Training
With Wolfie
By Karen Singer
Chapter 5 – Part 2 of 2
The
next morning, Brian stared at his phone, willing it to ring. But it remained all too silent. If his phone didn’t ring soon, then he would
be faced with spending the entire day next door…as a dog! Desperately, he wanted it to ring, but only
silence filled the air. And eventually,
he knew that time had run out. He wasn’t
going to get called for a substitute teaching job today…or any other job
either.
He
stared at the disappointing phone in a fog.
And when it did finally ring, it startled him. “Hello?” he said excitedly, hoping against
hope that it would be someone wanting him to teach.
“Brian?”
Rosa’s voice came over the line. “I see you’re not teaching today. What’s keeping you?”
“I’ll
be there soon,” Brian replied sorrowfully.
“Brian!”
Rosa’s voice cut through the line before he
could hang up the phone.
“Yes?”
“Are
you going to be able to pay your rent for next month?” Rosa
asked, not very kindly. Next weekend
would mark the start of May. She would
be busy getting money from a lot of people all next week.
“Um… Um…”
Brian was afraid he knew the answer to that one already, but it was hard
to admit. “I don’t know,” he finally replied.
“Which
means no!” Rosa interpreted.
“I
haven’t gotten my check yet,” Brian countered.
There’s still this week and besides, I’ve still got to the tenth.”
“Yes,
but after the fifth, there’s a penalty fee.
Don’t forget that.”
“I know,” Brian admitted sadly.
“I
know you know,” Rosa replied. “You pay
it so often that it’s more like your normal rent fee now!”
“I
know,” Brian replied dejectedly.
“Since
you’re not working, then get over here!
I know you’ve got nothing better to do anyway.”
Brain
hung up his phone. She was actually
right, he didn’t really have anything better to do. But was being her dog better than doing
nothing? Somehow, he didn’t think
so. Not as far as he was concerned
anyway.
A short while later, Brian was again naked,
collared, on all fours, his hands bound into uselessness, and was rolling
around on the ground with Wolf. Rosa let them play for a while to help get the
restlessness out of Wolf’s system. Then,
as she frequently did, she called them both up to the porch and put them again
through their usual training routine.
She had plans to add to the routine, but not yet. The result was that both Brian and Wolf
performed everything reflexively – without hardly thinking about it.
Before
she released them to go back out into the yard, she spotted Wolf’s pull toy
that had been left out on the porch for the last few days. She picked it up and threw it at Brian. Brian tried to catch it in his “paws.” “Your mouth, Brian,” she said. “Catch it with your mouth!” Brian didn’t even want to consider trying
that one. But Wolf had seen her throwing
the toy and it immediately attracted his attention. He pounced on the pull toy quickly and
carried it triumphantly around in his mouth as he pranced around the porch with
it. “Well go get it!” Rosa
said to Brain seeing him not moving yet.
“Go play!”
Brian
scurried after Wolf, who simply ran off past him to the other side of the
porch. Brian chased him as fast as he
could, but it was really no contest.
With no hands, Brian couldn’t even grab the toy as Wolf ran past
him. But Wolf was certainly loving the
game and being chased.
Rosa
was going to go back into the house to work a bit, but she was enjoying
watching the two of them playing together.
Of course, it was really no contest since Brian couldn’t move very fast
and also couldn’t use his mouth the way that Wolf did – yet. But she decided to sit for a few minutes and
watch them play for a while anyway.
Eventually,
Wolf jumped down the steps out into the yard and Brian had to follow him. Again and again, Wolf kept taunting Brian
with the toy, carrying it close to him, but never close enough. But finally, Brian actually managed to get
one of his “paws” hooked through the larger end of the toy. Instantly, the tug of war was on! Wolf growled and pulled back one way, while
Brian, his wrist hooked through the toy and his other “paw” trying to hold it
there, pulled back the other way. But
Wolf’s pulling power was too great for Brian, pulling him down onto his
stomach. To counter the big dog’s power,
Brian rolled over onto his back, extended his legs, and dug the heels of his
feet into the ground, leaning back and pulling as hard as he could. With his feet now braced, Wolf was no longer
gaining ground on him.
