Jeopardy stood next to me with her ears pricked forward. Her eyes darted around the room, from the other dogs to the row of hurdles to the tall, blond woman setting up a stretchy blue tunnel. Ella, Parker, Eric, and Danny and his little sister were already there.
I was about to go inside when big furry paws suddenly whammed against my shoulders, making me stumble forward. Jeopardy whipped around and barked frantically, which set off a whole volley of barks from the rest of the dogs.
“Oops!” Heidi cried from behind me. “Sorry!” Her hair was already falling messily out of its ponytail. She wrestled Yeti back to her side. He grinned goofily at me and Jeopardy, wagging his long black-and-white tail.
“Jeopardy, shush!” I said. “Stop it! Shhh!”
“RUFF RUFF RUFF RUFF RUFF RUFF RUFF!” she hollered, looking back and forth between me and Yeti.
“AWROOROOROOOOROOOWROOORF!” howled the beagle next to Ella.
“YAP! YAP! YAP!” the poodle puppy agreed.
“I set off a riot,” Heidi said ruefully. “Typical.” That surprised me, because it was really my dog who’d started all the noise. But before I could say that, Heidi said, “Hey, you came!” like she’d suddenly figured out who I was. “Awesome! Hi Jeopardy!” She crouched to pet Jeopardy, who stared at her intently while Heidi ran her fingers through the Sheltie’s long honey-and-white fur. After a moment, Jeopardy backed away and leaned against my leg.
“All right, let’s get started!” the woman called. Heidi and I hurried into the big room. As we took our places, Rebekah came running in behind us, carrying a tiny bundle of brown-and-white fluff.
The instructor’s name was Alicia, and her dog’s name was Parsnip. He was about Jeopardy’s size, with long black fur and a sweet terrier face. Alicia said he was a mutt — part Jack Russell, part Scottie, part papillon, and she had no idea what else. Parsnip sat politely at Alicia’s side the whole time she talked. The poodle puppy was desperately trying to get over to him to say hi, but he just wagged his tail a little bit at her and stayed right where he was, even though he didn’t have a leash on or anything.
Buttons, I reminded myself, watching the poodle. That’s what Danny had said at lunch. His little sister had sparkly pink heart barrettes in her curly dark hair and pink glitter on her shoes. There was an older boy with them, too. Luckily I didn’t have to try to remember his name, because the little sister kept yelling: “CARLOS, GIVE ME THE LEASH! I’M DOING IT FINE! CARLOS, STOP IT!” So I guessed that was Carlos. And when he yelled back, “ROSIE, JUST LISTEN TO ME!”, that was a pretty good clue that her name was Rosie.
We all stood in a semicircle around Alicia, holding on to our dogs’ leashes while she talked. Some of the dogs didn’t seem to mind, like Heidi’s dog, who just smiled and panted and looked around as if he was perfectly happy no matter what happened. Others, like Jeopardy and Buttons, kept leaning around trying to say hi to everyone else.
I tried to remember the other dogs’ names. I thought of my mental picture of the trumpet with curly hair — so the tricolor beagle next to Ella must be Trumpet. She had brown ears, a white chest and paws, and black fur on her back. She kept looking up at Ella with huge, adoring brown eyes. I glanced down at Jeopardy. She was watching me, too, but her little black eyes didn’t look adoring to me. They looked kind of impatient, like even my standing around was too slow for her.
Rebekah put her small fluffy dog on the floor next to Eric’s bulldog. Noodles and Meatball — that name was easy to remember now that I saw what a funny roly-poly pudge-dog he was. The bulldog immediately got low to the ground and rolled onto his back in front of Noodles, wriggling happily and snorting like a buzz saw.
“We’re going to start with the basics,” Alicia said, clapping her hands. Alicia’s blond hair was pulled back in a braid. She had a serious face and a sharp nose, and she looked like she could easily run to Canada and back in like an hour if she wanted to. I felt like I would probably sit if she told me to.
“How many of your dogs know how to sit?” she asked.
Buttons stopped straining at the end of her leash and promptly sat down. Jeopardy was already sitting, and so was Noodles, leaning forward to sniff Meatball’s fat white belly. None of the other dogs moved, except for Yeti’s tail, which was swishing back and forth like he was trying to start a hurricane. There was a shiny golden retriever next to Parker who kept looking over at Yeti like he desperately wanted to go make friends.
