Puppy Love (10 page)

As my mom pulled back into traffic, Muckle and I headed into the park through the big iron gate. It was a beautiful autumn day, warm and sunny with a slight breeze, and it seemed everyone in the tri-county area was out enjoying the weather. That definitely included the dog park. There had to be at least two dozen dogs in there of all shapes and sizes.

“Come on, Muckie,” I said, tightening my grip on the leash. I could already tell Muckle was revved up by all the new sights and sounds. “Let's check it out.”

We wandered around, getting the lay of the land. Well, I wandered—Muckle dashed back and forth in front of me, growing more excited by the second.

No wonder. There was a lot going on. We started by checking out the huge central lawn, which took up about two-thirds of the place. It was vast, flat, and grassy, with only a couple of large shade trees breaking things up. Tons of dogs were running around out there. Some were wrestling in groups of two or three, while others focused on the owners tossing Frisbees or tennis balls.

Muckle was getting overstimulated just watching all that action. I wasn't about to let him loose—I'd probably never be able to catch him again. Or at least not before the buses stopped running at midnight. So we headed over to the shadier area along the perimeter. It was divided into different sections. There were a bunch of smallish pens where little dogs were playing, along with a couple of slow-moving large dogs that I guessed were too elderly to handle the rough-and-tumble of the main park. The area also contained water stations, poop deposit cans with plastic bags for anyone who'd forgotten to bring some, and even a couple of crates where people could temporarily stow their dogs.

“Oh, look,” I told Muckle as we passed the last of the small pens. “This must be the agility stuff.”

We'd come to another separate pen, this one much larger than
the small-dog playpens. It was dotted with colorful equipment, only some of which I knew the names of. There were jumps, ramps, weave poles, a seesaw, and more. At the moment a cute mixed breed was practicing running through a fabric tunnel, his eyes focused on the twentysomething woman directing his movements. Both owner and dog seemed to be having fun. On the sidelines, an older woman was leaning against a tree trunk and watching while her dog—a tiny, delicate-looking papillon—chewed busily on a toy bone.

I glanced at the gate, which had shut behind us after Muckle and I entered. “I guess it would be okay to let you off your leash for a while,” I told Muckle. “You can't do much damage in here, right?”

Muckle sat relatively quietly as I clicked the leash off. Then he immediately dashed off, smelling along the fence line.

After a moment he spotted the papillon. Muckle's tail went straight up, and his ears pricked. Letting out several sharp barks, he bounded toward the tiny dog.

The papillon's owner looked over, her eyes widening in alarm. “Stop!” she yelled at Muckle, waving her arms. “Stay away!”

The way she was acting, you would have thought there was a giant hungry lion charging toward her instead of a friendly sheltie puppy only slightly larger than her own dog. Still, I didn't want to cause trouble on our first visit, so I decided to humor her.

“Muckle!” I called. “Come back here!”

But the dog park was clearly way too much for Muckle's tiny brain. He barked again—his hyper bark, the one that meant his
brain had pretty much switched off—and started chasing the papillon around and around its owner's legs. The woman shrieked, trying to grab her dog. For some reason the papillon seemed to regard both its owner and the crazy-eyed larger dog as equal threats. It dodged the woman's flailing arms, then raced off toward the big A-frame obstacle, heading up and over with surprising speed and, well, agility. Muckle followed, his claws scrabbling on the brightly painted wood.

“Sorry!” I cried as I ran past the woman. I tried to catch Muckle as he leaped down the last few feet of the A-frame, but he dodged me easily. “I'm really sorry,” I called over my shoulder. “He's friendly, he just gets too excited sometimes.”

“You have to stop him! He's going to hurt Midgie!” The woman sounded frantic.

Once again, I nearly rolled my eyes. But people were starting to stare. The young woman with the mixed breed had stopped her dog atop one of the pieces of agility equipment, and on the other side of the fence a sporty-looking girl with short blond hair had also stopped to watch. Beside her was a pretty red-and-white-spotted dog—I was pretty sure it was a Brittany, though I wasn't focused on playing Name That Breed at the moment.

“Don't chase them,” the blond girl called out. “You're just egging them on.”

