Chapter 7
Hugo
“Homework?”
Carson stops at the door and looks back at me.
“Dad, I’ve got all weekend.”
“You mean you have Sunday. You work tomorrow, remember? Are you really going to want to spend the only full day off you have worrying about homework?”
He rolls his eyes up to the ceiling and sighs dramatically.
“Come on, Dad. I haven’t seen Tate at all today. First school, and my shift at Strange Brew started right after, then when I got home, I even got dinner started. I promised Tate I’d come by for a bit after dinner. I swear I’ll be home by nine to do my homework.”
That’s right too, he’d mentioned he got called in to help out at the coffee shop for a few hours. I bite off a grin, looking at those big, innocent, blue eyes he’s trying to ply me with.
“Fine,” I concede, and he’s halfway out the door before I call him back. “Hey, what was going on at the coffee shop they needed you for?”
He throws me a grin over his shoulder.
“Clean up. Ragnar demolished the pantry.”
I’m puzzled, not sure what the heck he’s talking about, but it doesn’t sound good.
Ragnar? Who the fuck is Ragnar?
I manage to grab the front door before it latches and step outside to try and catch Carson, but he’s already hopping into my old pickup. I don’t bother waving him down, and instead head back inside to grab my coat and my keys.
Guess I’ll just have to go find out for myself.
“No! Bad boy. That’s enough out of you.”
The loud barking as soon as I started climbing the stairs had been a firm clue as to the elusive Ragnar’s identity, so when the door opens and I see Bess struggling to control a dog, it’s not a surprise. What is a bit of a shock, is the size of the animal.
“I’m in over my head,” Bess blurts out by way of greeting.
Hard to hear her over the incessant barking of the dog, but my eyes were already fixed on her mouth, remembering the last time I was standing on her doorstep.
“Ragnar! Quiet!” my voice booms.
To my amazement, the dog promptly shuts up and sits down in front of me, his tongue lolling from his mouth. I reach out to scratch his head and notice Bess has one hand still on the door, and is clutching the dog’s collar with the other.
“How did you—” she starts, when I interrupt her.
“Can I come in?”
My question appears to catch her by surprise, but she rallies and releases her hold on the door.
“Yes, of course.”
It’s not until I step through the door, I realize I’ve never been inside her apartment. It smells like her, with hints of cinnamon and citrus. But at the moment the scent of wet dog is almost overwhelming everything else.
Towels are draped over every piece of furniture, and I see the remnants of what I’m guessing were once the guts of a pillow strewn across the floor.
“I had to give him a bath, but he won’t stay off my furniture,” Bess explains, her voice wobbly.
I get the sense she’s on the verge of a meltdown.
A sharp whistle coming from the kitchen area triggers the dog again. He starts barking furiously and struggles against the hold Bess still has on him.
“Let the dog go, I’ll handle him,” I tell her. “You take care of whatever that is.” I nudge my head to the kitchen.
I manage to snag the pup before he bolts after Bess and drag him to me as I sit down on the towel-covered sofa. The ear-piercing whistle, I’m guessing was a water kettle, stops abruptly.
“Ragnar, quiet,” I repeat my earlier command, hoping for the same result.
Whether he was following direction or stopped because the noise did, I’m not sure, but the result is the same. Peaceful quiet. At least, until the dog decides to climb on my lap to show me some love.
“Hey, you mutt,” I grumble, dodging the large pink tongue trying to lick the stubble off my face. “We don’t know each other that well.”
I shove him off my lap and he immediately curls up beside me, his body pressed up against my thigh. Almost instantly his eyes close. That’s when I hear the sound of someone blowing their nose.
The dog doesn’t budge when I get up and walk over to the kitchen, where I find Bess wiping her nose with a tissue. She looks like she’s been crying.
“Like I said, I’m in over my head,” she says by way of explanation.
I could ask her what she was thinking, taking on a dog who is more like a teenage version of a puppy, and not little or even average by any stretch of the imagination.
I could admonish her for letting Buck con her into adopting the animal—since there’s no doubt in my mind the single-minded vet is behind this.
But I’m pretty sure she doesn’t need that from me.
“Nah, it’ll all work out,” I assure her, tucking a stray hair behind her ear.
“I remember when we first brought Carson home from the hospital. Shit, I couldn’t even recognize our house.
