Because of Shoe and Other Dog Stories Read online

  I don’t need to tell you the rest, except that Yap Yap hadn’t been lost at all. She had walked home on her own and fallen asleep in the basket of clothes in Grams’ laundry room, and no one thought to look there.

  Ha!

  I was hungry when we got back to Grams and Grampa’s house, and nothing tastes better than scrambled eggs and toast at eleven-thirty at night, cooked the way Grams cooks them.

  Then my mother tucked me into bed and gave me a long hug and cried a little bit but didn’t say much, and I knew they had been through a lot looking for me—probably more than I had been through, actually. I lay in bed afterward, thinking, slowly unwinding my mind and getting used to the thought that everything was fine. That took a while.

  I slept later than I’ve ever slept, and Patty did, too, and then the next day we said good-bye to Grams and Grampa, and Yap Yap barked as usual, but I did manage to get one pat in on her head before she tried to nip my finger.

  Then we were headed home, Patty with her head on my lap as we drove down the interstate, her cold nose snuffling now and then, and no more smell of skunk, but every so often a whiff of her bad breath.

  I wondered what it would be like if Patty and I could talk like friends talk. Just Patty and me. She definitely wouldn’t talk in front of anybody else. That way we could share each other’s secrets. We could lie on the hill behind the house and talk about what’s really on our minds.

  I wonder what Patty would say first.

  She wouldn’t say, “I’m Patty,” because then I would say, “I know that already.”

  She wouldn’t say, “I’m a dog,” because I know that, too.

  And she wouldn’t say, “How are you? Glad to meet you,” because we already met long ago, and I’ve known her since she was just a little ball of fur in my sleeping bag on the porch when I was little.

  Maybe she would say, “I’ve always wanted to be a hunter.”

  “A hunter?” I would reply.

  She would say, “Yes, all my ancestors were hunters, or we helped hunters find their prey, or we fetched it when it was downed.”

  My eyes would grow wide imagining long ago in England or somewhere like that, hunters in furs or big overcoats with guns or spears hunting deer in the woods, and it was a big deal because they weren’t hunting for sport—they were hunting because they needed to eat.

  Then I thought about Patty and me, together in the far north in the winter, bounding over the wild steppes with fire in our eyes, hungry—me with my spear and big fur boots. The winter night is closing in and we must find shelter before the storm. We will sleep in a cave in the far north after our meal of dried meat, sleep by a fire and dream of the coming spring, Patty’s paws twitching in the firelight as she runs through fields of wheat. We could be cozy together, Patty and me, hunters in the far north.

  Then I wonder, What were we chasing when she was pulling me through the woods like that? It wasn’t Yap Yap, that was for sure. Maybe it was that deer we saw, or a wooly mammoth or another animal from days of old. I guess I’ll never know.

  Picasso

  by Ann M. Martin

  illustrated by Olga and Aleksey Ivanov

  Picasso

  I am in charge of things today. Completely in charge and home alone for the first time in my life. Okay, it isn’t as if my parents had some big epiphany (look it up) and realized I (a) am twelve, (b) have never been in serious trouble, and (c) got straight A’s on my last report card, so therefore I can finally be considered old enough and responsible enough to stay at home alone. No. Sadly, there was no epiphany. There wasn’t time for one.

  What happened was that my little brother fell off his dresser, which of course he wasn’t supposed to be standing on, and broke his wrist. We all heard a huge crash (my brother landed on his truck collection) and went tearing into his room—Mom, Dad, Picasso (dog), and me. And there was Anthony sitting on the floor with a bath towel tied around his shoulders, rubbing his wrist and crying, “But I’m Superman!”

  No one commented on this remark. My dad untied the towel (which wouldn’t have been my first response in such an emergency, but whatever), and my mom examined Anthony’s wrist and announced, “I think he broke it.”

  Picasso and I looked on in fascination—Picasso because he had just realized that the strong smell of peanut butter in the room was coming from a sandwich Anthony had been holding at the time of his experiment and which was now lying, only partially squished, on the carpet by Anthony’s bottom. I was fascinated because I want to become a doctor and this was the first actual broken bone I had ever seen.