Something
about what Brian was doing bothered Rosa.
She got up from her seat. “Brian,
she called. “Stop using your feet!”
Brian
looked up at her, confused. What was she
talking about? He wasn’t using his
feet. Not really. But he rolled back to his knees again. Wolf gave another huge pull and Brian was
forced to let go of the toy before the big dog broke his arm. Wolf trotted away with the toy
triumphantly.
But of
course, Wolf thought that this was a great game, so he began taunting Brian
with the toy yet again, trying to get Brian to chase him and try to get
it. It took a while, but Brian was
finally able to hook his “paw” through the loop in the toy again, and again the
two of them went back to pulling against each other. And again, to counter Wolf’s strength, Brian
stretched his legs out and dug his heels into the ground.
“Brian!”
Rosa’s voice cut across the yard. “What did I tell you about using your
feet? Forget you have feet!”
Feeling
silly about it, Brian again rolled over onto his knees and immediately let
loose of the toy before Wolf could hurt him.
Wolf
ran off with the toy and laid down to chew on it for a minute, but then he was
back with it again, trying to get Brian to chase him and play. Brian was getting tired, but he bravely tried
catching the toy again. Having no hands
to hold onto the thing made the task nearly impossible, but he kept at it and
eventually, Wolf allowed him to get close enough to slip his “paw” through the
loop one more time. Again, the two of
them went into their tug-of-war game.
And again, Wolf was winning. It was only out of desperation that Brian
had to roll onto his back, extend his legs, and dig his heels in as he had done
before. But the moment he did….
“Brian! What did I tell you about your feet? Stop it!”
Knowing she had to find a better solution to what was going on, Rosa went back into the house. She went straight to her old “toy” box in the
basement where she kept many things from her former occupation. Quickly finding two nylon straps, she brought
them back outside.
She
whistled for Brian and Wolf to come back up to the porch where she once again
put them through their “training exercises.”
Both of them seemed to be getting bored with the routine now – even
Wolf. But as long as the way they
responded was becoming more and more automatic…more and more thoughtless, she
was happy to continue repeating it. When
she was done, both Brian and Wolf got two dog treats. She wondered how much Brian even tasted them
or cared about what he was eating anymore.
As soon
as Brian had finished his treats she told him to stand – on all fours of
course, which Brian did. Then she
grabbed her straps.
Brian immediately felt a bit scared the
minute he saw the black nylon straps in her hand. He wondered what she was going to do with
them.
Rosa
knelt down next to him and grabbed his ankle.
She bent his leg back at the knee and wrapped the strap around his ankle
and leg, pulling it tighter and tighter until the heel of his foot was firmly
strapped to his leg. Then she did the
same with his other leg. Now it would be
as if he didn’t even have the lower extensions of his legs.
She
stood up feeling very satisfied again.
This was something she hadn’t planned on, but she found she rather liked
the idea. “Okay,” she said. “You two can go play again.” Then she simply turned her back and went
straight into the house. Unknown to
Brian, she immediately went into the kitchen to watch him from her window where
he couldn’t see her.
Brian
stayed right where he was for a few minutes, trying to figure out what to do
about what she had done to him now. He
tried to move forward and learned that his movements felt strange and were
slightly hampered by the straps she had put on him. He turned his body to try to look at the
straps, which was difficult. Trying to
undo them was as useless as trying to undo his collar. He had no hands – it was impossible!
He
could still move, it just felt a bit strange.
And since he was now confined to moving on his kneecaps, he quickly
realized how much more tender they were than the way he had crawled about
before. She had taken away his talking,
his walking, his clothes, his hands, and now had reduced his legs to half of
what they were before. How much more
could she possibly do to him? He wanted
to scream in frustration, but making any kind of sound that wasn’t a dog sound
would quickly bring a beating – something he really didn’t want! Since she wasn’t around, he was tempted to
scream anyway. But in the end, he opted
to forgo the human wail of anguish.
