Max's Story

by W. Bruce Cameron

  CJ snatched it away from me. “Max, no!” she said. “That’s Sneakers’s food.” I stood, looking up at her, and barked to tell her to put the food back down. After everything I’d gone through that morning, I was hungry!

  “Well, okay,” CJ said. “But I don’t think you’d better get used to eating out of Sneakers’s bowl.” She opened a cupboard, took out another different bowl, this one white, and poured some of the food into it. Then she set it down on the floor for me.

  I was pleased that CJ had gotten my message, and I ate the food quickly. There was water in another bowl, and I drank some of that. Then I was ready for more exploring.

  Just as I was headed back out of the kitchen, a waft of scent fell over me. The creature that I had been smelling was here! I looked up and saw the new animal sitting in the center of the carpet, staring at me with narrow yellow eyes in a sleek gray face.

  She was about my size, but I knew she was not a dog. The smell was wrong, and the face was, too. Pointy ears stood up on her head, but when I came closer she got to all four feet and put those ears back flat against her head. Her whiskers swept back against her cheeks.

  Whatever she was, she needed to learn that I was Max. I stood as tall as I could and walked confidently toward her. She would back down. They all did.

  “Max, be good,” CJ said. “That’s Sneakers. Sneakers, it’s okay. Be a nice cat. Max is going to live here now.”

  Sneakers the cat took a step back from me. That was right. She was learning.

  Then Sneakers drew back her lips, showing teeth as sharp as mine, and let out a low, deep hiss. I was so startled that I jumped away. What kind of a noise was that for an animal to make? Why didn’t she bark or growl or whine?

  I recovered from my surprise, ready to show Sneakers that I couldn’t be scared by a sound, but she crouched down and, in one movement, leaped to a tall counter between the kitchen and the living room. From high above, she looked down at me smugly as I stared up at her in astonishment. Then I raced into the kitchen and put my front paws up on the cabinets to bark as loud as I could.

  This was completely unfair! How was I supposed to show this cat who was in charge when she could get up so high, out of my reach in an instant? I was so frustrated I ran in a small circle, and CJ laughed and scooped me up.

  She took me into another room with a bed in it and plopped me down onto a soft blue quilt. I liked it. It smelled like her. She petted me and scratched my neck in that excellent way she had, and I sighed with contentment and curled up right next to her hand.

  Then the door to the apartment opened and shut. “CJ? Are you here?” a loud voice called out.

  I felt CJ go tense all over. I jerked my head up quickly. Was there something bothering my girl? Did I need to protect her?

  “Okay, Max,” she whispered. “Here we go. Be good, now. Please be good.”

  She picked me up and carried me out into the living room. A woman stood inside the door. I recognized her scent at once. She was the other person who lived here.

  Her face was pale and her smooth dark hair just touched her coat’s collar, which was gray and furry and smelled very intriguing. My nose twitched as she stared at us.

  “Hi, Jillian,” said CJ.

  “What is that?” said the woman.

  CJ took a deep breath. “This is Max.”

  CJ and the woman talked a lot. After a while CJ put me down so I could move freely. I stayed close to her feet, since I could tell she was not very happy.

  “Look, your mother and I have been friends for a long time, and that’s why I said you could stay here for the summer. But I didn’t mean you could show up with an entire zoo!” Jillian said.

  “It’s not a zoo. It’s just one dog. Look at him. He’s so little. You won’t even know he’s here.”

  “I’m pretty sure I’ll know. This is an apartment, CJ! A New York apartment! It’s no place for a dog. What about—you know what I mean—calls of nature?”

  “I’ll take care of all that. I promise. And I’ll feed him and walk him.”

  “And what about Sneakers? What if it chases her? Or bites her?”

  “Sneakers is bigger than Max! And she already jumped up on the counter when he growled at her.”

  “He growled at her?”

  “He didn’t really mean it. It’s just an act. I can tell. He’s not really fierce. The people at the shelter were going to put him to sleep! Tomorrow! What if it was Sneakers? Wouldn’t you want somebody to help her?”

