Walking the Dog (29 page)

We sat on the bench quietly and then she spoke.

“What is that whispering you do with him?” she asked.

The pathological liar slipped right into place.

“It's just a signal I give him to let him know we mean business. Just sounds.”

“Well, some day you'll have to teach that to his future owner, you know. Can't be any secrets between you and him that his family won't be privy to. It'll confuse the training.”

“Absolutely,” I said. “I'm sorry.”

“
Sorry?
” Phyllis practically yelled. “Sorry?” She slapped my thigh. “This is the best-trained, most well-adjusted puppy I've ever seen. You're a natural, Carleen. I'm damn impressed. Beyond impressed. I'm dreamy.”

“Thanks,” I said.

“You got to keep drilling and drilling and drilling. No slacking off because he's doing good. These fellas ain't lazy or bad intentioned, but sneaky habits set in when they're young and then you could lose his absolute respect and priority of mind to be a hard worker. I'll be back in six weeks to check where you are on agility and socialization.”

I had to test out Phyllis on the subject of socialization.

“I'd like to speak to you confidentially,” I said.

Phyllis sat up like a midwestern housewife watching a reality show.

“Cross my heart,” she said. “Or whatever.”

“Agility will be no problem once he grows a little more into his body. I'm also good at building, so I can fashion the course
from your book exactly. No problem. It's the socialization I'm concerned about.”

Phyllis was intrigued. “I don't see any signs of aggression. In fact, he has a happy-go-lucky nature and—what do you call it—his stillness, well, it's almost Zen. Am I missing something? Is there a nervosity or fear reaction?”

“No,” I said. “The problem's not him. It's the environment. I don't know how I can socialize him with other dogs when there are no other dogs here. And I don't know how I'm going to get him to work in a basically hostile environment. I was wondering if you could ask the warden if I could take him to an obedience class once a week to meet other puppies and walk him around the town so he gets used to less agitated people.”

Phyllis had been listening intently. “Well, I hadn't honestly taken this into consideration so it's both our problem. I have a meeting with the warden to tell her of your progress, so you sit here and let me see what I can negotiate.”

I watched her walk off toward the main building. I was apprehensive and wondered if I was making too big a deal about it. I knew part of it was the criminal trying to get a pass to the outside. Androcles put his head on my lap and we waited for our verdict.

An hour later Phyllis Gelb came out of the warden's office and seemed to be having a hard time making the distance to the bench. “Showtime, Buff,” I said, and he lay in the proper position at my feet. Phyllis finally plopped down and took a deep breath.

“The news isn't good, but it's not the end of the world either. First of all, your warden congratulates you on a job well done and is pleased you'll be able to continue. She might have even smiled. But she said you are a prisoner who could have absolutely no privileges to leave the penitentiary. You are never
to leave the premises. Wowie zowie. But she came up with several solutions. She said she would authorize a daily program where Buff could work with different groups of your choosing, and he would learn about normal people just fine.”
Normal?
I wanted to scream in the realm between laughter and terror. “She said Buff could eat meals in the cafeteria under your strict supervision, go to classes, and partake in all activities. She and I agreed that if there was some unwarranted resistance from time to time, that as long as you kept your cool it could possibly be good for Buff and prepare him for future unpleasantries. It could determine the neighborhood or type of owner with which we place him, and that's fine.

“The puppy problem wasn't so easy. There's lots of workers who have dogs, and we'll have to set up special weekly sessions. One of the authorities will determine when and where these socializations will take place. Since no other prisoners have a dog, the prison will contact the staff and relatives of the staff to volunteer and bring their dogs to an enclosed area. You will then see if Buff is aggressive or timid with other dogs and if he is obedient around distraction. Next visit I personally will take him into town to begin street and sidewalk training.”

There was a silence.

“Wow,” she shook her head. “You must have done something awful bad not to be allowed a breath of fresh air. Or they must be doing something real bad to you girls.”

