Dog Crazy

by Meg Donohue

  “Keep a close eye on him,” Grant says. “He’s faster than he looks. We’ve tried all sorts of collars and harnesses on him, but because of his, er, unique shape and wiggliness, he’s managed to get out of all of them.” He reaches down to lift Seymour’s chin so that they look right at each other. “Keep your chin up, little man.” I can see that Grant is attached to the dog and I have a brief flicker of hope that perhaps this will turn out to be Seymour’s forever home after all. But then Grant straightens and I can hear the relief in his voice when he says, “Actually, I’m glad you’re taking him out. Maybe a walk with an expert will do him good. The faster he gets over his leash issues, the faster he’ll find a family willing to take him in, right?”

  “Oh, I’m no expert,” I say quickly. Grant looks disappointed. “But don’t worry, we’re going to find Seymour the right fit soon.”

  Sure enough, Seymour’s whole body seems to wilt, becoming as droopy as his huge ears by the time we reach the bottom of the hall staircase. When I open the door at the bottom of the staircase, revealing cars whizzing by in the street, Seymour balks. He sits on his haunches, trembling. Anya tries to give him a tug, but he begins to swing his head from side to side, nearly pulling back out of his collar.

  I swap leashes with Anya so that she’s holding Giselle’s and I’m holding Seymour’s. Then I kneel down in front of him for a little pep talk. I smooth back his ears a few times. He looks deep into my eyes and then looks away. Into my eyes, then away. I put my hands on his shoulders.

  “What are you going to do, stay inside for the rest of your life?” I ask him. It figures that I would somehow find the world’s only agoraphobic dog. “Exposure therapy,” I advise him softly, stroking his ears. “That’s the ticket. Desensitization.”

  Seymour cocks his head and whimpers.

  “What are you telling him?” Anya asks.

  “Psych talk,” I say, straightening. “It’s confidential.” I pull another biscuit from my pocket and step backward through the door so that I’m standing on the sidewalk. Seymour slinks toward me so reluctantly that I can practically hear him grumbling about his own damn canine impulses, his inability to reject food. He takes the biscuit from me. I pass his leash and a few biscuits to Anya and she hands me Giselle’s leash.

  Seymour isn’t much better once we finally get him moving. He darts from one edge of the sidewalk to the other, his long fuzzy tail tucked between his legs. Each time a car passes, he rears back, terrified, whipping his head around to look at the offending vehicle, his body quivering, the whites of his eyes widening. I stick close to his side, worried he’s going to yank his head right out of his collar and run away.

  “Poor boy,” Anya murmurs. “I’m tempted to pick him up.”

  I look from Seymour’s chunky, solid body to Anya’s rail-thin one. “I’m not sure you could. Besides, he has to learn to walk outside at some point, right?” The irony of my words does not elude me. I look away from Anya, feeling my face warm, and search the sky above the line of houses across the street until I see Sutro Tower high up on the hill in the distance.

  Anya doesn’t respond. After a couple of blocks of thrashing and near escapes, Seymour falls into an uncertain pace beside Giselle. When Giselle stops to pee, Seymour hurries to do so, too, and then Giselle covers his puddle with another of her own. Seymour is oblivious to the offense, and pads quickly after her when she’s done. His expression relaxes somewhat once he’s plastered himself to her side.

  “I think he has a crush on her,” I say.

  “Is there any chance Giselle’s owners would take him in?”

  I consider this possibility again, but still can’t see a way to ask Lourdes without her pushing me to adopt him myself. “I don’t think so.”

  Anya scans the streets in search of an inviting backdrop for a new photo. I focus my attention on the dogs, smiling at the way Seymour’s short legs move twice as frequently as Giselle’s long ones, and feel a hint of the peaceful happiness that always overtakes me when I see two dogs enjoying each other’s company. I glance over at Anya and see that she, too, is smiling. Seeing Anya smile is practically equivalent to spotting a unicorn. I defy anyone to tell me dogs aren’t magic.

  “Do you think we could include Giselle in the photo?” Anya asks. “Seymour seems so much more relaxed with her.”

