The Art of Wag (27 page)

Chapter 12

R
ob carried the crate up the stairs to Tracy’s apartment while she carried Roxy. She put Roxy on the floor and opened the door. “We’re home, Roxy!” The dog ran into the apartment and across the floor to her food bowl. She examined the empty dish and looked up at Tracy in disgust.

Tracy walked to the kitchen and dispensed some dog food. “Fine. Here you go.”

Rob put down the crate, sat down on the sofa, and looked around the room. “Where do you sleep?”

“You’re sitting on it. It’s a fold-out couch, but usually I don’t bother, since the hinges are sort of broken.”

“Sort of? Isn’t something either broken or not?”

“I use an old lock to latch it together. It mostly works.” Sometimes. When she could find the lock.

He looked down at the couch. “I see why you were impressed with the beds in the H12. Do you want me to take a look at it?”

Tracy sat down next to him. “You don’t have to. It’s been this way forever. I’m not worried about it.” She put her arms around his neck. “And you seem overdressed.”

He pushed her back onto the couch and slid his hands under her shirt and alongside her body, pushing the fabric up. “So do you.”

A few minutes later, they fell off the couch onto the floor with a resounding thud. Roxy barked and walked over to the complicated pile of humans to investigate. Tracy sat up and pushed Roxy’s nose away. “Go away Roxy. Ouch. That hurt. I’m glad the store is closed. Shoppers probably don’t appreciate loud upstairs neighbors. Not to mention my mom. Ugh.”

Rob stretched out a leg and rubbed at his hip. “I hate to complain, but you have a furniture problem.”

“I know. There isn’t any. And what’s here is decomposing. It’s trying to return to the land.” Tracy gripped his arm. “Hey, I just realized something. You owe me money. I could buy a bed! Or at least a new couch.”

“I vote for the bed.”

“Would you settle for a futon? I need a place to sit and watch TV too. There’s not enough space for both a bed and a couch in here.”

“I noticed. Where are my pants?”

Tracy pointed to a heap of cloth on the floor. “Over there.”

Rob reached over and extracted a piece of paper from a pocket. “I did a spreadsheet of the hours you worked. I was going to show it to you, but I forgot.”

“A spreadsheet? Sometimes I wonder about you.”

“I wanted to keep track.”

Tracy looked at the numbers. “Wow. I can so afford a futon.” She smiled. “I’m going to pick up the freebie classified newspaper on my way to work tomorrow and look at furniture ads.”

“What if you got a new futon? One that no one else has actually slept on. Or sat on. Or done anything else on.”

She scowled. “Maybe. I haven’t looked at anything new in a long time. I don’t know what it would cost.”

Rob wrapped his arms around her and kissed her. “I think it would be worth it.” He looked down at the floor. “I feel like I’m sitting in a sandbox. And I think there’s a chew toy digging into my—-me.”

She peered around his body “That’s gotta hurt.”

Rob stood up and reached for his pants. “It’s getting late. I should probably go back to the H12 and clean up the room. We left it kind of a mess.”

Tracy stood up and put her arms around him. “I could help.”

“Will Roxy be okay here by herself?”

“Sure. A lot of times, she sleeps in her crate at night anyway.” Tracy reached for her shirt. “I’ll just take her for her bedtime walk first. Then we can leave. She’ll never know the difference.”

After walking Roxy and stowing her in the crate, Tracy and Rob went down the stairs to the street. As Tracy was locking the downstairs door, a low howl arose from upstairs. She looked at Rob. “I guess this really shows how little I get out. Roxy is in her crate, so she knows I’m leaving for the night.” The howling continued rising in pitch and was punctuated by barking and yipping as Roxy worked herself into an exceptional vocal frenzy.

Rob looked at Tracy. “It’s hard to believe something that small can make so much noise.”

“When it comes to changes in her routine, Roxy likes to express her opinion.”

He cupped her face with both hands and kissed her. “I think you need to attend to Roxy. If she keeps that up, someone is going to call whatever law enforcement there is here. I’ll see you tomorrow.”

