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“Up, Bean,” I said, hoping he’d put his paws on the table and dig in. “Treat.”

Bean lunged forward and stuck his nose in the cup. To my right, Asher had his tongue in the cup. I laughed and picked up my cup with my teeth, tilting it back and trying to dump its contents in my mouth. I got a faceful of liquid. “Ugh.” The cream wasn’t budging. I put the cup back on the table and sucked in a big mouthful followed by another. That’s when Bean licked the side of my face.

“This is disgusting,” Brett said. “What is it again?”

Bean tipped over his cup and as the contents spilled across the table my eyes caught the wordBabyon the side in Kamala’s handwriting. “Oh crap.” Bean jumped on top of the table as I tried to spit anything left in my mouth onto the grass. That’s when Bean noticed the line of people with their treats. I grabbed for his leash but missed as he barreled across the table, knocking over cups as he went.

When he got to the end, where Chad was kneeling, he sneezed in his face and jumped down.

Dale was on his feet, brushing off his jeans with his hands. “These are my nice jeans.”

“Why’d you wear nice jeans to a dog competition?” Brett wondered aloud.

Chad was making disgusted noises, wiping up doggie snot and doggie drink with the bottom of his shirt.

Bean kept running. “Halt! Sit! Stay!” I yelled one command after the next as I chased after him, wiping my face on the sleeve of my shirt. I finally got him under control before he could bolt outthe side gate with me in tow. He sat, acting like he had been listening the entire time. His expression as he looked up at me seemed to ask,Why are you out of breath?

“You know why,” I mumbled to him.

I turned to see Asher come skidding to a halt.

“I thought you might need some muscle,” he said, then looked at Bean. “But he…he’s fine.”

I smirked. “Were you going to be the muscle?”

“I’ve been told I’m very strong.”

“By your aggressively nice mom?”

He laughed, then pushed his floppy hair off his forehead. “Well, that was a disaster.”

“You think we have anything usable?”

He nodded enthusiastically. “It will be funny. I’ll edit something together and shoot it over to you later.”

“What? No, I’ll edit it.” This was my actual job. He was a volunteer. I wasn’t going to make him do anything more than he’d already done.

“It’s easy for me,” he said. “I have all the software and stuff.”

“It’s fine. I got it.”

“Miss I’m Bad at Social Media has it?”

“I do,” I said. I hated counting on someone else to do something for me, wondering whether they were going to follow through. Doing it myself saved us all disappointment.

Asher held up his hands in surrender. “Okay, can’t wait to seeit.”

“Thank you for helping today.” I squeezed his arm because, apparently, I had the desire to touch him and since I wasn’t surewhy he’d stopped hugging me, this seemed like the most appropriate form of physical contact I could get away with in the moment.

He squeezed my arm back in a joking manner. “You’re welcome.”

“Are you making fun of me?”

“I mean, sort of, yes.”

I laughed.

Asher glanced back at the group. “Did you force Chad to come or what? He doesn’t seem like he wants to be here.”