  I shrug. “I don’t see why not. I’ll just make it clear in the description that he’s up for adoption and she isn’t. Who knows, maybe it will even trick a poodle fan into giving a mutt like Seymour a moment’s consideration.”

  Anya pulls her camera from her bag and fiddles with it, swapping one lens for another. She shoots rapid-fire, a bunch of shots of the dogs walking together. Then we convince them to sit side by side in front of a large flower box full of bright pink geraniums by the entryway of a well-kept Craftsman home. I tie their leashes to the house’s staircase railing.

  Anya pulls a ziplock full of bacon from her bag, gives each dog a small piece, and then hands the bag to me. “I thought you could hold this above my head while I shoot. If a bag of bacon doesn’t snag a dog’s attention, nothing will.”

  “Good thinking.” She crouches down to take the photos and I wave the bag over her head. “Very romantic,” I say, admiring the scene. Seymour and Giselle both look up eagerly at the bacon, their tails trembling with anticipation. After a few minutes, Anya holds the camera toward me so I can see its screen. She clicks through a few of the photos she’s just taken. Seymour and Giselle are so mismatched that the sight of them together is completely endearing, quirkily charming, and I’m relieved to see that Seymour’s gaze is softer than it was in his earlier photo.

  “These are great, Anya. I can’t thank you enough.”

  Anya takes the camera back. “Get ready for your forever home, Seymour.”

  Giselle and Seymour jump up from their spot in front of the flower box to retrieve their bacon slices. I can’t resist bending down to give Seymour a quick hug.

  “What a good, brave boy you are!” I say.

  Behind me, I hear the click of Anya’s camera. I straighten, and as I do a train rumbles down Carl Street, a block and a half away. Suddenly Seymour’s eyes go round and white with terror. He scrambles sideways away from us, and the leash, still tied to the house’s banister, pulls taut. When he rears, whipping his head back and forth, I can see his collar slipping forward on his neck toward his ears.

  “Seymour,” I say, holding out my hands toward him. My pulse is thundering but I try to keep my voice soothing and low. “It’s okay. You’re okay, buddy.”

  I fumble in the bag for another piece of bacon, but it’s too late, Seymour yanks his head right out of his collar. For one ever-so-brief second our eyes lock.

  Don’t run! The words don’t have time to travel from my brain to my mouth before he has spun around and is racing down the sidewalk away from me.

  The fear for Seymour’s safety should send me running after him. It should be enough to push all of my own anxiety aside.

  But it isn’t.

  I just stand there, my heart thrashing around like a wild animal trapped in a cage.

  Giselle strains against her leash, whining, as Anya sprints after Seymour. A group of school kids rounds the corner at the end of the block, startling Seymour. He turns, scrambling, running toward the busy street. Anya springs off her feet, flies through the air, and grabs him, wrapping her skinny arms around his belly. He thrashes back and forth but she holds him tight. I take a deep breath. Anya murmurs to Seymour and after a moment he settles down and turns his head to lick her cheek.

  I, for one, still haven’t moved. Seymour’s leash and collar are lying on the ground a few feet from me, but I can’t take a step. Giselle is whimpering, her gaze darting back and forth from me to Anya and Seymour.

  When Anya looks toward me, I can see the questioning look on her face even from a block away. After a beat of time, she stands, hoisting Seymour into her arms. Finally, as she’s approaching, enough moisture r
eturns to my throat that I’m able to hoarsely thank her. I can feel her eyes on me as I fumble to untie the dogs’ leashes from the stair railing, my fingers trembling.

  “We just have to teach you to walk, that’s all,” I hear Anya murmur behind me. “Oldest trick in the book.”

  I can only hope that she’s talking to the dog.

  Chapter 11

  It’s eight o’clock at night, and despite two glasses of wine and the hypnotic crackling of the fire, I still feel shaken by Seymour’s near escape this afternoon—and my own reaction as I watched it unfold. I keep thinking of the pure, animal panic I’d seen in his eyes when he looked at me for a beat of time before spinning around and racing away, and how I’d done nothing to attempt to soothe him. What did he see in my eyes when he looked at me in that moment? Dogs are intuitive enough that he probably didn’t even need to look at me to sense what I was feeling—an opaque sort of anxiety that only reinforced his own fears.