  The next thing I knew, Dad had picked up Anthony, and Mom was calling to me, “You’re in charge, Delilah. Take care of things until we get back.” I couldn’t actually hear the last three words of that sentence, since Mom said them after she had closed the back door, but I knew what she meant.

  I disposed of the squished sandwich before Picasso could eat it. Then I looked at Picasso, and he looked at me, and I said, “We’re on our own.”

  So now here we are. At any rate, here I am.

  Picasso is sort of missing.

  He hasn’t been missing for too long, which is the good news. In fact, he’s been missing for only about ten minutes, so I am not panicking. Yet.

  Still, I keep gazing around our backyard, trying to catch sight of some part of him: his tail, which has very long fur and waves in the breeze like a golden flag; or his head, which is on the large side and includes a nose that is half brown and a quarter white and a quarter yellow (let’s face it, he isn’t the most attractive dog); or any of his feet, which also have very long fur and make him look a little like a Clydesdale horse.

  I don’t see any parts of him or hear any of the noises he makes: woofs, yips, howls, growls, sneezes (he has allergies), or burps. Picasso is the best burper I know. Usually he waits until he has settled himself in your lap and is looking directly into your face before he lets loose with a belch that is like a fake one you’d hear on TV, that’s how loud it is.

  “Picasso!” I call. Then I listen for a few moments. I actually cup my hand to my ear, as if that will help me hear better. “Picasso!”

  Nothing. Just the wind in the trees and two barn swallows chattering to each other, and from far across the field, a roar, which I’m pretty sure is our neighbors’ tractor starting up, so it must be mowing day.

  “Picasso!” I shout. “Picasso!”

  Now panic is setting in. It’s amazing how quickly it can happen.

  The day is very hot, and I don’t feel like trekking all around our yard and into the woods beyond. The woods are on a hill. Well, so is our yard, but the hill is steeper where the woods are, and there aren’t any paths through the trees, so searching is difficult. But I have to find Picasso.

  I run inside, grab my sneakers, and shove them onto my feet. I always leave my sneakers pre-tied, not for speed in getting dressed, but because Picasso chews the laces if he sees them trailing across the floor. The day is not only very hot, but also very sunny, and I think that if I’m going to be outdoors for a while, I should wear sunblock and a hat. Then I think how proud my parents would be if they could see what I’m doing. It would certainly demonstrate to them that I’m responsible enough to be home alone and in charge of things.

  Except for immediately losing the dog.

  I run out of the house in my sneakers, sunblock glopped on my face, still pulling my ponytail through the back of my hat.

  “Picasso!” I yell. “Picasso, Picasso, PICASSO!”

  I lope to the edge of our property, where the woods begin, and stand by the old pear tree, looking down at our house. The house somehow seems bigger from up here, and I wonder if Picasso likes the view, since I often see him sitting in the exact spot where I’m standing now. He sits up straight and tall, the way Ms. Dooter, my science teacher (who deserves a name like that and, by the way, was the only one to give me an A- on my report card instead of a complete A), tells us to sit if we want good posture. Altho
ugh I ought to point out that she is not a very effective advertisement for good posture, what with her neck sticking out in front of her at approximately a ninety-degree angle.

  I sit on a large rock for several seconds and listen again. No Picasso sounds. Then I stand on the rock and call his name a few more times. I know I’m beginning to sound a little hysterical, and I try to calm myself. After all, Picasso has only been missing for (I check my watch) twenty-one minutes.

  I wonder how long my parents will be at the hospital with Anthony. Surely Picasso will return before they do. Or maybe not. Dinner, an event Picasso would never miss, is hours away. I slump a little. Then I get to my feet. “Picasso!”

  I stand in the sunshine and close my eyes, which makes the insides of my lids turn bright red. I tell myself that if I call Picasso three more times and then open my eyes, I’ll see him somewhere in the yard.

  “Picasso! Picasso! Picasso!” I yell.

  I open my eyes. Of course he’s not in the yard. What was I thinking? It isn’t like I’m standing on a magic rock.

