by Avery Ford
“She’s going to be okay,” Arthur said. He stood on the other side of the table, stroking Annie’s flank. “The vet is going to be able to take care of her.”
“I don’t know,” Dmitri admitted. “I don’t know what’s going on. I’ve had bitches who had troubled pregnancies before, but she’s shutting down. Her nose is burning up.”
“It’s going to be okay.” Arthur reached across the space between them and squeezed Dmitri’s hand. Dmitri tightened his lips and met Arthur’s eye, finding strength in Arthur’s gaze that he desperately needed. “I know it’s upsetting, but it’s going to turn out just fine. We’ll get through this.”
We’ll get through this. Not you’ll. The distinction warmed Dmitri’s heart and put some of his fears to rest.
He wasn’t alone. Not now.
Arthur took his hand back, and in the next second, Dr. Gayle came into the room. He moved immediately to the examination table, not wasting any time. Dmitri had known Dr. Gayle since he’d first started at Rollins Veterinary Clinic, and he figured Dr. Gayle knew him well enough that he trusted his judgment. If Dmitri said a dog was in danger, it was.
“When did you first notice the abnormal behavior?” Dr. Gayle asked.
“Not even half an hour ago,” Dmitri replied. “She’s been lethargic throughout the pregnancy, but every bitch from her bloodline has expressed drowsiness while carrying pups. I didn’t think anything of it.”
“Can you describe what she’s been doing in the last half hour?” Dr. Gayle pressed a stethoscope to precise points on Annie’s body. He spent extra time listening to her stomach.
“She’s been curled up in a ball at my feet. She wouldn’t leave my side, which was abnormal because I had a guest over, and usually Annie is all about people. I didn’t think too much of it. She’s so close to giving birth that I figured she was just feeling clingy.”
“Anything else?”
“She’s been licking at her stomach,” Arthur said. “She was doing it the whole drive over.”
Dr. Gayle cast Arthur a brief glance, then looked back to Annie. He lifted her tail and examined her, then shook his head.
“There’s been a complication with the pregnancy,” Dr. Gayle said. “She’s preparing for the birth.”
“Is she going to be okay?” Dmitri asked. Annie was his first priority. “Is there anything we can do?”
“We’re going to deliver the puppies.” Dr. Gayle moved from the examination table to the counters that lined the room. He started to prepare. “If we act quickly, we can save them all.”
Dmitri prayed that he was right.
An hour later, seven beautiful, healthy puppies nursed from an exhausted and recovering Annie.
Dmitri couldn’t be happier.
By the look on Arthur’s face, he was certain that Arthur felt the same way.
22
Arthur
Newborn puppies were more of a handful than Arthur could have imagined. During his downtime, he visited Dmitri’s kennel to help care for them. The mess they made was a two-person job, and with four other adult dogs to care for, Arthur knew Dmitri was up to his eyeballs in work.
He was glad to help out in all the ways he could.
One day, while scrubbed up after puppy messes, Arthur’s mind wandered to Locust Hill Animal Shelter and the experiences he’d been through while there. It occurred to him in retrospect that Dmitri’s rude behavior had influenced him to consider him a bad person, but it was Celeste who’d reinforced that dislike.
While Arthur scrubbed, Dmitri was handling the puppies. They were within earshot of each other.
“You know.” Arthur spritzed the floor with nontoxic disinfectant. “I’ve been thinking a little bit.”
“Uh oh. This means trouble.” Dmitri looked up.
Arthur rolled his eyes. “No. I mean, I’ve been thinking about Locust Hill, and about Celeste. I don’t think she means to be mean, but I’m starting to think that her love of gossip is part of the reason why you and I got off on the wrong foot. I mean, aside from me embarrassing myself, and from you being an ass.”
Dmitri laughed. “Guilty.”
“But she’s been telling me things, you know? Just little things that kind of back up what I was thinking when I decided you were a bad guy.”
“There’s nothing Celeste loves more than gossip,” Dmitri said. “Sometimes I think she’s only at Locust Hill as often as she is because she wants that broad social connection, and she doesn’t know where else to get it.”
Arthur finished scrubbing and collected his cleaning supplies. The floor was going to be messy again in no more than a few hours, but the cleaner they could keep it, the better.
“I was thinking…” Arthur looked in Dmitri’s direction. “We should prank her.”
Dmitri met Arthur’s eyes with disinterest. “Are you serious?”
“No, I am.” Arthur sat back on his haunches. “Not anything too mean, and not anything that’s going to damage her. But I think, after what we went through, maybe a little payback is in order. Something fun. Something she’ll laugh about later.”
