Colonel Victor isn’t convinced. His face shadows stay stubbornly deep purple, the color of a bruise.
“You and Daisy here are partners,” Alex says. “She’s been working hard for you all morning. You can’t expect a dog to work for you if you’re not willing to do some of the work, too. You’re a team. Fifty–fifty. That’s the workload.” These are the first words of Alex’s that haven’t made me want to upchuck.
“A team.” Colonel Victor lowers his mirrored sunglasses. I prefer when I can see someone’s eyes, because eyes talk louder than anything. He nods once. He understands teams. “Fifty–fifty. Let’s go, Micah.”
Micah huffs porcupine annoyance but joins us. We walk around the block to the park.
There are all sorts of glorious smells out here, and I breathe in deeply. Wet leaves and dandelion and rich soil and about twenty steps away, a chipmunk den. The breeze is swift and cold, and my fur dances in the wind. I feel sorry for humans, that they only have fur on their heads. There is nothing more delightful than tinkling fur.
There’s an annoying talky squirrel to my left, about ten steps away, shouting, Bring it, dog. You can’t climb trees and you know it. There are twelve gossiping birds to my right, flapping in a deliciously huge puddle. But I know based on the tension in my leash that Colonel Victor wants me to ignore them.
We do two laps around the small park, and the Colonel’s heart is thumping. But it’s a red-blood healthy thump, not a panicked one. He’s doing very well with his training, and I’m quite proud of him.
“Maybe you should put Daisy on your left, let her lead,” Alex suggests, an arrow pointing the way. “You might feel better putting her between you and anyone walking toward you.”
“That doesn’t help me with attacks from behind,” Colonel Victor says, but he does it and shifts me to his left. Surprisingly, his face shade lightens. I have to acknowledge Alex did that.
We all relax when the Colonel relaxes. Particularly Micah. Micah’s heart is practically singing at the moment, which surprises me because he’s not removed the terrible ear muzzles.
“Let’s see how Daisy does off leash, shall we?” Alex asks.
“Off leash?” The Colonel’s voice darkens like spilled oil.
Alex smiles but doesn’t show us his teeth. He reaches down and removes my vest (and the sudden nakedness makes me more than a little uncomfortable, to be honest). He unhooks my leash. “We need to make certain she’ll return when we call her.”
I’m free! Oh, glory, I’m free. For the first time since I was captured by that horrible Animal Control person, I am FREE. My muscles twitch like crickets. I could run wild. I could chase that horrid squirrel. I could tease the birds, take over that delicious puddle. But I’m unsure what to do, so I sit by the Colonel’s feet and await my orders.
Alex hands Colonel Victor a stick.
Colonel Victor nods ever so slightly. He doesn’t want me to go, but he’s trying. Fifty–fifty. He throws the stick. “Go get it, girl!”
So I run after it. AH, THE GLORY OF RUNNING! Every part of me is alive. My teeth sink into the meat of the stick and my jaws delight in chomping, my mouth in slobbering. Sticks taste like chewy delicious wildness. I bring it back when the Colonel hollers, “Come, Daisy!”
After three more throws, the Colonel is humming inside his skin, he’s so nervous being outside without me on my leash. “Can we, uh, head back in now, Alex?”
“In just a moment,” Alex says. His voice is pushy. “I want to make sure she understands COME.”
Like I don’t understand COME. That’s first-week stuff, Alex. I’m all the way up to BLOCK and CHECK and WATCH now. COME—don’t be ridiculous.
The Colonel sucks in a tight sharp breath and tosses the stick again.
I have to admit, I’m having so much fun being off my leash that I don’t protest. Freedom is a fast waterfall.
“The needs of a dog are the same as the needs of a human,” Alex is saying, but I’m not really listening to his butterfly words. The birds! They’re chirping so beautifully, I could just gobble them up. They taste awful, though. Feathers taste like gloom.
“Safety. Security. Food. Shelter. Exercise,” Alex natters on.
I bring the stick back. The Colonel throws it again. It feels so good to run! My paw pads squish in the mud, and I shiver with delight.
The Colonel’s muscles are tight when I return with the stick the next time. “I think we should go now,” he says.
Uh-oh. I’ve goofed off too long and the Colonel is lost-ball upset.