  Jillian sighed. She flopped down on the couch and ran both hands through her hair, fluffing it up and then smoothing it back from her face. “Well, it’s not Sneakers. It’s not a nice, clean, quiet cat who uses a litter box. It’s a dog. How could you bring a dog into my apartment without telling me?”

  “It was an emergency,” CJ said, and her voice sounded so sad I sat down on her feet so I could be as close as possible to her. She bent to scoop me up in her hands.

  “Please, Jillian. Let me keep him.”

  She brought her head down close to mine.

  “Listen, Max,” she whispered. “Be nice to her. It’s your only chance.”

  CJ went to sit on the sofa beside Jillian, holding me in her lap. Her hands were snug around me.

  “He’s so cute, Jillian. And he’s even smaller than Sneakers. Please let him stay.”

  Jillian sighed. She frowned. She looked at me.

  Then she poked her fingers toward me rather awkwardly. I felt a growl rising in my throat, but CJ squeezed me a little tighter, and Jillian pulled her hand back before I needed to show her to watch her step around me.

  I felt CJ relax. I sighed and flopped down in her lap, too. Apparently, Jillian was no threat to either of us. And I was tired and ready for a nap. It had been a very long day already.

  “Oh, all right, I guess,” Jillian said. “I guess I can put up with a dog for the summer. But I’m taking you at your word, CJ. I can’t get complaints from my neighbors about barking, or come home to a mess. And that thing can’t bother Sneakers. Do we have a deal?”

  “We do! We really do! I’ll take care of everything. Don’t worry!” CJ’s voice spiked with happiness.

  “If anything happens to my carpet, I might change my mind,” Jillian muttered. “But okay, I guess. For now.”

  5

  Before long, Jillian picked herself up from the couch. “I better make some dinner,” she said. Sneakers jumped down from the counter and went to rub up against Jillian’s ankles. Jillian swept the cat up and held her so that Sneakers’s head tucked right under her chin.

  Sneakers seemed to give me a taunting look from her perch. Then she closed her eyes to rub her head against Jillian’s jaw. Unfair again. But the time would come when this cat would learn that I was the boss and she was not.

  Jillian carried Sneakers into another room. Then she came out and went back into the kitchen while CJ cuddled me on the couch. When Jillian came out again, she had a bowl full of cereal and a spoon.

  Picking up something flat and rectangular, she pointed it at a screen on the wall. The screen erupted with color and sound and I twitched a little in CJ’s lap. Was this a new threat I needed to protect her from?

  “It’s okay, Max. The TV won’t hurt you,” CJ said. Her hands stroked me soothingly, one on each side of my body.

  “Get yourself something to eat,” Jillian said, settling down into a chair across from the loud screen.

  CJ set me on the floor and went into the kitchen, too. I stretched and thought I might go and see what had happened to Sneakers, but interesting smells drifted to my nose—bread, something sharp and spicy, meat! I hurried to see what CJ was doing.

  She was putting meat between two slices of bread and spreading that spicy stuff on top of it. I whined at her feet. “You want some sandwich, Max?” she asked.

  Whatever a sandwich was, I definitely wanted some!

  CJ put some bits of her sandwich filling on a paper towel and set the whole thing down on the floor
for me. I gobbled the meat up. Salty and delicious! Then I gulped down more water from the bowl on the floor, which CJ refilled.

  As CJ finished her half of the sandwich, I felt a familiar need and sniffed around the kitchen for the best spot to take care of it.

  “Max! No!” CJ gasped as I squatted down in a corner.

  I knew she was worried, but I couldn’t stop what I was doing. As soon as I was done, I leaped alertly to her side, looking around for whatever had her anxious.

  “Oh, Max, no,” CJ said again. She picked up some paper towels and wiped up the puddle I’d just left.

  “CJ, I warned you,” Jillian said crossly, not moving from her chair.

  “I’ll clean it up. I’m sorry.”

  “This is why dogs don’t belong in an apartment. Cats are really the only pets that work in a big city like New York.”

  “I’ll take him out right now. I promise.” CJ threw the paper towels in the trash. “Come on, Max!”

