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Authors: Nicholas Edwards

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BOOK: Dog Whisperer
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Emily spun around and stared at the examining table.
“Zack?” she said, uncertainly.
It was hard to tell in the dim light, but she was almost sure that his eyes were open.
“Zack? Are you okay?” she asked.
He lifted his head, and then moved—laboriously—until he was sitting up partway.
Whoa. “Mom!” she yelled. “Dad! Come quick!”
The door flew open, and within less than a minute, her parents and Dr. Kasanofsky had all raced in.
“Look, he's okay!” she said.
They looked at the table, and exchanged glances.
Emily couldn't figure out why they weren't more excited, until she saw that the dog was back on his side, with his eyes closed.
“No, you don't understand, he moved,” she said. “He sat up.”
Dr. Kasanofsky looked awkward. “It might have
seemed like that, Emily, but it was probably just an involuntary muscle—”
“No, he
sat up
,” Emily said.
They all stared at her the way the characters had stared at Dorothy in the last scene of
The Wizard of Oz
.
“He really did,” she said defensively. “And he barked, too.”
None of them patted her on the head, or said, “Of course he did, dear,” but she was afraid that they might.
Instead of shouting “Please, wake up!” at the dog—which she sort of did, inside her head, she rested her hand on his side. “Zack,” she said, very quietly.
After a long second, the dog opened his eyes. He held her gaze, and then made that sighing sound, and painfully began to climb to his feet. It seemed to take forever, and Emily held her breath the whole time. Since his left foreleg wouldn't support any weight, he stood on the other three legs, so shaky that she was afraid he would topple over.
He steadied himself, the cast hanging awkwardly in the air, and then wagged his tail a couple of times.
The room was absolutely silent. “
Wow
,” Gary, one of the vet techs, said from the doorway.
“Wow” was an understatement!
 
After that, everything seemed to move very fast. Dr.
Kasanofsky examined Zack, and his vital signs were strong and steady. He would still have to stay in the hospital for a while, and there were no guarantees, but his prognosis was dramatically better than it had been just an hour earlier.
Dr. Kasanofsky was going to stay late at the office to monitor Zack, and the other vet tech, Linda, would be spending the night, so that he could have twenty-four-hour intensive care. Emily was nervous about leaving him, but she knew that he would be in very good hands.
It wasn't until they got home, and were sitting at the dinner table, that Emily realized how exhausted she was. Her parents were kind of dozing over their plates, too, which made sense, because the three of them had had barely any sleep.
“Long day,” her father said finally.
Boy,
that
was for sure.
After supper, they all sat in the den to watch the Red Sox for a while, but Emily just couldn't stay awake.
“Maybe a shower, and some sleep?” her mother suggested.
Emily nodded. Despite all of the time she had spent sitting in the rain, she still felt muddy and could smell the brine on herself from her dive into the ocean. Sometimes, for her own pride, she liked to pretend that she didn't want to be tucked in and fussed over anymore—but she was always relieved when at least one of her parents still did it, anyway.
“We'll go over to visit him first thing tomorrow morning,” her mother said, as she put a fresh satin pillowcase on Emily's pillow. Her mother always worried that cotton pillowcases might be too harsh on her hair, and made sure that she deep-conditioned and moisturized her hair regularly, and didn't shampoo too much. Her mother also, unsurprisingly, had a large collection of books about how to take care of and style African-American hair—and followed the instructions
religiously
. In the meantime, her father would say things like, “Can't she just
brush
it, and leave it at that?”
“He'll be okay tonight, right?” Emily asked. Her mother nodded. “He seems to be a very determined dog.”
He seemed to be an
unusually
determined dog.
For once, Emily didn't have any nightmares at
all, and she woke up feeling pretty energetic, although her nose was a little stuffed up. That was probably just hay fever or something, though.
After she got dressed and fed Josephine, she checked her email and found a stack of about eight new messages from friends who were surprised she hadn't been online at all the night before—which was, of course,
totally
unusual—and one from her cousin Ronald, too. She answered each of them with a version of “I found a dog! Will let you know more later” and then closed her laptop.
When she went downstairs, her parents were already sitting at the kitchen table, eating breakfast and plowing through a stack of newspapers. Her father was looking sloppy—and sleepy—in pajama pants and an old striped Oxford shirt, while her mother must have already been out kayaking, because her hair was wet and she was still wearing aqua shoes and a water-repellant splash shirt over her shorts.
“Sleep well?” her father asked, drinking some coffee.
Emily nodded. “Yeah. Thanks. There weren't, um, any bad messages from the vet's, right?”
Her mother shook her head. “No, and I went out to get every local paper I could find this morning,
to see if anyone reported him missing. We haven't come across anything so far.”
