The Fast and the Furriest (17 page)

Elka dropped by the Pugh home unannounced on Wednesday night.

“I would like to confirm that you have these parents that are often referred to, yet never seen,” she told Kevin at the door. He sighed, reluctantly allowing her inside.

Howie and Maggie Pugh were pleasant enough with Elka, though Kevin’s dad was always visibly suspicious of people who hadn’t heard of him.

“You know,” said Elka, “Kevin and Cromwell’s achievement is
exceptional
, given their very limited experience and training.”

“Which is, like, a month, right?” asked Howie.

“Yes, Mr. Pugh.”

“Because it seems like just yesterday that Cromwell was a piece of furniture.”

“He is now an elite athlete,” said Elka, scratching Cromwell’s head.

“Hmm,” said Howie. “What’s that make Kevin, then?”

“Whatever he chooses,” said Elka. “He has been tremendous.”

Kevin blushed, though he wasn’t feeling especially tremendous at the time.

Elka spent several minutes explaining the changes she felt Cromwell and Kevin had undergone over the summer—mostly physical for the dog, physical and perhaps mental for Kevin.

“The boy who came to me earlier this summer could never have successfully led such a marvelous dog as Cromwell. But Kevin has grown quite a lot.”

“Looks to me,” said Howie, “like he’s actually un-grown. He’s shed some weight.” Howie looked at his son. “You’ve lost your foundation, kid.”

“Mr. Pugh,” said Elka, “Kevin will need to be in the best possible condition for tomorrow’s championship—physically, mentally, emotionally. This is a very demanding event, sir.”

“I thought the dogs did the running,” said Maggie.

“The dog will go as far as Kevin takes him.”

Kevin went to bed on Wednesday feeling incapable of taking Cromwell anywhere. After a fitful night’s sleep, he awoke on Thursday to his obnoxious alarm. He blinked his eyes open and considered simply calling Elka, feigning illness. The MKCC was going to end poorly—that much he absolutely knew.

Then Kevin realized that Elka was already in the Pughs’ driveway, honking the horn of an ancient Volkswagen.

“Let’s
go
, Team Cromwell!” cried Zach from the passenger seat of Elka’s car.

Kevin buried his head in his pillow.

Cromwell sniffed at him, then licked him frantically until he got out of bed.

Kevin had actually attended only five events at the United Center. Three of those events were circuses, another was a Bulls game—more accurately, three-quarters of a Bulls game, before he threw up an Italian beef all over his dad’s pants—and the fifth was
Monsters Inc. on Ice
. Kevin had only truly enjoyed that last one. He had a weakness for ice-skating productions, though he didn’t dare reveal it to his family.

Elka drove Kevin, Zach, and Cromwell to the stadium long before the event was scheduled to start.

“This car smells like hamster,” Zach whispered to Kevin, a little too loudly.

“This car,” said Elka, “has weathered many things, Zachary.”

Cromwell hopped from lap to lap excitedly during the drive.

“Sorry your parents can’t see Team Cromwell today,” said Zach.

“Yeah, well … they’re with Team Izzy today. Not the first time, won’t be the last.”

Elka parked in a lot that was designated for participants, then entered the stadium through a gate at the northeast corner. A sign above it read
MKCC MEDIA
&
COMPETITORS’ ENTRANCE
.

“Media?” asked Kevin.

“I believe I told you that it was an event with some prestige,” answered Elka.

Once they were inside, the enormity of the place seemed to shrink them. Kevin felt surges of nervousness. Cromwell zigzagged as they walked down the wide corridors, barking and whining at seemingly every animal they passed—and many of the animals they passed were, in Elka’s words, “most irregular.”

There were dogs receiving massages from accredited specialists.

There was a team of dogs and handlers wearing faux-leather jackets and studded collars.

There were dogs in bejeweled carrying cases; dogs wearing capes, tiaras, leopard-skin outfits, bow ties, tiny mirrored sunglasses, Star Wars costumes—mostly shih-tzus dressed as Ewoks, but also one Chewbacca, one Yoda, and at least three Leias—military uniforms, business suits, bunny ears, Mohawks, and fairy wings; and several different breeds wearing fancy hats.

A particularly yappy corgi and its middle-aged male handler wore matching satin tops. The dog’s tight-fitting shirt had white lettering that read BAD 2 THE BONE. The man’s tight-fitting shirt had lettering that read BRAD 2 THE BONE. They made eye contact with no one.