  Her intent was clear, but actually I wasn’t ready to “come on.” I hadn’t quite finished. But CJ seemed so urgent that I went with her, and I waited until I was outside to squat on the sidewalk and leave a little brown pile there.

  “Good boy, Max. Good boy!” CJ said happily. She seemed so pleased that I wagged up into her face and panted happily. If my girl was happy, I was happy. It had been such hard work to find her, but together, we’d both be fine.

  * * *

  That night CJ sat on her bed and lifted me up to sit with her. She took a black rectangular thing from a table beside the bed. I’d learn later that people called these things phones and spent a lot of time looking at them that would be better spent with dogs, but that was the first time I’d seen one. I thought it might be something for me to play with and jumped forward, ready to wrestle it out of her hand.

  “No, Max, not a toy!” CJ said, pushing me back. “Hold still. Okay, sit just like that. That’s perfect!” The black thing made a click. I barked at it.

  Then CJ tapped on the phone for a while, until I shoved my nose under her hand to remind her that I was the one who needed petting. “Okay, Max, okay,” she said, scratching me behind the ears with that perfect touch she had. “I just wanted to send a picture of you to Trent.”

  The phone made an odd jangly noise. I jumped, startled, and put my paw on it to teach it not to do that.

  CJ pulled it away, looked at it for a moment, and laughed. “Trent says he should have known I couldn’t make it all summer without finding a dog somewhere! Look, Max.” She held the phone up in front of my face. I sniffed it. It did not smell particularly interesting.

  “That’s Molly,” CJ told me. “She’s my dog back home. Trent’s taking care of her for the summer. He says she misses me.”

  Her voice sounded sad. Maybe the phone was making her sad. I nosed it out of her hand and stood right in front of her, jumping up to put my front paws on her chest and lick her chin.

  “Oh, Max!” She laughed, which made me glad. I’d gotten the phone away from her, and now she was happy. That was one of my jobs, keeping my girl happy. And the other was to protect her from anything that might hurt her.

  That night I slept in CJ’s bed, curled up against the warmth of her body. It was perfect. And in the morning she took me out for a quick walk and bought a bag that smelled absolutely delicious. From it she poured me a bowl full of crunchy things that I gobbled up happily.

  CJ had moved Sneakers’s bowl up onto the counter, so that I couldn’t get at the food it held. Sneakers was sitting up there now, eating and peering down haughtily at me. I ignored her. She just didn’t understand how things worked in this apartment, but eventually she would learn.

  Then CJ clipped my leash onto my collar again. “Come on, Max,” she said.

  Jillian came out of her room, wrapped in a fuzzy blue robe. “Up already?” she said sleepily.

  “It’s ten o’clock,” CJ said. “I’ve got to get to work.”

  Jillian yawned. “Have fun.”

  It was wonderful being CJ’s dog. So many walks!

  CJ took me down the hall to the same little room we had ridden in yesterday. (I found out later it was called the elevator.) While we were waiting for the doors to open, I lifted my nose. A remarkable smell was drifting down the hallway.

  Another dog. Male. Big. Angry. “Whoa, hold on, Baxter!” said a man’s voice, and I heard CJ’s breath draw in quickly and felt her worry spike.

  She didn’t need to worry. I was here to take care of her. I looked the same way she was looking and saw a brown-and-black dog with thick fur and alert, triangular ears that stood up high on his head. He was pulling hard on his owner’s leash, yanking the man down the hall toward us.

  I stood up straight, felt my hackles rise, and got ready to show this dog who was in charge. But CJ reached down and snatched me up. She started to back away.

  I squirmed impatiently in her arms, pushing with my legs. How was I going to show Baxter who was the boss if I couldn’t get close to him?

  “What’s that? A muff?” Baxter’s owner laughed as they both came closer. Baxter showed me his teeth and CJ backed up farther.

  “A Yorkie-Chihuahua mix,” she said stiffly. “Can you hold on to Baxter, please?”

  The man stopped about seven or eight feet away from us, pulling Baxter’s leash. The collar went tight around his neck, cutting off his growl.

