brow and narrowing his blue eyes up at Fang.

“Me? Nothin’.” Fang flopped down on the highest cardboard box and rested his head on his paws.

“That’s Fang,” Afghanna nudged Huck. “Always the take-charge type.”

Fang yawned.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Skip kicked a pebble down the sidewalk. Once, just once, he’d like to wring Fang’s golden-furred neck for his stupid show-off attitude. Everyone else went with it, but Skip despised being called ‘shorty’, and then getting written off as the stick-in-the-mud. Someone had to be the serious one in their dumb little group.

“Skip! Tu es venumevoir—you came back to see me!”

Skip stopped cold. “Huh…?” He turned to the right, spying—good grief, those eyes were blue!—Ariella trotting happily down the sidewalk towards him.

Skip immediately felt self-conscious. “Uh, well, I didn’t—I-I mean…”

Ariella sat down in front of him. “C'estmerveilleux! I am happy to see you!”

“Er, yeah, sure.” Skip looked away. He had a sudden, panicked thought. “Where’s your owner?”

She looked at him, baffled, cocking her head as if asking him to repeat it.

“The lady who takes care of you? Your human, your person? The pastry woman?” Skip jerked his head toward the pastry shop to their right.

Ariella’s eyes lit up. What a sparkling sky-blue they were, Skip couldn’t help noticing for the umpteenth time. “Ah! Mon gardien! Oui!” She giggled—it reminded Skip of the sound of those sleigh bells humans tied to their horses on Christmas Eve in town. “She is not working today. She puts moi—me—inside the shop.”

“How’d you get out?” Skip asked. Images flashed through his mind’s eye—broken window, a hole dug through the wood floor of the pastry shop, signs of a certain pretty French pup scooting underneath the door through the hole. He might be blamed again!

Ariella looked confused. “I walked.”

“No, no—I mean, didn’t she shut you up in there?” Skip was beginning to get impatient.

Ariella finally understood what he was trying to say. “She does not lock the dog door.”

“Oh. Y 've a dog door?” Skip scoffed.

Ariella looked worried. “Quel est le problème?”

“What?”

“What is wrong?” Ariella cocked her head again. Her bow tilted to the side with it, making her look sort of…cute, Skip supposed.

“Nothing. You’re a House Pet, that’s all.” Skip curled his lip.

“What do you mean?” Ariella asked.

“You live in the pastry shop, right?” Skip questioned.

“Oui. It is my home.”

“There, see?” Skip nodded, eyebrows lowering in disgust.

“No.” Ariella shook her head hard. “I do not ‘see’.”

Skip heaved a very loud sigh. “I’ll show you.”

With a final glance back at the pastry shop, Ariella immediately—as if willing to leave her post as guardian of the shop—fell in step beside Skip, smiling at him and asking so many questions he decided to finally change the subject—frequently. But nonetheless, she was being nicer to him than any other dog had ever cared to be. She listened to him, as if he were revealing secret by secret to her with every word that came out of his mouth. Before long he had stopped scowling. His eyebrows rose to a normal height. His eyes brightened. He was enjoying himself!

Finally Skip led her to Snob Hill, home of the prissiest House Dogs around.

“Lid on every trash can, fence around every tree.” Skip pointed out the demeaning neatness of the little street-town.

“Oui—elle est belle—it is beautiful, no?” Ariella commented. She had kept up with his quick trot the entire way, long, spotted-brown tail high in the air with barely contained happiness, content to walk along on territory she’d never seen.

“That’s what I mean,” Skip muttered. “House Pets would think this is—well—good-looking. But it’s not.”

“No?”

“No.” Skip almost actually chuckled then. Her speech was somewhat funny to him. “I mean…look over here.”

He led her to a fence and they poked their heads through an opening.

“Okay, see that?” Skip nodded.

Ariella followed his gaze.

A male Irish Setter, a reddish-brown one with a white collar was running in circles, chasing after a ball.

“Purquoi?” asked Ariella, eyebrows lowered as she tried to understand. “Why does he chase the toy?”

