Who's a Good Boy

Daniel Dixon was a young, successful tech engineer. He was also a bachelor who had never had a serious relationship. When he turned 30, Dan came to believe that sufficient wild oats had been sown—he needed to settle down. As corny and clichéd as it might sound, Dan wanted to find a good woman, get married, and start a family. Needless to say, that can be a rather challenging undertaking these days. Fortunately for Dan, fate intervened in a most remarkable fashion. At least it appeared to be fate, aided perhaps by some mystical canine power. 

The uncanny episode that changed the trajectory of Dan’s life began late on a Sunday evening. He was heading home from a football watching party at a friend’s lake house. Having had too much to drink, Dan was driving under the strong influence of alcohol. In fact, he was drunk enough to go to jail if he were pulled over.

One natural consequence of his drinking was a sudden urge to relieve his bladder. Driving on a dark and lonely country road with no traffic in sight, this was easily accomplished. As he pulled over, the car’s headlights illuminated a dog sitting at the side of the road. Exiting the car, Dan greeted the pooch with a friendly hello. In response, the dog trotted over, sat down in front of Dan, and held up its paw. Due perhaps to his state of inebriation, this overture seemed quite natural to Dan. He reached down and gave the paw a shake. The dog’s tail wagged excitedly.

In the back of his mind, Dan knew he should be more wary of encounters with strange dogs, but this was such a nice dog—some kind of mid-sized terrier-poodle mix with a long, sad face, and frizzy, light brown hair. Also, Dan noted that the friendly pooch was a male, as his family jewels were noticeably in evidence. Dan looked to see if he was wearing a collar. He wasn’t.

Walking to the shoulder of the road, Dan relieved himself and returned to the car. The dog was standing at the driver’s door. When Dan opened the door, the dog looked at him, looked into the car, and cocked his head to the side in one of those cute, questioning gestures so common among canines. Had Dan been sober, he probably would have rejected this apparent request for a lift, but he found the dog irresistible. Standing back and opening the door wider, Dan allowed his new travelling companion to jump into the car and settle into the passenger seat. 

As they headed down the road, the dog sat facing forward, staring out of the window. When they passed a speed limit sign reading 45, the dog eased over toward Dan and looked directly at the speedometer. Dan hadn’t been paying attention to his speed and was driving 70 miles per hour. The dog looked at him, looked back at the speedometer, whined, then shook his head and barked. Oddly enough, he seemed to be suggesting that Dan slow down. Dan complied with the suggestion.

Upon rounding a curve in the road, a couple of patrol cars with flashing blue lights came into view. A cop was standing on the shoulder pointing a radar gun at Dan’s car. Checking the speedometer, he was relieved to find that the gauge read exactly 45 mph. As the patrolman waved them on their way, Dan thought, “Jeez! This dog has just saved my ass. He’s my new BFF.” 

In retrospect, Dan should have been freaking out over the implications of this extraordinary occurrence, but in the moment, he simply took it in stride. Looking over at his canine savior, Dan declared, “Wow, thanks buddy. Ha ha. You are my buddy, aren’t you? I think I’ll call you Buddy. Are you okay with that?” Buddy wagged his tail enthusiastically and seemed to smile in agreement.

The two new friends made it the rest of the way home without incident. Once out of the car, Buddy discreetly relieved himself at the curb and then trotted to the front door. By that time, Dan was sobering up, feeling sick, and needing sleep. He figured that since Buddy had just peed, it would be okay to let him into the house for the night. He felt it was the least he could do after the dog had helped him dodge the dreaded DUI bullet.

The next morning, Dan woke up with Buddy standing at the side of the bed staring at him. Staring back at the dog, it began to dawn upon Dan how strange this all was. Surely, he told himself, it was merely a fluke, and not a psychic dog, that had kept him out of trouble on the way home. Then again, perhaps it was not so simple. Do dogs know about speed limits and speedometers and DUIs? Probably not, but maybe?

As Dan struggled with such thoughts, Buddy jumped onto the bed and gave a friendly yap. Then he hopped down and trotted out of the room. Shortly afterwards, Dan heard him in the bathroom, lapping water out of the toilet. Evidently, Buddy was thirsty, and likely hungry too. Dan knew enough to know that feeding human food to dogs could make them sick, a most unwelcome prospect. Deciding that a trip to a big box pet store was in order, Dan found a piece of rope and fashioned it into a leash of sorts. Buddy accepted the leash gracefully and they headed out.