“Trumpet sits sometimes,” Ella said, giving her beagle a dubious look. “If the treats are worth it.”
“Having great treats is the best way to get their attention,” Alicia said. She came around and gave us each a little treat bag to hook on to our belts. Mine was blue and so was Heidi’s. The treats were small and square and smelled like bacon. Jeopardy propped her front paws on my leg and leaned up to poke the bag with her nose.
“Not until you sit,” I said. To my surprise, she dropped back down and sat. I knew my dad had been working on teaching her that, but I didn’t know she’d really learned it. I fished out a treat and gave it to her.
“SNOOOORRRRRRG,” said Meatball, rolling up onto his paws and staring at Jeopardy while she chomped down her treat. She gave him a satisfied look like, Well, it’s just because I’m a genius and you’re not, that’s all.
Alicia showed us the hand signal we were supposed to use to get the dogs to sit — holding one hand out flat, palm up, while we said “Sit!” in a firm voice.
Only Buttons and Jeopardy did it every time. Yeti kept getting distracted by the other dogs. He’d start to sit, and then hear Parker saying “Sit!” behind him. So then he’d whirl around to find out who else was sitting and whether their treats were any better than his.
Trumpet would sniff the treat, then look at Ella like she was checking to make sure Ella really, really wanted her to sit. Then after Ella said “Sit!” a few more times, Trumpet sighed and slowly lowered her butt to the floor.
“Merlin, sit!” Parker said. Merlin was the golden retriever. I didn’t know how I’d remember that name, but he was a really handsome dog. His pink tongue hung out as he grinned at Parker. At first he kept wagging his tail and smiling instead of sitting, but he picked it up eventually.
Meatball was the funniest, though. Once Eric finally got him to sit, Meatball refused to stand back up again. He gazed around the room, breathing snortily through his nose. It was really loud. Eric kept waving the treat in front of his nose to make him stand, but Meatball just crossed his eyes at it and tried to take it without getting up.
This made Rebekah laugh too much to concentrate on Noodles, who kept circling around Rebekah’s feet and getting the leash all tangled up while she yipped at the other dogs. Her soft brown-and-white fur fluffed out as she bounced around. I wondered what kind of dog she was — I guessed a mix of some kind, although I didn’t know much about really small dogs.
It was noisy and chaotic with all the dogs getting excited at once. But I was actually relieved. Jeopardy was being much better than I expected, especially compared to the other dogs. Maybe she was pretty smart after all.
I should have known it wouldn’t last.
The trouble started with the hurdles.
After we’d all practiced “sit” for a while, Alicia brought us over to a part of the room where there were three hurdles set up in a row. They looked like big white capital H’s, except the middle bar was set low to the ground — only about a hand’s width from the floor for the first hurdle, and a little higher on each of the others. The white tubes were decorated with bright green stripes. There was a lot of space between each hurdle, enough for two dogs Yeti’s size to stand end to end.
“This should be fun for both you and your dog,” Alicia said. “The command you’re going to use is ‘over.’ Watch.” She walked toward the first hurdle with Parsnip trotting at her heels. Facing the hurdle, Alicia swung her hand toward it and said, “Over!” She used the hand on the same side that Parsnip was on. Parsnip ran right up to
the hurdle and jumped over it, then sat down and waited for his treat.
“So that’s what you’re working toward,” Alicia said. “But we’ll start with —”
She didn’t get to finish her sentence, because Rosie was already running at the hurdle with Buttons bouncing along at her heels. “Buttons, OVER!” Rosie yelled, flapping both hands at the hurdle like she was conducting an orchestra.
To everyone’s surprise, Buttons leaped right over the bar, then jumped over it in the other direction to get back to Rosie. The puppy capered around Rosie’s knees, wagging her tail frantically like she was saying, Did I do it right? Was that it? Was I amazing? I was, wasn’t I?
“Good dog! Good dog!” Rosie cried, dropping about twenty treats on Buttons’ head as she clipped the puppy’s leash back on. Buttons gobbled up all the ones that fell on the floor and then turned around and around, looking confused. She could smell another treat somewhere, but she couldn’t figure out that it was stuck in the fluffy fur on top of her head.
