Chapter 28.

The following morning, Josh arrived at the kennel planning Tucker’s next lesson. The smart pup already knew Sit and Stay. From there, it would be a natural progression to Lie down and Roll over, rewarded, of course, with a tummy rub.

The Large Dogs arrived for play group, all of them except Tucker. “Isn’t this one of Tucker’s day care days?” Josh asked Rune.

Rune shrugged. “They probably canceled. People do that a lot.” Lola came wiggling up to her, and Rune bent to touch noses. “Whoa, my dream last night,” she added. “I didn’t realize it in the dream, but that animal must have been Tucker.”

Rune and her paranormal drama. “A prophetic dream?” asked Josh.

Ignoring his frivolous tone, Rune stared at the back fence as if watching a dreamscape.

“But he wasn’t acting like Tucker. His ears were down, and his tail was drooping.” She turned suddenly to Josh. “Whoa, I bet Tucker’s racked with guilt about causing Carol’s accident. He probably felt too bad to come to play group.”

Startled, Josh laughed. “What?”

Rune nodded to herself. “That’s why I had that dream.” She frowned at Josh. “You probably don’t know that animals in distress can project their concerns over a distance. Maybe I should call the Harrisons and offer my services.”

Josh had to ask. “What services?”

Rune launched into an explanation about how certain psychics, like her, had the ability to establish telepathic rapport with a disturbed dog, even over a long distance. She’d done that once before, with a Cairn terrier named Ethel.

It seemed that Ethel’s owners had been staying at a campground in Vermont, at the same time as Kyle, a friend of Rune’s, and his three-year-old daughter. Ethel bit the little girl, and Kyle called Rune for advice. Rune had already moved back to Massachusetts the year before, but Kyle sent her a picture of the little dog, and Rune was able to make telepathic contact. “Ethel was inconsolable. I could feel her reaching out for help.”

“Wait a minute,” said Josh. “What about the little girl? Did the dog have its rabies shots?”

“Oh, Kyle’s kid was fine, just a flesh wound,” said Rune. “She shouldn’t have been teasing the dog, anyway. But poor Ethel! Her owners weren’t very aware. They were really surprised when Kyle told them how much guilt and confusion she was suffering.”

As Josh listened in disbelief, he thought Ethel’s owners must have been even more surprised when Kyle suggested Rune’s psychic healing services, for a reasonable fee. But they agreed, and Rune applied her special gifts in a long-distance session with the Cairn terrier. In the end, Ethel was still remorseful, but no longer conflicted, and newly aware of her responsibility for self-control. Ethel’s owners sent Rune a check, which she split with her friend Kyle.

“Very interesting,” said Josh. “Only in this case, the Harrisons are more likely to sue the kennel than write you a check.”

When Josh had a chance, he ducked into the office to follow up on Tucker’s whereabouts. Uncle George was at the desk, and he pulled up a schedule on the screen. “Yep, he was supposed to come in today. That’s Harrison for you, no consideration. Carol, now, would have called to cancel, but of course she’s laid up.”

“How is she? Is she in the hospital?”

“She’s home, but off her feet. I guess she sprained her ankle good.” The old man added with satisfaction, “Next time it’ll be a broken hip.”

But since Carol was “laid up,” why wouldn’t Gardner be glad to dump Tucker at day care? Maybe Carol was keeping the dog home for company. Josh sure would, if he were injured and hurting. Anyway, Josh resolved to take Carol flowers tomorrow.

 

The morning passed in the usual round of hurling balls for the retrievers, filling water buckets, and raking wood chips, but Josh felt different. He was no longer drifting wherever the summer took him. It was time to start planning, not in a fooling-around Small Business for Dummies kind of way, but seriously. Where was he going to go? What was he going to do?

On his lunch break, Josh went to the library to check his email. Nothing more from Tanya about the dog bed, but—Ron! Good man.

Josh ran his eyes over Ron Watanabe’s message: No worries, feel free to rant.” Ron gave the birth stats on his baby boy, and attached a picture of him and his wife at the hospital, beaming, cuddling a scowling infant.

It sucks that your principal had it in for you, Ron went on. But isn’t it a little extreme to leave teaching? You really love working with kids. Everyone says public schools are in the toilet, so why don’t you look at private schools? You could check with Nancy Reston, remember her? I hear she’s the new head of Kingstown Academy. If there aren’t any openings there, she might know of other schools that are looking.

Josh read this with mixed feelings. He was miffed that Ron didn’t even comment on Josh’s small business idea. Josh had thought he’d sounded pretty knowledgeable, even if he wasn’t. And “You really love working with kids”—like Vicky, Ron was annoyingly sure about what Josh should do with his life.

But— Josh’s throat ached as he remembered that exciting energy, when he was alone in his classroom with twenty-five kids. He remembered having nothing on his mind except working his strategies for luring the students into the subject, for teasing and challenging them just enough. And they tested him; they teased and challenged him. Teaching was like improv theater; the only way it could work was in attentive response to the other people.

