by Ruth Hay
“Are there not many other shows like this one, closer to home?”
“Yes, but not all of them count equally. This is one of the big ones leading to competitions in the United States.”
Their food arrived. It gave Vilma a chance to conceal her dismay at his comments. She did not want her dogs going all over the place without her. The sooner Andy established his business and had new client dogs, the better, as far as she was concerned. Suddenly, the results of tomorrow’s test of dog agility assumed far more importance than she had expected.
Chapter 23
Andy slept as well as he could. The room was possibly too luxurious. It was the kind of thing his ex-wife would appreciate. He was more accustomed to Spartan accommodations. The bed seemed to engulf him and he was dreaming strange dreams about failure and its consequences.
He rose early and took a cool shower. There was milk in the small fridge so he made coffee and sat drinking it while he ran over in his mind the routine with the dogs. It all depended on their mood today.
So far, there had been no incidents to disrupt their concentration but one angry outbreak between competing animals could set up a chain of reactions and the control he needed would vanish like the early morning mist outside his bedroom window.
The holding area at the arena was well monitored on Saturday. He pinned his hopes on that situation being repeated today. So much depended on this day. He had told Vilma the truth when he said how much he was counting on a victory but he concealed part of the reason, as he had always concealed the inner functions of his mind and emotions when he was with her. It was an ingrained habit now, and he had no idea how to move from his present guarded position to one of more openness.
He allowed himself a few seconds to recall how wonderful it was to sit beside her in the restaurant last evening. It felt like a normal couple sharing a meal in a nice setting. The only difference was the conclusion of the evening when they went to separate rooms for the night.
It had taken him a very long time to acknowledge he wanted much more from Vilma Smith. He knew it was not likely she would ever climb down from her high horse and see him as he wanted to be seen.
He was totally to blame for this. He had shown her only the worst of himself.
He retreated behind his security barriers whenever she approached.
He made excuses for his cowardice.
He was damaged inside and out.
He was poor and she was rich.
He had nothing to offer her.
He had his one chance at happiness long ago and it was all taken away in a flame of destruction.
He was better off on his own.
It was a familiar litany of despair, often repeated, but the truth of the matter was unassailable.
In spite of every reason he could throw against it, he had serious feelings for this woman.
Deep, serious feelings that nothing in his litany of rational reasons could diminish in the least.
He cared for her.
He would love her if he could.
He was royally screwed.
As he had done so many times before, Andy Patterson turned off this vulnerable side of himself and concentrated on the business at hand.
Today. Astrid and Oscar. A win, if possible. Then, one more night and home.
He collected the dogs from Vilma and warned her they would be leaving in twenty-five minutes.
She was wearing a huge, white, hotel robe over a long filmy nightdress and looked sleepy and soft like a puppy or a small child. He hardened his heart and took the dogs for a fast run.
When he returned, she had dressed and ordered breakfast for both of them which he gulped down rapidly without really tasting it, but glad, nonetheless, for the calories to keep his energy high.
They were parked at the convention centre and in place for the competition in good time. Vilma went off to get a seat and he scanned the performance listing to see how long he would have to wait.
Fortunately, he was placed early because of the previous day’s standings. He noted this competition excluded most of the small breeds and favoured mid to large dogs whose agility was more evident.
He had paid close attention to the mid-sized dogs yesterday and assessed their performances, but today was an entirely different thing requiring a huge amount of skill and strength that was available only in the best of animals under the best of training plans.
He could only hope and pray he had done enough to prepare Astrid and Oscar. He secured the dogs in a quiet corner and went out to walk the course. The first part was much as he expected. The challenges were of moderate difficulty. The second part of the course, which would be where only the best of the morning’s participants would compete, was at another level altogether.
He examined the height of the obstacles, comparing them to the extension capabilities of his dogs’ legs.
He walked the distance between the tunnel and the ramp. He stood and eyed the zigzag course and estimated the largest dogs would not be able to change direction as fast as required.
This alone gave him a modicum of hope. It was a far more difficult set up than he had ever encountered in his years of training King for police work.
* * *
He returned to Oscar and Astrid, who welcomed him eagerly. There were ready to go; bright eyed and bushy tailed. He brushed their gorgeous coats to soothe himself more than to make them look more appealing. He talked to them calmly although his heart was hammering in his chest.
They knew. Dogs always knew. They pushed up against him, one on either side and forced him to sit down. They sat and stared at him with tails waving. The message was clear.
They were here.
They were ready.
They would do whatever he asked of them.
He could ask no more.
