Page 13 of The Good Boy

“I’m not working today,” Miles had said, as if it were no big deal. “And I thought that the dog might need a coach. You know, man coaching from a typical man.”

He’d looked straight ahead as he made this suggestion, totally deadpan. With his clip-on shades.

“Good idea,” I’d said, “do you know any?”

Miles smiles.

“The truth is I still owe you from back in the day when you took me under your wing.”

“It was more like just hanging out,” I remind him. “Like kids do.”

“You invited me into you friend group, you made me laugh when I honestly thought I might not laugh again. And you always had my back. The last time you really needed your friends I wasaway at university and I couldn’t do much to help. But now I can. So, man coach at your service, Eugenie Wilson.”

I was trying to think of a way to say thank you, without crying or looking like I cared one way or the other, when Rory saved me the job.

“Why do humans talk so much?” he complained from the back seat. “And can I have the window rolled down so I can taste the day?”

“Nanna Maria doesn’t have a mobile,” I tell Miles now. “She has always insisted that she will know if we need her and will phone us. Nanna Maria!” I call up to the heavens, or at least the top of the Ferris wheel. “It’s me, Genie! Give me a call, please? Got a bit of a situation here!”

As I’m despairing out loud, I notice Rory drifting off toward a fish-and-chip shop.

“That looks nice,” he says to a young woman in her twenties, hanging out with her friends and holding a bag of chips, awarding her a winning smile and a tilt of his head.

“Want one?” She giggles, fluttering her lashes.

“Yes, please,” he says, opening his mouth. She laughs, drops a chip in his mouth, and smiles at him invitingly over her shoulder as she leaves, laughing with her delighted mate. Rory sees an elderly couple receive their lunch wrapped up in paper.

“That looks nice,” he says, with the same winning smile.

“Sod off, you pervert,” the old lady says.

“Rory, come here.” I pat my thigh out of habit. “Just because I can’t put you on a lead anymore doesn’t mean you can go around begging for food. You are over six feet tall. People won’t like it.”

“I think that lady wants to give me some more, though,” Rorysays, pointing at the girl, who smiles and waves at him from the other side of the road.

“She wants to give you something... oh, dear god.” A terrible thought strikes me. “Look, you are a really handsome dog who has turned into a really handsome man. That means that you must stay away at all costs from anyone who might fancy you.” Rory cocks his head. “You don’t want to make puppies. You are a dog, and it would be...” I gag by way of an explanation.

Rory gags back at me. Luckily the thought seems to appall him too.

“Genie’s right,” Miles says, as he makes the decision to lead us up the narrow flight of steps that took us off the main drag and onto the only slightly less busy street above it, right next to the taxidermy shop.

“Dead birds,” Rory says approvingly.

“Rory,” Miles tells him. “Here is your first lesson in being a human male. Women are very mysterious.”

“Ugh.” I roll my eyes. “Come on, Miles—that’s not true. Women are people too, you know.”

“It is true,” Miles assures Rory. “They don’t tell you what they are thinking, and you have to guess, and then when you get it wrong, because unlike Genie’s gran you are not psychic, it’s all your fault.” He looks at me. “Although not Genie. Genie is actually quite simple to understand. But most women: mysterious.”

“Are you sure they don’t just want biscuits?” Rory asks.

“Hang on—why am I so simple to understand?” I ask.

“Well, you tend to say most of your inside thoughts out loud,” Miles tells me.

“Oh.”

“It’s your best feature,” Miles adds.

---