Chapter Eight
CHARLES
Afew weeks of guitar lessons and I’m better at it than I expected.
Maybe Tucker commenting on the size of my hands is true.
Maybe it’s all about the length of your fingers, your dexterity, maybe it’s a combination of my eagerness to learn and the patience of my teacher.
Or maybe that’s all bullshit and the universe spun a web to ensure Tucker and I ended up in the same place at the same time in some perfect touch of fate.
Who knows.
September in Hope Island is lovely. The air is chillier in the evenings, the days less balmy, and the tourists are mostly gone.
With every season that passes by, this place starts to feel more like home, which is a scary thing for someone like me who’s never known a real home before.
But between Brent and Mark, Marcia, and being added into Tucker’s group of friends, well, I’m starting to realize that maybe I’ve ended up right where I’m supposed to belong.
After I return from my run one mid-September day, it’s to find Cupcake still lying in her bed, lethargic and odd.
I dip down beside her and lift her paw to rub it in the palm of my hand.
She doesn’t open her eyes or acknowledge me at all, and my heart all but races out of my chest. Calm, I remind myself.
Growing up on the farm didn’t harden me in the way my father always wanted or expected.
I think in some ways it made my heart softer, not what my family expected from the son of a farmer.
I pick Cupcake up, ignoring the hard twinge in my knee. She’s loose in my arms and my stomach turns at the weight of her.
“It’s all right, sweet girl, it’s all right.” She’s quiet in my arms as I head out to the truck and settle her into the back. I don’t even bother calling the veterinary office. I just start the truck and head that way.
The early morning dew is just melting away as I cross the bridge, hoping and praying that they’re open already this early in the morning.
Cupcake’s breathing is shallow and fast, and my mind flashes to holding her as a puppy all those years ago when I inherited her from a teammate in San Diego.
She’d been small, then suddenly she’d been huge.
I rub anxiously at my chest the closer we get to the veterinary office.
A few cars dot the parking lot when I pull in, but thankfully the office is lit and the sign on the door is flipped to open.
Relief courses through me for one moment before being replaced with dread again when I pick Cupcake up.
Her stomach is hard and distended, breathing shallow and fast, and I know, after the years on the farm, that this isn’t good.
I just have to hope she’s strong enough to survive.
She’s been my only family for so long, I can’t lose her.
“Please help,” I say the moment I step through the doors.
The kind nurse from last time, Sarah, is there immediately, guiding me into the back. I ignore the waiting room, not caring if anyone is there to see the tears streaming down my face.
“Help me get her back to the emergency room, then you can go back to the waiting room,” Sarah says softly, gently—far too gently for the situation.
“I can’t stay with her?” I beg, throat tight. I don’t want to leave her alone. I lay her on the table Sarah pointed at and press kisses across Cupcake’s face. “She’ll be okay?”
“Doctor Young will be here in a few minutes, and he’ll come right to her first. But you can’t stay.” Sarah pets Cupcake’s hind leg, but her eyes are squinted and her mouth tight. “We’ll tell you soon what’s wrong.”
“You know what’s wrong already,” I accuse, which isn’t like me at all, but I know she knows but won’t tell me.
“I can’t say. Now, go back to the waiting area with Sue.”
A kind-looking older woman magically appears in front of me.
Despite the situation, I can’t be an asshole, so I kiss Cupcake once more, then follow Sue back to the waiting room.
After tossing myself onto the bench seating in the corner, I press my elbows to my knees and hang my head in my hands.
People come and go as I sit there, the morning moving forward in a sort of haze that I haven’t experienced since my last injury.
Time feels fake, yet it keeps moving forward.
Finally, after too long, Dr. Young comes out to greet me. He holds his hand out for mine, and we shake loosely because I don’t have enough energy in me to return a strong grip.
“She’s going to be okay,” Dr. Young says with a tired smile.
“I know your name,” I say, like the idiot I am.
He smiles gently, like a father smiles to a small child.
“You can call me Orson. Cupcake is going to be okay. Her stomach twisted, basically. It’s pretty common in dogs of her breed and size.
We’ve given her some medicine through IV, and I put a tube down her stomach to relieve the pressure.