Arriving at the pet store, Buddy led the way to the food isle and stopped in front of a display of Merrick dry kibble. Feeling that this was a reasonable choice—conveniently dry and not too expensive—Dan picked up a bag labelled “Real Salmon and Sweet Potato Recipe.” Buddy looked at it, looked up at Dan, and shook his head. Dan put that flavor back and held up a bag of “Real Texas Beef and Sweet Potato.” Buddy nodded happily, wagging his tail. “Definitely knows what he wants,” Dan thought. They also bought a couple of chew toys and a real leash.

Back at home, as Buddy ate his breakfast, Dan considered the situation. He recognized, of course, that someone would surely be missing such a smart and friendly dog. Feeling a strong obligation to try to locate the rightful owner, Dan found a “Lost Pet” page on Facebook that appeared to cover the area where he first made Buddy’s acquaintance. Among the “lost dog” entries, there were none matching Buddy, so Dan added a “found dog” entry as follows:

Found on County Road 12, just before intersection with Hwy 129. Dog appears to be some sort of terrier-poodle mix weighing about 20 lbs. He’s a male with a long, sad face, and curly, light brown hair. Very intelligent. 

Early the following day, Dan received a Facebook private message from a guy named Oberon LaFong. It read: “About the dog. Probably mine. Can I give you a call to make sure?” 

Before responding, Dan took a quick look at the guy’s Facebook page. The banner photo was of a dark and somewhat spooky forest that might have been in Middle Earth. For the profile pic there was an avatar of a jovial old man with an imposing beard, a splendid smile, and a crown made of green ivy and holly berries. Oberon LaFong had a couple hundred friends who looked to be the heterogeneous hodge-podge one typically sees on Facebook. The only other photo on the page was an especially becoming one of Buddy sitting on a tree stump wearing a bright green kerchief. Dan recognized this as fairly convincing evidence that the dog was LaFong’s. 

While all of this definitely seemed peculiar, Dan was nevertheless determined to fulfill his obligation. He messaged his phone number to LaFong. Almost immediately, the phone rang. When Dan answered, a husky male voice with a hint of an accent said, “I’m calling about the dog. Your description matches my dog Puck perfectly and the place where you found him makes sense. But to be certain, can I speak to him?” 

“To the dog? You want to talk to the dog?” Dan asked incredulously.

“Yeah, just put the phone up to his ear,” instructed LaFong.

Puck, aka Buddy, was sitting next to Dan on the couch. Holding the phone to the dog’s ear, Dan could hear LaFong talking, but couldn’t understand the words. Puck seemed to be listening intently, occasionally letting out small barks, low growls, and soft whines. Dan sat there, dumbfounded, not knowing what to think. Was there any way that the dog could understand telecommunication?

After a few seconds, Puck barked and jumped off the couch. Looking at the phone, Dan could see that the connection was still live. He asked, “Hello, are you there?”

“Yeah,” LaFong replied, “and I’m totally sure that’s my Puck. Where are you?”

“I’m in Pikeville, on Mitchell Avenue.”

After a slight pause, LaFong said, “Hold on for just a moment please.”

Although it wasn’t Christmastime, the on-hold music was Tchaikovsky’s “Dance of the Sugarplum Fairies,” which happened to be one of Dan’s favorite Christmas pieces.

After a bit, LaFong came back on the line, “Well, I’m sorry to say it’s going to be sometime next week before I can come get Puck. Would you have a problem with that?”

“No, no, he’s a good dog, no trouble at all. Is there anything special I need to know about him, or do for him?”

“Probably not, but if there is, don’t worry, he’ll let you know. Anyway, I’ll call you early next week so we can arrange to meet.” Before Dan could respond, the call dropped. 

The next few days were uneventful. Dan took Puck for a short walk each morning before leaving for work and again each afternoon when he got home. Alone all day, Dan was pleased that Puck never had any accidents, never peed or pooped, or chewed anything he wasn’t supposed to chew. “What a great dog!” Dan thought. “No doubt about it, I’ll sure be sorry to see him go.”

When Dan awoke on the following Saturday morning, Puck was standing at the side of the bed staring at him. “Well Puck,” Dan announced, “no work for me today. I’m all yours. What would you like to do?”

Puck jumped onto the bed, wagged his tail, and barked twice. It was undoubtedly a couple of dog barks, but sounded so much like “dog park” that Dan was taken aback. He asked, “Do you want to go to the dog park?”

The tail wagging went from moderate to extreme, and again Puck barked twice. This time it sounded even more like “dog park.” Puck jumped off the bed and ran out of the room, returning quickly with the leash in his mouth. As you might expect, they were shortly on their way to the dog park.

