Page 13 of The Fantastic Fluke

She looked the bag over, then up at him. “Oh, you’re going to be fun, aren’t you?” She looked over at me. “Do you have a budget?”

I looked at her, then down at the food.

My shop, I reminded myself.

My father wasn’t paying me minimum wage anymore. I owned the bookstore. Technically, all the shop’s revenue was mine. It wasn’t enough to go buying caviar and a brand-new car, but how expensive could dog food be?

More expensive than my own food, I suspected.

I sighed and shook my head. “As long as it doesn’t cost twice as much as what I’d pay feeding him my own lunch, I’ll figure it out.”

She gave another musical laugh and nodded at foxy. “Excellent choice, friend. Well done.”

Foxy sat down, curling his tail around his feet and lifting his chin in the air like a self-satisfied cat or a pleased monarch surveying his kingdom.

“So he hasn’t given you his name yet?” she asked as she went back behind the counter. “It’s okay, we’ll just put the order under your name until we know.”

I figured the order should go under my name anyway since however expensive it was, I was the one paying. But it was kind of sweet. His food, his order. “I don’t have a name. I’ve just been calling him foxy. He doesn’t seem to mind it.”

She kept smiling at me like I was a puppy who’d gone on the newspaper instead of the carpet, and I couldn’t decide if that was nice or really insulting. Insulting, probably, but whatever. At least she wasn’t berating me for giving foxy a sandwich.

Fifteen minutes later, I had a standing order of foxy food set up to be picked up biweekly, a huge bag for the next two weeks, and assorted dishes, treats, and toys Sapphire said foxy needed.

Also, a braided rope toy foxy himself had decided he wanted.

You never wanted a dog, some small corner of my brain taunted me as I paid the bill, almost half as much as the licensing fee I still had to pay.

Beez slipped a hand around my shoulder. “It’s good to see you doing something that’ll make you happy for a change.”

“It’s not making my bank account happy,” I whined.

She leaned against me. “We’ll figure that out. Meanwhile, a fox has to eat.”

“Meanwhile, I have to eat,” I answered back. “And if you’re asking me for a favor, you’re so buying me a sandwich and not just coffee.”

Beez carried the bag of dishes and toys—except the precious braided rope, which foxy didn’t want to relinquish—while I carried the twenty-pound bag of food. I looked down at foxy accusingly. “You eat a lot.”

“Says the man demanding a sandwich,” Beez shot back. She leaned down and crooned to foxy, “Don’t you worry, baby boy, Auntie Beez will take care of you. This coffee shop even sells doggie biscuits. I’ll bet you’d like one of those.”

Foxy squinted up at her, head and tail held high, and I swear, smiling. It was kind of hard to be annoyed, even weighed down by twenty pounds of kibble. At least I didn’t have to worry about hurting him by feeding him sandwiches anymore.

The coffee shop was nice enough, if a little sterile. Maybe that’s why I liked Starbucks, with all its dark wood and homey furniture. Voices there were always muffled, while at this place, they carried weirdly. It was decorated in black and silver, like one of those diners they’d thought was futuristic in the fifties. Did that make it retro-futuristic?

Foxy stopped just inside the door, looking around, his tail drooping toward the floor and head ducked. A woman in line took a step back from him, nervous, and guilt shot through me. Technically, if foxy were a familiar, I was allowed to take him wherever I liked, presuming I didn’t work in food service. Even if everyone was acting like he was, though, foxy wasn’t my familiar. It really skirted a line, ethically, and I didn’t like it.

I stepped in close to him, to show how harmless he was, and looked over at Beez. “We’re gonna go sit down, okay?”

She waved me off. “Go, sit, put the giant bag of fox food down, take a break. I promise not to get you tofu.”

I glared at her before turning toward the front seating. “Why would anyone put tofu in a sandwich?”

Foxy settled in next to me on the tiled floor, chewing on one knotted end of his toy, but his posture wasn’t as casual as it had previously been. Obviously, retro-futuristic diners weren’t his thing either. I ran an absent hand through the fur on his back, trying to reclaim the calm from Fetch. Now that was a shop I could hang out in. I wondered if Beez would be willing to go back to eat at the book shop.

With Dad, who definitely wouldn’t give me a moment’s peace after leaving in the middle of the day.

Maybe not.

I glanced over at the front of the bookshop, where it took up most of the block on the opposite side of the street. There was no one there. I didn’t expect anyone. Often, I didn’t get any customers at all until after three on Thursdays. It wasn’t prime shopping time. So why did I feel so guilty about walking away?

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