Everything around him faded from view. He saw only the two dogs and the course. He had decided to do something risky and unusual. Because of the closeness of the two dogs and because they had been trained together, he intended to run the course simultaneously, with Astrid in the lead and Oscar following only a few seconds behind. The risk was that Oscar might not get the signals fast enough to maintain the required control. Astrid was smarter, faster and the leader. He was relying on her to get the instruction quickly and move on independently while he focussed on Oscar.
There was one part that might prove to be disastrous. In tunnel practises in the barn, Oscar had the habit of trying to catch up with Astrid and nip her tail before she could exit. The only way to prevent this, while the dogs were out of sight, was to delay Oscar’s entry just long enough to give Astrid a head’s start. The danger was that their emergence would be out of synch with their entry. The required standard was for the dogs to maintain an equal distance from each other all the way through the course.
The initial phase would show their mettle but the delay between the competitions in phases one and two was a concern. If the dogs were too wound up in the first phase they might lose their edge before the second and most important part.
There was not much he could do about this. Time would tell.
* * *
They were up and off soon after the announcements. All went well. Astrid went separately in this set with Oscar following as next competitor. He did not want to give away his master strategy too soon. Both dogs performed well and passed easily into the second phase.
Several animals were eliminated for faults but one beautiful, red, Hungarian Vizsla was an outstanding performer and drew an appreciative sigh from the audience. She would be the one to beat, but she had the long legs of her breed and there was a chance she would falter on the low tunnel task.
* * *
In the break between the two sets, he took the dogs out to a fenced area where they could run free. He had signalled to Vilma, who had a front seat, to join them outside. She left her coat on her seat and as soon as the dogs saw her emerge they swarmed her and she lavished them with praise and love in a way he admired, but coul
d not reproduce. His police training did not allow such extravagant expressions of emotion with a working dog.
They loved her with their whole hearts. They trusted him and enjoyed their exercises as a way to demonstrate their strength and power. The two attitudes were complementary but quite different.
He thought, as he watched the trio laugh and play, that he and Vilma were also quite different. The question was; could they ever be complementary?
The few minutes of freedom were quickly gone when the warning bell sounded. It was back to business but the break had accomplished a fresh burst of energy in the dogs. He hoped it was enough.
He sat with Astrid and Oscar but did not permit them to see the arena performances of the first two competitors. The first dog, a good, slender young pointer, was too eager and knocked over a post.
Andy put it down to inexperience and nerves. The hall was now full to the brim and the excitement was palpable. He stroked his dogs and waited for the signal to begin.
The announcer said the next would be a challenging round, one of only three similar attempts they would see today.
As soon as the voice echo died down, he walked smartly to the starting point and stood ahead of the simple stair climb and jump with the dogs, one behind the other, waiting for his signal. Once they began, there would be no pause until they completed the course.
They were off!
Astrid was going fast, so Oscar had to match her speed. Andy stayed ahead of them and monitored the delays to keep them evenly spaced. It went by in a blur, so great was the required concentration, but when the tunnel appeared he changed tactic and stood at the tunnel entrance to keep Oscar back for a second more. Astrid vanished with a wave of her tail and Andy counted in his head. If he missed this calculation, his chance of a perfect score would disappear.
He hardly breathed as he walked briskly to the finish line. He turned, hoping to see Astrid emerge immediately but he was required to wait. The audience also waited in suspense. This was the final test.
Astrid burst out of the tunnel and exactly five seconds later a jubilant Oscar emerged and the two dogs ran to sit obediently at his feet, expecting the praise they knew they so richly deserved.
The arena erupted. Even the announcer was applauding. Vilma was on her feet, as were the judges.
It was a glorious moment, founded on endless hours of practice and the trust between man and dogs.
* * *
Andy withdrew and went outside at once. Their participation was finished. It would be an hour or more until the judges awarded their prizes. The parking area was silent and the enclosure was vacant.
To his surprise, he saw Vilma running toward him with her arms out, coat flying and purse dangling from her hand. She launched herself at him before he could summon his defences. His arms clenched around her automatically and her voice sounded in his ear with words he never thought to hear.
“Andrew Patterson, you wonderful man! That was a tour de force! You were amazing and everyone in there knew it. I can’t believe how you handled these two monsters. I love them and I……………”
He was not about to let her finish just in case the sentence ended differently than he hoped.
He bent her over his arms and kissed her mouth soundly and often until the beat of their hearts was synchronized and the dogs lay down in shock at their feet.
Chapter 24
Vilma did not go back to her seat for the awards ceremony. Her mind and body were in a state of turmoil and she needed to think about what had happened. The problem was that her mind refused to cooperate. Her brain was not functioning at all it seemed. All she could remember was the exquisite feeling of being in his strong arms knowing he was present with her in a way he had never been before. It felt like stripping back a heavy drape and seeing out of a window for the first time. The view from that window was not yet clear but it was certainly compelling.