I patted Phyllis Gelb's thigh.

“Both,” I said.

I concentrated on building a simple agility course that I'd expand in difficulty as Androcles got older. It consisted of low hurdles, tubes to crawl through, a slide, a hoop, a bunch of stairs going up one side and down the other, and a simple maze.

Agility was not his strong point. Whereas when he ran free he was astonishingly like a deer or TV pictures I'd seen of tigers or antelopes, his tricks were earnest but clumsy. I took him through each section of the course separately, showing him how to do it myself. Anyone who walked by laughed at me, but I figured if I did it he'd do it.

We both made our way through the course, gradually but not brilliantly. Then I realized what was wrong. This was the most boring, unchallenging agility course a person could put together. I kept it up so Buff could use it with Phyllis, but in another location I designed my own Olympic Coney Island that was much more up to Androcles's speed. He was a klutz, but was having a blast, so he learned faster. I designed treadmills and turnstiles and ditches and limbo bars and revolving wheels. I made cages to open and close, long running tracks with borders on each side, difficult-size windows to jump through, and whatever I could get my hands on kept adding devices as they came to me, and Androcles got better and better at the jumps, leaps, rolls, and crawling. We'd warm up on his private agility carnival and then walk over to the course that followed Phyllis's exact blueprint. He became more coordinated and was able to execute the more simple angles and heights.

Socialization started with my own honors coven. We met in our tiny recreation cottage, and these women, aside from Flax and Midge, couldn't wait to get their hands on him. His hair was soft like a baby poodle, and Amanda put her big, fat arms around him and drew him to her bosom. Androcles softened, wagged his tail, and licked her without jumping all over her. Midge, to my surprise, at one point rolled around on the floor with him wrestling. Each woman had her turn petting him and holding him, and I saw that each member of the coven was hungry for a baby. A baby they'd left back home or never had a
chance to have. Androcles always returned to me, put his paw on my knee, and then leaped up and licked me. Flax sometimes stood in the doorway with her arms folded and a disgusted look on her face. Mostly she didn't show up at all.

I asked to have a large table at the far end of the cafeteria, and when I brought Androcles in for my first breakfast, there was almost a riot.

“Don't you bring an animal in here.”

“My family's starving. You gonna feed him our own food?”

“He's filth, he'll contaminate the food.”

“Fleas, bugs, worms!”

“I think he's sweet. C'mere, poochie.”

“Who said he could be here? He could go wild.”

“He's gonna bite.”

“Call the guards.”

“Throw Carleen and her twin outta here.”

A couple guards stood by the table and Buff took a “stay” position and didn't move. He was shaking a little. He'd never encountered so much hostility. I kept him in position and went up in line to get my food. A few women tried to push me, and the cook refused to serve me. Finally I reached over the counter and grabbed some eggs and bacon for myself. “Demerits,” hissed one of the servers. “You can be sure you'll get demerits.”

“So will you, bitch,” I said. “You can't refuse to serve me.”

“I can when you bring filth into the cafeteria with you,” she shouted back. I almost threw my steaming eggs in her face, but I didn't want to spend more time with Androcles in solitary. He needed fresh air and light.

I got back to the table and Androcles was still shaking rather badly. “Easy,” I whispered gently. I'd never used that word as a command before. But there would probably be situations
like this where Buff would be sorely tested. I took off my shoe and rubbed his neck with my foot, being careful not to use my hands with so many phobic prisoners looking out for bugs and fleas. Androcles licked my foot and rested his head on it and he calmed down. Five women came over to the table to sit with me. I recognized one from the pants factory and four from the fields.

“He don't beg,” said a woman with a shaved head and a tattoo of a bull's-eye on her scalp. She had on overalls and had grubby hands. “That's a virtue.” I remembered her name was Teresa, a gentle name for such a tough-looking woman. “I had a hound—we hunted birds together. Great beast. But at the table he'd walk around as if we were starving him.”

“Buff's not allowed to eat human food. Strict rules.”

