Page 28 of A Season in the Snow
Chapter 14
From then on the weekly training sessions became the linchpin of Alice and Bear’s routine. She settled into a life of being only with him, and was glad to be left alone. She didn’t go back into theFunny Packoffice, and instead they bought all her drawings, perhaps out of pity.
When she took Bear for his twice-daily walks, she saw increasingly familiar faces, but she continued to wear her earphones without any sound, and they seemed to accept that this quiet girl with the big puppy didn’t want to talk.
She spoke to her mum and dad on the phone regularly enough, but mainly about Bear and what he’d been doing that week. She avoided questions about herself.
She slept a lot but never felt rested, and ate a lot but never felt satisfied. Her time with Bear was the only thing that made her feel happy, like when he was practising his growls or chasing his own tail around her living room, or had climbed onto the sofa and snuggled his furry back into her, and they fell asleep, spooning. In bed he would keep her warm by lying right up against her, calming her night tears, and he was very nearly able to scrabble up onto the mattress himself, rather than place his front paws up and wait for her to come and lift his bottom.
Bear was growing and Alice found herself daily telling him, with complete honesty and awe, how big he was getting. The tufty black streamers on his ears were beginning to flow, his nose was longer and stronger, like a concertina that had popped out, and it now proudly displayed all of his black and orange freckles. His tail had popped like a firework and had changed from a white-tipped rope to a plush, cloudy plume. The sharp pins of his teeth were falling out and making room for great white gnashers. He was leaning more, and had become interested in feet and the backs of knees. He was changing quickly, and filling up what little space there was in the flat.
And every week their outing came around, and Alice would pack up his ‘school’ bag, he would be on his best behaviour for an hour, and then they would drive home to music in companionable silence.
‘He’s definitely improving and being a bit more structured, but he can still be naughty and restless when it’s just him and me,’ Alice said to her mum after four sessions. ‘It feels good to be doing something towards making him better and happier and more settled.’
Alice’s mum ‘mm-hmm’ed down the line. ‘And have you thought any more about maybe seeing someone yourself?’
‘What, about Bear?’
‘No, like a doctor or a therapist, perhaps.’
‘I don’t need to see anyone, Mum, I just need to get this dog more settled and then everything will be fine.’
‘Mm-hmmmmmm . . . ’
Alice steered the conversation back to Bear’s training. ‘We just need to keep practising, that’s all. We have homework to do. And everyone there loves him.’ Even when he was being a pain, Alice felt pride with how instantly Bear could make people fall in love with him, and he always reciprocated. He was just like Jill in some ways.
‘So just one more week left?’ her mum asked.
‘Yep, one more session and then he’ll be perfect,’ Alice joked.
‘Maybe it would be nice to plan in something else for once it finishes, you know, to keep you motivated to leave the house.’
‘Mum . . . ’
‘Liz,’ Alice heard her dad say in the background.
‘I just think it’s been good for you having a bit of routine back. How about trying to go into the office again, just once a week?’
‘I can’t leave him on his own. I don’t need to go into the office, I can’t, I’m not . . . ’ Alice ran out of words. She wasn’t ready yet. She wished she was, she wished she felt better, but she also wished Jill wasn’t dead, and she wished she could go back in time, and she really wished she wasn’t having this conversation.
‘I didn’t want to upset you, it was just an idea.’ Liz wavered, and then her dad came on the line.
‘Your mum’s not trying to upset you, love,’ he said.
‘I know, I’m just not ready.’
‘That’s okay, there’s no rush, she just . . . ’ he paused, as if waiting for her mum to leave the room. When he spoke again he was quieter. ‘She just wants you to be okay. She thinks all the time about how she could have lost her little girl, we both do. But we don’t mean to put any pressure on you. We’ll wait.’
Alice was watching Bear, and thinking, did he always take up that much space on her sofa? He was luxuriating on the cushions, his ears dangling over the edge, and when he caught her watching him his mouth opened in a big, tongue-lolling smile. Despite everything, Bear certainly brought a little laughter back into her life.
The doorbell rang and Bear rolled off the sofa.
‘Who’s this?’ she murmured to him, assuming it would be the postman, and he pushed through to go to the door with her, causing her to bump and edge her way around him.
‘Oh! Hi!’ Alice stood at her door and faced Bahira, Theresa and Kemi. Bear appeared, her tone of voice arousing the curiosity in him, and he nudged and bumped into her calves from behind, desperate to see who it was. ‘What are you guys doing here?’
‘We’re here to visit you,’ said Bahira, with her usual practicality. ‘Like it or not.’