Skip grunted. “Because he’s a House Dog. He’ll do whatever it takes to please his human.” He gestured with his nose toward a lanky teenage boy with dark hair, tossing the ball over and over for the Setter.

A smell hit Skip’s nostrils.

“Check it out,” He said, pulling his head out from the fence opening. Ariella copied him. “Over here.” He trotted to the house across the street which had a very short, puppy-tall brick wall with a small cement top on it.

They stood on their back legs, placing their front paws on top of the wall and peeking over it.

Ariella cocked her head.

“There, see? Look at the human.” Skip ordered.

Ariella complied, turning her gaze thoughtfully to the overweight man with a chef’s hat on in the mowed-grass yard.

“What is he doing?” Ariella asked.

“Don’t you know anyth—” Skip stopped. He backtracked. For some reason he didn’t want to hurt Ariella’s feelings with his usual sharp tones and barbed words. “I mean…well, he’s grilling. Look, he’s got burgers going.”

Ariella sniffed the air and licked her muzzle. “Bonnes odeurs—it smells good!”

“Yeah, but don’t go getting any ideas. Look, there’s a House Pet on guard.” Skip curled his lip.

Sure enough, a slender Dalmatian female dog with a blue collar and golden license was sitting at the grilling man’s feet, also licking her lips in anticipation.

“Heel, Francis,” the man ordered to the Dalmatian. “Sit.”

Francis, the Dalmatian, immediately sat up next to his heels.

“Roll over.”

Francis rolled onto her belly, then back, then her belly again, sitting up.

“Beg.”

Francis sat on her hind legs and raised her front paws in the air.

Ariella gasped. Her eyebrows lowered. She rattled off an angry spew of French. “Comment puis-que l'homme de sa volonté?Elle ne le mérite pas!Elle obéit sans poser de questions et ne reçoit pas de récompense!”

“Ariel—” Skip began.

“Pourquoi at-elle agir de—”

“Ariella!” Skip snarled.

Ariella stopped and stared at him.

“What are you talking about?” Skip moaned, frustrated. “From now on, only English, okay?”

Ariella nodded vigorously. “Oui, monsieur Skip!” she stopped. “Oh—I mean—yes, of course.”

Skip finally grinned. His first grin in a while. It felt weird, but not unpleasant.

“Now do you see?” He asked. “House Dogs are like little tools for humans.” He walked closer to her. “And the mark of the trade—” He held a light-yellow paw under the golden license of her collar. “Your collar.”

Ariella blinked down at it. “But—my owner—human—she loves me. I am not her tool.”

“Course not.” Skip scoffed. He was getting frustrated. “But your collar gives it away. You’ve got the mark of a House Pet.”

“Do you not like House Dogs?” Ariella asked as they turned and both began walking again, side-by-side, back in the direction of where the came—toward the pastry shop in town.

“You could say that.” Skip muttered.

Ariella looked at him sideways as they went. Skip didn’t meet her very-blue gaze, avoiding it. He realized how that had sounded. Maybe he should’ve rephrased it. Too late now.

“Do you like me, Skip?” Ariella checked.

Skip felt his fur heat up. “Er, sure. Yeah, I guess. You’re fine.”

Ariella smiled, seeming satisfied. “Where are we to go now?” she asked in her French accent.

“Uh, well, I’ll take you back home. Is your owner back yet?” Skip asked. He turned a corner, heading into town on the sidewalk past a neat row of trees.

Ariella stopped walking. “No.”

“She’s not?” Skip stopped too.

“No!”

“What do you mean no? She’s back?”

“Non,” Ariella said firmly.

“No what?” Skip barked, exasperated. His eyebrows lowered again, his telltale scowl returning. It felt bitterly at home on his muzzle.

“No—I do not want to go back.” Ariella spat. She looked determined.

Skip faced her. “If it’s what I said about House Pets and their humans, I didn’t mean—”

Ariella interrupted his awkward ramble with a shake of her head. “No! I do not want to go back—yet.”

Skip