“That was very good,” Alicia said, rescuing the treat and giving it to Buttons. “She’s a natural. But let’s all take turns, OK?” She turned to the rest of us. “It’s more likely that you’ll have to lure your dog over the hurdle the first time, using a treat. You can put it in front of their nose, or throw it over so they’ll follow it. Heidi, give it a try.”
Heidi led Yeti up to the hurdle and took off his leash. “Yeti, over!” she said, sending her hand forward exactly like Alicia had. It looked like she was pushing something through the air, or bowling an invisible bowling ball.
Yeti stopped in his tracks and started sniffing Heidi’s hand. Heidi giggled. “OK, silly,” she said. She pulled a treat out of the little bag. “Here, follow this.” She put the treat in front of Yeti’s nose and made him follow it through the hurdle. Yeti’s dark eyes were focused on the treat the whole time. He was so intent on watching it that he didn’t look down at the bar. His enormous white paws bumped right into it, knocking the pole onto the floor. Yeti didn’t even seem to notice.
“Goofy!” Heidi said. “Knocking things over is my job!” But she ruffled the fur on his head and gave him the treat anyway. He wagged his tail happily.
“That’s OK, it’s a good start,” Alicia said. “We’ll work on it.”
Alicia set the pole back into place and beckoned Parker forward. Merlin sniffed the treat that Parker held in front of his nose. Then when Parker tossed the treat over the hurdle, Merlin jumped right after it.
“Perfect,” Alicia said, smiling at Merlin. “Ella?”
It took a couple of treats, but Trumpet finally stepped gingerly over the hurdle. She kept giving Ella this furrowed-brow expression like, WHY are you making me do this? What is the ultimate goal, exactly?
Meanwhile, Jeopardy was leaning forward at the end of her leash, staring at the dogs as they went over the hurdle one at a time. I had to really dig my feet in to hold her in place. Even when I waved a treat at her and told her to sit, she only glanced back at me, rolled her eyes at the treat, and went back to staring at the hurdle.
Eric went next, which was really funny. As soon as he pulled out a treat, Meatball sat down, right in front of the hurdle. He looked up at Eric with an expression that said, This is what you wanted, right? I mean, you’ve been telling me to sit for the last ten minutes. Look how good I am at it now! I could sit here all day!
“Come on, Meatball!” Eric said. “Over!” He waved his hand toward the hurdle.
“Make sure you use your right hand,” Alicia said, “since he’s on your right side at the moment. Lean into it like you’re propelling him forward. Great agility dogs will read your movements carefully and respond to little signals.”
“SNOOOOOOOOOOORRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRGH,” Meatball offered. His enormous tongue flapped up and down as he panted.
“I think he just said ‘Yeah, Eric! If you were using the right hand I’d know exactly what to do!’” Danny said. He and Parker and Heidi all started laughing.
“Ha ha ha,” Eric said. He looked flustered. He ran his hands through his straight black hair, which made it stick up at the top. He glanced at Rebekah, who had picked up Noodles and was cuddling her while she waited for her turn.
“Come on, Meatball,” Eric said. He leaned down and tugged on Meatball’s collar, but the bulldog refused to stand up. Eric stuck the treat in front of his nose. Meatball studied it for a long moment, then tried to grab it out of Eric’s hand. But Eric moved it quickly forward, holding it out over the hurdle.
Meatball sighed, like this was really quite inconvenient for him. He lowered his head and sniffed at the bar of the hurdle. Then he swung his big head around to stare longingly at Noodles.
“Meatball!” Eric said firmly. “Over!” He poked the treat in front of Meatball’s nose again and then tossed it right over the bar like Parker had.
Meatball watched the treat hit the floor on the other side. Slowly, very slowly, he lumbered to his feet. He put one front paw over the hurdle bar, then the other front paw. With half of him on one side of the hurdle and half of him on the other, he was able to reach down and snarf up the treat.
CHOMP SNORT CHOMPFLE SNORFT, he rumbled, smacking his lips as he ate it. He looked immensely pleased with himself.
Eric threw up his hands. “Meatball!” he cried.
“That’s OK!” Alicia said quickly. “That’s a very good start! Bulldogs are … let’s just say, they’re not always too fond of agility. Quick, run around to that side and lure him all the way over with another treat.”
