Chapter 13 Milton #2
“Oh, yeah? What shop is it? I had a guy up in the Bay Area I went to for years, but now that I’m down here, I need to find someplace new.”
Her eyes widened. “Oh my gosh, yes! You have to go to Brian at Creature Tattoo! It’s over by Eighth and Spring Street downtown. You’ll love it!” She glanced over my neck and arms and then to my fingers holding the pen. “You, uh, have much room left to work with?”
I nodded and shrugged, flashing a smile. “I’ve got some patches here and there I’d like to fill in. Mostly on my legs.”
Sweets released a long, audible sigh and leaned against my calf like a lump of potatoes, letting me know this was taking far too long.
I filled out the remaining lines on the form, paid the adoption fee, and then let the staff all say their goodbyes to my new boy.
My eyes burned, glossing over with joy as I walked out with Sweets, feeling something in my chest fill that I hadn’t known was missing.
My mind was usually all over the place, switching from one idea or task to the next, but my world had seemed to slow once I brought a dog home.
For the last week, all I could think about was making sure he had food, attention, comfy beds—yes, plural—and plenty of walks outside. He had messed up my usual routine but gave me a new one. I liked this one better though. I was no longer chasing a busy life just so I’d feel a little less alone.
Growing up, I’d never had any pets. My mom didn’t like the idea of having to care for anything other than me, even when I begged and pleaded.
After my dad left when I was eight, my mom spent any spare time she had trying to fill the empty father-figure role in my life—or at least that was how she rationalized the endless assholes she brought home.
There were a couple of good guys in the mix, but they never lasted long enough to put in the effort to learn their names.
Most of them, to no one’s surprise but her, were just after one thing, and my mom was desperate and lonely enough to give it to them in hopes that one day, one of them would stay.
I thought a part of her was still so angry with my father for choosing a life without her that she was trying to prove to herself that she was still worthy of love. Which she was.
But so was I.
It wasn’t that my mother was a bad parent or didn’t love me; she just showed it in ways I couldn’t always see or feel.
She worked a job she hated, but it paid well so that she could afford to keep our house. It was far too big for the two of us, but she wanted to keep it out of spite. To prove to my father she could do it all without him. That his leaving didn’t change anything.
Of course, she made sure I had clothes that fit and that the refrigerator was never empty, and she periodically checked that my grades stayed above average. She even bought my first drum set when I was thirteen, which unexpectedly changed the course of my life forever.
I was grateful. I really was.
Knowing what Liam had gone through, turning his dad over to the police when he was a teenager and being alienated by his mom, as well as the struggles Danny and Avery had faced with the death of their dad and their difficult-to-please mother, I had been fortunate to have a semi-stable single mother who only wanted me to grow up happy and without the need for much.
She loved me by providing for me, but she was never really … there.
The four walls we lived in, the materialistic nonsense, and my absentee father didn’t matter to me. All I wanted—all I needed—was her.
And when that need had become void, I’d dreamed of a pet that never left me instead.
Sweets rested his chin on my bare thigh, just above my knee, while I lightly traced a charcoal portrait of him on my sketchpad.
My hands moved quickly, trying to take advantage of his stillness for as long as he would allow it.
I was used to stationary muses or imaginary ones.
Not a wiggly, playful subject with the attention span of a toddler.
A moment later, Sweets huffed, demanding that I throw the ball I’d tucked behind me on the couch.
Focused and desperate, I made a few more strokes to define the shape of his ears better before he suddenly stepped up into my lap and barked.
“Ahh! Fine, fine! Here you go, buddy.” I tossed the ball down the hall and waited for him to return.
A few moments later, I heard the faint pitter-patter of his paws on the hardwood above me in my bedroom, and I shook my head.
“You’re fired!” My voice echoed throughout the house as I called out to him and laughed.
Glancing back down at the paper, I noticed one of his paws had smeared the charcoal across the page before he pushed off on my leg. A perfect charcoal paw print was left behind on my thigh in a vacant spot between tattoos, and it gave me an idea.
Leaning forward, I snatched my phone off the coffee table, searched Creature Tattoo online, and called the number. It rang twice before I was connected.
“Hi. Yes, I was hoping to get in for a consult. I’d like to see Brian.
Is he accepting new clients? He is? That’s great!
Yeah, man. As soon as possible actually.
” I twirled my pencil between my fingers as I waited for him to check with the artist. The guy returned to confirm with me a few moments later.
“He’s got a spot open tomorrow? No way. That’s actually perfect.
What time? Yeah, I can make that work. Great. Thanks. I’ll see you then.”