  I squirmed harder, getting impatient for CJ to let me down so I could make it clear to Baxter that he had the wrong idea. My girl didn’t understand how to treat a dog like that, though. She moved even farther away as the elevator dinged and the doors opened.

  “Better keep that little toy out of Baxter’s way,” the man said, yanking the big dog onto the elevator. “He wouldn’t even make a good mouthful! You getting on or not?”

  “We’ll take the stairs,” CJ said coldly. The doors shut on Baxter’s barking as she carried me down the hallway. “Max, stay away from Baxter,” she told me, opening a door that led to a staircase. “Most dogs are nice, but that one—even I don’t like that one. I’m glad he never comes to the dog park.”

  After that CJ showed me how marvelous it was going to be to be her dog.

  First we went to another apartment on the floor below Jillian’s. When CJ knocked on the door, a woman opened it and there was a dog beside her, a leash trailing from his collar. CJ still had me in her arms, which meant this dog and I were just about eye to eye. Later I heard CJ call him a Great Dane.

  I had seen him before, the first time I’d spotted CJ. He looked even bigger up close! His white coat was spotted all over with black blobs, each bigger than my whole body. He put a giant nose right into my face without even checking to see if it was all right. Then, to my astonishment, he put out an enormous tongue and lapped it over my face!

  I shook my wet head indignantly and barked as loudly and fiercely as I could. I could smell that he didn’t mean any harm, but still—he needed to be polite.

  The big dog took a step or two back in surprise. His head and ears went down apologetically.

  “Duke, you’re such a big baby,” his owner said, laughing. “Who’s this?”

  “This is Max,” CJ said.

  “He sure is cute,” the woman said, and she reached out to rub my head. I showed my teeth. This woman smelled nice, like food—eggs and bacon!—and like Duke. But even so, I was CJ’s dog, not hers.

  She snatched her hand back. I was pleased she’d understood.

  “Whoa! Kind of ferocious for such a little puffball. What’s the deal? Why is he so aggressive?”

  “I don’t know.” CJ hugged me tighter. “I’m working on it.”

  She set me down and took Duke’s leash in her hand. The big dog came out with us into the hallway. He turned out to be all right, once he understood that I was going to lead the way.

  We went out into the street and stopped at two different buildings to pick up the other two dogs I’d seen with CJ before. The first was a fuzzy black male with
a puffball on his tail; the second was a tan female, old enough to walk slowly. The black poodle, Jay, bounced around me and barked with excitement, but I stood my ground and raised my hackles just a little. He seemed to understand that he shouldn’t get carried away.

  The female was named Honey. She sniffed me once, and then sat down with a sigh and looked at me. That seemed to mean she wasn’t going to challenge me, any more than Duke or the poodle was. But somehow I couldn’t quite get over the feeling that she was humoring me.

  It didn’t matter too much, however, because CJ took us all out onto the street again and there was so much—so much!—to see and smell that even bossing the other dogs fell to the back of my mind. She held my leash and Duke’s in one hand, and Jay’s and Honey’s in the other. I pushed to the front of the pack, where I belonged, and led us all through the streets of New York.

  So far, I had only known the shelter and the park and CJ’s apartment. Sure, there had been that run through the streets while I chased CJ, but then I’d been so intent on catching up with my girl that I hadn’t been able to enjoy myself.

  Now every step brought fascinating new smells. The sidewalk smelled like feet, thousands of feet, each trail crossing and crisscrossing the others and going off in new directions. To our right, cars growled and grumbled as they swept by. On our left there were many doors that opened and closed. Each time, delicious scents wafted out—coffee, sugar, baking bread, sizzling oil, cooking meat.

  Every corner brought us to tall trash cans filled with fascinating garbage. Jay thought he was going to be first to sniff, but I taught him differently with a quick snap at his front feet.

  “Max! Don’t be like that!” CJ said. I could tell she was worried, but I was too busy inhaling the scents of coffee in old paper cups to help her out right then. There were sandwich scraps inside the metal can and sugary liquid dripping down its sides. I let the other dogs sniff after I’d had my turn, and then CJ pulled us on.

  My nose worked without stopping. Even more intriguing than all the food smells and all of the feet was the smell of many, many dogs.