“Dude, that could
totally
be Team Cromwell,” said Zach. “But maybe not so shiny. And not taupe, but …”

“But teal?” asked Kevin.

“Right. Team colors.”

Cromwell was clearly skittish.

There were hundreds of displays run by aggressive salespeople hawking products for dogs and dog lovers. Zach dutifully gathered business cards.

“Just in case Cromwell achieves the stardom I’ve foreseen … and you
fear
,” he told Kevin. “These
jokers will crawl to us, begging for product endorsements.”

“Right. Cromwell Pugh, superstar celebrity pitch-dog.”

“Kids will want officially licensed gear from Team Cromwell,” continued Zach, taking out a video camera. “Lunch boxes, video games, energy drinks. We’re an agility powerhouse. As your business manager, I’m just performing due diligence.”

“No video today,” said Kevin.

“Come
on
!” said Zach. “Just for my personal coll—”

“No … video … today,” repeated Kevin.

Cromwell strained at his leash and whined as he wove through the legs of passersby on the way to the check-in area.

“Dude, calm the talent,” said Zach, watching Cromwell flit around on his leash, constantly tangling and untangling himself. “The dog must chill.”

“The dog is freaked,” said Kevin. “The handler is freaked. We’re just generally—”

Zach stopped abruptly and pointed down the corridor—at a Doberman wearing a dog-sized Bears jersey with PUGH 56 on the back.

“Oh, man,” said Zach. “That is so …”

“… totally unexpected,” said Elka. “Your marketing efforts appear to have paid off, Zachary.”

Kevin laughed.

“That’s my dad’s jersey,” he said.

“Your father makes dog jerseys?” asked Elka.

More laughter.

“No, he’s just … well, he played football. People know him. He was a Bear.”

“And I was a stewardess,” said Elka. “But that was a long time ago.”

She made a disgusted face as they passed the dog in the Pugh jersey. Elka took the leash from Kevin, bent low, then scooped up Cromwell in her right arm. He licked her and sniffed; she lifted his ear and muttered unintelligible things into it. Then she addressed the boys.

“Let me teach you something about dogs,” she said, walking fast. “They were domesticated from wolves, probably in East Asia, and almost certainly 15,000 years ago.” Cromwell licked her again. “For the next 14,990 years, they were naked—totally naked. They wore nothing but their own fur. No holiday sweaters, no tracksuits, no hats.” She swept her left hand across the spectacle of costumed dogs. “And now look at them. People dressing them like little Kens and Barbies.” She eyed Zach. “Please do not put one of your little uniforms on Cromwell. He neither needs nor wants it, Zachary.”

Elka set Cromwell down on the slick floor, and he fell in stride with her.

“So Cromwell was a wolf?” asked Kevin, watching his small, roundish, droopy-eared dog trundle along.

“Thousands of years ago, Mr. Pugh. His forebears were wolves. Dogs were domesticated from them to protect us.”

Kevin could not imagine Cromwell as either a wolf or a protector of anything, except possibly chew toys—and he’d give up a chew toy if you offered him something chicken-flavored or bacon-scented.

To Elka, dogs in tracksuits and handlers in matching outfits may have appeared silly. But they all seemed to be eyeing Kevin and Cromwell sharply, sizing them up, looking for weakness.

Kevin certainly had plenty of weakness to offer.

E
lka checked them in, received all their race materials, and then mingled with various trainers and agility enthusiasts. Kevin tried to ignore the other dogs and their handlers as best he could, but Zach was not much help in this regard. He kept pointing out tough-looking animals and their intimidating owners.

Still, Kevin tried to keep his mind on Cromwell and the course—just the course.

Don’t even consider the competition
, he told himself.
They aren’t the obstacles. We don’t climb them. We don’t jump them. Don’t let them distract you
.

Whenever Kevin was able to direct his focus away from the other dogs, it was soon redirected to the stands. The Midwest Kennel Club event apparently
attracted a crowd of actual
paying
customers—not a large crowd by the arena’s standards, but large enough to fill much of the stadium’s first level.

And this audience—which Zach excitedly estimated to be three thousand or so people—did nothing for Kevin’s self-confidence. As soon as Elka strayed, Cromwell seemed to come unglued, too. The television crews certainly didn’t help.

“Come
on
!” said Zach. “A crowd is a
good
thing. I’ve heard athletes discuss this. They feed off the crowd’s energy. At least I think that’s what they say. So try feeding—that’s never been a problem for you before.”