  I’ve spent the last hour looking online for information on how to help an anxious dog, and even if I hadn’t already made up my mind about not taking Seymour myself, everything I’ve read is further proof that we would not make a good match. I’m not surprised to learn that people and dogs are pretty similar when it comes to overcoming their phobias.

  For fearful, anxious dogs, the ASPCA’s website recommends “systematic desensitization and counterconditioning,” a course of action that is, of course, familiar to me. Desensitization, for a dog who is afraid of city noises and walks like Seymour, would involve taking shorter, quieter walks in less busy areas, slowly building up to more populated streets, avoiding anxiety triggers, and making each walk as pleasant and uneventful as possible.

  I think back to my first day of walks with Giselle nearly two weeks earlier, how I’d started with a blink-and-you’d-miss-it walk to the corner and back, taking progressively bolder “baby steps” on each outing. Of course, I haven’t done a very good job of avoiding one of my anxiety triggers—heights—which might explain why I’m still not totally comfortable being outside even though I’ve made considerable headway. But I live in San Francisco now; heights aren’t exactly avoidable. I hope I’m ripping off the Band-Aid—less systematic desensitization than shock exposure therapy.

  The counterconditioning part of the ASPCA’s recommendation is something I’ve thought less about when it comes to my own treatment plan. The idea, according to the website, is to retrain, or recondition, the dog’s mind so it associates a once-feared act with something good rather than something bad. With dogs, the best way to do this is using food—if every time a dog goes for a walk on a city street he gets a special treat, over time he will be reconditioned to associate the walk and the noises of the city with feelings of satisfaction and joy.

  Maybe I should start hiding wine at the top of these parks Anya keeps taking us to.

  Unfortunately, I’m pretty sure alcohol isn’t the healthiest counterconditioning incentive for humans.

  As I consider my own walks more, I realize that I do have something that is serving a similar purpose as a special treat would for a dog—helping Anya. Even though she isn’t a patient, experiencing our relationship grow, the way she is opening up to me, telling me more about herself than I ever would have guessed she would have been willing to share during our one and only disaster of a counseling session, watching her pick up a camera again, encourages me to keep pushing open that sidewalk gate. I’m learning to associate my walks with something positive because I’m able witness the way Anya is slowly, but undeniably, improving. Anya’s improvement is my biscuit.

  I wish I could ask Grant and Chip to give Seymour a special treat every time the train passes. I can’t imagine it would take long before Seymour would start thinking train equals food (and bonus: positive attention!). But it doesn’t seem fair to ask Grant and Chip to undertake an extensive desensitization program for a dog that has already caused them so much trouble. Considering their work schedules and the unfortunate fact that Seymour frequently relieves himself behind the couch, it’s a wonder the dog gets any walks at all. Besides, I wouldn’t want to put any more strain on them and possibly risk their deciding that fostering dogs just isn’t their thing. SuperMutt needs foster families like them.

  My own work schedule, on the other hand, is light enough that I could probably take Seymour out for daily walks myself. Anya’s schedule is even less full than mine and I wonder if I could wrangle her into helping me spearhead Seymour’s ASPCA-recommended systematic desensitization and counterconditioning program. It seems to me that she could easily look for Billy as she walks Seymour—and maybe along the way she’ll decide Seymour is irresistible and would be better off living with her and Rosie away from the rumble of the train.

  I’m still clicking through various animal behaviorism and training websites, researching and plotting, when I’m startled by a knock on my door. I flick on the outdoor light and peer through the eyehole. Henry Ravenhurst is standing on my doorstep.

  I glance over my shoulder at the state of my apartment and am glad to see that it looks innocuously neat—there’s nothing, for example, that yells “Crazy Lady Who Only Goes Outside with a Dog” or, maybe worse, “Crazy Lady Who Only Goes Outside to Visit Your Sister.” And luckily I haven’t changed into my pajamas yet; I’m still wearing the jeans and blue sweater I’d worn during my outing with Anya earlier in the day. I walk my wineglass to the kitchen, take a quick, final swig for courage, and place it in the sink. Then I open the front door.