Easy for her to say. I gulped, not sure what to do. The papillon was still managing to keep at least a yard or two ahead of Muckle. Not for lack of trying on Muck's part.

“Lauren? Everything okay?”

It was Jamal. He was standing outside the gate with Ozzy. I'd never been so glad to see a friendly face.

“I can't catch him,” I blurted out, my eyes filling with tears. “He's not listening to me at all, and this lady's worried about her dog, and . . .”

Jamal was already letting himself in. “Here. Hold Ozzy's leash,” he said, shoving the loop into my hand.

Then he reached into the pocket of his letterman jacket and pulled out a tennis ball. He let out a sharp whistle, then wound up and threw the ball. It bounced off the grass—just inches in front of Muckle's nose.

Muckle skidded to a stop, his eyes following the ball as it bounced again. With a short bark, he turned and chased after it.

“Midgie! Come here, baby!” The woman hurried forward and grabbed her dog as it slowed down, cradling it to her chest. With a glare at me, she hurried out of the ring.

Meanwhile the woman with the mixed breed grabbed Muckle as he pounced on the tennis ball. I hurried over to retrieve him, thanking her profusely as she handed him over.

“Maybe we should get Muckle and Ozzy into a pen of their own,” Jamal suggested.

“Good idea.” I held my puppy tightly as we let ourselves out of the agility ring. Muckle was still pretty worked up, and I didn't want to take any chances of him getting loose in the larger area of the dog park.

The blond girl, who was probably around my age or a little older, was still watching from outside. “Everything okay?” she asked. “Cute sheltie, by the way.”

“Thanks,” I said, not slowing down as I followed Jamal toward an empty pen nearby. The girl seemed friendly, but I wasn't in the mood for socializing at the moment.

Once all four of us were safely in the pen, Jamal shut the gate firmly behind him and then unsnapped his dog's leash. I set Muckle down on the grass, and the two puppies joyfully greeted each other.

“Thanks,” I told Jamal as we watched them play. “You totally saved us—I think that woman was about to call the cops on Muckle. How'd you know what to do to stop him chasing that dog?”

Jamal shrugged. “Ozzy will stop anything to chase a ball,” he said. “He loves it more than anything. I was hoping Muckle might be the same way.”

Sure enough, Ozzy's ears pricked at the word “ball,” and he stopped what he was doing and raced up to his owner, panting eagerly. I smiled and patted him.

“I'm not sure Muckle's as obsessed as that,” I said. “But he is easily distracted. The important thing is, it worked.”

“Yeah.” Jamal pulled the tennis ball out of his pocket again and tossed it across the pen. Ozzy raced off after it with Muckle in hot pursuit. Jamal shot me a sidelong grin and flexed his arm playfully. “I gave up baseball back in middle school when I discovered running, but I guess I've still got it.”

I laughed. “Definitely. If I'd tried to throw the ball like you did back there, it probably would've hit Muckle in the head. Or no—with my luck it would've hit the lady with the pap!”

He chuckled, then cocked his head. “Pap?” he echoed.

“Papillon. That's the breed of that little dog Muck was chasing. You can recognize them by the big ears—they look sort of like butterfly wings, which is how the breed got its name.”

“Gotcha. And wow. You sure know a lot about dogs.” Jamal leaned back against the iron fence and grinned. “Or maybe you just know a lot about everything. Like that obscure Scottish island you named Muckle after, for instance. Do they teach you stuff like that at County Day or what?”

“Not really. And I definitely don't know that much about dogs, either.” I smiled back ruefully. “It's easy to research breeds and stuff online, but this training stuff is another thing.”

I glanced at Muckle, who was running in circles around Ozzy as the larger puppy trotted back toward us with the ball in his mouth. Then I shot a look toward the agility pen across the way. The lady with the papillon had disappeared, but the blond girl was in there now, calling out instructions to her dog. Meanwhile the woman with the mixed breed had gone back to work too. Neither dog was paying the least bit of attention to the other, keeping their attention on their owners as they jumped over stuff and zipped through tunnels or whatever like pros. Would Muckle ever be like that? For that matter, would he ever learn to walk on a leash without trying to pull my arm out of its socket?

I sighed. Jamal glanced at me. “What? You look worried. I latched the gate, I swear.”