“Funny stuff,” said Kevin, his eyes sweeping across the stands. “I don’t think I’m the feed-off-the-crowd sort of athlete. In fact, I don’t actually feel like I’m any kind of athlete.”

Zach rubbed Kevin’s shoulders vigorously, like a boxing trainer with a fighter.

“You are one-half of an award-winning dog agility machine, dude. And you’re not even the
dog
half. Cromwell does the tricks … what the heck can go wrong?”

Plenty, it turned out.

During their preliminary walk-through, all of Cromwell’s old problems returned. It was like their first week at Paw Patch all over again. The dog was
leaping too soon from the ramps and the seesaw; he missed weave poles; he brushed against hurdles; and, of course, he whacked himself silly with the bottom of the suspended hoop.

From the edges of the course, competitors snickered as the unknown boy-and-dog combo botched pretty much every apparatus.

As Cromwell crossed the seesaw, Kevin slipped, flailed, and then landed facedown on the green turf. His belly hit the opposite end of the seesaw that Cromwell was on, catapulting the dog into a low trajectory.

The crowd of onlookers issued a collective
“Ooooh!”

The dog bayed an abrupt
“Rrooooo!”

Cromwell hit the turf rather gracefully, rolled a few times, then shook himself off and ran back to Kevin, drooling. Kevin didn’t want to pick his head up. His fall—and Cromwell’s flight—was shown in slow motion on the giant scoreboard suspended above the United Center floor.

And then it was shown again.

And again, even slower, this time focusing on Kevin’s pained expression.

Each time it was shown, the accompanying laughter seemed to grow louder.

Finally, the scoreboard switched to something
else … Jody and Shasta. The girl was laughing, no doubt at the image she’d just seen of a stumbling, awkward Kevin Pugh. Or, as she had pronounced it, “Poo.”

But as her face appeared on the scoreboard, many in the crowd began to respectfully cheer. She switched from laughter to the too-polite, too-obnoxiously-sweet wave she’d delivered at Paw Patch. Kevin trudged off the course, his chin down, his feet shuffling slowly. It was unusually cold on the floor of the arena. The United Center was colossally large, full of echoes and vast distances. The atmosphere was disconcerting, really.

“That did not go well, Mr. Pugh,” said Elka as her protégé left the course.

“Oh really?” said Kevin sarcastically. “Hmm. Well, you’re the expert, I suppose. What clued you in? Was it the first time you saw the video of me falling, or the third?”

“This is not the best day for the dour, self-defeating Kevin Pugh to return,” Elka said quietly. “Nor for the wilder, undisciplined Cromwell.”

Kevin knew that much was true, but he wasn’t sure how to make either of them go away. He decided to walk off his nerves, if possible. But as he circled the arena, the walk only reminded him of the presence of other people
—many
other people.

“Almost showtime,” said Zach when Kevin returned. Zach was nervously tapping a foot and looking into the faces of the crowd. “You know, I might have underestimated the size of the audi—”

“Okay, shut up,” snapped Kevin. “Not helpful, dude. Not in any way helpful.”

“Sor
-ry
,” said Zach. “Just a little uptight, I guess.”

Kevin flashed a very ticked-off look.

“Not for any, um … particular reason,” said Zach. “Certainly not because of, um … that warm-up. Which really wasn’t so ba—”

“Okay, really. Shut”—Kevin held his right hand in front of his mouth and made a zipping motion—“up. There will be no more talking among Team Cromwell. None. Total silence. This has not been one of your better pep talks, so let’s just cut our losses.”

Zach slouched into one of the folding chairs that ringed the course. Kevin sat down next to him and waited quietly. He watched as Elka shared one of those odd, indecipherable conversations with his dog, lifting his ears, whispering secrets to Cromwell that were apparently quite reassuring. The dog panted happily.

At that moment, Kevin needed some reassurance himself, and Zach clearly wasn’t going to provide it. None of the voices in Kevin’s head were especially positive:

“Kev didn’t really seem too confident about his chances” … “Of course you were both technically horrible” … “These people don’t have you wearing costumes, right, Kev?” … “I had not imagined that Cromwell could be ready for an event of this magnitude” …

A summer’s worth of discouragement drifted through Kevin’s mind. He tried thinking of the little motivational phrases that his dad was always offering Izzy, but he kept mixing them together in a stew of total sports gibberish: “Give 110 percent of want it more to the next level of gut-check time to get no respect …”