Chapter 7 #2
Bobby petted the top of Lucille’s head. “I’d best get her home before she gets cranky.”
I held a tissue against my bleeding forearm. “You mean she’s not cranky now?”
Bobby chuckled. “Nah, that was just a love tap. Now why don’t you go back and see your new dog? Maybe Cash will help you name it.”
“It’s not—” I started to say, but then I stopped.
Because it was my dog now, wasn’t it? And even though it was the worst possible time to get a dog, I found I didn’t hate the idea.
In fact, I kind of liked the way he curled up behind my knees at bedtime, despite the snoring.
There was something grounding about the weight of him.
Something simple and solid and real. Hell, I didn’t even really hate the snoring. “Yeah,” I said instead. “Maybe.”
Once Bobby left with Lucille and Kayla went home, I took a minute to duck into the treatment room to disinfect the goose bites on my forearm and slap some Band-Aids over them. Then I grabbed a clipboard and went into the kennel room where Cash was still sitting on the floor with the dog.
The dog was curled up in his lap as Cash stroked him gently. “Who’s a good boy?” he asked quietly. “Is it you, dog? Yeah, it is. You’re safe now, okay?”
The dog gave a contented sigh and melted further into Cash’s lap. I felt a pang of envy, and I wasn’t sure if it was due to the dog’s totally relaxed state or Cash touching him so tenderly.
Cash looked up when I stepped into the room but for once he didn’t flinch.
“Hey,” I said, crouching down next to them.
Cash’s eyes went wide when he saw the Band-Aids on my arm. He whispered, “Lucille?”
“All birds are assholes. Ask any vet.” I reached out and petted the dog. “So you wanna help me with this guy? It’s time for his cone to come off, for starters.”
Cash pushed the dog gently off his lap and stood.
We headed through to the treatment room, and the dog trotted behind us.
I thought of the first time Cash and I had been in here with the dog.
Hopefully this time wouldn’t be as dramatic, what with all the blood and the fainting.
And if Cash stuck around after instead of vanishing into the night, that would also be good.
Cash lifted the dog onto the table and held him in place, telling him what a good boy he was while I checked his ear.
The intradermal closures had healed perfectly, and I took a moment to be proud of the neat work.
I took the cone off and the dog shook his head vigorously, his ears flying and his tail thumping against the table.
I turned away to put the E-collar on the side table, and when I turned back, Cash was curled over the dog, hugging him tight. He lifted his head and caught my gaze, his eyes shining. His throat bobbed before he spoke. “When does he go to the shelter?”
“What?”
His fingers tightened in the dog’s hair. “If I can’t find him a home, when does he go to the shelter?” he repeated, unable to hide the tremor in his voice.
Jesus. Cash might be the one who didn’t talk, but apparently I was the one who couldn’t communicate worth a damn. I’d assumed he’d figure out I was keeping the dog—but how could he, when I’d only just decided myself?
I rubbed the back of my neck and gave him a shrug. “Funny story. Bobby just called him my dog, and he’s right. He’s staying here with me.”
“With you?” Cash’s expression wavered for a moment and then settled on a shaky smile. He raised his eyebrows. “For real?”
I nodded. “I—I like him. Wouldn’t put up with his snoring if I didn’t.”
Cash swallowed, nodding.
I cleared my throat. “When I was a kid, Uncle Jim had this three-legged dog. It was sweet as hell and ugly as sin. It had a whole bunch of issues apart from the missing leg. There wasn’t a condition this dog didn’t have, it seemed like.
Uncle Jim always said it was put together wrong at the dog factory.
” I rubbed the dog’s forehead right between the eyes, in the spot that never failed to make his eyes half close in bliss.
“Someone had dumped it on Uncle Jim, like this guy here.”
Cash gave a guilty start.
“Anyway, the dog just never left.” I gently tugged the dog’s uninjured ear and he let out a contented sigh. “Uncle Jim always said he’d never trust a vet who didn’t have at least one broken animal. I guess this one might be mine.”
I hadn’t spent much time in Goose Run as a kid, but when Uncle Jim had made his occasional visits to Cincinnati, he’d brought Trip—short for Tripod—with him.
I’d taken Trip for a walk around the neighborhood one afternoon, and some kid had yelled, “Is that supposed to be a dog?” And for reasons I still had no explanation for, apart from kid logic, I’d decided in that moment that I was going to be a vet.
The fantasy of helping every animal, especially the ugly ones, had been a powerful one.
The reality had turned out to be a lot different.
To begin with I’d had to face up to the fact that I couldn’t help every animal.
After that came the slow realization that doing worthwhile work wasn’t always satisfying or sustainable, and that sometimes it was just sad and demoralizing.
And that was even before you did your taxes and saw your parents’ point about how you should have gotten your real estate license instead of a two-hundred-and-forty-thousand-dollar student debt.
But try telling that to the dog’s big brown eyes. Or Cash’s.
No, this moment here made me feel as though I’d made the right choice in becoming a vet, however much it sucked the rest of the time.
“Obviously if I’m keeping him, you’re not paying for his surgery,” I said. “I’ll pay you in actual money for the hours you’ve already worked.” I scratched the dog behind his good ear, and Cash’s smile ticked up a degree.