  “Hey, Maggie,” Henry says. “I’m sorry to drop by so late, and unannounced.”

  “It’s fine. Is everything okay?”

  “Yes,” Henry says, playing with the strap of the messenger bag that cuts across his chest. “Yes,” he says again.

  “Would you like to come in?”

  He hesitates, his eyes dropping down to my bare feet. My toenails, I realize, are each painted a different color—the result of a recent bout of insomnia.

  “Well, you better decide one way or the other,” I say. “It appears some of my toes are turning blue.”

  Henry smiles. “I won’t take up too much of your time.”

  I wave him inside and shut the door behind him. “Have a seat. Can I get you something to drink?”

  Henry sits in the yellow armchair. “Actually,” he says, sounding a bit sheepish, “I brought this.” He unzips his bag and pulls out a bottle of wine.

  “Well, that’s terribly selfish. Did you bring anything for me?”

  Henry looks confused. Then he laughs. “I suppose I could share,” he says. “If you’re thirsty.”

  I take a few moments longer than necessary rifling through a kitchen drawer for the wine opener, trying to gather my thoughts. Other than Lourdes, Leo, and my patients, Henry is the only person I’ve invited into my apartment since I moved in. My pulse quickens. I’m not anxious, though; I’m nervous. It’s an important distinction. I take a deep breath and head back into the living room with the opener and two glasses.

  “So,” I say, setting the glasses in front of him on the coffee table and handing him the opener, “to what do I owe this pleasure?”

  Henry’s sheepish look returns as I settle into the couch across from him. “The wine is an apology,” he says, maneuvering the cork out with the opener. He pours the dark red wine into the glasses and passes one to me. “And a thank-you. Now that I think of it, maybe I should have brought two bottles.”

  We clink our glasses together. The wine is rich and warming, perfect for a foggy night like this one, and I feel it in my head immediately. I remind myself that it’s my third glass; I’ll have to be careful.

  “One bottle is plenty,” I tell Henry. “A bottle of wine is like the word ‘aloha,’ it can mean several things at once. Hello, good-bye . . .” I trail off. The other thing “aloha” means, of course, is “I love you.” Shit, I think. I might already be drunk.

  “Slow down, Maggie,” he says, his eyes full of good humor. “We barely know
each other.”

  I take another sip of wine as I recover from my embarrassment. “So tell me more about this apology.”

  Henry nods. “It’s overdue, really. I didn’t get a chance to say anything after that walk to Kite Hill because we had to race off to the hospital—”

  “I was so glad to hear from Anya that Rosie is doing better.”

  “Well, she’s out of the hospital at least. I hope Anya doesn’t think that means she’s in the clear, though.” He shakes his head. “But I’m not here to talk about Rosie. I just wanted you to know that I saw how Anya responded to you during that walk. She really does think of you as a friend. She didn’t want to see a therapist, and you could have left it at that. You could have just written her off. But you didn’t. You found another way to help her, and you won’t even accept payment for it.” He looks down, studying his hands. “I’m ashamed of the way I acted when we first met. So I want to apologize.”

  “You were only trying to protect Anya. She’s lucky to have you in her life, looking out for her.”

  “Well, now I realize that she’s lucky to have you in her life. I’m sorry I didn’t see it sooner. Anya told me that she went with you to take photos of that dog. Apparently, after she left you, she spent the rest of the day working on her computer. Not wandering around the city looking for Billy, not lying in bed and staring at the ceiling—working on those photos. Rosie’s nurse said Anya even came downstairs at one point to make a grilled cheese sandwich. When I went over there tonight to check on Rosie, I saw the empty plate in Anya’s room. She’d eaten it. The whole sandwich.”

  “And she survived?”

  Henry laughs. “Yes, she ate something that she cooked, and lived to tell about it.” His voice softens. “Really though, I’m just so relieved that she’s starting to take care of herself. And that she’s using her camera again . . . Thank you.”