Good
. Yay, even!
“I have some work I need to get done this morning,” her father said, “but you and your mother can go over to Oceanside and see how he is in the meantime. Just in case someone really did lose him, Dr. Kasanofsky is putting the word out to the other vets, and all of the animal shelters, too.”
Emily nodded, knowing that she should be smart and stay
cautiously
optimistic, but she was starting to feel
genuinely
optimistic. After having eaten almost no dinner the night before, she was really hungry and easily finished several pieces of French toast, along with some cut-up strawberries and a glass of chocolate milk. She had never liked the taste of plain milk, but her parents had agreed that it was worth the trade-off of having her drink more milk, as long as it had a little bit of flavoring—okay,
sugar
—in it.
When she went outside, she saw her friend Bobby pedaling down the street past her house on his bike. To be specific, he was riding no-hands, with his arms folded across his chest—because, lately, he had decided that he was mostly too cool to ride the normal way. He saw her and put on the
brakes, lowering his hands onto the handlebars to keep his balance.
She walked over to meet him. “Hi, Bobby.”
“
Bob
,” he said.
Emily grinned. At his twelfth birthday party back in June, he had insisted that he now wanted to be known only as “Bob.” Or, he had said, “Sir” would be okay, too. She told him she would call him that, if he referred to
her
as “Your Highness” or “Your Lordship.” But, since Emily had met him when they were barely three years old, she still automatically called him “Bobby” without thinking. He was the only other kid her age in the neighborhood, so it was a good thing that they had always gotten along really well. In a lot of ways, they didn't have much in common—he loved fishing and playing lacrosse, and
didn't
like school, but he was always funny and cheerful, and they had a great time goofing around together. They would ride their bikes, or climb around on the rocks in front of one of their houses, or spend hours shooting baskets with his older brother and sister.
And the birthday party had been really
fun
, because his parents had taken fifteen of them to the water park near Old Orchard Beach. She had liked it so much that she was thinking of asking her parents
if they could do the same thing for her birthday, in September.
“Hello, Robert,” she said.
He laughed. “Yup. Okay.” Then, he leaned down with his elbows resting against the handlebars, which made him much closer to her height. Bobby had grown a lot in the last year or so—and that included his hair, which was long, thick, and sandy blond. Her friend Karen always said that he looked like a big old hippie. “I am
so
too cool to ride by your house and stuff, but it seemed like, you know, no one was home at all yesterday.”
Emily nodded. “I know, we weren't.” Her throat was hurting a little, and she coughed a couple of times. Sometimes, she got allergies, so maybe there was a bunch of pollen in the air today? “I rescued a dog, and we didn't get home until pretty late.”
“Cool. Can I see him?” Bobby asked.
“I found him over on the rocks, and he was bleeding and everything,” Emily said, gesturing towards the Peabodys' house. “So he's still at the vet's, but they're pretty sure he's going to be okay.”
“What kind is he?” Bobby asked.
He was probably a mongrel, but there was something so elegant and distinctive about him that she wondered if he might be some rare, valuable breed
she just didn't know about. “He looks like a retriever, sort of, except he's all white,” Emily said. “I named him Zack. Well, I mean, Zachary, but
Zack
, mostly.”
Bobby motioned towards the house, where her mother was on her way out to the driveway. “They going to let you keep him?”
On the whole, they probably didn't have much of a
choice
—and besides, she assumed her parents were already pretty fond of him, too. Emily nodded. “Yeah. Even though Dad thinks he's kind of too big. I don't think he belongs to anyone, because he's all thin and everything.” She looked at him uneasily. “Have you heard of anyone who lost a dog?”
Bobby thought for a second, then shook his head. “Nope. But Mr. Johnson's horse got out again and was running all over yesterday. Andrea”—who was his big sister—“said he was in Mrs. Griswold's yard, and she was going wicked crazy about it and screaming and stuff.”
Mrs. Griswold was this mean older lady who lived by herself about six houses down, and never seemed to come outside, except when she was yelling at people. She didn't have a car, so she always rode an old black bicycle around to do her errands, and some people called her Miss Gulch—from the character
in
The Wizard of Oz
—behind her back. Whenever Emily went past her house on her way to visit Bobby and his family, or go watch the boats at the wharf, she stayed on the other side of the road—and walked quickly. Her parents—who were invariably very, very polite—always just said that Mrs. Griswold was “eccentric.” Emily probably would have gone with “scary.”
“Good morning, Bobby,” Emily's mother said, as she opened the car door. “Please thank your father for the lobsters. If they ever start
growing
, I'll bring some of my vegetables over for all of you.”
Her mother could do a lot of things really well—but, even though she worked hard on it and read lots of instruction books, so far, gardening did not seem to be one of them.
