Rachel Alexander 03 - A Hell of a Dog

could I ask you to leave him with me and take your seat?”
    Nearly everyone there leaned forward, and there wasn’t a sound in the room. Some of us, at least, must have been waiting for the volcano to blow, but Boris left the stage without a word. He was so pleased his dog had been selected, Audrey could do no wrong. If she’d asked him to leave the country, he probably would have pulled out a cell phone and called the airlines right from the stage.
    “Sasha, come on over here and tell me what’s been on your mind.” Audrey patted the stage right next to where she sat, and the big dog, his head rolling from side to side, walked slowly over to where she was and sat. Then he rolled onto one hip so that he was leaning against her. Everyone began to clap.
    Audrey stroked Sasha’s neck, just sitting at his side. And listening. Or so we were meant to believe.
    “He says he’d really like to go to Burger King, and have one his way.”
    We all laughed. I could hear Boris from where I sat, laughing louder and longer than any of us. Then I saw him smirking at someone off to the left. He was apparently trying to catch Martyn’s eye, but Martyn didn’t see him. He was still paying attention to whatever was on his lap.
    “He says he doesn’t like to be disciplined.”
    Audrey was smiling, patting Sasha on the top of his broad head. There was a loud moaning sound from the humans, as if to say, Get on with it, tell us something we don’t know. And as if Audrey heard those very words, she did.
    “He said his leg still hurts when it’s damp out,” she said. “But not when he runs. It used to. But not now. And he’d like you to rub it the way you used to. He says it’s much better, but it still aches when the weather is wet.”
    It was quiet again. Very quiet Boris stood. “Leg was broken when he was nine months old. Sasha jump for fly in office, come down on slippery floor and skid. Break bone.” He sat again, and waited. We all did.
    I had once let Lili drag me to a numerologist all her friends had been raving about. It’s ridiculous, I’d told her, I have better things to do with my time and money than listening to some charlatan telling me the sort of junk everyone wants to hear, call it a “reading” and charge an arm and a leg for making up stuff to fool me with. My treat, she’d said, and when I’d told her that the money wasn’t the issue, she’d said, Please, Rachel, do this for me, I’d never have the nerve to go without you. And so I’d gone with her, laughing all the way, until the guy had gotten specific enough, and scary enough, to get my attention. The way Audrey had just gotten all of ours.
    “What else would you like Boris to know?” she asked, her cheek against Sasha’s. We waited a long time, just watching them. With nothing else to do, I wondered if Boris had told her about the broken leg, and if he’d forgotten that he had. Or if there were stitches there, an old scar she’d felt when the dog sat next to her. I thought I could feel his legs later on, see if that was the case.
    “You’re safe here,” she told the Rottie. Then we all waited for him to answer her question, the way we’d all waited for him to sing the national anthem.
    “He won’t say anything else,” Audrey finally said. “He’s—” But she didn’t finish her sentence. She was looking out into the audience, at Boris. “I think that’s it for now,” she said, but when the dog lay down at her side and began to tremble, Audrey continued. “He’s afraid of making you angry,” she said, her hand on the dog’s back, her eyes on Boris. “He’s afraid of you,” she added, as tenderly as she could. “Of your anger.”
    “What anger?” Boris shouted, his arms raised, palms up. He looked around the room for confirmation of his judgment, but didn’t receive any. “This is biggest baloney I ever hear.“
    “Perhaps next time,” Audrey said.
    “People come here for knowledge, not ridiculous storytelling, dog says he’s afraid, wants hamburger, ach.” He charged up to the stage to get his dog.
    I expected him to storm out of the room, but he didn’t. Audrey waited until he was seated again. “It’s just that he wants to please you so badly,” she said. “He would never want to make you angry at him by complaining.”
    Boris grunted, appeased by what she’d added.
    Audrey asked Tracy to bring Jeff up, but she declined, saying that Jeff had always told her absolutely everything he required for