A Pug Like Percy: A heartwarming tale for the whole family

‘Ooh, that’s a bit posh,’ Peg panted, echoing Bugsy’s words as she scampered to join me. ‘It’s lovely to meet you, Percy. Can I come around and see your place sometime?’

‘Steady on, old girl,’ Jake barked sagely. ‘Perce here has just arrived. It’s a bit soon to be inviting yourself over for a bowl of Pedigree Chum.’

‘Sorry, Percy,’ Peg woofed a little shamefaced. ‘Where are my manners? It’s just rare to meet another pug, especially not one that lives in such a nice part of town. I got carried away, that’s all.’

‘That’s okay,’ I replied, her beauty leaving me almost barkless. ‘I’d love to have you visit. I’ll see if I can encourage Simon to invite your owner over.’

‘Oh, our Sally doesn’t need much encouragement,’ Peg barked knowingly. ‘She’s a sucker for a pretty face that girl. I suppose that’s where I get it from.’

Heather turned to Peg. ‘How is your Sally now?’

Peg rolled her big brown eyes in despair. ‘She’s all right, Heather. But it doesn’t take much for Sally to start turning on the old waterworks. She’d only been on a couple of dates with this latest one but she’s been sobbing on my fur all week about how she thought he was the one, whatever that means.’

‘She’s been looking for love in all the wrong places again,’ Heather barked sympathetically.

‘You can bark that again,’ Peg replied. ‘Honestly, she’s getting on my nerves with all these tears. We always have such a nice time when it’s just the two of us, I can’t understand why she wants to ruin everything by chasing after every man in trousers.’

‘It’s not our job to understand, Peg,’ Jake barked wisely. ‘It is ours merely to be there for our owners whenever they need us.’

‘And I am, Jake,’ Peg insisted, her little tail, curling and uncurling in frustration. ‘But all these tears are making my fur soggy and cold.’

Jake patted her much younger paws with his old wizened ones. ‘I do understand, my dear, but such is our lot. Into this life a little rain must fall.’

‘Literally, when it comes to our Sal,’ Peg barked mutinously. ‘Anyway, what about everyone else? I can’t be the only one with owner problems.’

Being new to the group, I didn’t want to speak first, but the others wasted no time comparing war stories.

‘Well, I’m sure it’s no secret that mine are getting divorced,’ Heather barked matter-of-factly. ‘It’s been a long time coming. Pete’s been convinced for years she’s been cheating on him so he finally got fed up and hired a private detective to do some digging last month.’

I rolled my eyes in amazement. Was that really something humans did? I looked around the rest of the group, but they did not appear remotely surprised.

‘And he found some evidence that she’d been with someone else?’ Peg woofed compassionately.

‘No, she hadn’t been cheating at all,’ Heather barked with exasperation. ‘But when she met the private detective, she fell head over heels and has now moved in with him, so Pete really has got something to worry about and is either moping about the house or throwing plates in the garden. I have to be careful when I pop out for my evening tinkle.’ Heather shook her head in disgust. ‘What about the rest of you? I can’t be the only one suffering thanks to my daft owners.’

Bugsy cocked his head and let his tongue loll to one side, an unattractive pool of drool gathering at the corner of his mouth. ‘My owners have just had a baby,’ he barked. ‘Jasper’s really sweet and cute and I like to look at him when my parents have gone to bed, but he’s not asleep very often when it gets dark. In fact, most of the time he’s awake and he’s crying, and screaming and waking everyone up because he shouts so loudly. I never get any sleep and neither do Mum and Dad and they’re tired, and I’m tired and all I want to do is go to bed. Sometimes I think I could sleep standing up, but then I know I’d fall over and probably hurt myself. My owners say they haven’t got time to play with me any more because they’re so tired and I miss going for walks with my parents in the morning because instead I’ve got the neighbour’s son, Maxwell, taking me and he’s horrible and listens to his headphones all the time and I’m fed up!’

With that, Bugsy slumped to the floor, his head on his paws in despair. As he let out a howl of frustration, Jake and Heather rushed to his side and encouraged him to his paws.

‘Come on, Bugsy, lovey, don’t take on so,’ Heather barked soothingly. ‘Jasper won’t be a baby for long and Johnny and Bella will be playing with you again before you know it.’

‘Absolutely, old boy,’ agreed Jake. ‘My owner’s son, Patrick, was a baby once, made a huge racket night and day for months. Thought it was never going to end, but it did, and now the boy’s almost a man. Mighty fine chap too, I might add. Stick with it, Bugsy, this baby phase won’t last for long and your owners will come to rely on you once more over the years.’