She stood in the foyer surrounded by tables and with the glass wall between her and the arena floor.
The announcements were piped in so she heard the judge say Andy had won the Best in Brace and both the Agility and Obedience awards. Photographers were taking pictures of Andy with her dogs. She should be out there with a camera but that was a million miles from her mind.
She was reassembling everything in her life and it took all the mind power she could summon.
Andy Patterson and her?
A relationship?
A romance?
What and where?
When?
Now?
She was practical enough to realize they were far from home. Far from the view of anyone who might know them. If they were to take this ‘thing’, she did not yet have a suitable descriptor, to the next level, here and now, some kind of trial, was the obvious answer.
The obvious question was did she want to? The answer came in a flood of emotion that was overwhelming. Her body screamed, Yes! Yes! Yes!
She was almost embarrassed at this response and glad no one could see the flame in her face.
She calmed the turbulence within, by making a promise to herself….. if Andy still felt the same when they returned to the hotel, she would not hesitate.
It was a revolutionary decision, given her determined position of the years before. And yet, this could be her last chance for a fuller life. Not a life she could control in all respects. That would not happen with Andy Patterson. Not a life predictable and cozy. That was not in the cards.
Despite a series of negative reasons her brain was beginning to put in line for her, she stopped it short.
These matters were for the unknown future. Now was the time and place to find out if there would be a viable future for them.
The audience began to filter out of the building. She went to the car and waited.
It was a long time before Andy and the dogs arrived. Dusk was falling and the temperature was sinking fast.
She saw him approaching, his arms full of trophies and photographs, the dogs attached to him by leashes slung over his arms, but his eyes were only for her and her heart lifted at the sight.
They said little on the way back to the hotel. The dogs were already sleeping in the back seat. Without a word he parked the car, roused the dogs and took them inside to her suite where he settled them with premium chews and water bowls and lavish amounts of dry food. He then returned to fetch her and take her to his suite.
She let him be in charge. She knew there would be awkward moments but that was inevitable and temporary. She felt such admiration for this man, not only because of his accomplishments with her dogs, but also because he had chosen to make himself vulnerable; finally casting off the veneer of his tough exterior and letting her glimpse the tender depth that lay inside.
All of that was present but, in the end, it was the feeling of his arms around her that convinced her to let go completely.
His passionate words helped, of course.
They woke to a bright new day and a bright new future. Neither wanted breakfast but copious cups of coffee were enjoyed, after hot showers and fast packing.
Functioning as a pair for the first time and yet, knowing what each must do, they separated, with Vilma taking care of the bill and Andy looking after the dogs, much subdued after their efforts of the day before.
They set off early and there was a lot to talk about on the way to Kingston. Andy drove and Vilma looked at his profile and saw so much more there now that he had the look of a happy man. Predictably, the practical matters of what next, and where and when, were set aside for now. With his attention on the road and his eyes forward, he felt free to open up about his longing for connection, his admiration for her and his fear of never rising above the restrictions he had placed on his life.
“When you came into my life, Vilma, I was drawn to you immediately but I was afraid of rejection and not yet in a good place. Just knowing you would be arriving at the farm with the dogs gave me the will to think and act differently. My recovery is all about you. I kno
w I never gave that away until yesterday. I know that was wrong. I know I can change. Now that I have you in my life, for real, everything changes.”
He reached for her hand and squeezed it hard.
“I understand what comes next is up to you Vilma. I can’t give you much because I don’t have much other than myself to give, and I give that with my whole heart. Everything else is in your hands. You must decide and I do not want to rush you in any way. You must set the pace. You have so much more than I to lose.”
She had listened carefully until this point. The flow of words comprised more than he had ever shared before on any topic. Now she had to interrupt.
“Andy, don’t put me on some high pedestal. I am a woman who has had both joy and sorrow in my past. Not to the degree you have experienced, of course, but I am as surprised and shaken by what happened yesterday as you are. I had given up on finding a man I could love. I thought we had a business arrangement until you kissed me.”
They both laughed, then they smiled, and Vilma reached up to touch the side of his face with tenderness and delight.
“So, you see, you are not the only one in a state of shock today. It’s not about losses and gains and who has what. It’s only about us. Us. Together.”
She let that statement sit there in the car space for a moment. It was simple, but powerful, and said it all.
“We have time, Andy. Our feelings grew slowly, in silence. We have a lot of that silence to fill in and we will take the time we need to do it.”
* * *
Without actually discussing it, the decision was made to make the journey home in one long drive. Vilma called ahead to alert Faith and they drove into Kingston to find her waiting outside the house with Melvin, bag packed, and with a full carrier bag at her feet.