Chapter 8 #3
“I know what I’m talking about,” he says quietly.
“You need to show him you’re not playing, or he’ll never take commands from you.
” He sees something in my reaction, because he puts his hand on my lower back and his voice is low and level as he continues, “I’m not saying you can’t love on him and play with him.
But when you tell him to do something, there has to be clarity.
He has to know what you want him to do, and that you mean it.
He’s still so young, he is absolutely trainable.
But you can train them to have bad habits more easily than good ones.
So it’s important that you’re consistent. ”
I glance over at him and we lock eyes. I feel like I’m swallowing a golf ball as I stare into those dark brown eyes with their flecks of amber scattered around the pupils. Suddenly, my mouth feels extremely dry, and I instinctively lick my lips. His eyes shoot down to my mouth.
“Show me?” I ask, and the way he looks at me makes me forget there’s a crazy dog running in circles in a crate at my feet, or that I’m headed out to dinner with my friends. It makes me want to stay in, spend more time with him, maybe get naked with him.
Luckily, that train of thought is broken when he squats down and says, “Winston, stay.”
The puppy stops running in circles and looks up at him, his tail wagging so fast I can’t believe he doesn’t fall over. “Stay,” Beau says, his voice a warning tone as he reaches over for the crate door.
I can see how tightly wound Winston is, how much effort he’s putting into staying in one place. And I’m curious to see if he bolts the minute Beau opens that door. I’m not sure how I’ll contain my laughter if he does.
Beau reaches his hand through the bars on the crate and rubs Winston’s little brown head, right where his floppy ears meet his skull. “Stay,” Beau says, his words still slow, like a warning.
He reaches out and slowly unlocks the crate. To his credit, Winston doesn’t move except for the tail wagging, even as Beau slowly opens the crate door.
The care and patience Beau has when dealing with Winston has me questioning some of the things I thought I knew about him.
“Come,” Beau says, and Winston quirks his head at him, not knowing what to do. Beau reaches in and grabs Winston’s collar and repeats himself as he leads Winston out of the crate. “Do you want to try?” he asks me.
“Sure. What should I do?” I ask, feeling incredibly out of my league.
Beau nods toward the couch. “Why don’t you sit down and then use the same commands I just used.”
I take a few steps over to the couch and when I’m seated, I tell Winston to stay using the same tone Beau just did.
Beau slowly lets go of Winston’s collar and when he stays in place, I am so proud of him that I can’t help grinning.
I give it a second before I say “Come” and the second I do, Winston bounds toward my outstretched arms. He jumps right up with his front paws on my lap, and I spread my knees and bend down to kiss his head as he dances around on his hind legs.
The force of his tail wagging would probably knock him over if he wasn’t being supported on both sides by my knees.
I reach down and pick him up, cradling him in my arms like a baby and talking to him like he’s one too.
I can’t help it, it just happens. And in a way, it’s a relief.
After seeing how my mom raised me and after practically having to raise my own siblings, I’ve always wondered if I’d ever want kids.
I kept waiting for those instincts to kick in—I’ve always known I wanted kids, but I’ve never felt the need for them.
It had me questioning whether I have those motherly instincts.
But I feel them now, as I cradle this bundle of energy in my arms. I know he’s a puppy, not a human, but I imagine that this desire I have to love and protect and help him is similar to how I’d feel if I were holding a human baby.
Winston quickly wiggles out of my arms and onto the sofa, so I pick him up and set him on the rug, where he runs around the coffee table and right to Beau, who is still kneeling on the ground next to the crate.
Beau takes some of the dog toys out of the crate and I go sit on the floor with them and we marvel at Winston as we try to teach him how to fetch his toys by name.
Eventually, I glance up at the clock on the wall and realize that we’ve been playing with Winston far longer than I thought, and I was supposed to leave about ten minutes ago. The thought of being late has my skin itchy, like an allergic reaction.
I ask Beau if he wants me to crate Winston before I leave, but he says, “Nah, I’ll put him in the crate before I go out later.”