‘But it’s so horrible,’ Bugsy groaned, ‘I liked it better before he came along.’

I scratched my ear thoughtfully with my hind leg. Bugsy’s people were probably just a bit distracted at the minute, but they still loved him. Bugsy just needed to figure out a way to try to get his family a little sleep, then they might have a bit more time for him.

‘How about we try to help you, Bugs?’ I barked. ‘There must be something we can do to give your family a bit of a rest.’

‘Oooh, what were you thinking, Percy?’ asked Peg, turning her pretty face to meet mine. ‘I love a man with brains and beauty.’

My heart fluttered nervously in my chest. Was Peg flirting with me?

‘There’s no point,’ Bugsy barked once more, interrupting my thoughts. ‘They don’t care about anyone else apart from Jasper. I might as well move out and live at the tails of the forgotten. At least I would get some peace and there would be other people to care for me.’

‘That’s enough,’ I barked reprovingly. ‘Your family are just a bit distracted at the moment that’s all. There’s no need to go wishing yourself to a shelter, if anyone knows it’s me, I’ve just come from there.’

The others looked at me in surprise before Heather broke the silence. ‘You never said, lovey.’

‘Well, I want to make the best of my new start,’ I woofed in explanation. ‘I’m looking to the future now, not at the past.’

‘Quite right, old boy,’ Jake barked in agreement.

‘Yes, Percy, ignore me, I didn’t mean to pry,’ Heather barked apologetically before looking at Bugsy. ‘Now, it sounds to me that if we can get you and your family some sleep things will improve for all of you. In my experience, the best thing to get a child to stay asleep is a lullaby. How about we all gather outside your house tonight Bugsy and sing Jasper to sleep.’

‘Can you sing, Heather?’ Peg barked incredulously.

Heather looked at the floor and toed the ground self-consciously with her paw. ‘Well, I don’t like to brag, but I always used to sing my owners’ girls to sleep when they were very little and they drifted off to sleep immediately.’

‘I was once a member of the Welsh Dog Voice Choir,’ Jake yapped. ‘We had the children of the Valleys asleep in seconds. Of course, that was a few years ago now and my lungs aren’t what they were.’

‘Nonsense, Jake, you’ve a lovely voice,’ Heather barked warmly before turning to me. ‘What about you, Percy? Can you bark a tune?’

‘I’ve never really sung. Perhaps the odd note in the bath,’ I barked. ‘But I’m willing to try, if you think it will help, Bugsy.’

‘Me too,’ barked Peg, sidling closer to me. ‘Percy’s right, we’ve all got to stick together.’

‘Then it’s agreed,’ yapped Heather delightedly. ‘We’ll meet at Bugsy’s at six tonight, so we’re ready for Jasper’s bedtime and can have a practice. I’ll rap out the usual three barks for you.’

‘What shall we sing?’ Peg asked.

‘How about “Baa Baa Black Sheep” or “Hush Little Baby”?’ suggested Jake. ‘In my experience, those two songs always get the children off to sleep quickly.’

‘Good idea. Now can everyone get away? Percy, Bugsy lives on the next road to yours so we could meet at the corner of your street if that suits?’ asked Heather.

I looked around me and saw barks of assent all around. Quickly, I thought how I would make my escape. Gail, Simon and Jenny usually ate their dinner at six so it would be quite easy for me to wriggle through their old cat flap.

‘Sounds good,’ I barked excitedly.

‘Excellent,’ Heather yapped delightedly again. ‘Now, just one thing, not a word to anyone. No matter how lovely your owners are if they find out we’re performing our very own dog quartet they’ll be furious.’

‘Or at the very least, we’ll end up on the front page of one of the tabloids,’ added Jake. ‘And the last thing we want is the press camped out whenever we go to the park.’

‘Quite right, Jake,’ agreed Heather. ‘Remember when old John got caught rescuing his owner from a fire? He couldn’t move for journalists for weeks! None of you breathe a word, especially you, Bugsy.’

At the sound of being singled out, Bugsy groaned. ‘Honestly, Heather, I won’t say a word. I know there was that time I told Saul the shih-tzu around the corner that we wanted to do something nice for Jake’s birthday and then there was a massive party, which Jake didn’t want—’

‘And always made it clear to you, old boy, I never wanted,’ Jake insisted, cutting across him.