  Now I begin talking to myself out loud, which just goes to show you how nervous I’m getting. “Okay, Delilah,” I say to myself. “You have only looked in the backyard. You have a front yard too, you know.”

  This thought doesn’t calm me, though, because along the edge of the front yard is the driveway, and the driveway leads to the road, and the road is about the most dangerous place I can think of for a dog, especially one like Picasso, who, as appealing as he is, is not particularly bright.

  I jog down the hill toward the house, and suddenly a whole list of not-too-bright things that Picasso has done begins to play in my mind. It’s like I’m envisioning Picasso’s bad report card.

  For starters, when my family went to the shelter in search of a pet, we had intended to adopt an older dog, since older dogs have a harder time finding homes than puppies do, but we were stopped by the sight of a puppy (Picasso, obviously) who was barking at a bowl of water.

  “What’s he doing?” Mom asked the shelter manager.

  The shelter manager’s name was Brian. He shrugged. “He barks at it a lot.”

  “I think it’s funny,” I said. (I was eight.)

  “Does he bark at other things?” asked my father.

  “No. Just the water bowl,” Brian replied.

  Picasso looked at us briefly, pawed at the bowl, and barked twice more.

  So we adopted him and brought him home, and I tried to come up with an explanation for his behavior. “Maybe he sees himself in the water. Maybe he’s barking at his reflection,” I said.

  “Maybe,” my father replied. And then I distinctly heard him whisper to my mother, “Picasso isn’t the brightest dog.”

  Sadly, it was true. Picasso grew up a little and stopped barking at water bowls, and my mother even fondly pointed out to whoever would listen that he’d been housebroken far more quickly than either Anthony or I had been toilet-trained. On the other hand, we once lost track of Picasso at a state park, and while we called and shouted and frantically yelled, “Treat, Picasso!” he joined up with another family, and almost went home with them. When we caught sight of his flag tail disappearing down a path, we ran to him and hugged him and kissed him, and he gave us a look that plainly said, “Oh, were you gone? I found these nice people who had hot dogs.”

  “He’ll do anything for a hot dog,” I said later to my parents. “That’s why he was going to go home with that other family.”

  “He’s not too bright,” my father whispered to my mother.

  Picasso’s report card is looking worse and worse, because now I also remember his problem with hiding. Every so often, Picasso tries to hide for one reason or another, usually when we have company and he doesn’t want to meet anyone new. This is how a not-very-bright dog hides: with his head and front feet behind one of the dining room curtains and his tail and entire rump sticking out in full view. Once when he was hiding like this, a visiting six-year-old went shrieking into the dining room, saw Picasso’s rump, and patted it, and Picasso jumped a mile because he wasn’t expecting it. He was so sure he was well hidden.

  So you can see why the thought of Picasso on the road is alarming. I increase my speed from a jog to a full run, and since I’m running downhill, I can barely stop myself when I reach the front yard. I actually have to grab at the side of the garage as I fly by in order to slow down. Then I stand in the middle of the yard and catch my breath and listen for Picasso sounds again. Nothing. Just the Wilsons’ tractor.

  “Picasso?” I call. “Picasso?”

  Horrible, horrible images are creeping into my mind. I picture Picasso lying by the side of the road, unmoving. I picture a pack of coyotes taking him down. I picture someone driving along the road and luring him into a car with a piece of hot dog and selling him to a lab where unspeakable experiments are performed on him for the rest of his life, which is very short.

  Picasso is plainly not in the front yard, so I run to the road and look up and down it as far as I can see, which isn’t very far, since we live on a curvy, wooded country road. But at least there are no furry bodies anywhere. I don’t know whether to be relieved or more frantic. Where is Picasso?

  I listen to the sound of the tractor, and now I picture Mrs. Wilson riding around and around as she mows the field, and that makes me picture Cynthia Wilson behind the wheel of the Wilsons’ Prius. Cynthia is seventeen and has just gotten her driver’s license. I don’t know much about cars—or Cynthia—but I have a feeling that Cynthia is looking for any possible excuse to get the Prius out on the road.

