Page 18 of Puck Daddies
The manager nods at me from the office window and points to the whiteboard. The morning list is already up. Kennel clean. Laundry. Dishes. Walks rotation. Intake at nine. Familiar, ordered, doable. Perfect.
I almost pull my phone before I start, thumb hovering over Meg’s name. The text I almost send is not long:Last night meant more than I can say.Or shorter:I’m not okay. In the good way.Or stupider:I keep thinking about your laugh right before we got started.
I don’t send any of them. I tuck the phone back in my pocket. I pick up a scoop. I start where I always start.
Clean water first. I move down the line, empty, rinse, refill, set down, slide to the next. Dogs watch me with the same look people do when they’re waiting for a thing and trying to be cool about it.
I talk to them without thinking.Hey, buddy. Morning. I see you. Hold on, I got you.It sounds silly out loud. It’s not silly to them. Some of them have barely heard a kind word.
By the time I hit the fifth kennel, my breath is lined up with the work. Pour, wipe, swap towel, tuck, latch. The muscle memorytakes over. The part of my brain that keeps replaying last night finally goes a little quiet. Not erased. Just far enough away that I can see straight. I hang on to that.
The anxious hound from last week stands up when I pass and sits immediately when he notices he did a big action. I crouch. “Hey, Brownie,” I say, low. It’s not his name—we don’t know it. He was abandoned here. But he’s brown, so it works for now.
He inches forward, decides that’s too brave, inches back. I put the water down and slide my hand under the opening like a question mark. After a minute, his nose bumps my knuckles and he exhales. I hum one note.
It’s instinct these days. Nothing more. I don’t have more to give than the occasional hum. Lost my real voice years ago, thanks to a virus that lodged in my throat and stole my tenor opera career.
He licks my thumb once and retreats like he didn’t mean to. Fine. We’ll count it. Brownie is coming around. I hum a little more, and it seems to put him at ease.
My brain tries to fill the empty with her name. I don’t let it. I keep my eyes on the sink. I keep my hands in the water. The animals in this building ask for nothing except what they need. Easy to be the person who can give that when the ask is simple and immediate.
Food. Clean. Walk. Warm. Hum a tune now and then.
Intake arrives early. A pair of dogs with the same head and different bodies. Somebody writes their weights on a clipboard. Somebody else checks ears, eyes, teeth. I hold the leash for a minute and rub the spot behind the bigger one’s shoulder blades because I know little tricks about where bodies store worry. The manager nods me toward the laundry and I go there nextbecause there’s a rhythm to it that could hypnotize you if you’re tired enough. Wouldn’t mind being hypnotized right about now.
I almost call her again, between loads, when the room is just machines and me and the sound my brain makes when it’s left alone. I take the phone out. I put it back. What would I say?We can’t do that again, maybe, in the same breath asI would say yes if you asked. Both true. None of my business to make the first one into a rule without her. Not my job to ask for the second. I swallow and keep folding.
For a while, it works. It really does. Space opens between now and last night. The dogs need me more than my head does, and that’s a relief. I put water where water goes and blankets where blankets go, and I saygood dogto faces that look like they want to believe me.
When I pull out my phone at noon to check the time, there’s a text from Meg. It’s not a paragraph. It’s a bee. Yellow and dumb and perfect. I feel something in my chest unclench and then clench again. I typebuzzand delete it. Smile emoji? A rose? A heart? No. I send nothing. There’s nothing I can say right now that can’t be misconstrued.
I put the phone away and finish the round like a person who knows dogs remember if you stop in the middle.
By early afternoon, the to-do list is shorter. The whiteboard looks friendlier. The laundry is mostly folded. The bowls sparkle in a way only stainless steel can. Brownie is asleep with his nose tucked under his paw. I hum again as I pass, and he doesn’t wake up. That feels like a win I can keep.
I clock out by signing the clipboard again. The manager gives me a look that could be a question and I give a thumbs-up thatmeans “I’ll be back.” I step outside, and the air is different, softer. My phone buzzes once.
Hudson:Home?
Me:On my way.
Walking back into our hallway feels strange and also normal.
Inside, it smells like whatever Hudson cooked this morning and the lemon cleaner he uses when he’s pretending to calm down. He’s on the couch with his feet on the table and a look on his face like he’s talked himself down from a ladder. The TV is on mute. The closed captions mention a local council vote.
“Hey,” he says.
“Hey,” I say back. I kick off my shoes because noise feels like the wrong choice. I hang my hoodie on the hook. Meg will have to take the hoodie she stole into her room, since there are no more available hooks. I kind of like that idea. I keep my hands busy with small straightening that doesn’t need doing.
He watches me do the ritual. When I sit, he gives it a breath. “You good with her staying?” We had this conversation before, which means it’s eating at him.
I look at the TV because it’s easier than looking at him. “Yeah. Of course.”
“Okay,” he says. He nods like that was expected. He taps his thumb against his kneecap twice. The room records both little lies and keeps them to itself. “Me too.”
We sit in it. Let it be what it is. Two men who know exactly what last night meant, pretending we’re built to hold the after withoutleaking emotions. We are and we aren’t. It doesn’t matter. She needs a place to sleep. We can both do that part.
“Deliveries?” I ask, because asking about his route lets him talk about something he knows how to finish.
