said.
“He is nice,” Brisa said as Dr. V. switched on a video.
The film started by showing dogs in various stages of aggression, displaying sharp teeth and letting out low growls. Lety pulled out Finn’s profile. He definitely was not an aggressive dog. Finn was sweet and mostly quiet until someone wore a hat, but she didn’t want to mention his hat-hating ways in the profile. She worried it would scare people away from adopting him. Instead she described Finn’s favorite blue blanket and noted his age and breed. She still needed to use one of the five words in his profile. She grabbed her dictionary and looked up colossal and fusion. Neither worked. She looked up infectious, rigid, and supersonic. She frowned and closed her dictionary just as the man in the film was giving tips on how to act when faced with an angry dog.
“Don’t move; stand rigid and be silent,” the man advised. “Most importantly, do not make eye contact with an angry dog, as it will see that as a challenge.”
Rigid! It was one of the words she was supposed to include in a profile.
The man in the video had used rigid to mean stiff, but it also could mean being strict about rules. Lety’s brain buzzed as she finally saw a way to fit rigid into the profile. She jotted down a few more notes about his favorite blanket. It was a soft blue fleece blanket that he dragged in his mouth from one corner of his cage to the other. After a few minutes, Finn’s profile was finished.
The next day, three new profiles were up on the Furry Friends Animal Shelter website. Hunter had finished a profile for Kenzie, the tan-and-white American pit bull.
“He used ‘gush,’ ” Kennedy announced. “I didn’t think he’d find a way, but he did.” The three girls huddled over a computer at the reception desk to view Kenzie’s profile on the shelter’s website.
A wave of mixed emotions flooded over Lety. Once again, Hunter had written a beautiful profile. She was glad because it meant that someone would hopefully adopt Kenzie soon. Yet Lety felt like she was letting Kennedy and Brisa down. More than that, she felt like she was letting the shelter down. She pulled out the profile she’d started on Bella, the fluffy black Pomeranian.
“I don’t know why I thought I could be shelter scribe,” she mumbled.
“Your profile for Finn was awesome. You just need to write them faster,” Kennedy said. “It’s Friday already. You need to get as many profiles up as possible today for the weekend.” Kennedy looked at her watch. “C’mon, Brisa, we have to go help make feather toys.”
“Be there in a second,” Brisa said, hanging back with Lety as Kennedy walked off toward the multipurpose room.
“I think she’s mad at me,” Lety said.
“No, she’s not. She just really wants you to beat Mr. Shruggy Llama and Mario. It’s Kennedy. She doesn’t like to lose. Remember that soccer match we played against Mario’s team and he accused her of a handball?”
Lety nodded; she remembered the game. “We won that game. Why is she holding a grudge?”
“We are talking about Kennedy and Mario. They are like two stubborn goats.” Brisa shook her head. “Enough about them. I have to go to the cat room, but first I want to talk because you have this loca look in your eyes like you want to quit. I hear it in your voice, too.”
Lety wondered how Brisa became such a great mind reader. Hunter was just too good. He could do a better job for the animals. She regretted signing up to be a shelter scribe.
“His profiles are better than mine,” Lety said.
“No es verdad,” Brisa said.
“It is true.”
“Do you remember that I didn’t want to do this camp?”
Lety grimaced just thinking back to how hard she had to work to convince — more like beg — Brisa that enrolling in the camp would be better than ELL summer classes. Then she had to sell the idea to Brisa’s family and her own family, who had to pay two hundred dollars for them both to be there. For Brisa’s family, two hundred dollars wasn’t that much because her father was an engineer for one of the biggest firms in town, but for Lety’s family … it was a lot of money. Especially when ELL summer camp was free. “I only joined because of you,” Brisa said. “If you start to doubt, I will doubt.”
“It’s tougher than I thought,” Lety said.
&n
bsp; “Tough?” Brisa said, narrowing her eyes at Lety. “Tougher than leaving your grandparents and cousins to come here? Or do you mean tough like not being invited to birthday parties with amazing cupcakes and extra-cheesy pizza that everyone talks about the next day in class?”
And just like that, a light went on in Lety’s head. She felt ashamed to be making excuses. If anyone knew tough, it was definitely her and Brisa.
“Focus on those sweet puppies and precious gatitos. Be their voice.”
“How …” Lety started when suddenly Brisa interrupted her with high-pitched meows.
“Meow, meow, please find me a home. Meow, meow, I don’t want to stay in the shelter forever. Meow write for me —”
“Brisa!” Lety laughed. “¡Ya! Stop already.” Brisa gave her a satisfied smile. Lety knew that with Brisa around, complaining did no good. “I will finish Bella’s profile today. Then I’ll write for the cats. You can help me with those.”
“¡Sí, por supuesto! I can tell you anything you want to know about Bandit and Lorca. Bandit is a tornado with whiskers. Lorca thinks he is a lion. Hunter could never write about them, but you can. Nos vemos, amiga.” Brisa walked off and then stopped and turned to face Lety again.
“Lety, I just realized I don’t remember how to say ‘give up’ in Spanish anymore. Do you?”
Lety scanned her brain. She panicked, letting out a gasp.
“I don’t remember it, Brisa.”
“Let’s keep it that way!”
Brisa swaggered down the hallway toward the cat room, leaving Lety feeling like she’d been lifted up by a strong cool wind.
“This little one was lost and found,” Dr. V. said, speaking over the noisy dogs in the small-dog room. He handed Bella to Lety. “No one claimed her.”
Lety wrapped the Pomeranian in her arms. How could no one come looking for her?
Lety Out Loud Page 4