We came home in silence, Skeeter cleaned off my feet in silence, and he settled into his L-Z-Boy—without me—in silence. I took a chance and hopped up onto his lap and into my little place, wedged between his tonnage and the chair.
"You've got some fucking nerve," he muttered, quietly but clearly enraged.
"So you're talking to me now."
"Don't push it. I'm telling you, Leo, I could rip your fucking head off. If there hadn't been so many witnesses, I'd've grabbed you by the tail and thrown you into traffic."
"You're a violent, violent man."
"And you're one mean little dog."
"Mean! What did I do?"
"OH, YOU CAN SELL THAT FALSE PIETY SOMEWHERE ELSE!" he bellowed.
"Look, is it my fault that dog was so stupid?"
"That fucking animal, stupid or not, was busy and I know—I JUST KNOW!—you set out to distract it."
"All I said was, 'How're you doing?'"
"OH MY FUCKING STARS AND GARTERS!! YOU ARE SUCH A LITTLE...FUCKING...LIAR!!!"
He was right, of course. The minute I saw that caniche royal/special Olympian cross I knew I could have some fun. I saw him coming and he was concentrating so hard on what he was doing, his ears so attuned to his surroundings, his eyes seeing a mile ahead; I knew that anything I did or said would send him into a lather. "Hey, suckface! Are you tied to that one forever or can you stop being a bumboy and get rid of him in traffic?"
"Leave me alone!" the CR whimpered, guiding along with all the focus, now, of a horny fruitfly.
Because yes, dear readers, the big, galumphing idiot was a guide dog in training and was leading a blind dude about with the trainer of both of them not too far behind. But I have very strict beliefs about working animals—as in, we shouldn't be. Skeet could sense trouble but as he does not talk Dog Speak he was just yanking me away instead of verbally intervening. But I didn't need contact with the other dog to fluster him. I just had to say, "That's it! That's it! Slave away for the Man, Princess."
Now the stunned pooch was looking at me instead of ahead and—boom!—the blind feller tripped on the curb and fell flat on his face. Nothing was hurt except the useless guide dog's dignity but Skeeter nevertheless apologized profusely and carted me home. I could hear the stupid son of a bitch (literal use here) squealing at me, "Look what you did! You made me fuck up! They're going to can me for sure, you bastard!"
"Stop being a pussy!" I hurled back and snerfed with satisfaction.
But Skeeter was mad. The silence on the La-Z-Boy was clinging. "Look," I began.
"If you try to justify what you did, I can't help what I might do—"
"Oh! Simmer down—"
"—they invested thousands of dollars and hundreds of hours into that dog and you fucked everything up in a minute."
I've learned, with Skeeter, you have to take the upper hand and fast. "Now look, clearly that dog was not prepared for street training and probably was not meant to be a working dog—"
"—you're an insufferable little shit, you know—"
"—and you can be very unkind to me!" And I made a sound he had never heard from me—a little, gentle and profoundly poignant sniff of sadness. It stopped him in his tracks. But here's the thing: I know Skeeter and, unfortuneately, he's starting to know me. For instance, he knows he can rough-house with me—hard!—and I would die before crying out with pain or yelling, "Uncle." So it didn't take him long to figure out my little sniff of grief was a sham.
He stared at me. Would he kill me this time? There was a stare-down. Then I just curled a bit and closed my eyes, pretending to sleep.
He let out a long, deep sigh that probably prevented him from pitching a massive cardiac.
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