Dmitri’s expression didn’t change. “Are you five?”
“Hey!” Arthur scowled at him. “It’s been a long, long time since I pranked someone. Like, high school long.”
“If high school was a long time for you, that must mean I’m ancient.”
Arthur sighed. “I just thought that since we’ve both been so high-strung lately, it might be good to kick back with something indulgent and silly. It’s just a harmless prank. Please?”
The look on Dmitri’s face said no before his lips did. It didn’t look like he was going to budge.
“My best friend, Quip, was also my best friend in high school.” Arthur stood. He left the kennel they were in to dispose of his cleaning waste and the rubber gloves he’d been wearing. He placed the cleaning products on the shelf. “He was the class clown, and he was a low-key troublemaker. Everyone loved him, and for some reason, he latched onto me and roped me into doing all these pranks with him. It was never anything harmful.”
“Define harmful,” Dmitri said.
It was better than a no.
“I mean like… we did things like fill a teacher’s car to bursting with balloons once. One time we installed a voice modulation system into the PA system, and everyone died laughing. We made little notes to slip into library books, kind of like pieces of a treasure map, that led to a place where we’d buried a small chest filled with chocolate coins. When news hit the school that there was a treasure map hidden in pieces in the library, everyone freaked out. You’ve never seen so many books flying off the shelves.”
Dmitri’s lips curled, only slightly. Arthur grinned.
“See!” Arthur said. “You’re totally smiling. They were good, wholesome pranks. No one got hurt, there weren’t any damages, and the worst of the cleanup was dealing with putting books back on the correct shelves.”
“Did you ever get caught?” Dmitri asked.
“No.” Arthur paused. “But I think everyone knew it was us. It was kind of hard not to figure it out, you know? The class clown with the quiet, kind of understated best friend? We were the perfect pranking duo. While Quip was distracting everybody else with his antics, he could deploy me to set up the perfect pranks. Now that I’m thinking about it, I wonder if that wasn’t his motivation for friendship in the first place.”
“You think anyone would suspect us at the shelter?” Dmitri asked.
A grin grew broadly on Arthur’s face, and he hooked his fingers into the chain link that separated himself and Dmitri. “No,” he said. “I don’t think anyone would suspect us at all.”
“Then let’s get on it.” Dmitri’s eyes glimmered with mischief. “When’s your next scheduled shift?”
“Tomorrow.”
“Me too.” Dmitri set the puppies down and rose, dusting off the back of his pants. “It looks like we’ve got a lot of prep work to do, and only a short time to do it in. We
’d better get to work.”
Arthur had never seen him more pleased.
23
Dmitri
Celeste wasn’t due in until several hours after Arthur and Dmitri’s shift began. Dmitri spent his time getting work done. He saw to the dogs who needed his help the most, every now and then sneaking glances at Arthur when their paths crossed. Every time he grinned.
What they had planned was going to be great.
With the prank planned, Arthur had come to life. He glowed, and Dmitri felt all of the excited energy he put out. Doing something silly — and planning it together — had rejuvenated both of them.
It was going to be a good day.
“She’s here,” Arthur murmured as he made his way past Dmitri, a load of laundry in his arms. “Get ready.”
“I’m ready,” Dmitri promised. He had to hold back a laugh. “I can’t believe you talked me into doing this.”
“It’ll help you feel young again,” Arthur said before moving out of earshot. Even as he did, he looked over his shoulder and grinned at Dmitri.
Planning the prank had bonded them closer together, and Dmitri tried not to linger on what that meant.
Over the last week, Arthur had been stopping by his place with increasing frequency. Most of the time he helped with the puppies so Dmitri had time to pay attention to his other dogs. Sometimes, when there was no work to be done, they simply spent time together. Whether that meant watching television or having meaningless conversations that always left Dmitri feeling like he understood himself that much better, he’d been having fun.
It had been a long time since he’d had a stable friend in his life — someone who he saw with regularity, and who made an effort to hang out with him. Rachel and Harry were fantastic friends, but they’d forged their own life together, and Dmitri couldn’t expect them to drop what they were doing as a couple to cater to his loneliness.
But Arthur?
Arthur was single, and Dmitri remembered how he’d expressed his loneliness that drunken night on the front lawn of the party house. They were two kindred souls looking for the same thing and finding it in each other.
Even if Arthur never wanted anything more than a platonic relationship, Dmitri was glad to have him in his life. The bad blood between them had officially ended. Dmitri finally saw Arthur for who he was.
Charming, hard-working, and dedicated. Loyal to a fault. A little awkward, but always with his heart in the right place.