“If you’re feeling anxious, maybe you should pet Daisy,” Alex says. “Train yourself to pet her whenever you’re feeling . . .” He leaves the sentence hanging there, and the silence is plump with embarrassment that he can’t find the right word.
“Dangerous,” the Colonel completes the thought like a hammer on a nail. Everyone’s face shadows over at that, especially Micah’s.
I need to cheer him up. And the last time I cheered him up was when I disobeyed Alex, dragging that laundry basket of toys. I learned that early. I should do something yellow silly like that again!
“Come, Daisy,” Alex says. He pats his leg. “Come!”
But I have a better plan. I decide to chase the leaves that are skipping around in the wind, chomping each one between my jaws and grinding them to dust.
Ha-HA! Look at me! Ptooo! Ugh. So this is what disobedience tastes like: dry leaves.
“Daisy!” Alex shrieks. “What are you doing? Get back here!”
Not until the Colonel cheers up. Ha-HA! Gotcha, leaf! Ugh. Miserable dust.
Micah hops off a nearby bench. “I’ll catch her!” His face is serious, his words a promise tight as knots.
Aha! Notice my antics have challenged the young one! Chase me, Micah!
“Micah, no! Don’t chase her!” Alex shouts. “She’ll think it’s a game.”
Come and get me, kid. Ha-HA! Close, but NOPE.
Micah leaps and misses me, landing THUD in the dirt. I’ll win, Micah. I will.
“Daisy, COME!”
Not now, Alex. I’ve got leaves to chomp and a child to outrun. Ugh. This is exhausting. And tasteless.
“MISS DAISY. COME.”
The voice booms down on me like a lid clanging on an empty metal garbage can. I tuck my tail and slink back to the person who shouted it: Colonel Victor.
Alex huffs blue disappointment and clips my leash back on. He doesn’t bother with my vest. I notice suddenly how cold I feel without it. “Most inconsistent dog I’ve ever worked with,” he mutters, his words pinpricks.
Inconsistent is a new word for me, but the way Alex says it, it tastes awful close to useless.
Micah frowns rain and dusts off his jeans.
Worst of all, the Colonel scowls, points the tip of his walking stick at me. I cower, because I know sticks. “Daisy. You know better.”
I do. I know better. COME is first-week stuff.
We walk in silence back to our car.
He didn’t call me Miss.
I don’t understand why that didn’t work this time.
This pack is inconsistent.
9
HUMANS ARE WEIRD
The stringy, gushy inside of pumpkins looks like something I’ve eaten too fast and then thrown up. Smells like it, too. I want to walk away from the smell, but the Colonel told me, Sit, Daisy. Stay. I remind myself: Sit. Stay. I’m not disobeying anymore.
I remember how much I want to be useful, after I failed at the park a few sunrises ago. I don’t want to fail like that again. I’m still not whole-hog certain what I did wrong, but I know inconsistent is bad.
Micah and Anna and baby Analise and the Colonel squish their precious human hands right into the pumpkin mess, squealing and slopping and pulling out globs of muck. Then they jab knives into the pumpkin and cut out creepy, fleshy faces. They top off all these oddities by placing a fire stick inside the hollow pumpkin and putting it outside the front door.
Humans are w
eird.
Next, Anna billows a cloth over a table. On it, she stands up a piece of glass, and behind the glass is an old piece of paper with two smiling human faces on it. “My abuelo and abuela,” she says to Micah and Analise. They nod. And another: “Tía Maria.” More nods. And another: “And of course, your sweet abuela Luciana, your dad’s mom.” That one, Micah studies. He runs his finger over the paper, his shades soft glowy pink. He feels a connection to this smile on paper. Pink means I miss you.
I am still sitting, still staying. The Colonel never tells me otherwise, even when he leaves the room. Sit, Daisy. Stay. I practice my commands all the time now. I’m getting really good at being useful.
Next Anna places bright yellow-orange flowers in an arch over the smiles. The flowers look like small suns but smell musky, like a push. Like they pushed themselves right out of the soil by their smell alone. She hangs pops of colorful thin paper and places more fire sticks around (humans and fire! So ignorant to the danger!). Then she lights a stick that smells heavenly sweet, like the inside of trees. Small wisps of smoke swirl off its tip, whispers from ghosts.
