Anna Wilson                          

Puppy Love

I chewed my nails all the way to Frank’s. I had promised myself never to chew my nails again because I know it is not what celebrity people do, and Molly says that if we are going to Get Anywhere with our Celebrity Club, we must not bite our nails any more. So I had painted them with this shiny stuff which I thought looked glam and gorgeous like the real nail varnish April, my older sister, wears but it actually tastes Grim with a capital G! There is one problem I have found though. If you are truly stressed and anxious about something, you will always find a way to stop thinking about the Grim taste of the nail stuff and you will always bite your nails anyway. So that’s what I was doing on the way to Frank’s house.
  I just kept thinking and turning it over in my head: ‘What if the whole class has already been there and all the puppies have gone? What if Frank laughs at me and says, ‘Ha-ha! You are too late Summer Holly Love!’ and what if there’s not much room in the room, and I have to stand too close to him and try not to be sick because of the smell of his socks? Because if I was sick because of the smell of his socks, he might be angry and not let me take one of the puppies anyway. And what if Mum just takes one look at the puppies and says, ‘NO WAY HO-ZAY’ like they do in films and then Frank laughs and says, ‘I told you you needed Parental Consent!
  ‘Does Frank’s mother know we are coming to look at these puppies?’ Mum asked, breaking her way into my most anxious thoughts.
  Why do mums always worry about other mums knowing whether you are coming round or not? Molly’s mum, Mrs Cook, is always happy to see me whenever I turn up as she says, ‘It’s nice to see you girls playing together,’ and she always gives us flapjacks with apricots in, which she knows are my favourite.
  I just shrugged and said, ‘Frank said to come round.’
  Mum sighed and muttered something about ‘getting this over and done with’.
  I rang the bell and we waited. I thought we might hear yapping or barking as Frank said there were eight puppies, but there was not a sound of a dog at all.
  Frank opened the door and Mum took a step back. The sock smell was particularly of a whiffy nature.
  I held my breath and tried to speak quickly so that I wouldn’t have to breathe in the honking smell.
  ‘Hello, we are here because I have got Parental Consent to have an appointment with you about the puppies.’
  Frank grinned and led us into his house. His mum was in the kitchen. I was really very surprised to see that she was quite clean and normal-looking. She did not smell of socks at all. The kitchen was even tidier than our own in actual fact.
  Mum had got her ‘Isn’t this nice? I’m ever-so delighted to be here’ smile on. The mums started a chat about school and how lovely it was that they had children in Year Four now and what a difference it made.
  I didn’t know how much of a difference it could make to anyone what year we were in, but mums are always saying things like this. Molly says she thinks it’s all a secret language which only mums understand. They say these things to each other that we think are dull and make no sense, but then they always seem to have picked up all kinds of information that we don’t want them to have about our lives. And they always say they got it from someone else’s mum. Maybe the government gives you a secret handbook when you become a mum that tells you the language so you can learn it in time for your children to start school. Governments do that kind of thing. I’ve seen it on telly.
  Anyway, Frank did a circly thing with his eyes and beckoned to me to follow him. He obviously thought that mum-conversations are totally baffling and dull too. We went out of the kitchen into the utility room where the washing machine was. I hoped he wasn’t going to ask me to wash his socks while I was there.
  ‘Why are we in here?’ I asked. ‘I thought you were going to show me the puppies.’
  ‘They’re in here, stupid,’ said Frank. He obviously does not know that to be a truly successful sales-person you have to be charming and polite. Not rude and smelly.
  He pointed to a large box in the corner of the room. I heard a small snuffling noise and rushed over to have a look. I could not believe what my eyes were telling me. On the far side of the box, snuggled up against Meatball, were the tiniest, cutest, squidgiest puppies ever in the whole world!
  ‘Why have they all got their eyes closed?’ I asked Frank, as I suddenly felt a little bit confused.
  ‘Don’t you even know that?’ Frank asked in his huffy, girls-are-the-stupidest voice.
  I felt my face going a bit red and hot which I don’t like as it doesn’t go extremely well with the colour of my hair which is what I like to call auburn, but my sister, April, calls ginger.
  ‘Well, they’re very much obviously not asleep, are they?’ I said importantly. ‘I can see with my own eyes that they are moving around – unless they are sleepwalking?’ I asked, feeling pleased with myself for coming up with this brilliant explanation.
  ‘Der, stupid – they can’t open their eyes,’ he said with what can only be described as a very smug, know-it-all grin on his unattractive features.
  I put my hands on my hips to show that I was not a girl to be messed with or talked to in that manner. ‘In that case, Frank Gritter, you have broken the Sales and Tradespersons Description Act,’ I said importantly. (Luckily I knew about this because Molly told me that if you are selling something you have to be truthful about all the details of what precisely you are getting, otherwise the government can put you in prison.) ‘Who wants a puppy who can’t open its eyes?’
  ‘Oh, shut up,’ said Frank. ‘These little guys can’t open their eyes because they are not even two weeks old. You would know this if you had been listening to what I said this morning. They are still being weaned. They should open their eyes any day now. That’s why you can’t take one home yet, even if you definitely want one and have definitely got Parental Consent. You can have one at seven or eight weeks. They’ll be ready at half-term actually.’
  I made a mental reminder to go and look up what ‘weaned’ meant. And also to check in a book whether or not Frank was telling the truth about the puppies not being able to open their eyes yet. I did not want to be sold a dog who could not fetch a stick or a ball. How would I teach it tricks if it could not see? I could not be a Responsible Dog-Owner-Type person if I could not train my dog. Anyway, I certainly was not going to ask Frank about my Concerns, as it would show that I was a tiny bit ignorant of dog-type Issues, and then he might not think I would be a suitable owner of a puppy.
  ‘Can I hold one?’ I asked.
  He reached into the box and picked up one of the puppies. ‘It’s a girl,’ he said. A golden girl.
  Frank put her into my arms. I could almost have held her in one hand only. And I nearly squealed when I touched her. She was the most absolutely softest and velvetest thing you have ever imagined. And she made small grunty piggy noises that made me want to squeal even more. But I didn’t want to frighten her, so I just kept the squeals inside and gently stroked her.
  That was when Mum and Mrs Gritter came in.
  ‘So here’s the whelping box,’ said Mrs Gritter.
  ‘Whelping’: another word I absolutely had to remember to look up later.
  ‘As I said, the puppies can’t leave their mother yet, but if you want to put your name down for one, we can arrange for you to come back in a few weeks.’
  I looked up at Mum, all ready to be most persuasive and persistent. I had decided I wanted the puppy I was holding more than even I wanted to be the winner on Seeing Stars, and I was most determined to let Mum know this.

Puppy Love © Anna Wilson, 2008. Published by Macmillan Children’s Books.