“It should teach you!” I’m overreacting, I know it. I was just so sure Luanne was drowning. My heart hammers. I have to keep her safe. “You can’t turn your back on a baby near a pool.”

The human pup is safe. Calm, calm. Drool with me. Diesel pants a huge string of dribble.

“Okay, okay. I’m sorry. I won’t.” Morgan sighs. “Water wings, I’m telling you. Let’s just keep going.”

“I have to go pee.”

“Didn’t you go before we left?” Morgan complains.

“Yes, but Luanne falling in scared me. I always have to go when I’m tense.”

“Fine. Go behind the pool house.”

“Maybe there’s a key to the pool house under a rock somewhere.” I start searching.

“Forget about it. And we’re not taking off yet.”

I shake my head, hating the idea. But I have to learn how to swim, and I’m always going to be anxious near water. We’ll never get anywhere if we quit whenever I get nervous. Step one means conquering my nerves. I climb out of the water and walk behind the little cedar house. Diesel circles me, barking his head off.

“Shh, boy, shh!”

Small four-leggeds are tunnelling in this ground! He starts digging madly at a hole under the fence, dirt flying. I can’t afford to care right now. I need him to be quiet, and the dirt throwing gives him something to do. I must get to them. Tongue hanging to the side, he pants silently as I crouch down low, making myself even smaller than usual. Here in this fancy neighbourhood, surrounded by trees and a wrought iron fence, I pull the crotch of my bathing suit to the side.

Finished, I pull Diesel away from his digging and manage to replace the sod he dislodged. I stomp on it. No one will ever know what either of us has done.

That’s when I sense I’m being watched. I turn, nothing. Something makes me look up, and there, at the open window of the house next door, I spy a wrinkled apple face squinting at me.

10

Saturday, June 26:

Gathering New Pack Members

“I see you back there. Up to no good.” The white-haired woman shakes her fist at me. “I’m going to call the police!”

Angry elder! Diesel barks.

I don’t answer either of them, just scoot around the pool house back to Morgan. Diesel follows at my heels. “Quick, let’s go,” I tell her. “The neighbour spotted me as I was going to the bathroom.”

“I heard. Don’t worry. Uncle Lurch told me about the old lady. No one ever listens to her. She always” — Morgan raises two fingers of each hand to make air quotes — “‘calls the police.’”

I look back. The apple face disappears from the window. “You don’t think she’ll do it?”

“Who cares? We’re allowed to swim here. Uncle Lurch said.”

“But I peed on the grass!”

“C’mon. Guys do it all the time.” Morgan grins. “Come back here. I want you to try a different move now. Hold on to the edge of the pool and kick your legs like a frog.”