“It's not that. I was feeling pretty good about Muck's progress after Tuesday's class,” I told him. “But now I'm back to wondering if he'll ever turn into a good dog.”

Jamal looked sympathetic. “I hear you. Ozzy ate one of my mom's magazines last night.” Ozzy dropped the ball at his feet, and he threw it again. “Mom was furious. Mostly because he left scraps of slobbery paper all over the house.”

“Bummer.” I shook my head. “Adam keeps saying they're just puppies, and puppies don't know what to do until we teach them. I don't know why our parents can't seem to understand that and maybe cut us some slack, right?”

“Yeah,” Jamal said. “But in my case, I know why. My folks didn't really want to get another dog after our old dachshund passed away. I had to talk them into letting me get a puppy.”

“Sounds like my parents.”

“Yeah. Rex was really old when he died, and he was pretty cranky the last few years.” He shrugged. “Actually, he was always pretty cranky. We started calling him T. Rex because he was always trying to bite people. Looking back, I realize it's probably because we never taught him any better.”

“Sounds like something Adam would say.” I tried not to look too lovesick at the mention of his name.

“Right,” Jamal agreed. “Anyway, Rex was pretty much untrained. But I want to do it right this time. I had it all figured
out—I'd go to the shelter and find some tall, lean dog that could keep up with me whether I was doing a long run or a sprint.”

I watched Ozzy as he grabbed the tennis ball in his mouth and tossed it up, leaping after it. He was definitely athletic, but the words “tall” and “lean” weren't the first to spring to mind.

“So what happened?” I asked.

“Well, first my friends tried to change my mind about what to get,” he said. “My girl-crazy cousin Reggie thought I should pick out something small and fluffy and cute. He says that kind of dog is a girl magnet.” He grinned at me. “So what do you think? Is it true?”

I had the uncomfortable feeling that he was flirting with me. But I tried to sound casual as I replied, “I don't know. Maybe you should take a poll of all the girls you can find. That's another way to meet them, right?”

That made him laugh. “Anyway, that was Reggie. My friend Kenny had the opposite opinion. He wanted me to get a big dog—something tough-looking and macho.”

I looked over again at Ozzy, who was neither big and tough nor cute and fuzzy. “So how'd you end up with Oz?”

“When I went to the shelter, there was just something about him. Yeah, he's not much to look at, I guess. He's sort of scruffy and gangly and looks like three different dogs put together.” He shrugged. “So I don't know. He just has, like, a good energy, you know? We got along right away. Plus, I could tell he was active enough that he'd be able to keep up with me while I run, even if he wasn't exactly what I was picturing.”

I couldn't help being impressed. Most of the guys I knew at school were all about the optics. Who had the snazziest car, the best clothes, the prettiest girlfriend. That was the main reason I had zero interest in getting to know most of them—and didn't mind that it seemed to be mutual. Took it as a compliment, almost.

But Jamal didn't seem to be that way at all. Was it a public school vs. private school thing? Were people just less shallow at MVHS? I tended to doubt it—I'd gone to public school up through eighth grade and didn't remember it being that much different.

So maybe it was just him. In any case, hearing him talk about choosing Ozzy made me feel a bit sheepish about the reasons I'd chosen Muckle. But never mind. It had worked out for the best—I was crazy about the little monster now, regardless of his breed.

Ozzy and Muckle had stopped chasing the tennis ball to wrestle, but now Ozzy bounded toward us with the ball in his mouth again. He dropped it at his owner's feet and barked. Jamal scooped up the slimy ball and tossed it in one graceful motion. Nice.

Wait, why was I noticing that? I wasn't interested in him that way. Maybe being in love with Adam was making me more sensitive to male beauty in any form.

“I guess it's a good thing we both found Adam, right?” I said, my mind now wandering in that direction. I shot a surreptitious look around the rest of the dog park, but my future boyfriend was still nowhere in sight. “Um, so you were saying you had a study hall with Adam once. Do you know him well?”

“Nope.” Jamal bent to grab the ball again as Ozzy brought it back. “I mean, the school's pretty big, and he's a senior. We don't really hang in the same crowd, you know? But I've seen him around. Didn't know he was into dogs until Rachel told me, though.”