Page 4 of Scout Takes the Lead
We circled the toy aisle again, it was so cute to watch the big tough guy playing tug with the little puppy. Scout planted his paws on the floor, grasped the end of the rope in his mouth, and leaned backward. He lost his grip and fell back on his butt, but he bounced right back up again. Alex twirled the rope in front of the puppy, and he jumped for it.
That happened twice more.
“Alex, you don’t have to win every time,” I said, laughing. “You’re training him to lose.”
“Can’t have that,” he said. He stood up, and Scout leaned his body against my legs, pushing me into Alex. I lost my balance for a second, and Alex grabbed my arm. His fingers were strong but gentle against my skin.
“Thanks,” I said, blushing again.
He threw a couple of different types of rope in his cart and picked up Scout. The way the puppy snuggled against Alex’s broad chest melted my heart.
It was funny, but I thought that Alex was holding Scout between us, almost like a shield. What did he need to protect himself from? A girl in a pet shop?
I led them over to the piddle pad aisle. “You’re going to need these while you’re training him,” I said. “What do you do for a living?”
He got kind of weird and awkward then. “I got out of the service a few months ago and I haven’t decided what my next move is. All I know is that I don’t want to go into an office every day, so I found a company that uses home-based customer service representatives.”
“That’s cool,” I said. I noticed that I was waving my hands the way I do when I’m nervous around a cute guy. “I don’t want to work in an office either. I love that in addition to teaching my classes here I go around to peoples’ houses to train their dogs. It’s very flexible.”
Alex had a great smile. When he relaxed, I did too. “Yeah, my gig is flexible too. When I want to work, I initialize the software on my computer and wait for a call to be routed to me from the main call center.”
He leaned down to scratch Scout under the scruff of his neck. More evidence that he was comfortable with the dog between us. But that’s okay. I have all kinds of quirky clients.
“I work for a company who controls health care spending accounts for individuals, and most of the time I help people check account balances, submit receipts and so on,” Alex said. “If a problem is too complicated for me, I transfer the customer to the supervisors at the company itself.”
“That’s good, because it means you’ll have a lot of free time to work with Scout,” I said. “If you come to my class I’ll train you to look for signals from him, like when he needs to pee, so you can take him right out.”
By time he was ready to check out, Alex had relaxed a lot with me, and Scout picked up on the change. They looked like a good pair, and I hoped that Scout would help Alex the way Buddy had helped me.
3: Urge to Explain: Alex
Something about Grace calmed me. Maybe it was that we had Scout between us, so I didn’t have to interact directly with her. He just lapped up her attention as if it was his due. There was a lot I could learn from him.
We walked out to the parking lot together. “Good luck, Scout,” Grace said. She leaned down to ruffle his fur. “It looks like you’ve got a great daddy.”
“Daddy?” I asked. “Last I heard dogs and humans don’t share genetic material.”
“Pet parent,” she said, elbowing me. “We don’t like to use the word owner. Your relationship with Scout is a partnership, but you’re still the responsible one.”
I thanked her again. “We’ll see you at your training class on Saturday,” I said. I looked down at my new buddy. “Right, Scout?” He woofed and Grace and I laughed.
As I drove away I realized that while I usually worried about who or what was lurking around the next aisle I hadn’t felt anxious in the store. Maybe this dog thing was going to work out fine. Then Scout threw up.
Grace was right. Pet vomit was not fun.
I drove home with the smell of Scout’s stomach contents all around me. Got him out of the car, put him in the fenced yard of the tiny bungalow I was renting on the outskirts of downtown Hollywood.
I had picked it because it was quiet and affordable, and there was a big discount store within walking distance. I’d learned that if I went shopping very early in the morning, when it first opened, I could avoid most human contact.
While Scout sat by the gate, watching me, I cleaned the car. Then we took a long walk, Scout stopping every few feet to pee. Every time, his snout quivered, as if he was absorbing all the information that the grass or bush had to offer. “Jesus, dog, how much urine do you have in you?” I asked.
He didn’t answer, but he did seem to be done peeing. We walked back to the dim house and I fed him some kibble, which he seemed to like, and then turned on my computer to take some calls. While I worked, Scout napped beside me, his legs outstretched and his head resting against the floor. Any time I moved my chair he looked up to make sure I was still there.
After a couple of hours at the computer, I needed to get up and stretch. Scout immediately woke up and rushed to the front door, so I took him for a quick walk.
When I returned, I began my workout routine with the conditioning I’d learned in the Army—a series of ten exercises beginning with the bend and reach and ending with bent-leg body twists and pushups.
Scout was eager to figure out what I was doing, moving around me and sniffing, and I had to gently push him away. I did five reps of each, then through another dozen, in a precise pattern. The routine calmed me, and it must have done the same for Scout, because he snoozed on the carpet beside me.