Wolf
was laying down on the deck, his head flat on the floor. But his eyes were wide open, watching
him. Brian crawled over to him and laid
down too. He couldn’t straighten out his
legs to get comfortable the way he wanted to.
He tried turning over on his back, but with his legs bent backwards, it
felt very awkward. It was now more
comfortable lying on his side, like Wolfie was.
Damn her! He felt more like a
stupid dog than ever!
Rosa
chuckled as she saw him trying to get comfortable lying down. She hadn’t even thought about him being
unable to lay comfortably on his back until she saw him trying it. She wondered what he must think about
everything, but quickly decided that it was probably better if she didn’t
know. She could pretty well imagine it
anyway.
--- §§§§§§§§§§ ---
At
lunchtime, Rosa called the two of them into the kitchen and gave them each one
of the usual treats she gave Wolf whenever she ate. Brian again chewed his with a great deal of
difficulty. When he saw that she was
finished eating, he expected her to feed him.
But instead, she seemed to ignore both him and Wolf and she simply left
the kitchen and went into her living room where she had a desk set up. Brian crawled after her, wondering what she
was going to do about feeding him. But
all he saw her doing was making phone call after phone call, handling her
landlord business. She had forgotten
him!
Having
nothing else to do, he laid down on the soft living room carpet to rest. Wolf was sleeping on the hard kitchen
floor. Brian quickly realized that her
carpeting felt much better on his body – especially his aching knees.
Brian
stayed right where he was, on the carpet, ignored by her. Wolf slept in the kitchen, then moved to the
living room, then back to the kitchen.
Every little while he had to find someplace different to sleep. At one point, Brian watched as Wolf pulled
one of his toys out of a box that was partially hidden under an end table. The box seemed to be full of them. Wolf laid on the carpet and chewed on the toy
for a few minutes before getting bored with it and wandering off to someplace
else. A little while later, Rosa was walking by the toy, spotted it and picked it
up. She started to throw it back into
the toy box, but she spotted Brian instead.
She threw it at him. “Here,” she
said. “Something to chew on.” Brian ignored the toy. He certainly wasn’t going to put that dirty,
disgusting looking thing anywhere near his mouth!
Later
in the afternoon, Rosa again shooed both of her dogs outside to play again for
a while. Brian and Wolf wrestled a bit –
even though Wolf now won much more easily since Brian wasn’t used to having
only part of his legs to work with.
Still, it was a lot of fun wrestling around with the big dog, and his
fur still felt nice against Brian’s naked body.
While
they were outside, Rosa called them back to the porch twice for more training
practice. The routine was starting to
mean less and less to Brian, other than it was sometimes a welcome break from
the tiring play he and Wolf often engaged in.
At
dinner time, Brian again kept his head firmly in his dog bowl to keep Wolf
away. Wolf again tried to get at his
food, but soon gave up and Brian was able to relax and eat a bit easier than
the night before. After dinner, Rosa left
the “dogs” in the house for a little while, mostly ignoring them, but before
too long, she shooed both of them back outside again.
Back in
the yard, Wolf wandered out to the back corner to relieve himself both
ways. Brian simply squatted somewhere
out of the way again.
The
loud angry sound of a motorcycle coming into the driveway caught both Brian’s
and Wolf’s attention. Wolf immediately
started barking ferociously as he ran back and forth between the gates on both
sides of the yard, trying desperately to get at whoever had pulled into the
driveway. Brian, knowing that Rosa now
had a visitor, crawled up close to the bushes by the deck in hopes that he
would be less visible there.
Rosa
heard the motorcycle approaching and had her door open by the time Edward
Tolliver got his helmet off and was walking up the front steps. “You’re right on time, Edward,” Rosa said warmly.
