Rules of the Ruff

by Heidi Lang

  Jessie could hear Aunt Beatrice talking quietly on the phone in her bedroom. She tiptoed past and found Uncle David in his home office, playing some silly game on his computer.

  “What’s up, Jessie?” Uncle David leaned back in his chair, the legs creaking.

  “Is it OK if I go to the park this afternoon?”

  “Sure, sure.”

  “Aunt Beatrice won’t mind?”

  “Nah. Go have fun.” He waved her off, already turning back to his computer. Jessie smiled triumphantly as she snuck back into the kitchen and made herself another sandwich.

  “How much do you eat?” Ann asked from her perch at the table.

  “As much as I need.” Jessie took a large bite. “No Loralee today?” she mumbled around her food.

  “That’s disgusting.” Ann flipped another page in her magazine. “And she said she had some sort of errand to run. She’ll come by later.”

  Jessie mentally resolved to be far away whenever “later” happened to be. She chewed another large bite of sandwich, scrutinizing her cousin’s face, noticing the mascara, the eyeliner, the way she styled her bangs. Ann looked nothing like the frizzy-headed girl she’d been at the start of last summer.

  “Done staring at me yet?” Ann scowled.

  Jessie quickly dropped her gaze, her chest filling with that same humiliated feeling only Ann and Loralee seemed to inspire. Finishing her sandwich, she left the house without another word, stopping only to grab her soccer ball from under the porch.

  Max grinned at her from their usual meeting spot under the third elm tree. Usual spot. Jessie rolled that around in her mind. She and Max had a usual spot. For some reason, it made her stomach clench and her skin tingle, and she had trouble meeting Max’s eyes as she jogged over. Instead she kept her gaze on the ball. “Ready to play?” she asked.

  “Uh, good morning? Nice to see you? Hello, even?”

  Jessie looked up, forcing herself to hold his gaze. His fox smile was in full force. She took a deep breath, let it out. “It’s actually afternoon.”

  “Oh.”

  “And I don’t have time for small talk. I’m busy focusing on my upcoming win.”

  “Ah. Your ‘win.’” He wiggled his fingers like quotation marks next to his head. “I think you’re in for a real disappointment.”

  “Your face is a disappointment,” Jessie said, and just like that, the weird feeling left her, the tension gone.

  “Well, I guess it’s on, then.” Max’s brown eyes shone as he lunged and slapped the ball out of her hands.

  They’d been playing for about twenty minutes when a voice trilled, “Max! Oh, Max!”

  Max turned to look. Jessie didn’t even hesitate, just ran past him and kicked the ball into his goal. “Ha!”

  “Hey! That’s hardly fair.”

  “You’ve gotta stay focused on the game. All’s fair in soccer and . . .” Her eyes slid past him, and she finally noticed the girl leaning against a tree. A girl with long chestnut-brown hair and overly glossed lips. “. . . war,” she finished.

  “I was hoping I’d catch you here.” Loralee pushed away from the tree and sauntered over. She was wearing a pair of skin-tight black capris with silver swirls around the hems and a snug white athletic top. Definitely not her usual look, and it gave Jessie a bad feeling, like she’d just bitten into an apple and found half a worm.

  “I’m up two. Game point,” Jessie said, doing her best to ignore Loralee.

  “Are you losing?” Loralee’s lips curled in a small flirty smile. “To Jessie? To a girl?” Her wide brown eyes flicked past Max, fixing on Jessie for the first time. Jessie straightened and met that gaze head on. She recognized the look: She was being challenged. “Maybe you need another girl to show you how it’s done.”

  “You want to play? Against me?” Jessie asked.

  Loralee shrugged, a slow, deliberate gesture that pulled her shirt up a bit, exposing her stomach. “Or I could play against Max,” she purred.

  “Er,” Max said.

  “Max and I are in the middle of a game,” Jessie argued. “Right, Max?”

  “Er,” Max said again. He kept looking at Loralee, but sideways, as if he didn’t want her to know he was looking. He shouldn’t bother trying to hide it, Jessie thought bitterly. He was doing a terrible job. So obvious.

  “Hey.” Jessie tossed the soccer ball right at his face. He blinked, catching it an inch in front of his nose. “We still doing this, or what?”