Tracy wrapped her arms around him and hugged hard. “This has been such a—I don’t even know what kind of day. But I wish you weren’t leaving. I’ll call around for futon prices at lunch. Promise.”

“I’ll come by the clinic at three and bring your check.”

Tracy released him from the hug and held one of his hands. “See you.”

He let go of her hand and began walking down the sidewalk, but Tracy didn’t move. As the traffic light flashed red, she stared at his retreating form, pondering the various intricacies of his body that she’d spent quite a lot of time exploring earlier. Halfway down the block, he turned and looked back at her. “Go deal with your dog. I can hear her from here!”

Startled into motion, Tracy waved and turned to unlock the door. She ran up the stairs and opened the door to the apartment. Roxy stood in her crate, completely silent. Tracy walked over to the dog and crouched down in front of her. “You are really putting a damper on my social life, you know.”

Since she was already way too awake with frustrated hormones jangling everywhere, Tracy decided to clean up a little. By midnight, almost everything was off the floor, except for big things like the paint box, which didn’t really have a place to go. Now that she could see it again, Tracy even swept and mopped the floor.

She looked down at Roxy, who was sleeping happily in her crate. “This is all your fault. I hate cleaning.” Tracy swished the brackish water in the bucket with the mop. “Maybe it was a little dirty. But not
sandbox
dirty. I mean, come on. I do have a few standards.” Roxy lifted her head and stared at her sleepily. “Okay. Maybe not.”

The next morning, the alarm rang painfully early. Tracy dragged herself out of bed and managed to get to the clinic on time. Barely. She began cleaning kennels and preparing for the day. Dr. Cassidy walked in and worked on setting up her surgery station.

Tracy pulled some surgery packs out of the autoclave and set them aside. She walked over to the vet. “I saw on the schedule that we have some new appointments in there that weren’t there on Saturday. What happened? We’re double-booked for a couple of slots and I would really like to leave on time today. Would it be okay if I try to move some stuff around?”

Dr. C looked up. “Yes. Call the ones getting just vaccinations and see if they can reschedule to later in the week. I came in to do an emergency surgery on a cat yesterday and he’s coming in again for a follow-up so I can take a look. And then someone else called with a basset who probably has an ear infection. The poor guy sounds really unhappy. Lots of head shaking.”

“Okay, I’ll get on it.”

“You look tired. How was the meeting? Did it go well?”

Tracy shook her head. “I don’t know. It’s hard to say. I stayed up too late cleaning my apartment, so I’m sort of tired.”

“Cleaning? Really?”

“You don’t have to look so surprised. I clean. It’s not
that
unusual.” Yes it was. And it wasn’t the only reason she was tired.

After chatting with what seemed like half of the answering machines in Alpine Grove, Tracy managed to communicate with enough people to reschedule several appointments, so when Rob came by at three, she was ready to leave. She waved to him in the lobby, unsnapped her dog-hair-covered scrub jacket, and hung it on a hook.

He leaned on the counter. “So did you call about futons?”

“Yes. I found a great one. And it’s on sale!”

“I’m happy to hear that. On another note, it’s a beautiful day out there.” He held out his keys. “Here you go.”

Tracy’s eyes widened. “Ohmigod!” She snatched the keys from his hand and ran out the door. She opened the car, crawled into the plush interior, and reached over to unlock the passenger door.

Rob got in the car. “Be nice. This is not The Turd.”

“I can be nice.” After putting on her seat belt and adjusting the seats and mirrors, she put the car in neutral and turned the key. The car purred to life and idled quietly. “Wow. Just wow.” She leaned over to Rob and gave him a kiss. “I’m glad to see you too.”

“Thanks for noticing I’m here.”

Tracy put the car in gear and drove slowly through Alpine Grove, carefully shifting gears, getting the feel for the clutch and the car’s steering. She headed out toward the long rural road that once was used by farmers taking their wares to the marketplace to be sold. The aptly named Farm to Market Road wound around through the hills with lots of fun dips and valleys. For someone who loved to drive, it was the perfect automotive playground.

