| Puppy Drabble Series Updated Again | [Oct. 25th, 2008|03:25 pm] |
Here is the next installment in the story about Season Five and the puppy. This story begins here and links along.
Thank you to ![[info]](https://www.insanejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif) xie_xie_xie (not her real name) for typing this for me finally.
Homing Instinct
By Rebel
It took me weeks to find a place, even with my mom's help. Finding somewhere that allowed dogs at all was tough. Forget something with a yard and enough light and space that I could use it as a studio.
I found a loft on my own, in a neighborhood that would have given my mother a heart attack, but they said no pets and the stairs would have been hard on the puppy, anyway. So we kept looking.
I was trying one day, for the millionth time, to think of a name for my puppy, when my phone rang.
Unspoken
By Rebel
"Hey." It was Brian, his voice silky as ever.
We'd kept seeing each other, sort of – at the diner, at Debbie's, at the comic book store. I was at Michael's one night, letting the puppy play in his yard with a neighbor's dog, when Brian stopped by.
I'd gone home with him that night, but it was hard to be at the loft with him. I don't know why; he was gentle and tender in a way he hadn't been for a long time before I moved out.
He even petted the dog, and acted like he'd missed us both.
The Morning After
By Rebel
He asked me to come over, and I did. It was like it always was: a little comforting, a little painful. In the morning, the puppy was curled up on my jeans, next to the bed. I gave his head a scratch, then turned over.
Brian looked at me. "You still haven't named him?"
I shook my head. "I can't think of the right name."
He lit a cigarette, and blew out a thin stream of smoke. "You used to be pretty good at names."
"Everything seems so banal, or just not him."
Brian laughed. "I know what you mean."
Thinking
By Rebel
I left when I took the puppy for a walk. Brian seemed surprised, or maybe not; he always hid his feelings pretty well. It was a long walk from the loft to Debbie's; I stopped and got a coffee to-go when we were around halfway there, and sat on a bench in the park, watching him play with two other dogs. I couldn't decide if I felt contented, or lonely.
My mom had called twice the night before, so I called her back.
"I have a place for you to look at," she said, sounding happy. "I'll pick you up."
The Place
By Rebel
It wasn't really a house, but almost. If it had been cuter, you might have called it a cottage or a bungalow, but it was more like a glorified shed. There was an old brick patio, uneven and broken from too many freezes and thaws. There was a fence around a small back yard, mostly mud and weeds, and a few unhappy shrubs.
The leafless trees in the yard let in more than enough light. It was just one room, not even that big, but it had a lock on the door, a place to cook, and room to paint.
Decision
By Rebel
I'd left the puppy at Debbie's, but I stood in the yard and imagined him there. I smiled.
"I thought you'd like it." My mom looked pretty happy herself; it wasn't a bad neighborhood, just a few blocks from PIFA, in fact. It was cheap and clean and I decided it was going to be mine.
"The landlord's okay with the dog?"
She nodded. "He has dogs himself, and his previous tenant here had a dog. That's who built the fence."
"Let's do it, then." We walked back to the car and went to the office to sign the lease.
Trouble
By Rebel
I'd given a pretty big piece of my Rage savings to the rental agency, so my mom bought me lunch. After she dropped me at Debbie's, I ran inside to get my puppy, thinking yet again that I really had to come up with some kind of name for him. But his crate door was open, and he wasn't inside.
I checked the yard, but he wasn't there. I noticed his leash and collar were gone, too, so I figured Debbie had taken him for a walk.
But she hadn't. She'd gone out looking for him, because he was gone.
Missing
By Rebel
"What do you mean, he got out?" I was staring at Debbie, who was holding his leash and collar in her right hand.
"He was whining, so I let him into the yard while I did the dishes. When I went out to get him, he'd dug out under the fence." She pointed to a little gap between the grass and the fence. Just big enough for a puppy to fit through.
I sat down, hard, on the kitchen chair. "Where would he go?"
"Looking for you, I guess." She sat down. "Michael and Ben are coming to help look."
Continued here...
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