“What are you gonna call him?” he asked softly. His eyes were still bright with unshed tears, and his gaze dipped and his fingers edged close to mine as he stroked the back of the dog’s neck.
“You heard what those guys called him?”
The line of his mouth tightened and he gave a sharp nod. Our fingers brushed as we both petted Dog. Cash’s hand froze for a second; then his pinkie nudged mine again.
“Pair of assholes,” I said. “But he’s not their dog, so that’s not his name.”
Another sharp nod.
“I haven’t thought much about what to name him,” I said. “But he already answers to Dog.”
Cash lifted his head and showed me a dubious expression.
“I mean, unless you can think of something else. But it’s what you use when you talk to him,” I pointed out. “And he listens to you and comes when you call him. I think he already thinks it’s his name. Don’t you, Dog?”
Dog’s ears perked up and he panted happily.
“Looks like he’s made the decision for us,” I said.
Cash paused in his petting of the dog and whispered, “Us?”
“I mean, he loves you, and I’m kind of assuming you’re going to keep visiting him. So yeah. Us.”
Cash gave me a shy smile, then turned his attention back to Dog. “You hear that, Dog?” he murmured. “Mason’s going to keep you, but I’ll still come and see you.” He shot me an uncertain look, like he couldn’t quite believe he’d be allowed to visit.
“As often as you like,” I said and hesitated a beat before adding, “Dog’s not the only one who likes your company.”
Cash looked away, his mouth curving up into a smile, and his cheeks flushed pink.
I guessed he wasn’t used to people saying nice things about him.
But I meant every word. Cash’s visits had become a bright spot in my days, his quiet delight in every animal he saw cutting through the frustration and self-doubt of running the practice and helping me remember why I’d chosen this career in the first place.
If only there was a way to bottle that feeling for when I woke up in the middle of the night and reviewed every diagnostic error I’d ever made.
I shook the dark thoughts off. Today was a good day.
“So, wanna hold him while I microchip him and give him his shots?”
Cash nodded and positioned himself so he had a solid grip on Dog.
I prepared the shots, then paused. “You’re not gonna pass out again, are you?”
Cash huffed and rolled his eyes so hard I swore I heard them bouncing off the back of his skull. He shrugged one shoulder in a hurry up gesture, and I took the hint.
I gave Dog a treat to distract him, then delivered his shots. Dog gave a single indignant yelp before turning his attention back to the treat, and when I slipped the needle with his microchip under the skin between his shoulder blades, he didn’t even notice.
“Done,” I said, lifting Dog down from the table. “Nobody else can claim him now.”
I was expecting Cash to fuss over Dog, so I wasn’t surprised when he came around my side of the table.
But I wasn’t expecting him to pull me into a hug instead of Dog.
It wasn’t quite like the hug he’d given me last week, which had been steady and firm.
This one felt different, and it took me a moment to realize that this wasn’t Cash lending comfort, this was Cash asking for it.
The threat of Dog getting taken away might have vanished, but his body’s physical response to that sharp moment of fear—that surge of adrenaline and cortisol—would take a little longer to settle.
Cash pulled out of the hug before I was ready to let him go, and the memory of his touch lingered even after he left the treatment room with my new dog at his heels.
He was back a moment later, holding a garish knitted something that was made up of too many clashing colors and a lot of shapes that made no sense.
“This is for Dog,” he said, holding it out to me.
“Did you make this?” I asked, holding it up. It was possibly meant to be a sweater.
Cash shook his head. “Grandma. I was gonna put it in his cage, but…” He shrugged.
I snorted. “Yeah, he sleeps upstairs with me. Thanks, Cash.”
I held the not-a-sweater out to Dog, who sniffed it once, then grabbed it out of my hand and danced out the door with it firmly clamped between his jaws. I watched him go and said, “Shit like that is why people think dogs are colorblind.”
Cash snorted and bumped his shoulder against mine. “They’re not, not really,” he said.
“I know. Except maybe Dog is. What even was that thing?”
Cash turned his head to answer me, and I dropped my gaze to his mouth, suddenly transfixed.
It was one of those moments where something had shifted so that everything seemed instantly charged with a new energy, as though the air itself was humming with expectation.
Cash’s throat bobbed as he swallowed, and then his lips parted slightly, and any question I’d had about whether the attraction between us was mutual was answered in that one tiny movement.
He leaned infinitesimally closer, and I held my breath.
It felt somehow both crazy and inevitable that we were about to kiss.
And then Dog came racing back into the room, his claws skittering on the linoleum, and smacked into the back of my legs like a wrestler trying to bring me down, and the moment was gone.
Cash stepped away from me, his cheeks pink. He gestured at Dog. “I, uh.”
For once, it wasn’t just him that couldn’t get his words out.
“Yeah,” I said, examining the back of my hands before glancing up.
Cash’s mouth twitched, and he leaned down and scooped Dog up and left the room. Moments later, I heard the kitchen door open and close and figured he was throwing a ball in the yard.
Which was probably for the best, given I had no idea how I would have navigated that moment if Cash and I had kissed, and I was willing to bet everything I owned that Cash would have been even more out of his depth than me.
Still, the idea of the kiss lingered long after Cash had gone.