Diapers, laundry, dirty dishes, I mean, the house was in a constant state of chaos, as were we, trying to fit a kid into an existing routine.
It took a while, but a new routine evolved that included him.
I’m guessing adopting a pup wouldn’t be that much different.
Except it looks like it might be more like adopting a three-year-old than a newborn,” I joke to lighten the mood.
With some success, since her pretty mouth spreads in a smile.
“The difference is, we were kinda stuck with Carson, but you always have the option of finding him a new home.”
She shakes her head adamantly. “No, I couldn’t do that. I couldn’t give him away.”
“Understandable.”
I knew she wouldn’t, but I wanted to make clear there was that option.
“My point is; give it time, you’ll figure it out,” I conclude, adding, “And in the meantime, there are plenty of people who can help.”
She shakes her head. “This was my choice, my decision, my responsibility. I couldn’t burden others with it.”
“Who says that’s a burden? When you looked out for my son after school, or brought food to the hospital when Emily was sick, or when Carson was attacked, did that feel like a burden to you?”
“Of course not,” she blusters, clearly annoyed by my question. “But I enjoy helping, I like being useful.”
All I have to do is raise an eyebrow for her to huff a reluctant concession.
“Maybe give others a chance to do the same for you. No, scratch that,” I correct myself, folding her in my arms. “Give me a chance.”
Bess
“Did you know I slept last night for the first time in weeks?”
Hugo shakes his head and grabs a seat in my mother’s old wing chair across from the couch, where I’m sitting.
I’m not sure what moved me to share that information, except that Ragnar is once again pressed up against me like a warm, living, weighted blanket. Much like he was last night, when he jumped uninvited into my bed and burrowed under my covers with me.
I slept. Boy, did I sleep.
After way too many mornings watching the clock creep slowly toward the time my alarm would go off, I almost slept through the familiar ring this morning. I might have, if not for Ragnar loudly signaling his need to answer the call of nature.
That’s when things started going downhill.
Thank goodness no one is living in the neighboring building, because they would’ve gotten an earful this morning when I tried to leave the dog in my apartment.
I had to get downstairs to start baking and had planned to leave him upstairs, but he wasn’t having any of it, barking and howling, so I ended up taking him with me.
It was fine for a while, he kept busy for a bit chewing the marrow from a bone I’d intended to use to make stock. When Lola came in, they made fast friends, and he ended up tagging after her while she got the place ready for customers.
But I couldn’t have him roaming around the coffee shop when we opened the doors at seven, so I tried to keep him contained in the kitchen, which was no mean feat.
He would cry and scratch at the door every time I stepped into the shop.
The one time I didn’t close the door properly behind me, he got out, excitedly barging into the coffee shop.
Fortunately, there were only a few customers, none of whom seemed particularly upset a rambunctious dog jumped up on them in greeting.
Still, I apologized profusely while I chased after Ragnar, who wasn’t about to give up his newfound freedom.
My biggest mistake was locking him in the walk-in pantry during the worst of the lunch rush.
Most of the supplies in there are either sealed in storage bins or up on shelves.
Fridays are always busier than the rest of the week, in part because that’s the day I test out new recipes.
Except, with the dog taking up a good chunk of my morning, I never got around to it today.
I thought I’d found the solution, especially when Ragnar stopped whining and scratching after a few minutes.
Hopeful he’d curled up and crashed from the morning’s activities, I focused on filling lunch orders.
I didn’t discover the silent carnage he wielded inside until we ran out of lids for the take-out cups, and I poked my head in to grab a new box.
As it turns out, the heavy-duty plastic bins are no match for a puppy’s sharp teeth. The entire inside of the closet was covered in flour, rolled oats, and remnants of the almonds he’d managed to get down from the second shelf.
I’d barely even been aware of my audience of one as I relived the events of the day, until Hugo started chuckling.
When I look over, I notice his blue eyes sparkling with humor.
In hindsight, I guess it is kind of funny, and I find myself cracking a smile, even though the whole experience had me in near tears a little bit ago.
“You always hear parents say you should start worrying when the kids are too quiet. Nobody told me it’s true for dog owners as well,” I observe.
“Learned that the hard way myself,” Hugo commiserates before adding, “Carson mentioned something about someone going nuts in your pantry, but I wasn’t sure who or what until I saw the dog.”
Maybe that’s why he showed up at my door unexpected.