Finally, she places bread and fruit and little rainbow sugar candies shaped like skulls around the table. She pours salt into a bowl and pops open a tin can of something that fizzes and crackles in small bubbles from the hole in the top. She hums while she does this, and Micah and Analise help, and it’s all very sunshine warm and yellow.
“Día de los Muertos.” Anna sighs. “The Day of the Dead. I love the altars, don’t you? They’re my favorite. So colorful.”
I wonder why the Colonel isn’t here. Why he isn’t a part of the I miss yous. Micah shifts, like he’s heard me think that. “Where’s Dad?”
Anna lays a soft hand on Micah’s shoulder. “Remembering those who have passed on can be difficult.” Micah nods with the tiniest of head bobs, like a whisker twitch. “Not everyone can see it as a celebration, mi amor.”
She adjusts a picture here, a flower there, then steps back.
“There!” she says, and dusts her hands. Analise copies her, and the three of them giggle dandelions. “Go get dressed, Micah. It’s almost time to go trick-or-treating.”
Micah leaps from the room like a grasshopper. When he returns, he’s wearing a suit that makes him look like walking bones. Anna puts Analise in clothes that look like a ladybug. Ladybugs are pretty, but they taste like dirt.
“Let’s go, hijo!” The Colonel picks up my leash (which I’ve been dragging about, thank you very much). Micah leaps again, and his clothes make him look like a bone dance. “Walk, Miss Daisy!”
Walk.
Anna and Analise stay behind, holding a bowl of colorfully wrapped sugar things. “Have fun!” When we go outside, the sun is lowering, and long shadows are creeping up from below to take over the day. I don’t like night. Nothing good happens at night.
Micah swings a plastic pumpkin around, and I cower a bit, because swinging things are sometimes aimed at dogs. “Which house should we hit first?”
I cower at hit, too, because those are sometimes aimed at dogs as well.
But the Colonel snaps my leash, and I know I’m to be brave and keep up. “The Millers?” He seems okay tonight. I need to be okay, too.
We climb the steps of the house next door. They have a hollow pumpkin with fire inside, too, and out here in the growing dark, it is creepy.
They ring the doorbell. Inside, another dog barks. My shackles rise, and I feel a growl beginning in my belly. Block, I tell myself, even though the Colonel didn’t. I move between him and the door.
The door squeaks open, and Micah shouts, “Trick or treat!” to the smiling man standing there.
“Micah!” the stranger says. The dog inside barks—MY HOUSE! MINE! MINE!—but she’s penned up. I know because I can hear there’s another door between us and her somewhere.
“And you’re looking good, Victor,” the man says. He drops a bar of poisonous chocolate in Micah’s plastic pumpkin. Chocolate is evil; my belly never ached so bad as it did after I ate a tiny bit once in the Dumpster. I feel the growl getting stronger.
The Colonel flinches but smiles. “Thanks, Tom.”
We leave.
The growl flattens.
The shadows grow.
We do it again, and again, and again. After six houses, I am panting, confused. The Colonel seems clenched a little tight, too. The hollow pumpkins throw confusing light everywhere, kids dart and squeal in the streets, and the scent of poisonous chocolate hangs above it all.
But Micah! He dances, he leaps, his heart sings. Those bones of his are happy. The Colonel sees this, too, and he is trying not to crack. So I want to honor him. He is here, and he is trying to be here, so I won’t pull him aside.
But his teeth are grinding and his breathing is getting close to the edge.
The next house is dark. Too dark. But Micah insists. “C’mon, Dad. This is Jack’s house. He said his parents love Halloween!” Micah runs up the driveway.
Wait! I yell, and pull the Colonel after him. Why is Micah breaking from the pack?
We catch up to him and approach the steps.
Something feels wicked. Off. I pant. Drool.
At the top of the steps—
“AHHHHAHAHAHAHAHA!” An electric-wire-and-light skeleton cackles and jumps from a coffin, eyes glaring red.
I leap backward.
And the Colonel cracks.
He punches the plastic electric skeleton, then yanks it and tosses it across the yard. “Take that, you—” and he says a word that makes Micah flinch.
It makes the neighbor who opens the door flinch, too. “What the . . . ?”