Bobby grinned, but then nodded enthusiastically. Probably
too
enthusiastic to be convincing. “Thank you, Mrs. Feingold.”
“You may not want to hold your breath, though, until it happens,” Emily's mother said wryly.
“It's a
nice
garden,” Emily said. “The weeds are very pretty.” And there were
a lot
of them. Although, personally, she liked the way the dandelions looked. A lot of people in Maine were crazy about dandelion greens, and sometimes, one of their neighbors
would come over and ask to dig a few up for a salad or stew the person was making.
Her mother sighed. “I know. They are getting a little out of control, aren't they? Well, maybe this weekend, we can spend some time pulling—”
Just then, the back door flew open, and Emily's father hurried outside.
“I'm sorry, they just called from the animal hospital,” he said urgently. “We need to get over there right away!”
On the ride over, Emily was so tense that it was hard to
breathe. Her chest felt tight, and her throat hurt, too. Oceanside had not told her father many details, other than the fact that Zack had taken a sudden turn for the worse, and was now back in intensive care.
When they arrived at the vet's, it turned out that Zack had developed pneumonia and was being given oxygen and strong antibiotics. He was also going to get regular treatments in something called a nebulizer, which was like a huge vaporizer and was supposed to help his lungs work more easily. He was actually in the middle of a treatment at that very moment, and they were going to have to stay in the waiting room until it was finished.
A really weird thing was that she must be having sympathy pains or something, because she had been coughing on and off in the car, and felt like she might even be running a fever.
“Are you all right?” her mother asked anxiously. “You don't look very good, Emily.”
Except for a little bit of a stuffed nose, she had felt perfectly fine when she woke up, so this must be like, hypochondria or something. Or—was that the right word? “I think I'm just worried about Zack,” Emily said.
But, her chest
did
hurt, and that was creepy. She caught herself rubbing her sternum without thinking, and immediately stopped, because she didn't want her parents to notice.
However, her mother must have seen her, because she reached over and felt her forehead. “You're a little warm, Em,” she said, and frowned. “Maybe you're coming down with something.”
“It might be, like, ragweed,” Emily said uncertainly. “I was coughing a couple of times when I was talking to Bobby.”
Plus, of course, she was
upset
now, and that was bound to make her feel pretty bad.
The waiting room was crowded—with people, dogs, cats, and even a guinea pig, so her father was pacing around, and stepped outside every so often so that he wouldn't be surrounded by so many animals. There was only one free chair, and her mother wanted her to take it, but Emily would have felt
guilty about that, so they shared it. Her mother was pretty small, so they had had a habit of sitting together that way for years, anyway.
But, right now, it was too close for comfort, because her mother was watching her so closely.
“Maybe I have, you know, hypochondria,” Emily said, whispering so that no one else would hear them. “Because I'm so worried about him.”
Her mother's arm, which was around her, relaxed slightly. “That's true,” she agreed. “Although I wouldn't call that hypochondria, I'd call that empathy. Take a few deep breaths, and see if it helps.”
It hurt to take deep breaths, but since she knew it was just in her head, Emily did it, anyway.
“He's a very strong dog,” her mother said. “We'll just have to pray that this is a temporary setback.”
Emily nodded, taking another deep breath. The floor in the clinic must have been mopped recently or something, because there was a very strong medicine smell all around them. An overpowering smell that was making her a little dizzy. She wanted to ask her mother if she could smell it, too—but she had already been weird enough for one morning.
“Was hypochondria the right word?” she asked, to distract herself. “I feel like there's another one.”
Her parents
loved
words, so any conversation about language was guaranteed to be lively—and
lengthy
.
Her mother nodded. “You're probably thinking of ‘psychosomatic.' It's similar, but not quite the same—” She broke off her sentence, as they both saw Dr. Kasanofsky come out of the back and motion towards them. Emily quickly went to the outside door, and when her father—who had been in the parking lot—saw her, he hurried back into the building.
Once she and her parents went into the same private examining room where they had been the day before, Dr. Kasanofsky looked so solemn that Emily knew that Zack's condition had to be grave.
“I'm very sorry,” he said to them. “I know we discussed the possibility of pneumonia yesterday, but I was hoping that the antibiotics would kick in before that happened. He has lots of fight in him, but he's so weak that he may not be able to rally past this, on top of everything else.”
Emily swallowed, her throat hurting worse than ever. “Do we have to put him to sleep?”
Dr. Kasanofsky hesitated, but then nodded reluctantly. “Right now, we're looking at intubation as our next step and, to be honest, that may be further
than we want to go. If his breathing continues to be this severely impaired, I'm afraid that would be my recommendation, yes.”