“It’s good to see you again.”
“And
you too, Madam Rosa,” Edward replied, his British accent very evident. Although Edward’s speech and mannerisms were
polished and proper, his appearance was always in direct contrast. Edward Tolliver was a huge man, probably
close to three hundred pounds. He was
usually dressed in leather from head to toe, resembling the typical motorcycle
gang members that you often saw in the movies.
In the
living room, over top of Wolf’s barking out back, Rosa filled Edward in on
exactly what it was that she was doing, and what she wanted him to create. Wolf’s barking outside went on for quite a
while before it eventually slowed down and finally stopped.
When
Rosa had explained everything, Edward pursed his lips in thought. “You said he’d be wearing them for a long
time, without them being removed? How
long?”
Rosa
shrugged. “A few months for
certain. Quite possibly…longer.”
Edward
only nodded. The long time factor was
where the real problems occurred. It
would give him much to think about. “Can
I see him?” he finally asked.
Rosa
smiled. “He’s out back with Wolfie. I’ll call him in.” But before she left the room she turned back
to Edward. “Um…if possible, I’d like for
him not to know what it is that you’re going to be doing for me…or him. I’d prefer to keep him as much in the dark
about it as possible.”
Edward
only smiled. “I think we can manage
that,” he replied. “At least, for now.”
While
Tolliver stayed in the living room, Rosa went to her back door. The minute she started to open it though, she
had to fight against Wolf to keep the big dog from getting in. “No Wolf!
No! Stay!” But Wolf knew there was someone else in his
house and was frantic to get at him. “No
Wolf!” In desperation, she went all the
way out onto the porch and closed the door behind her. “Wolf!
Sit!” she finally ordered.
Surprisingly, Wolfie sat like he was supposed to. “Good dog,” Rosa
crooned, amazed that Wolf had actually done it.
Wolf barked a few more times, then was finally quiet.
Rosa
looked around for Brian and just spotted his back semi-hidden by the
bushes. “Brian! Get up here.
Now!” Brian poked his head up to
look. He hadn’t heard the motorcycle
leaving, which meant that her guest was still in the house. But he only saw her on the porch and no one
else. Cautiously, he crawled away from
the bushes and toward the steps.
Climbing the steps with his legs strapped up was harder than ever, but
he had done it a few times now and was getting more and more proficient at
it. “Hurry up!” Rosa
commanded as she waited, not so patiently.
As soon
as Brian got to the top of the steps, Rosa opened the door again. Wolf started to get up to head for the
door. “Stay!” she yelled at the big dog. She was pleased to see him sit back down
where he was. “Come on in the house,
Brian” she said as she held the door open and watched to make sure that Wolf
was going to remain out of the way. But
Brian knew that she had company there, and he was fairly sure it wasn’t her
friend Connie who had seen him several times before. Brian sat down instead, like a dog because it
was now the best way for him to sit.
Rosa
saw Brian balk at coming into the house.
“Come, Brian. Come!” she
ordered. But Brian was too scared. He didn’t want anyone else to see him the way
he was. Rosa
quickly went over to him and grabbed him roughly by his collar and pulled. Brian was forced to follow her as she dragged
him through the door and into the house.
She was only glad that Wolf was staying out of her way for once. “When I tell you to do something, you better
do it!” she muttered angrily as she closed the door behind them.
Still
holding onto his collar, she reached up and grabbed Wolf’s leash that she kept
hung by the back door. As she leaned
down and clipped it to his collar she whispered threateningly, “I suggest you
be on your best behavior…or you’re going to be one sorry puppy!”
Brian
was scared to his bones. Especially when
she stood up and he still felt her pulling hard on his collar. No, she was pulling on the leash, which was
attached to his collar, but it amounted to the same thing. As she walked slowly through the kitchen,
keeping the leash pulled up tightly all the way, Brian was forced to follow
wherever she went. All the way into the
living room where he immediately saw one of the biggest men he had ever seen in
his life. Scary looking too!