  He grinned, his teeth dimpling his bottom lip. “Oh, we’re doing this.” He glanced once more at Loralee. “Sorry, uh, Laura.”

  “Loralee.” She snapped the name without its usual drawn-out lilt.

  Max rubbed the back of his neck. “Loralee. Well, we’re in the middle of a game already. Maybe later?”

  “Maybe . . . later?” Loralee repeated slowly, like she just couldn’t believe it.

  “Yeah, later.” Max was already turning away from her.

  Jessie pictured herself as a soccer ball soaring effortlessly into a goal, right past the goalie’s out-stretched arms, the net wrapping her in its embrace. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Loralee watching them, her eyes narrowed, her face an ugly mask. It made Jessie feel triumphant. It also made her nervous.

  Max kicked the ball and Jessie had to sprint to catch up. When she looked up again, Loralee was gone, but for the rest of the game, Jessie’s skin prickled like someone was standing right behind her.

  “Can’t seem too eager,” Max confided when the game was up.

  “What?” Jessie wiped her sweaty brow on her sleeve.

  “With girls. You know.” He hesitated. “Or I guess maybe you don’t.”

  Jessie sniffed. “I know all about girls. I mean, I am one. Remember?”

  “I thought we were starting over?”

  “We are.”

  “Doesn’t that mean you have to forget about earlier mistakes?”

  “Nope,” Jessie declared. “It just means I’ll keep playing you in soccer.”

  Max chuckled. “You are a character, Jessie. A real character.” He brushed grass from his shorts. “See you tomorrow?”

  “Stranger things have happened.”

  “That’s what I thought.” He gave her a mock salute and sauntered off across the park. Jessie found herself watching him walk, the way his sweaty T-shirt clung to his shoulder blades.

  CHAPTER 7

  Jessie managed to slip into the house without her aunt noticing, and she used the opportunity to take a quick shower and change. That ought to keep Aunt Bea happy. Or, at least, less unhappy. She even ran her fingers through her hair, which was basically the same as brushing it, then headed into the kitchen, where her aunt was busy chopping vegetables. “Can I help set the table?” Jessie asked.

  Aunt Beatrice paused, knife lifted. She eyed Jessie suspiciously. “What did you do? Did you break something?”

  “No, no, just trying to be helpful.” Jessie grinned. She figured if her dad was going to get her a dog, she could stand to be a little nicer to her aunt. Plus, the sooner the table was set, the sooner they’d eat. “Really, Aunt Bea, I didn’t break anything. You can put the knife down.”

  That actually brought a small smile to her aunt’s lips, and a few minutes later, the table in the dining room was set.

  “Ann’s not back yet, so we’ll have to wait,” Aunt Beatrice said as Uncle David sat down at the table.

  Jessie groaned and flopped down in her customary place in the far corner, the wall at her back. Her stomach grumbled. She imagined it as a pack of dogs, all sitting in the back of the car, ready to walk.

  “Stop being dramatic, Jessie,” her aunt said.

  “I wasn’t being dramatic. This is ‘being dramatic.’” Jessie put the back of her hand against her forehead and swooned against the wall.

  Uncle David chuckled, but Aunt Beatrice just shook her head and swept out to the kitchen, returning with a large platter of food.

  It was Thursday, which meant
it was fish day. Sure as clockwork. Jessie wasn’t a big fan of fish, especially the way her aunt cooked it. It always tasted dry, like she was eating a salty sweater. But it was better than nothing, and she’d learned long ago that complaining about the menu meant going to bed without any food at all. At least they’d have a side of rice pilaf, which she usually liked, as long as her aunt didn’t add onions to it.

  “Maybe we should just start,” Uncle David suggested. “It seems like some people here are getting a little hangry.”

  “‘Hangry’?” Jessie raised her eyebrows.

  “Angry when hungry,” her uncle explained. “It’s what all the kids are saying these days.” Her uncle was a fifth-grade math teacher. He liked to think that made him cool.

  “My father would cry to hear you butchering the English language like that,” Jessie said. Her father had never gotten his college degree; Jessie was pretty sure her unexpected arrival had stopped his education plans. She’d heard her aunt whispering about it a couple of times in the past. But he read a lot, more than anyone she’d ever known, and was a stickler for proper speech.

