I stop on the sidewalk to stuff my uniform into my bag and change out of my cleats. Then I hurry toward the humane society, listening for sirens because today is a firehouse day for my dad and if I hear that wheeeee-ooooo, I’m stepping into the next store or hiding down a skinny alley between buildings until the sirens stop.
My eyes are on the pavement, and I’m walking fast because I don’t want to see anyone who knows my dad. Adults talk all the time about everything, and it would be just my luck that someone says, I saw Cyrus the other day at three o’clock headed toward the humane society carrying his cleats. I already know the looks my dad would give me. The ones that say I was worried and I told you.
Because he did tell me. He told me no more faking. No more not being where I’m supposed to be. He told me no dogs, and he told me no visiting. No getting attached.
Five of The 7 are in the waiting area when I get there, and they’re talking about the first-day essay assignment.
“It’s got to be boring for them too, right?” DeeDee says. “What teacher wants to see the same essay fifty times every year?”
“I don’t think they read them,” June adds. “I heard one year someone wrote, ‘If you are actually reading this, please tell me,’ in the middle of their essay, and it just came back with ‘A-plus’ on the top.”
“I believe it,” DeeDee says.
I get my sticker name tag from Max, and June says, “Be glad you have Mr. Hewett, Cyrus.”
I nod my head like I’m glad, except I’m not really, because an essay about Joseph Lee Heywood is way easier to write than a review of a book you haven’t actually read, especially when your teacher has an excellent fake detector.
Katherine and Elli rush through the front door. It slams again, and just then two vet techs with green smocks open the back doors. We hear the nails scratching on the floor and see the dogs pulling on their leashes and wagging their tails, excited for their walk.
“It’s like they know it’s Tuesday and they’ve been waiting for us,” Katherine says.
Parker runs straight for me and parks his head on my shoulder. I rub his back and his tail is wagging so fast it knocks me off-balance and we end up in a pig pile on the humane society floor, which is the only pig pile that feels like it’s right where I belong.
“Where’s Rocky?” Katherine asks.
One of the vet techs looks at her with sad eyes. “We found her a home. A good one. With two little kids.”
Katherine smiles and nods, but she has sad eyes too.
“Rocky was her favorite,” Ruth tells me in a quiet voice.
And it’s right there on Katherine’s face why my dad says not to get attached.
I wrap the end of Parker’s leash around my wrist and hold on tight.
There’s a new mutt puppy that wasn’t here last time. She’s chewing on her skinny pink leash and tripping over it with every step.
“This baby was dropped off Friday night,” Max tells us. “Healthy, excited pup. Lots of yipping and barking. Ready for her first walk.”
The puppy is down on her front paws wagging her tail and playing. She hops toward Katherine and starts nibbling on her shoelace, untying her sneaker with her little puppy teeth. Katherine laughs and scoops the puppy up in her arms.
“She doesn’t have a name yet,” one of the vet techs says.
Katherine smiles and I can see that look on my dad’s face. That face that says Don’t name it. It’s not your dog.
We gather all the leashes and follow the fast paws out the door, and then we’re walking along the same trails as last time. Parker sniffs the grass and lifts his leg and never goes one inch beyond me even when all the other dogs run ahead and pull on their leashes. He stays right by my side, step by step. I’m checking my watch every few minutes because I can’t be late to the firehouse.
Katherine jogs off with the new puppy bouncing along beside her. The puppy stops every once in a while and hops off the side of the trail into the tall grass and sniffs in circles, tail wagging.
There are eight of us and fifteen dogs and miles and miles of trails out in these fields behind the college, and it’s making me think of what my grandma used to always say about finding happy places, places where you feel just right. And even if it’s just Tuesdays and Fridays, out here with the Humane Society 7 and with Parker by my side is a happy place for me.
“Red!” Katherine calls back to us. “I’m naming her Red! She likes the red flowers and the red berries, and she keeps chewing on my red sneakers!” Then she and Red bound off down the path, and I can see this is her happy place too, and maybe it’s not so bad to get attached.
When we bring the dogs back, I hand Max the end of Parker’s leash, but I don’t want to.
She pats my hand and looks right at me and says, “Cyrus, we’re going to be shuffling some of the dogs around to other shelters to make some space. We’re really at capacity.”
