better going on her own, without Toby and James fighting and splashing and trying to push each other in, and Mum panicking about Sukie’s pushchair getting stuck in the mud.
And a regular walking job would earn her some money, too, Emily realised suddenly. She’d put how much she would charge down on the leaflet, of course, but she hadn’t really imagined having the money. She could save up for a dog of her own, perhaps. Surely one day she’d be able to persuade Mum?
Quickly Emily took out the bits she didn’t need, and made the photo of her and Billy a bit bigger to fill up some of the space. Then she hit print, and crossed all her fingers together into complicated knots…
Emily had been hoping that as soon as she had delivered her leaflets (Maya came with her, and they counted the number of houses where they could hear barking, which was quite a lot), that there would be phone calls and emails. Lots of calls would be nice, but she’d get at least one or two, surely?
But there weren’t any, and Emily gloomily supposed that her leaflets had been thrown away, or maybe pinned up on a board like her mother’s, just in case. It was very depressing, especially as Maya and the others kept asking if she’d heard anything and she had to say no.
At least she still had the shelter to go to. Maya and Emily arrived early on Saturday, and Lucy beamed at them.
“I’m really glad you two are here already! Twinkle’s desperate for a walk. She’s whining like mad. Some of the other volunteers have been taking the dogs out during the week, but I think she really loved those long walks she had last weekend.” She eyed them hopefully. “Do you think you’d be up for taking two dogs each? If we make sure they’re ones who’ll get along?”
Emily glanced at Maya and they both nodded. “Definitely,” Emily said. And Lucy was right – she could hear whining from the dog pens even out by the gate. She was pretty sure that Twinkle was making the squeaky, grumpy noise.
“You went towards the woods last week, didn’t you,” Lucy said thoughtfully as they got the dogs out. “Maybe today you could go across the fields, by thestream. I don’t want you to get bored…”
“We won’t,” Emily giggled, as Twinkle bounced excitedly round her feet, and Trevor the Westie tied her up with his lead.
“Sammy wants to go now!” Maya said anxiously, gripping tightly on to the big black dog who was sniffing excitedly at everything he could reach, and pulling her step by step away from the dog pens. It didn’t help that Barney was sitting down as usual, so she was being pulled in two different directions.
“Maybe you should tie their leads together,” Emily suggested, as they headed out of the yard in the direction Lucy had pointed, down a little path to the fields. “Then Sammy could pull Barney along, and you’d just have to sort of point them in the right direction.”
“They’re trying to tear me in half,” Maya grumbled, but she was laughing.
The dogs took up too much of the girls’ attention for chatting, but by the time they were on their way back they’d worn off some of their energy, and it was a bit easier to talk.
“Lucy didn’t say anything about the party, did she?” Maya said, side-stepping over Sammy’s lead, as he snapped at a butterfly in front of them.
Emily shook her head. “Nooo… Maybe she thought we didn’t really mean it. After all, we haven’t come back with plans, have we?”
“It’s a bit hard, when we can’t think of anywhere to have it,” Maya sighed. “Maybe we could just hope for the best and have it in the middle of the yard? The weather ought to be OK in June.”
Emily shook her head. “No. My birthday’s at the beginning of June too, which is nice because it’s usually in the half-term holidays. But it’s always, always raining on my birthday. Mum’s stopped even suggesting outside parties. We need a hall or something. It would be really good if we found one
London Casey, Ana W. Fawkes