“Here,
he is,” Rosa said as she led Brian into the living room. “Sorry it took so long. Wolfie can be a real handful.”
Edward
looked down at Brian. From the barking
I’ve been hearing, I take it that this is not Wolfie.”
“Not
even close!” Rosa replied, then added, “But we are making progress.”
Rosa
continued to hold the leash tightly while Edward looked Brian over
carefully. Brian was nearly shaking with
fright and embarrassment, but since Rosa was
pulling so tightly on his collar – with her leash, he had little choice but to
remain where he was, and silent.
Edward
finally bent down and grabbed Brian’s feet, both of them at the same time. He twisted them inward toward each other and
finally grabbed them both with one hand and held them that way. “Hmm,” he mused
as his brain raced through ideas.
Brian
wanted to scream, but he forced himself to remain silent. He didn’t want to face whatever Rosa might do to him.
Rosa
wanted to tell Edward that she had only just strapped his legs up like that to
make a point with Brian today…that he didn’t need to worry about it. But if she said anything now, it would let
Brian know too much that she didn’t want him to know…yet.
Edward
finally let go of Brian’s feet and Brian immediately felt a wave of
relief. “Let me see his hands,” Edward
asked as he moved around in front of Brian and knelt down.
“Sit!”
Rosa commanded and pulled up a bit harder on
the leash. Brian immediately went into
his sitting position.
Edward
picked up one of Brian’s taped up hands and examined it carefully, then the
other one. Then he stood up again.
“Let
me get back to you in a day or two,” he said to Rosa. “I’m going to have to think about this a
bit.”
“But
are you going to be able to do something?” Rosa
asked.
“Oh
yes,” he looked down at Brian to signify that he didn’t want to say too much in
front of him. “There are just some pesky
little problems that are going to need to be considered. That’s all.”
Rosa
smiled. “Thank you, Edward. I look forward to hearing from you then.”
Edward
smiled down at Brian. “Don’t bother to
show me out,” he said. “I can see that
you’ve got your hands full right now.
Until later, dear Madam,” he said.
Then he left.
Rosa
kept Brian’s leash tight the whole time.
She didn’t release it until Edward had closed the door behind him. “You did very well,” she said in her no-nonsense
voice. Then she leaned down and
unclipped the leash from his collar. The
moment she did, Edward’s motorcycle roared to life out in the driveway, and
Wolf’s barking roared to life on the back deck.
Later
that night, Rosa spent a few minutes considering the fact that Edward Tolliver
had spent so much time looking at Brian’s legs.
She could easily call him, probably right now in fact, and tell him to
not worry about them, that it was just his hands that she was mostly interested
in. But as she considered it, she had to
consider just what it was that she was doing with Brian. Turning him into a dog, of course. But more than that, she was trying to make a
point with him. And of course, in doing
so, she was trying to strip him of as much humanity as she possibly could. And of course, the lower extremities of his
legs could certainly be a part of that process.
Maybe even a big part of it. In
the end, she decided that even though Tolliver was going to charge her an even
bigger arm and a leg for what she would get, she would go ahead and gladly pay
for it. Tolliver did come up with some
amazing things. It would probably be
worth it in the long run.
--- §§§§§§§§§§ ---
That
night, Edward Tolliver stayed up late drawing.
Rosa had indeed presented him with a
challenge. Similar things to what she
wanted could be easily purchased over the internet, or he could make them for
her. But none of them would really meet
the problems that had to be overcome. He
was going to have to be creative. And as
long as he was being creative….
2 comments:
Karen,
I absolutely LOVE where you are taking this story! Even though I am bracing myself for the amazing roller coaster ride with its ups and downs and twists and turns.
Thank you for sharing this wonderful part of your life with me. I have always been a huge fan of your stories.
Alana
Karen,
Thank you so much for all your work. You are one of the most prolific and cfreative writers I know.
Erica
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