Eric did as she said, and Meatball finally stepped all the way over the bar. He wrinkled his forehead while Eric clipped the leash back on, like he was thinking, That was an awful lot of fuss about nothing. What just happened?
Rebekah had trouble with Noodles, too. The brown-and-white puppy kept running around the hurdle to grab the treat instead of jumping over it. She poked the bar with her nose and then scampered in a circle around the whole thing.
“Noodles, come back!” Rebekah said, laughing. She held the treat on the closer side and Noodles ran back around to her. “No, jump over, silly!”
Alicia showed Rebekah the hand movement again. They both got down on the floor and kept the treat close to Noodles, encouraging her with lots of happy noises when she got close to the bar. Finally, with a little yip, Noodles put her front paws right on the bar and boosted herself over.
“Yay!” Rebekah cried. “What a good girl! Good girl, Noodles! Such a good puppy!”
Noodles ran around the hurdle and jumped into Rebekah’s lap. Her long fluffy tail was going nuts and she kept jumping up to lick Rebekah’s face. She climbed onto Rebekah’s shoulder and peered over it at Meatball like, Did you see me? I was awesome!
At last it was my turn. I was pretty nervous, because Jeopardy was quietly freaking out. She couldn’t take her eyes off the hurdle. I heard her go “ooorf! rroorrf!” in this tiny, whimpering kind of way while she watched the other dogs. Her white front paws went up and down, up and down on the rubber floor beside me, like she was practicing dance steps in her head or getting ready to start a race. By the time Alicia called us, Jeopardy was up on her back paws and straining at the end of her leash. As I stepped forward, she went: “ARF! ARF!” like she was shouting, FINALLY! FINALLY!
I stopped in front of the hurdle. Jeopardy’s whole furry body was quivering with excitement. I leaned down to unclip her leash.
“OK, Jeopardy —” I started, but before I could say “over!” — actually, before I even finished her name — Jeopardy was gone. She leaped over that first hurdle and kept going. Zip! She went over the second hurdle. Swish! She flew over the third hurdle. “ARF ARF ARF ARF ARF!” she barked as she jumped, and then she kept barking at the top of her lungs as she bolted around the room.
“ARF ARF ARF ARF ARF ARF ARF ARF ARF!” She galloped in a huge circle around all of us, barking frantically.
“Jeopardy!” I yelled. “Get over here!”
&nbs
p; “ARF ARF ARF ARF ARF!” she answered, flying like the wind from one wall to another. She looked both blissful and smugly triumphant, like she’d managed to fool me and escape and now she was having the time of her life.
I wanted to sink into the floor. Rosie put her hands on her hips like she’d never seen anything so disorderly in her life. She looked even more disapproving than Alicia.
“Jeopardy, come!” Alicia said firmly.
“ARF ARF ARF!” Jeopardy barked, darting forward and then dashing out of reach again as Alicia reached for her. Eric and Rebekah had their hands over their ears. Heidi and Ella were laughing hysterically.
“Jeopardy!” I shouted. “Stop! Stay!” I ran at her, but she ducked away from me, too. I threw myself forward to grab her collar and missed. My chin hit the bouncy floor with a painful thwack.
“Oh my gosh!” Heidi cried, clapping her hands to her mouth. “Noah, are you OK?”
“Yeah,” I said, although my jaw hurt like crazy. Jeopardy stopped and stared at me from a few feet away.
“Aw, see, she feels bad,” Heidi said, clasping her hands together.
I wasn’t so sure about that. Her face was more like, Why did you stop playing? What’s wrong with you? Why are you so lame?
“Come here!” I said.
“ARF!” Jeopardy answered and ran off with her tail wagging.
“Here,” Parker said, handing Merlin’s leash to Danny. “Let’s corner her.” He chased Jeopardy around the shiny blue tunnel. She raced toward the wall and we both ran at her from either side. Even so, she nearly slipped through our hands again, but I threw my arms over her back and tackled her to the floor.
Immediately she relaxed. As I lay on top of her, gasping for air, she craned her head back and licked my ear. “Ruff,” she said calmly, like, So that was fun. Now what?
“Thanks,” I said to Parker. He took the leash out of my hand and snapped it onto Jeopardy’s collar.
“No problem,” he said. He shook his brown hair out of his eyes and patted Jeopardy’s head. “That’s totally happened to me with Merlin.”