If my dad were here, I’d look up at him so he could explain what capacity means, but she makes it sound like it means too much or too hard, and I’m wondering if they’re getting too attached to him too.
“There’s another humane society an hour from here that isn’t full. Parker will join them there September ninth,” she says. “Unless we find him a home.”
Katherine holds tight to Red’s leash and pats me on the back and I’m counting the days in my head and there’s only one more walk day before the ninth. Friday. DeeDee puts her hand on my shoulder.
I nod to Max, but my heart hurts big achy hurts thinking about Parker being far away. After I say goodbye to The 7, I let Parker rest his nose on my shoulder for a whole minute before I tell him I have to go. “I’ll see you Friday,” I whisper.
Then I pinch my feet back into my cleats and run down the sidewalk to the firehouse, blinking my eyes hard and trying not to think about September ninth and how Parker will be in a town I can’t walk to and my happy place will be too far away for me to find.
I’m out of breath when I get to the firehouse, and Dad pinches his eyebrows together and gives me a look.
“Coach says if we’re walking home we might as well run.” I don’t like how quickly the lie falls out of my mouth, but it’s a good one because it sounds just like something Coach Matthews would say, and it makes my dad chuckle.
Sam slides down the pole and lands square on her feet. “Man, I love that,” she says and smiles. “It just never gets old.”
It reminds me of how Mr. Hewett leaned in when he talked to us and stood up to show us the pictures, and the way Marcus and Shane slam their chests together and chant huh huh huh graaaa, and how Chris describes flipping his canoe over his head and portaging from lake to lake in the Boundary Waters. And I try to come up with the things that make me smile wide like that. Listening to music with Grandma, especially when the horns join in. And Parker.
And now Parker is leaving.
Leo comes in the door and puts out his fist for a pound. He and my dad bump knuckles and Leo claps me on the shoulder. “Quiet day?” he asks my dad.
“Prevention and inspection at the day cares,” Dad says. I know what that looks like because I went along with them once. They check the alarms and teach the kids about stop, drop, and roll. They identify the exits and inspect for any hazardous materials. Then all the kids have a hundred questions that they ask all at the same time and everyone jumps up and down when my dad asks if they want to see the truck.
“I think I spotted a few future firefighters,” Sam says. “That little girl in the front row with the wild curls and blue striped dress.”
My dad nods his head and smirks, and I can tell he’s recalling the little girl’s face, and I’m thinking, great, another five-year-old who knows exactly what she loves.
Leo rolls his eyes and mumbles something about how it’s hard to fit a dress under a pair of fireman’s pants, and I wish he would take his hand off my shoulder.
“What was that?” Sam asks. “You were kind of mumbling.”
“Nothing,” he says. He takes his hand from my shoulder and waves it back and forth like he’s trying to shoo Sam’s question away, like he’s trying to say No big deal, forget it.
But she doesn’t forget it. “No, really,” she says. “You can say it out loud, in a big-boy voice.”
That almost makes me laugh, but I look up at my dad first. His lips are pressed tight together, then he opens them and says, “Go ahead, Leo.”
Leo just scoffs and shakes his head. “I’m going to get changed.” Then he climbs the pole hand over hand and we hear locker number two slam upstairs.
Sam breaks into quiet chuckles and so does my dad, and I do too. “Big-boy voice,” my dad says. “That was a good one.”
Then Sam pats my shoulder, right where Leo clapped it earlier, and says, “Don’t let anyone tell you where you do or don’t fit.”
On the way home I tell Dad all about the first day—about Mr. Hewett and how he read us a picture book, and how I already have an assignment due next week, and how we have a new kid with a really good memory. I leave out the parts about skipping practice and walking Parker. And I don’t tell him that Shane was sent out of the circle and that Marcus wasn’t very nice and that Mr. Hewett gave us a terrible look as if I were mumbling under my breath too.
Then I start wishing that Eduardo would speak up like Sam and not let Marcus and Shane and all the other kids giggle at him the way they do.
And that Marcus and Shane would quit acting the way they’re acting and just go back to how they were when we played in Mighty-Mites and tossed a pee-wee-sized ball around our backyards.
And I wish I could speak up for Parker. Tell Max and everyone else that he doesn’t want to leave and he’ll be staying right here in Northfield, where the air smells like Cheerios and I can walk him every Tuesday and Friday forever.