The three humans stand there, panting and looking at the broken skeleton lying twisted on the wet grass, wires spraying from his bones. The pause feels like a pinch.
We all wait. Watch. See what the Colonel does next.
I’ve messed up. I waited too long. I didn’t listen to my instincts. I didn’t block or calm or watch or do any of the commands for myself like I was supposed to.
But the Colonel laughs. At first it feels stiff: he forces his shoulders to shake, his lungs to gasp, his face to smile. But slowly, even in the dim light of the creepy hollow pumpkin, I can see his face shadows loosening, hear his heart switch from a hammer to a hum. He grabs the extra skin around my neck and gives it a little tug, like I’m his reminder of here and now.
“Looks like that skeleton won’t be bothering you anymore, Jill,” he says.
The woman laughs. “We’ve had that thing for years. Scares the daylights out of me at least twice a week when it’s out. Good riddance.”
Micah laughs, too.
I smile and loll my tongue.
The Colonel’s training is improving.
10
A TOOL, NOT A DOG
I don’t know the human equivalent of a place that is fireworks and tulip gardens and taco trucks and marching bands and slow high tennis balls and endless grass rolled into one, but that place for a dog is called the GROCERY STORE.
We are halfway through our training: five weeks done, five weeks to go. Alex is really tangled up about this. He’s been chirping like a cricket about it all morning. Days . . . weeks . . . Alex uses words that fly by with wings instead of words that stick to you, like TODAY or BUBBLEGUM.
Now, we—Colonel Victor and Micah and Alex and me—step on a cool, rubbery pad. The doors to paradise slide open with magic, and it’s almost like I can see rainbow sunlight bouncing off angel wings, it’s so glorious. Glory tastes like fine Italian sausage. Smells like it, too. Right. Now.
The drool begins. I have to slurp every few seconds to prevent myself from looking the fool, because oh my. The hodgepodge of smells. Bacon and eggs and steak and bacon and ham and chicken and bacon and turkey and lobster and bacon. It is a wide-open blue sky of smells.
“Okay, Victor,” Alex says. His voice of late has less of an onion tinge to it and more of a mint-leaf tinge. Still too green and overwhelming, but
slightly more pleasant. “We’re going to put all those commands we’ve been practicing with Daisy to work.”
Colonel Victor’s face pulls down. His heartbeat speeds slightly. But he nods. That’s what bravery tastes like: saying yes when you want to say no.
We walk inside and, oh, the focus it takes when all the smells are massaging my nostrils! We grab a clangy metal cart with a wheel that shrieks like a demon, but the humans don’t seem bothered by it.
Right away, a pink smiley person greets us. “Hello! Welcome to Heavenly Groceries! No pets allowed, sir!”
“Block, Miss Daisy!” Colonel Victor shouts, a too-gruff warning bark. But I do: I move between the Colonel and the greeter and plant my booty on the cold white floor. The greeter’s face shifts from smiley pink to uncomfortable brown. A moment of heavy embarrassment hangs over us. Micah grinds his teeth.
Alex giggles, a palmetto bug skittering across too-hot sand. “We’re training Daisy here. She’s a service dog. See her vest?”
I puff my chest because I am indeed sporting my vest.
“I don’t know . . . ,” the greeter says. He’s no longer a greeter, though. He’s a stopper. A sharp-cornered stop sign. “Is she certified?” He cranes his neck, looks around the store for someone else. This tells me there is someone of higher rank in his pack than he.
“Technically, there’s no such thing as a universally recognized certification for service dogs,” Alex says. His voice is harsh like shells. “But . . . no. Not yet. This is perfectly legal, I can assure you.”
The Colonel is sweating now, and spit is beginning to pool in the corners of his mouth. I perk my ears back toward him to feel him better.
The stop-sign man droops a little, becomes less sharp. He steps aside. “C’mon into Heavenly Groceries, then.”
It wasn’t quite the trumpeting welcome into Heaven I thought I’d get, but oh! The blend of smells and colors. It’s fur-tingling splendid.
I trot beside Colonel Victor, swimming through each individual smell: roast beef. Salami. Cheddar cheese. Apples (gag). As I’m splashing through each scent, I feel Colonel Victor’s heart speed up. His eyes scan the building. I can tell he’s searching for an escape route.
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