Alpha Dog (10 page)

I walked Seamus into my room and shrouded him in one of the towels I’d set down for his bed. Clutching him against me once again, I went into the kitchen and got the coffee pot going one-handed. By the time I’d finished my arms were sore and aching, so I returned to the living room and settled on the opposite end of the couch from Robot.

“What happened to him?” Robot asked, nodding toward Seamus, his upper lip curling in disgust.

“He fell into a pool,” I grumbled as I rubbed the water out of his fur. I really didn’t want to tell them the whole story, and thankfully they didn’t ask.

“Were you at our gig last night?” Kinky asked. He sat sprawled in the yellow chair, his long legs stretched way out in front of him.

I shook my head. “No.”

“Why not?”

Because I wasn’t invited.
“I was busy.”

“Man, you should have come,” Lyle said. “We were pretty awesome.”

Just then the phone rang. I saw Robot turn to grab the receiver and screeched, “Don’t!” Seamus jumped slightly in my arms and all the guys froze, staring at me in alarm. “It could be my mom,” I explained. “She’d freak if a guy answered.”

Robot lifted his hands as if in surrender. “Whatever, love. You answer the bloody thing.”

I set Seamus down on the floor and wagged my finger in his face. “Stay put,” I said. Then I snatched the cordless off its base. “Hello?” I said, trying to sound calm and collected.

“Hello?” came a deep, male voice. “May I please speak with Ms. Katherine McAllister?”

“Speaking,” I replied hesitantly.

“Ms. McAllister, this is Alan Wethington from the shelter. I was just calling to see how your dog was doing.”

I looked at Seamus. He was sitting on the floor with his snout poking out from beneath the towel, looking like an incredibly small, bearded monk. “Um . . . okay, I guess. I do have sort of a problem, though.”

“Really? What’s that?”

I couldn’t tell if the guys were listening to me or to the talk show on TV. Just in case, I went into my room and shut the door halfway.

“Seamus doesn’t seem to be, you know, going,” I explained. “It’s been two days, but he hasn’t had a bowel movement.”

“I see. Is he eating?”

“Yes.”

“Is he lethargic?”

“Not at all.”

“Well, if he doesn’t seem sick, I wouldn’t worry about it too much. He’ll go. You might try taking him on a long walk to get things moving.”

Duh. Been there.
“Okay.”

Just then, there came a huge crashing sound from the main living area. An uneasy feeling came over me.

“Uh . . . gotta go now,” I said quickly. “Thanks for calling!”

I turned off the phone and sprinted out of my room. I checked the spot where I’d left Seamus, but he wasn’t there. The towel was lying about a foot away.

“Where’s Seamus?” I asked.

“Beats me,” Robot said.

Lyle and Kinky just shrugged.

A tinkling noise emanated from the kitchen nook. I raced around the bar and skidded to a stop. The tall yellow plastic trash can had been knocked forward, its lid halfway open, disgorging coffee grounds, used tissues, and ketchup-frosted wrappings all over the kitchen floor. In the middle of the mess stood Seamus, his wet fur grainy with Folgers and other unidentifiable fragments. He was chewing on something brown and drippy.

The guys ran up behind me.

“
Eew!
What’s that?” Lyle asked.

“It’s my burrito from last night,” Robot replied.

“Eew!”

“Drop it, Seamus!” I lunged for him, but he quickly cut sideways. His eyes drooped guiltily and his tail curved between his hind legs, but I could tell he had no intention of letting go his loot. “Please, Seamus! Put it down!” I stepped over the upturned can and made another grab for him. Seamus jogged in place for a split second, his paws slipping on the gooey debris, then finally got up enough traction to race from the room. “No! Stop!”

But there was nothing I could do. Seamus was tearing around the living room, leaving behind a mucky path and the fragrance of wet, slimy dog.

It took me over half an hour to clean the kitchen and vacuum up the trail of coffee grounds. The others sat on the couch eating Pop-Tarts and watching TV. Every now and then Lyle would flash me a look of pity, and Kinky even offered to help, but I refused. As it was, tears of frustration were already collecting in my eyes, and their sympathy only made me feel more pathetic. When I finally did spring a leak and start crying, I didn’t want it to be in front of them.

Meanwhile Seamus sat whining on the patio, watching me through the cracks in the blinds. Pity and anger took turns squeezing my heart. As embarrassed and aggravated as I was, I also knew he didn’t really know what he was doing. He was just being a dog: a sloppy, curious, clueless dog.

Finally
Christine emerged from the steamy bathroom and I was able to get Seamus cleaned up—his second bath in as many days.

Just as I was heading into the hallway with Seamus bundled in a towel, Christine came out of her room. She was wearing a black minidress, ripped tights and clunky black leather shoes. Her hair had been scrunched into thick dreds, and her eyes were outlined in dark, Cleopatra-like streaks.

“You ready to go to orientation?” she asked me, her brows furrowed as she took in my sloppy outfit and droopy ponytail.

“Is it that late already?” I asked. I leaned sideways to check the clock above the oven. Sure enough, it was almost noon.