  “Anyways,” Uncle David picked up one of the serving spoons, “Ann can just join when—”

  “Sorry I’m late!” Ann bounced into the room. “Uh, is it OK if Loralee joins us?”

  Jessie’s heart sank down to her feet. No, lower than that. She felt like it had left her body entirely and been replaced with a rock.

  Loralee’s eyes met Jessie’s and she smiled her little smile, her lips curving just the slightest bit. And just like that, Jessie was no longer hungry.

  “Only if it’s not inconvenient,” Loralee purred, gaze still on Jessie. “I’d hate to be a nuisance.”

  “There’s not enough fish,” Jessie pointed out. “There are only four pieces.”

  “Jessie!” Aunt Beatrice smiled at Loralee. “Of course you can join us. Ann, grab your friend a chair and place setting, would you? And I’ll just do . . . this.” She used a knife to cut the largest piece of fish into two smaller pieces. “There. All fixed.”

  And, of course, Jessie was given one of the fish halves. The smaller of the halves, more like a third really. She looked at it sadly. The other part of the fish was dropped onto Ann’s plate, and Loralee, the intruder, got a whole piece to herself. Not that she’d even eat it. She usually just nibbled at her food, just enough so no one else could have it. Then she’d claim to be “oh so full.”

  Jessie stabbed into her fish viciously, picturing it as Loralee’s face, and had a momentary feeling of satisfaction as it flaked apart.

  “Has Jessie told you about her new boyfriend yet?” Loralee asked.

  Uncle David choked on his bite of fish, Aunt Beatrice gasped, and Ann looked down at her plate, her face reddening.

  “B-boyfriend?” Jessie managed, her feeling of satisfaction drying up faster than Aunt Bea’s cooking. “I don’t have—” Max’s face swam through her mind, and suddenly she was redder than Ann. Was that who Loralee meant?

  “What is she talking about, Jessie?” Aunt Beatrice asked.

  “I-I don’t know. I don’t have a boyfriend.”

  “Bea, this is Jessie we’re talking about,” Uncle David said.

  Even though he was defending her, his comment made Jessie feel even worse.

  “I know, it’s so surprising.” Loralee’s smile was as sharp and vicious as the knife she sliced into her fish. She took a tiny, tiny bite.

  “Is this why you’ve been sneaking off in the mornings?” Aunt Beatrice asked.

  Jessie spared a glance for her cousin, who wouldn’t meet her eyes. So much for covering for her. “No, Aunt Beatrice,” she said. “I’ve been meeting a boy in the park, but only in the afternoon for soccer. That’s it, just soccer.”

  Aunt Beatrice’s nostrils flared, and Jessie braced herself. “Then where have you been going in the morning?”

  Jessie hesitated, but she’d already told her dad. Her aunt would hear about it from him anyhow. So, reluctantly, she told them about walking dogs with Wes.

  “You mean old Wes?” Uncle David asked, surprised. “Wes the Dog Man? Blond hair, scruffy face, talks kind of funny?”

  “That sounds like him,” Jessie said.

  “You should stay away from him. He’s not very friendly,” Aunt Beatrice said.

  “Yeah, doesn’t like kids,” Uncle David chimed in.

  “Wasn’t he the one whose wife ran off?” Ann asked.

  “Ann-Marie,” her mother said warningly.

  “What? I heard she took the dog and everything.”

  “Stop spreading rumors.” Aunt Beatrice turned toward Jessie and put on her “I’m your friendly aunt” smile. It looked painful. “Jessie, I know how you feel about dogs, but I think you should leave Wes alone. He’s been through a lot,” she glared at Ann, who sat up straighter in her chair, “and I don’t want you to bother him.”

  “Isn’t your new friend a dog walker?” Uncle David asked, nudging his wife. “Maybe she’d take Jessie on.”

  “No,” Jessie said quickly. She didn’t want to work for another dog walker. Wes was rude, and kind of strange, and . . . well, unpleasant all around, actually. But despite his grumpiness, she knew she was winning him over. You did well today, kid. He’d admitted that, just this morning. If she left him now, she’d be letting him down.

  “Jessie—” Aunt Beatrice began.

  “Wes already said I could work for him,” Jessie said. “And I told my dad, and he’s fine with it.” She ate the last of her fish, ignoring the pointed look her aunt gave her uncle. Jessie didn’t want to disappoint Wes, and besides, she only knew two Rules of the Ruff; she had to learn the rest of them. It felt like a challenge, and she didn’t like to back down from a challenge. Would a dog back down?