Oh. She hadn't been expecting such a definite answer, and she had to rub her hand across her eyes as they filled with tears.
Her mother came over to hug her, which made her feel a little better, but not that much.
“May we see him?” Emily's mother asked.
Dr. Kasanofsky nodded. “Yes, I think it might be very helpful, so they're setting it up right now. He's just come out of the nebulizer. We've been monitoring his blood gases very carefully, too, so that we can decide what steps we want to take with his oxygen treatment. Let me go see how they're doing.”
They had to wait for a few more minutes, and then Gary, one of the techs, came to get them.
Zack was in what looked like an intensive care cage, well padded with towels. His breathing was very labored, and he was coughing feebly, too. He seemed to have even more tubes and IVs than he had the day before, and there was some thick, folded plastic next to him.
“That's the oxygen hood,” Dr. Kasanofsky explained. “Unfortunately, it has been causing him some anxiety, so we may have to sedate him to be
able to use it. Right now”—he pointed at a thin, plastic tube—“we're trying to direct a small flow towards him and see if that helps.”
Emily could smell the intense medicine scent more strongly than ever, and wondered if it was from his medication, and not floor cleaner, after all. Her chest felt as though someone was squeezing her lungs tightly together, and out of nowhere, she felt a wave of fear so intense that she couldn't focus on anything else.
She realized that someone was talking to her, and shook her head to try and snap out of it.
“It's okay if you want to pat him,” Dr. Kasanofsky said.
Emily nodded, and reached forward tentatively.
Her dog was trembling, and it seemed as though the fear was coming directly
from
him.
“It's okay,” she said, and stroked him soothingly on the head. “You're going to be okay. They're giving you medicine, to help you feel better.”
She could feel the trembling ease, and—he seemed calmer, somehow. He even seemed to be breathing more easily.
Dr. Kasanofsky moved in next to her with his stethoscope. “No, please keep patting him,” he said, when she started to step aside.
So Emily did, while Dr. Kasanofsky listened intently to whatever it was he was hearing through the stethoscope.
“Okay,” he said. “Would you please move away for a minute?”
She had no idea why he would want her to do that, but she hesitated and then withdrew.
Dr. Kasanofsky waited a couple of minutes, and then pressed the stethoscope to Zack's chest again. “Interesting,” he said, when he was finished, sounding as though he was talking to himself. Then he looked up. “Gary, will you come over and pat him now?”
Gary shrugged and did it.
Once again, Dr. Kasanofsky waited before he checked Zack's vital signs, and then nodded to himself.
Emily glanced at her parents, who were both too busy watching curiously to notice.
Dr. Kasanofsky straightened up, briefly draping the stethoscope over his shoulder. “Emily, will you humor me, and go out to the waiting room for about ten minutes? I'll have one of your parents come get you.”
She knew he was a very good veterinarian—and a nice person, to boot, but Emily still looked at him
suspiciously. “You're not going to put him to sleep, and just don't want me to see, right?”
Dr. Kasanofsky shook his head. “No, I promise. I'm trying an experiment here, that's all.”
Emily didn't like it, but she went. Instead of going all the way out to the waiting room, she decided to stay in the corridor, where she leaned against the wall, folding her arms nervously across her chest.
After a couple of minutes, her father joined her.
“Did he kick you out, too?” Emily asked.
“Just keeping you company,” her father said.
Emily nodded, and they stood there quietly.
“You don't really like dogs,” she said, after a minute.
Her father started to shake his head, and stopped. “Well—I'm not really
used
to them. I've never had one before. But I sure like
Zack
.”
She hoped so. Because it
mattered
to her that he liked him, especially since he wasn't really an animal person.
It seemed to take forever, but finally, her mother appeared in the doorway and waved them back inside.
As soon as she touched him, Emily could feel that Zack had gotten very scared again, while she was gone. Dr. Kasanofsky had her go through the
whole patting/stethoscope ritual one more time, and then nodded to himself, looking very pleased.
“Zack has
really
bonded to you, Emily,” he said, as he stuck the stethoscope into the pocket of his lab coat. “When he's by himself, his vital signs are terrible, but they improve slightly when one of us rests a hand on him. But, when
you
pat him, his respiration and heart rate are almost completely normal.”
Emily was puzzled. Why would it be surprising that her dog would feel better when she was there?
“It's
dramatic
, Emily,” Dr. Kasanofsky said. “He moves from being critical to stable in just a minute or two. Then, when you're not here, he swings right down again. It's—well, there's no good medical explanation for it, frankly.”
She still wasn't really following him.
“Let me put it this way,” he said. “The more time you spend with him, the more likely it is that he just might pull through.”
Oh.
Wow!
BOOK: Dog Whisperer
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