Rob was right; it was a gorgeous fall day, probably one of the last of the season. The afternoon sun streamed through the trees as Tracy cruised along the deserted pavement. The Honda was just as much fun to drive as she had anticipated. She opened the moon roof and let the air stream through the car.

Rob pointed at a road off to the right. “I went that way earlier. There’s a pretty little park back in there. I guess it’s a memorial or something.”

Tracy nodded. “Yes. Teenagers also go there late at night to drink beer and make out.”

“That wasn’t in the brochure.”

She flashed a grin at him. “It never is.”

After an exhilarating drive through the hills, Tracy returned to Alpine Grove, deposited her check at the bank, and parked in front of the furniture store. “Let’s buy me a futon!”

Rob got out of the car. “I get to witness a special moment here. You buying
new
furniture.”

“Don’t get used to it. My financial picture is rarely this good. I might even buy a new box of cereal.”

“I think we ate all the Cap’n Crunch.”

After spending some time sitting on the new futon to try it out, Tracy paid for it and asked the store to deliver it to her place that evening.

They got back into the car and Rob drove to Tracy’s apartment. Tracy reclined in the passenger seat and reached out to stroke the back of his hand on the gear shift. “That was the best drive ever. Thank you.”

“You’re welcome. I’ve never seen anyone enjoy driving a car quite so much.”

Tracy sighed. “I would love to go on a long multi-state road trip. Maybe even all the way across the country. The farthest I’ve ever gone was to LA. In The Turd. Which is just sad.”

Rob shifted gears and reached over to hold her hand. “Well, I can’t argue that The Turd is sad, but I’m sure you’ll take a road trip someday.”

“With all that extra cash I have lying around? I haven’t gone anywhere in years. I haven’t had a vacation, unless you count when I was unemployed. Which I don’t, because in case you’re wondering, unemployment and vacation are definitely not the same thing.”

“Today is the first day I have really been on vacation since—-well, I’m not sure exactly. I’ve done a lot of traveling, but traveling for work isn’t a lot of fun. Or at least for the type of work I do. Standing on top of a big-box store in North Dakota in January is not an experience I’d like to repeat.”

Tracy released Rob’s hand so he could shift gears. “Okay, you win the ‘most likely to get frostbite’ award. What were you doing?”

“Chain stores have to send their sales to the home office. Something in the network was broken and I fixed it.”

She stroked the back of his hand again. “Yuck.”

“That pretty much sums it up.”

They arrived at her apartment and walked up to collect Roxy. The dachshund apparently had not been pleased about the delay in being let out, and most of Tracy’s pots and pans were scattered on the floor.

Rob surveyed the array of kitchenware. “I thought you said you cleaned.” He pointed at the kitchen. “I think you missed a spot.”

Tracy picked up Roxy and clipped on her leash. “Let’s go.” She turned the dog’s head toward her face. “I’m not happy with you, little dog.”

After a short walk, they returned to the apartment. Tracy decided to put Roxy in a “time-out” in the crate while she put her pots and pans back in the cabinets. Again.

Rob handed her a saucepan. “It does look a lot better in here. The floor is even clean.”

“I couldn’t sleep after you left.”

He put a frying pan on the counter and took her in his arms. “I missed you.”

She looked into his eyes, took off his glasses, and put them on the counter. “I missed you too. After spending so much time together, it just felt strange not being with you all of a sudden.”

“I know.” He kissed her lips, then her earlobe, and whispered, “I couldn’t sleep either. You’ll be happy to hear that room 2 at the H12 is a lot cleaner now too.”

A knock at the door triggered frantic barking from Roxy and startled Tracy out of her dreamy languor. Rob leaped away from her, looking disturbed. She smiled at his expression. “That sure killed the mood. But it could be the new futon!”

Tracy let in two burly men in blue coveralls who took away the old couch and plunked the new futon down in its place. After they left, Tracy grabbed both of Rob’s hands and took a few steps back across the floor, dragging him to the futon. She fell backward onto it, and although he made a valiant effort not to crash-land and crush her, she pulled him down on top of her anyway. “I think we need to try this out. How do you feel about leaving the H12 and staying here?”