Page 34 of Yolo

I could tell that I’d stunned him because he said, “Umm…wow.”

I smiled. “I found out I had the knack for languages when I took Spanish in high school. I whizzed through all the languages like it was my first language. Then I moved onto all the others.” I paused. “I stopped learning them when I met Joseph because he said it made him look dumb when I couldn’t help but to learn languages.”

“Sounds like a real winner,” Trance murmured. “Can you get him to sit?”

I called out for him to sit, and he did—at least I thought.

“Good,” Trance said. “What about walk with you?”

I shrugged and held out my hand for the leash, which was placed in my hand.

“Tell me where to go?” I asked.

“The yard is large. As long as you don’t go sprinting for a solid minute in one direction, you should be able to stay in it just fine.” Oakley giggled.

I started walking around the yard with the leash in my hand, talking in German to the big guy. Every once in a while, I would stop to talk to him, and a few times I dropped down to my haunches to speak with him as I pet him.

“Wow,” I heard Trance say from afar. “I’d about given up on that one because of his refusal to work. I got him from Germany from a friend who said that he couldn’t get him to work, either.”

“Looks like he’s doing just fine under the right supervision,” Oakley mused.

A motorcycle sounded from somewhere in the distance and came closer and closer until it sounded like they stopped right beside me.

“Hello,” I heard another male voice say.

“Hello,” I replied.

“This is my husband, Pace,” Oakley called. “Pace, this is the woman I was telling you about that was coming over here today to meet with Rooster.”

“I thought Rooster was black?” Pace asked. “This one is definitely white.”

“White?” I smiled. “That’s cool.”

Pace paused. “You’re blind?”

“Yeah,” I said. “I’m blind as a bat.”

Pace chuckled. “Guess since you can’t use echo-location, you could use a dog.”

I felt more than heard Pace wander off toward the other three that were still behind me somewhere and kept walking, talking to Mister/Panzer as I did.

“So who is this Rooster guy?” I asked Mister/Panzer.

The dog beside me growled a cute little grumble.

I started to make my way back toward the voices.

Only when I sensed I was close did I say, “I think you should probably keep the commands in German like you were doing. Start calling him Panzer, too, so he knows who you’re talking to. Another suggestion…you could also play a German show or two on television. It sounds like he’s just homesick and likes to hear my voice and German words.”

“I’ll do that.” The man named Trance smiled. “Come meet Rooster.”

“I’d love to,” I said.

“He speaks only English, though.” Trance chuckled as Gee grabbed my hand to do the guiding again. “You could probably teach him a different language, though. He’s a smart boy. Just hates to sit in a car all day—which is what he’d be doing if he was a police K-9.”

“Boring,” I teased.

“Very.” Trance chuckled as we walked. “I’m going to put Panzer up because he hates Rooster.”

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