At the park, all of the other dogs came crowding around Puck. Some were smelling his privates, other hopping around as an invitation to play, and a few seemed to be cowering before him. After a few minutes of such introductions, Puck took off running, leading the pack in sweeping circles around the park. Little by little, dogs dropped out of the race until it was just Puck and one other dog. The two made a few more rounds before they came to the bench where Dan had taken a seat.  

Puck’s new friend was a female bichon frisé, very well-groomed with an abundance of white, curly hair, a pink ribbon on her head, and a tag that read “My name is Ginger.” She jumped onto the bench next to Dan and stuck her nose under his hand. Dan took the hint, patted her head, massaged her neck, and scratched her back. When Ginger had enough, she jumped down and headed to a bench on the other side of the park, with Puck in tow.

After several minutes of waiting for Puck’s return, Dan became impatient. Standing up, he looked toward the bench about twenty yards distant. It was facing the other direction and Dan could see neither dog. When he called out for Puck, his frizzy, brown head popped up over the back of the bench. Dan shouted for him to come, but the dog didn’t move. A little annoyed, Dan headed in that direction.

Arriving at the bench, Dan found Puck sitting next to a remarkably attractive redhead. She was neatly dressed, nicely built, and looked to be about Dan’s age. Her naturally fair complexion was sprinkled with faint freckles. She also had a lovely smile. Puck was sitting on one side of her and the bichon was on the other side. Dan gave the pretty redhead a friendly grin and said, “Hi, I guess that’s your dog?”

Pointing to the bichon, she answered, “This one is mine, but the other isn’t.”

“Yeah, the other one is mine, well sort’a mine. His name is Puck. My name is Dan by the way.”

“Well, I’m Cindy and this is Ginger. People sometime say I should be the one named Ginger. Ha ha!”

Dan laughed too and said, “I actually thought of that, but I was afraid it might seem a little rude.”

Cindy’s expression darkened just a bit, “Why? Do you think there’s something wrong with being a ginger?”

“Oh no, not at all,” Dan offered apologetically. “Quite the contrary. In fact, I find gingerness abundantly attractive. Ha ha.”

Cindy laughed and said, “I’ll take that as a compliment. By the way, why did you say the dog was sort’a yours?”

“Because I found him last weekend,” Dan replied.

Cindy looked a little doubtful, “You found him? So you’re going to keep him?”

“No, no, he’s a great dog, such a great dog I knew someone would be looking for him. I actually located his owner on Facebook. The guy’s supposed to come get him sometime next week. I’m really going to miss him though.”

They sat in the park chatting for an hour. Cindy was so pretty, smart and witty, the more they talked, the more Dan was smitten. He really wanted to make a connection with this woman and thought she was sending signals that she might be open to an overture on his part. Dan was nervous and uncertain, but the dog park atmosphere seemed conducive to making friends, so he ventured, “Well, I guess it’s getting near lunchtime. Is there any possibility of my buying you lunch?”

Cindy put her hand on his arm. It was soft and warm. She responded sweetly, “More than a possibility, I’d say it’s a pretty good probability.”

They ate outside at a dog-friendly restaurant, chatting, laughing, and genuinely enjoying each other’s company. Puck sat sedately at Dan’s feet. Ginger stood at the side of Cindy’s chair, looking up, hoping for a morsel of something, anything. After they finished the meal, Cindy mentioned that she had some errands to run and needed to be leaving. Dan responded, “So, I guess you know by now that I would very much like to see you again. How would you feel about that?”

Cindy must have felt pretty good about it as they made a date for dinner and a movie the next Saturday night. That was the beginning of the end of Dan’s bachelorhood. They dated for six months, moved in together for a couple of months, and ultimately tied the knot, living pretty much happily ever after. 

***

But what about Puck, you ask. Actually, as might be expected, the ending of their odyssey was as mysterious as the beginning. On Monday after the dog park outing, when Dan arrived home from work, Puck was not there. After searching for Puck, to no avail, Dan noticed a missed call and a new voicemail on his phone. The caller didn’t identify himself by name, but the voice on the message was clearly that of Oberon LaFong. He said, “Just wanted to let you know that Puck made it home safely, his mission completed. Thanks for taking care of him. I hope you enjoyed your time together.”

Dan tried to call the man back, but found it was a non-working number. When he checked Facebook, LaFong’s page was gone. Somehow, this didn’t surprise Dan. The whole episode had been uncanny to the extreme. He surely didn’t know what to make of it, but he had no complaints, except that he missed Puck and wished he’d had a chance to thank the dog properly for all he’d done.