Once I’ve watched her overnight and feel she’s stable, if you’re okay with it, then I’d like to go ahead and do a procedure that’ll basically staple her stomach inside so that it won’t twist again.
Also, pretty common. Have you been feeding her any large meals? ”
Suddenly, I feel a little sick myself. “She has bloat?” I ask, wanting to climb under the nearest bridge and die.
Orson’s eyebrows climb. “Well, yes. How do you know about bloat?”
“I grew up on a fucking farm,” I mutter and return my head to my hands in utter defeat. “It’s my fault.”
“Nope. It could’ve happened if you followed the perfect diet.
We don’t blame ourselves at this clinic unless we’re feeding dogs straight baker’s chocolate for weeks in a row.
Even then, if the reason is good, I won’t likely assign blame.
Now”—Orson stands, bringing me with him with the firm grip he has on my forearm—“come see her because I’m keeping her overnight.
If all goes well, she’ll be back home with you in three days. ”
“I’ll pay anything. I don’t care. She’s my…” I choke off and squeeze my eyes shut against my tears. “She’s my best girl. I’ll pay anything.”
“Oh, I know. Now, come give her some kisses, then go home, eat something really sweet, and cry it all out before you take her home.”
Orson leads me back to where they’ve got Cupcake all cozy in a kennel.
My heart does that dangerous spin and dive again at the sight of her.
Her gaze is hazy as she blinks at me, but I dip down to the ground, ignoring the painful twinge in my knee.
I kiss her slightly warm nose and over her eyes, then rub her snout until her eyes fall closed and she’s back asleep.
“I love you, old girl.” I press another kiss to her snout and bite back hot tears. “Never scare me like this again, okay?”
“She’ll be okay,” Orson says softly.
I stand slowly, coming to my full height. I meet Orson’s gaze despite being a little taller than him. He shrinks back a little, probably because I forget my size sometimes and forget about my resting bitch face, as my teammates used to say I had.
“Please give her the best care. I can afford it.”
Orson’s mouth bunches at the corner. “It’s my job to keep her alive, and failure isn’t an option to me. Plus, I don’t really feel like killing the dog of one of my best friends’ probably future boyfriend.”
“What?” I squawk out.
Orson chuckles. “Ah, I love tying the tongue of a big man like you. Now shoo. Sue will call you when Cupcake is ready to come home.”
Orson all but shoves me out to the front waiting room.
Sarah gives me a stack of papers about Cupcake’s care and what to expect, and both of the women give me very kind smiles and promise to call me if there are any urgent updates.
But I can tell their speeches are practiced and that the likelihood of anything going wrong is small.
My father would no doubt be embarrassed by my tears over an animal, but I left the farm for a reason. My tears for Cupcake are allowed.
The drive home is quiet without Cupcake’s usual noises in the car.
But it’s even worse once I get home. Her usual bed is empty, but the shape of her is still pressed into the soft blue material.
The lid of the jar that holds her favorite biscuits is lopsided after last night’s treat, so I fix it with my throat tight and hot.
It feels silly to be this distraught over an animal.
I decide to spend Saturday out on the back porch practicing my guitar as a distraction, then in the evening I practice cooking a gluten-free meal from the new cookbook.
Tucker had seemed so shocked at the idea of me altering my kitchen for him.
Maybe I am a little crazy, who knows, but maybe Orson is a little right.
Maybe I do want to be Tucker’s… friend. Maybe more than a friend.
I’m not rushing into a relationship with a guy who clearly just escaped something very seriously abusive.
But, when he’s ready, it might be nice to be here waiting.
I feel that small kernel of something inside me that I don’t often feel, that attraction for someone, that makes me wonder what it would be like to kiss Tucker.
What do his lips taste like? I bet he tastes like cotton candy, sweet and mysterious at the same time.
Like blue raspberry, a flavor that’s delightful but shouldn’t exist.
The next morning I wake up for my jog before the sunrise, but I don’t feel like jogging today.
Instead, I get dressed in some sweatpants and a loose T-shirt, grab some gluten-free snacks I picked up at the store, and make my way toward the beach behind Mark and Brent’s house, where I’m sure a guy with a pink buzz cut will be waiting.