  I jog across the Wilsons’ front lawn and ring their bell. My fingers are crossed that both Cynthia and the Prius are at home. Cynthia answers the door, which is good, but I don’t see a car anywhere.

  “Hey, Cynthia,” I say.

  “Hey, Delilah. What’s going on?”

  This is a fair question, since there aren’t any Wilsons my age and I don’t have much reason to show up on their doorstep.

  I think for a moment. “I heard you got your license.”

  Cynthia beams at me. “Yeah. I got it on Friday.”

  “That is so cool.” (I have no idea if seventeen-year-olds say “cool.”) “I can’t wait until I can drive. Anyway, I was wondering…”

  “Yeah?”

  “If you could take me for a dr—” This is probably the lamest thing I’ve ever suggested, but the fact that Cynthia doesn’t even wait until I’ve finished the sentence before she makes a grab for the car keys just goes to show you how eager she is to show off her new skill.

  “Sure!” she exclaims. “Come on!”

  In about one second, we are sitting in the Prius (which was in the garage), and about one second after that, we’re nosing onto the road.

  “Where do you want to go?” asks Cynthia. “Into town?”

  That would be the logical destination, but I’m forced to say, “Let’s just drive around here a little.” There is absolutely no way I’m going to admit that the first time I was left alone and in charge I immediately lost our dog. My parents must never know about this.

  “Seriously?” asks Cynthia.

  “Yeah. Up and down the road and, oh, maybe out Carter Lane a little way.” (Picasso and I sometimes take walks along Carter Lane, so he’s familiar with the road, and he likes it because once he found part of a hamburger under a laurel bush.)

  “Really? Because I’m allowed to drive into town.”

  “No, here is good.”

  So Cynthia starts speeding along our road, and I say, “Could you please slow down?”

  “You don’t get carsick, do you?”

  I don’t, but I reply, “Yeah,” and look all sheepish.

  Cynthia slows down, and I open my window and peer carefully at the ditch that runs along the road. I try to see into the woods too. I really want to call, “Picasso! Picasso!” but of course that would give things away.

  After we’ve gone about a mile and a half, I say, “Okay, now co
uld you turn around, please?”

  “Here?” (We’re in the middle of nowhere, but I don’t think Picasso could have gotten this far already—unless he’s been dognapped.) “There isn’t anywhere to turn around,” Cynthia points out.

  Something springs to mind. All I know about driving is the stuff my mother shouts at other drivers when she gets frustrated behind the wheel. Things like “Use your signal. Your signal! You have a signal, don’t you? Or am I just supposed to guess which way you’re going to turn?” And “Go ahead, take up both lanes. It’s fine with me. The road was made for you and you alone. Don’t worry about anyone in any of the other cars.” Also once I heard her shout, “Are you kidding me? You’re going to make a K-turn here, in the middle of the road? Well, go ahead, take your time. No one else is in any rush. It’s all about you.”

  “Did you learn how to make a K-turn?” I ask Cynthia now.

  Cynthia brightens. “Oh! Yeah! I did. My dad says I do them really well.”

  “Could you show me?” I ask, trying to appear fascinated and scan the woods for Picasso at the same time.

  Cynthia wrenches the wheel around, and pretty soon we’re heading back the way we came and I’m checking the ditches on the other side of the road, which, thankfully, are free of dog bodies. Eventually I see the turnoff for Carter Lane, so I say, “Hey, could you demonstrate a left-hand turn? You could turn there, onto Carter.”

  “Sure!”

  More cruising along, more searching for Picasso, more pretending to be impressed with Cynthia’s driving ability, and eventually the flawless execution of another K-turn.

  “Wow,” I say, shaking my head. “I hope someday I’ll be as good a driver as you.” I gaze meaningfully at Cynthia until my eyes are drawn to a flash of tan—a moving flash of tan—through the trees a little ahead of us. I stare hard and realize that the lean haunches belong to a deer, which glances at me before crashing out of sight.

  “Thank you,” Cynthia replies.

  She gives me a grateful smile, and I feel like a horrible person. Then I think about Picasso and feel even worse.