Jazzy’s eyes are fixed on Kathy. She’s trying extra hard to make Kathy hold the leash loose as they walk around the circle.
“You’re not going to run away from Kathy when class is over, are you?” I ask Jazzy. I’m afraid that’s exactly what she’s planning. Why else would she say wait until the door opens?
I think of all the bad things that could happen if Jazzy runs away. She could get hit by a car. She could get caught by the dog catcher. She could end up at the P-O-U-N-D.
And if I follow Jazzy, all those things could happen to me, too.
“We’ll see you next week,” the alpha human says.
The humans start gathering up their water bowls and treat bags. Kathy still has a pretty loose hold on Jazzy. Even looser than the hold Connor has on me.
All the dogs are watching Jazzy and me.
“Are you ready?” Jazzy asks.
“Jazzy, listen to me,” I say. “There’s got to be another way.”
“I don’t know what it is,” Jazzy says.
The door opens and Jazzy jerks her leash out of Kathy’s grasp.
“Peaches!” Kathy calls, lunging for the leash.
Peaches? Is that what Kathy calls Jazzy?
Jazzy darts through an Irish setter’s legs and is out the door.
“Don’t let Jazzy go by herself!” the other dogs urge me on. “You have to go with her. You have to help Jazzy find Owen, and you have to help Muffin get back to Kathy!”
They’re right. I don’t know if Muffin could find her way back to Kathy by herself. I don’t even know if I can find Kathy once Muffin and I leave Owen’s grandma’s house. But I can take Muffin back to Connor and Mom’s house. And then together we can figure out how to find Kathy.
“I have to go,” I tell Connor. He is the one who is most likely to understand me. “But don’t worry. I’ll be back.” I pull my leash out of Connor’s grasp and make tracks for the door.
“Buddy!” Connor exclaims. “What are you doing?”
Connor starts to run after me, but he’s too slow. “Mom!” he screams. “Can you grab Buddy?”
“Go, Buddy!” the other dogs shout. “Don’t look back! We won’t let your humans catch you.” They all move in between Mom and me.
“Somebody, grab Buddy!” Mom cries.
But I am already out the door after Jazzy.
Jazzy glances over her shoulder as I catch up to her. “Hey, this is kind of fun,” she giggles. “I’ve never run away before.” She skips into the street.
“JAZZY!” I scream as a car swerves around her. “BE CAREFUL!”
“BUDDY! COME BACK HERE!” Mom yells. I feel her feet pounding on the pavement behind me.
There is an opening in the traffic.
I feel bad about running away from Mom, but I have to. I have to follow Jazzy.
“This way!” I tell Jazzy. I tilt my head toward a different street. There are houses over there.
Jazzy slows to look at me. “Is Grandma’s house that way?”
“I don’t know. I don’t think so,” I say. “But we have to lose all those humans that are chasing us before we can look for Grandma’s house. I think we can do that if we run through those backyards over there.”
“Okay,” Jazzy says.
“Look for cars this time,” I warn her.
We look both ways, then dart across the street ... across somebody’s front yard, and around to the back. I hope there isn’t a fence back there.
There isn’t.
Jazzy and I keep running. Through backyards. Over and around fences. Back to a front yard. Across another street.
I put my nose to the ground. “Hey, I think we drove on this street to get to obedience school,” I tell Jazzy. I’m pretty sure I smell Mom and Connor’s car.
Jazzy sniffs the edge of the street. “I think I smell it, too.”
And we seem to have lost the humans. For now, anyway.
We follow the car trail back to Connor’s house.
We pass Mouse’s house along the way. He is resting under the big maple tree in his front yard.
“Mouse!” I call to him. “Look who I found.”
Mouse raises his head. “HEY ... IS THAT JAZZY?” He comes to greet us at the fence.
“Yes, it is!” I say as we hurry on past.
“Nice ... to ... meet you ... Mouse,” Jazzy puffs. She’s getting tired, I can tell.
We can’t slow down, though. “No time to chat,” I tell Mouse over my shoulder. “But guess what? I’m taking Jazzy home!”
“THAT’S GREAT,” Mouse calls back. “BUT THEN WHO’S GOING TO MOVE IN WITH CONNOR AND MOM WHEN YOU GO TO SPRINGTOWN?”
I can’t think about that right now. The trail Mouse and I left when we came back from Owen’s grandma’s house should be around here somewhere. If I can find it, we should be able to follow it in reverse.
“I have to get Jazzy back to her house before the humans catch us,” I tell Mouse.
I sniff. Ah! There it is!
“Switch to this trail,” I tell Jazzy.
We follow the new trail up one street and down another. For some reason it doesn’t take as long to find Jazzy’s house now as it took us to come back the other morning. But that’s probably because we have a trail to follow.
“We’re getting close,” Jazzy says, speeding up. “I smell Grandma. I smell Owen, too!”
I smell Muffin!
We round another corner and there, up ahead, is Owen’s grandma’s house. Muffin is outside. She’s sitting on the top step of the porch with Owen.
They both turn to look at us.
“Jazzy?” Owen says, his eyes growing wide. He rises to his feet. “Is it really you?”