I look away, trying to ignore how badly I want to ask him what he’s doing tonight, and who he’s doing it with.
It’s none of my business, and if he’d wanted me to know, he’d have volunteered the information.
So before I can press him for that information, I turn and head for my bedroom to grab my purse.
“Sierra?” he says from behind me.
“Yeah,” I call over my shoulder as I head down the hall.
“What’s wrong?”
I both hate and love that he’s so perceptive.
I think he’ll be a good partner to someone someday—once he’s ready to settle down.
And I hate how uncomfortable it feels knowing that he’ll make someone else happy someday.
What the hell is wrong with me? Is this all it takes for me to start thinking of a guy as marriage material—he just has to be nice to my dog?
Who isn’t even really my dog, just the dog that I’m fostering but already starting to think of as my own?
“Nothing’s wrong,” I call out, “I just realized I’m running late, and I think you know how I feel about being late.”
“Okay, I’ve got to go for real.” Jackson laughs.
“My husband is literally dragging me to bed.” She holds her phone behind her so we can see Nate pulling her up off the couch.
He must scoop her into his arms once she’s standing because the camera is jostled all over the place before she brings it up and focuses it on their faces.
“You’ve had her long enough,” Nate says into the camera. His lips curve up in amusement, but when he glances at Jackson, the look is suddenly full of heat. “Good night, ladies.”
We don’t even get a chance to say our goodbyes before the call is disconnected.
“They are so freaking cute I can’t stand it, and I think I might cry because these stupid postnatal hormones are no joke!” Lauren says tearfully as she wraps her napkin around her finger and dabs at her eyes.
“Darling, your pregnancy convinced me that I never want to have children,” Petra purrs at Lauren.
Lauren’s eyes go wide and fully fill up with tears. “Well, that’s a shitty thing to say,” she tells Petra.
I reach over and grab Lauren’s hand, giving her a supportive squeeze while I look over at Petra with my eyes as wide as I can possibly make them. What the hell? I mouth. Petra just shrugs and takes a sip of her martini.
“Hey,” I say softly, turning back toward Lauren. “These hormones are making you feel all these really big feelings, and you know how Petra is about emotions. Besides, she was never planning to have kids anyway.”
Lauren gives me a small smile before she looks over at Petra, who’s got one arm resting up along the curved back of the banquette as she takes another sip of her martini.
Her long curly hair flows around her shoulders like tendrils of black smoke.
Her eyes are cast somewhere across the bar, most likely staking out tonight’s conquest.
I reach over and nudge her foot with mine.
“What?” she asks, the question is defensive as she slides those perfectly made-up eyes my way.
“You know what.”
Petra looks over at Lauren. “Sorry, sweetie. Sierra’s right, I don’t want kids and it wasn’t your pregnancy that turned me off to the idea.
But even if I hadn’t already decided against having children, seeing someone go through a difficult pregnancy like you did would make me second-guess my choices. ”
“Wow.” I sigh. “You almost managed an apology.”
“I’m not sorry that I don’t enjoy other people’s misery. Would it be better if I’d said it was wonderful watching Lauren puke every day and lose all that weight and have to go to the hospital once a week for an IV just to make sure she got enough fluids?”
“It wasn’t that bad,” Lauren speaks up.
“Honey, you couldn’t keep anything down for months, and when you finally could, all you ate were canned peaches and those fresh cheese ravioli drowned in butter.
And you had those purple circles under your eyes because you were so dehydrated from throwing up all the time.
And then your belly got as big as your whole body. ”
“Well, when you put it that way . . .” Lauren smiles. “But even as crappy as I felt, I was elated that Josh and I had finally managed to start our family after trying for so long.”
The two of them had gone through over a year of infertility treatments before conceiving their twins.
“I’m happy for you that you finally got what you wanted,” Petra says. “And I will be the best auntie ever—just wait till you see how I spoil those little girls when they’re older. But motherhood is just not for me.”