Even when Josh failed to get a concept across, it was always interesting. And once in a while there was a big payoff. The year before last, one of the boys in his third period class had joined a discussion unexpectedly. It was March, as Josh remembered, and Zack had not yet volunteered in class. Zack, the coolest guy in the eighth grade, had better things to do, such as soak up furtive stares from the females in the class, and admire the decal tattoo on his arm.

Josh’s question to the class was, “What do you personally know about the Vietnam War?”

The first answer came, predictably, from Brayden, a military history buff. “Nothing,” he said with a smartass grin. “Because it was in the 1960s, and I wasn’t born yet. My dad wasn’t even born yet.”

Josh acknowledged Brayden with a faint smile and nod. “In the sixties, right.” Zack was actually raising his hand! “Zack?”

Zack rubbed his tattoo absently as he said, “So . . . my grandmother told me she went on a protest march. Against the war. She was pregnant with my mom, and there were TV cameras, so she thought it would help.”

Several of the kids laughed, and one boy snickered, “Help how—if the baby was born right there on TV?”

Josh started to speak in support of Zack, but the boy spoke first, staring at the taunter. “Help, asshole, because babies are, like, the future. And the war was ruining the future. She wanted to show everyone that.”

The class was suddenly quiet. Josh’s throat tightened with emotion. He’d been so sure that Zack was paying no attention whatsoever the other day, when Josh talked to this class about the influence of the media. Zack not only got the concept; he’d offered an illustration from his own family’s history.

“Good example,” Josh said, letting the “asshole” go without comment. He went on to explain how public opinion had affected first President Johnson and then President Nixon. Zack had yawned and looked at the clock, as if to make clear that he was not sucking up to the teacher.

If Josh did go back to teaching, a private school might work. Of course he remembered Nancy Reston, another classmate from the long-ago MAT program, and he was intrigued. As a graduate student, he’d been in awe of her ambition.

In those days, Ron had teased her for wanting to reform American education. “What’s wrong with that?” Nancy had said with one of her fierce looks. So it wasn’t surprising that she was the new head of a good school like Kingstown Academy—maybe only surprising that she wasn’t the new U.S. Secretary of Education.

It wouldn’t hurt to give Nancy a call. Josh still had options—he was thankful that he hadn’t let Principal Voss’s report on his supposed insensitivity go uncontested. Carl, who was the president of the local teachers’ union, had advised him to write a rebuttal and send copies to anyone who might care, including the board of education. Carl had also gone over Josh’s draft to edit out the rage. “You can’t call Voss a ‘psychopath.’” (Josh had thought that was simply objective language.)

Looking over the Kingstown Academy website, Josh felt let down. Their only open faculty position was a coaching job. Was it worthwhile to pitch himself to Nancy, when the best she could offer would be a tip about some other school? To tell the truth, Josh had always been a little afraid of Nancy.

Still, Josh knew that word of mouth and people who knew people was the best way to find a teaching job. Clicking on “Contact us,” he started, “Hi Nancy.”

No. Composing a message would take a long time, and he had to get going. Better to call, anyway—if he really wanted to explore that possibility. Closing the email, Josh noted down the Academy phone number and Nancy’s extension.

As Josh left the library, his stomach reminded him that he hadn’t eaten, although he was due back at Coastal Canine in five minutes. He pulled into Cumberland Farms and dashed into the store. A poster beside the door urged, “Indulge your inner carnivore” and showed a meatball sub so enormous, it extended beyond the edges of the poster. Yes.

“I’m indulging my inner carnivore,” Josh explained to Danielle at the counter.

She gave him a cool glance as she scanned the bar code. Josh added, “I’m really sorry about the other night. I was a jerk to forget.”

Danielle only shrugged and dropped the change into his hand. Then she seemed to remember something, and her eyes widened. “Oh! By the way, I can take the cat now.”

“The cat? You mean the one that was riding in my car?”

“Yes,” she said impatiently. “Panda. I can take him home now.” At his confused expression, she went on, “I know what I said, Ryan and his supposed allergies. Well, last night I’m doing some wash, and I look down at one of his shirts—and it’s covered with cat fur.” She hit the side of her head. “Duh! If Ryan can pal around with Cat Woman, I guess he’s outgrown those allergies.”

“Too bad,” said Josh. “I mean, I don’t have that cat anymore. I found its owner.”

“Oh.” Danielle looked disappointed, more so than Josh would have expected.

“You should try the cat shelter, Fur-Ever,” Josh told her. “Rune says they have so many cats, they don’t know where to put them.”

“Yeah, I know,” Danielle snapped. “I wanted Panda.” She began ringing up the next customer’s iced coffee.

Josh paused outside the store to take a thoughtful bite of his sub. Cat Woman. Did he know who that was?

 

 

 

What! Lost your mittens, you naughty kittens!

Then you shall have no pie.

“Meow, meow, meow.”

No, you shall have no pie.

Nursery rhyme