The university was officially kicking off its Core Curriculum Program with a big mandatory assembly. I had sort of been looking forward to meeting some other students and hanging out with Christine minus Robot. Only the day’s crises had disrupted my schedule and I was caught completely off guard.

“You better get a move on,” Christine said.

“Yeah. Um . . . right.” I was walking around in a circle, trying to think everything through. “I guess I don’t have time to shower or change. I should probably bring a pen. Oh, no! What about Seamus?”

She frowned at me. “What about him?”

“He’s sort of had a bad day,” I explained, staring down at him. His brown eyes nervously darted back and forth. “I’m not sure if I should leave him.”

“But you have to. This thing is required.” She walked into the living room and faced the guys. “You all will watch Katie’s dog while we’re at this orientation, right?”

“Right.” “Sure.” “No prob.” They answered without taking their eyes off the NASCAR race on TV.

“There,” she said, turning back to me. “See? It’s all taken care of. Your precious dog is going to be fine.”

The orientation lasted longer than I’d expected. Christine and I had piled into a giant lecture hall along with a couple hundred other students and listened to speech after speech. One officially welcomed us. One gave a shortened history of the university and its summer program. And one reminded us of campus rules.

I started to take notes and caught Christine giving me a look. The rest of the time I doodled on my notebook page while she slouched way down in the seat and shut her eyes.

“God, I hope college isn’t like that all the time.” She was still complaining as we walked through the door of the condo.

“About bloody time!” Robot said, sitting up on the couch.

“What’s wrong with you?” Christine asked. “Where are the other guys?”

“They went off to find food,” he explained. “That daft dog went postal after you left.”

“What happened?” I asked, setting down my book bag.

“Beats the hell out of me. We were just hanging around, programming tracks on Lyle’s drum machine, when he started charging around, barking like a lunatic.”

“Did you guys hurt him? I mean . . . accidentally?”

“No one laid a bloody finger on him.” He stretched out along the couch and folded his arms across his chest. “Dog’s just a freaking mental case, that’s all.”

“No, he’s not,” I said, feeling really defensive. “He’s just . . . just . . .”
immensely constipated,
I finished silently. Poor thing was probably in pain. “Where is he?” I asked, grabbing his leash.

“On the balcony. Took us forever to catch the nutter.”

I rushed to the patio door. “He’s not out there.”

“Yes, he is.”

I opened the door and glanced around the balcony. “No, he isn’t!”

Robot’s scowl disappeared. “What do you mean? That’s where we put him. I swear!”

“Well, it’s not like he could fly away. . . . Oh God!” Cold tingles were spreading down my scalp and over my body. “You don’t think . . . ?”

I bolted back onto the patio and raced over to the railing. Bracing myself for the worst, I stared down over the side to the ground below.

But there was no crumpled little doggie. No blood-stains or tufts of fur or four-legged chalk outline. All I could see was grass.

Christine and Robot ran up beside me. “Thank God,” Christine said as she looked over the railing. “But then . . . where
is
he?”

“Seamus!” I called out.

Chiiinnng!
A clanging noise sounded nearby.

“Seamus?”

Chiiinng! Chiiinng!

The noise was coming from my right. Turning around, I spotted Seamus on Mrs. Krantz’s side of the balcony. He was standing against the iron rail that divided the concrete ledge, his tail wagging happily.

“Seamus!” I cried in relief.

He bounced around in an excited circle and threw himself against the railing again, causing his tags to bang against the bars.
Chiinnng!

“What the hell?” Robot scratched his left sideburn. “We didn’t put him over there. I swear!”

Right as he said that, Seamus flopped onto his side and wriggled his head through the space beneath the railing. The rest of his body followed.

“Hey, you! What were you doing over there?” I exclaimed as he ran up to me. He stopped at my feet, wagging his tail and staring up at me with his pink tongue halfway out of his mouth, looking very proud of himself. I bent over and started fluffing his fur. After that brief scare, I was really glad to see him.

“I can’t believe the little bloke fit through that space,” Robot said, shaking his head in astonishment.

“And he was so fast,” Christine added. “Like he’d been doing it forever.”

My hand froze in midpet as I thought about what Christine said. It did seem like Seamus had done that before. Maybe several times. I straightened up and walked over to the railing, scanning Mrs. Krantz’s side of the balcony.

“Oh, no! Crap, no!” I exclaimed.

Crap
yes.
Lots of it. Some fresh, and some a day or two old. All neatly scattered about the patio along with Mrs. Krantz’s potted plants.

“Gross!” Christine said, plugging her nose.

Robot burst out laughing.

“You little doofus!” I shouted, rounding on Seamus. He skipped about on his feet and looked even more pleased. Judging by the mess, he
should
have felt light on his feet.

So the mystery was solved. The good news was my dog wasn’t going to burst open from retaining too much poo. The bad news was I just might get evicted—after living there only a couple of days.

For the next forty-five minutes, I cleaned my dog’s manure off Mrs. Krantz’s ledge. It was by far the most disgusting thing I’d ever done in my life. But it also gave me real practice at scooping, something I’d been spared since adopting Seamus. For example, I learned quite a bit about consistency, how sometimes the droppings would come right up, and sometimes they . . . uh . . . didn’t.