“He's a convict like us,” said an uptight woman at the edge of the table. She was showing her sisters somewhere in the room that she was brave, but still shook when Androcles made any move whatsoever.

There was a slender woman who worked in the gardens. I think her name was Tashi, but she reminded me of Marcella Histrionics. I tried to glance casually at her plate. She'd finished her eggs, so I relaxed. I saw, however, that her eyes were pitch-black, and I realized she was stoned into dreams with quaaludes and barbiturates.

“Can I touch him?” she asked slowly.

“Buff, up,” I ordered. He stood, immediately joyous to be released from lying down. The ten or so women who'd joined the table all twitched or jumped.

“It's all right,” I said, to the dog and the table.

“That's Tashi—go to her,” I instructed.

He loped slowly in the direction I pointed and sat down next to Tashi. She held out her hand above his head.

“Go ahead,” I told her.

She stroked him timidly, and then with more courage. He wagged his tail.

“He's a sucker for a touch.” I smiled.

Then she put her arms around him, and he burrowed his head into her hair and behind her ears.

“He's my teddy bear,” she shouted. Longings for childhood dolls or stuffed animals or soft-haired babies must've opened up in the women because they started asking almost all at once if they could hug him and touch him. Phyllis Gelb's book said that the dog couldn't go up to anyone without permission. So Androcles went from woman to woman when I gave permission, and I could see how he filled in a physical gap I'd never thought about. Not that the women didn't have sex. They had visitors, were lesbians, or forced into being lesbians. But it was a much more childlike need. He and I were in constant physical contact during training, so he probably filled a void without me knowing it.

After a few weeks different women would visit my table, and one day I made the leap of having Androcles stand in line with me. When the cooks saw he didn't jump up and grab food, they calmed down too. Word got passed around the prison, and though there were still angry words and unsettling groans, Androcles and I ended up being accepted or at least tolerated as we entered and exited more and more classrooms, recreation areas, and cells.

When the time came for Androcles to socialize with the other dogs, the workers and guards, confused and annoyed, showed up at the appointed time. There were dirty squares of grass near the staff parking lot. A wide variety of men with dogs showed
up, but the majority of their pets were guard dogs, a lot of pit bulls, shepherds, Dobermans, and large mutts. The owners had been told what the meeting was for, but they didn't really understand at all and used the occasion to have a few beers and laugh at me. A young guard with a baton had been sent along to make sure I wouldn't make this an excuse to run off.

By the book, Buff was to be instructed not to approach a dog on his own, and to be friendly and accepting when a dog came by, but not to initiate play. The guard dogs were also well disciplined, but little by little they sniffed Buff and formed a small pack and began to roughhouse with each other. At a certain point I said, “Release,” and Androcles joined in with the roughhousing. He got along much better with the mutts with whom he chased and tumbled. Then he made the mistake of approaching the guard gang and got humped by a Doberman and snapped at by a particularly quick-moving German shepherd. But I didn't realize how fast Androcles the Hero was, and he got away from the aggressive dogs easily. He zoomed to my side the second I called him and lay down.

“Not bad,” said one of the men. He had a crew cut, plaid shirt, and potbelly. I think he owned a fairly mellow pit bull. He stood next to a younger guy, dressed similarly, but with a strong upper body and long dark sideburns. He had a white shepherd on a chain leash who seemed ill tempered and restless. The others were gathered around their trucks and cars, dealing with their dogs, and getting ready to go.

“Are you as well trained as your puff puff ?” asked the guy with the pit bull.

I didn't say anything.

“Yeah, it looks like your puff will do whatever you tell it to,” said the smaller man.

“The bitch ain't the expressive type,” snickered the other. “She needs to be trained slow, more passion. Has to listen to commands.”

“I like that type,” smirked the small one. “And I know a lot of commands.”

Now the other men started getting interested. It was obvious they'd drunk a lot of beer.

I could feel my guard tensing up.