  “If James is OK with it.” Uncle David shrugged.

  “James doesn’t always have the best judgment. And he’s not here right now, not responsible for the safety of this child.”

  “Wes is safe enough. Besides, it keeps Jessie busy.”

  Aunt Beatrice hesitated, but Jessie could see how this argument appealed to her. Last summer, once Ann had stopped hanging out with her, Jessie had been a little . . . destructive. She hadn’t meant to be, but she’d been bored, and sad, and, OK, kind of angry. “Fine,” Aunt Beatrice said. “But only if you’re not bothering that poor man.”

  Uncle David winked at Jessie, and she relaxed against her seat. She could keep working for Wes, and there was no more embarrassing talk of boyfriends over dinner. For the second time that day, she felt like she’d beaten Loralee.

  Loralee set down her fork and knife with a soft plink.

  “Aren’t you hungry, Loralee?” Aunt Bea asked.

  With her eyes on Jessie, Loralee shook her head. “No, thanks Beatrice, I’m oh so full now.” She smiled her glossy cat smile, and Jessie knew Loralee wasn’t beaten at all. No, she was just biding her time, waiting for the next moment to pounce.

  CHAPTER 8

  Jessie trudged back through the park, her soccer ball tucked under one arm. She’d just spent yet another morning on poop-scooping duty, and still Wes had refused to tell her the third Rule. How was she supposed to master the Rules of the Ruff if she didn’t even know what they were? Still, she felt like she’d really perfected the art of leashing dogs and dropping them back off at their homes. Her record from the car to the house and back was now twenty-four seconds, and even Wes had seemed impressed with her efficiency. It had been enough to make her feel a little proud, despite her role as human pooper-scooper.

  That is, until Max hadn’t bothered to show up at the park afterward. And the worst part was Jessie had actually waited for him.

  She stopped at one of the water fountains along the elm-lined path for a quick drink. Covertly she glanced back across the park in case Max was just running late. Really late.

  A flash of pink caught her eye. Straightening, Jessie stared across the park at a familiar-looking harness. It was on wrong, the leash cl
ipped to a loop in back instead of attached to the front, so the Labrador wearing it was able to pull to her heart’s content. A Labrador who looked suspiciously like . . . “Sweetpea?” Jessie whispered. And walking her . . . that same woman from before, her black hair in long perfect braids, her arms straight and stiff as she let Sweetpea yank her around like some kind of amateur.

  Jessie remembered Wes’s words from yesterday: Her owners called this morning. They don’t need any more walks this week.

  What was happening? What did this mean? Frowning, she made up her mind and headed back to Wes’s house.

  “You’re sure?” Wes sat on the porch, Hazel curled up on a pillow next to him. A pillow. Not even a dog bed but an actual fluffy, down feather–stuffed pillow.

  “Definitely. Same dog, same woman,” Jessie said. “And is that your pillow she’s sleeping on? Or does she get her own personal pillow?” Jessie wasn’t sure which would be worse.

  Hazel lifted her little snout and yawned, her tongue pink against the dark fur of her face. She licked her chops, shifted once, and settled more comfortably. She really was kind of cute . . . Jessie shook herself. She wasn’t going to fall for that. “Wes?” she asked, realizing he’d been silent.

  Wes ran a finger down the groove between his eyebrows. Then he stood abruptly.

  Jessie scrambled to her feet, too. “What’s the plan?”

  “Plan?”

  “She’s stealing your dog walks, isn’t she?” It was the only thing that made sense. “We have to stop her.”

  Wes scowled. “Let’s not jump to conclusions. I need to think this over first.”

  “But—”

  “Go away, irritating child. I can’t think with you jabbering at me.” He went inside and slammed the door.

  Jessie stared at the closed door. She shouldn’t be surprised. She shouldn’t. But when it opened a few seconds later, something inside her relaxed. “I knew you’d—”

  Wes whistled for Hazel, then slammed the door shut again behind her, leaving Jessie alone on the porch.

  Jessie’s shoulders slumped. She trudged down Wes’s steps, hesitating at the bottom. If she went home right now, she’d just sit around feeling miserable. Might as well check one last time for Max.