Dmitri was glad to know him.
Fifteen minutes later, Celeste entered the kennel. She headed straight for Dmitri, just like Dmitri thought she would. He finished up his session with the troubled dog he was working with and stepped out of the kennel before Celeste drew near.
“Dmitri!” Celeste called. “Hello!”
“Hey, Celeste,” Dmitri said casually. “What’s going on?”
“Oh, nothing much.” Celeste shrugged. “I was just talking with Nikki in the lobby, and it turns out that her long distance boyfriend is coming into town this weekend. How sweet is that? He’s coming all the way from Maryland to see her. It melts my heart.”
“I didn’t know she was in a relationship.” Dmitri opened his posture and did his best to smile. For what was about to happen, he needed to look as friendly and approachable as he could. “How long has that been going on for?”
“Oh, um, I think a year, actually.” Celeste pushed her mouth to the side, considering it. “I remember thinking one day last year that Nikki looked particularly happy for no reason I could figure out. I think they’d just gotten together that day.”
“I see.”
“But yeah, he’s coming into town! I’m worried that she’s getting catfished, but I guess if he’s on his way, it’s pretty legit. I asked her if she wanted me to be there when he arrives, but she said that she’s fine. I hope she knows what she’s getting into. You never know with people on the internet, you know?”
Celeste started rambling, spreading seeds of doubt about Nikki’s boyfriend’s character. Dmitri was used to it by now, and he let it all roll off his shoulders. If Nikki wanted to share what was going on in her life with him, she would. Until then, he tried not to form opinions.
Especially when people unrelated to the situation were the ones telling him what to feel.
“It’s so great for her that she’s got someone in her life like that,” Dmitri said earnestly. “I’m wishing her all the happiness in the world.”
Celeste made a face. “Really?”
“Um, yeah?” Dmitri blinked, hamming up his confusion. Putting on a sweet and innocent act and keeping a straight face was harder than it looked. He wanted to burst out laughing. “Don’t you?”
“I do, I do! But I mean, usually you don’t care at all about anything going on in other people’s lives, so it seems kind of… weird?” Celeste frowned. “I mean, it’s good, but I’m just kind of taken aback. Are you feeling okay?”
“I’m feeling great.” Dmitri’s smile grew, and he looked Celeste in the eye.
Don’t laugh. If I laugh, it’s going to fall apart before the fun even starts.
Celeste squinted, then shook her head. “Well, good. I kind of like this side of you, Dmitri. It’s refreshing to see you having a good time and being positive instead of walling yourself off and shutting other people out. What happened?”
“Oh, that’s not important.”
“No, I’m pretty sure it is. Something good must have happened. You want to share?”
“I—”
Dmitri stopped when he saw Arthur come in through the door in a fury. The door slammed in his wake, and Celeste jumped and turned around. Some of the dogs started to bark, but the barking ended quickly enough — the atmosphere in the room had changed.
Arthur looked like he was about to murder somebody.
“Dmitri.” Arthur’s voice rang out through the kennel, furious. Celeste looked at Dmitri with wide eyes and pushed her back against one of the kennel doors as Arthur made a clear path straight to Dmitri. “What the hell do you think you’re doing?”
“I’m volunteering at the shelter, like I always do,” Dmitri said, meek. “I don’t understand. What’s the problem?”
“You know what the problem is!” Arthur reached Dmitri, grabbing him by the front of the shirt. Celeste gasped. “You fucking know what the problem is. Do you think I wouldn’t catch on? Do you think I wouldn’t know?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Dmitri said innocently. More than ever he wanted to dissolve into laughter, but he couldn’t let on just yet what was really going on.
“Don’t even pretend that you’re innocent!” Arthur bellowed. He shoved at Dmitri’s chest, and Dmitri theatrically took a few staggered steps backward. “I know exactly what you did, you literal piece of scum!”
“Arthur, that’s not nice of you to say,” Dmitri said. He never rose to the offensive, letting Arthur steer the course of the conversation with his anger.
“And you think what you did to me was nice?” Arthur demanded. His eyes were narrowed slits of rage, but Dmitri saw right through his act. Arthur’s voice trembled, but it wasn’t from anger — he was holding back laughter, too. “You think that I enjoyed what you did to me? You bastard.”
“Guys,” Celeste said in a small voice. “Guys, maybe you should calm down, you know? We’re still in the shelter, and… and you should probably take whatever problems you have outside.”
“I don’t care where I take him,” Arthur hissed. “Inside, outside, or in fucking space. I’m going to take him, and I’m going to take him hard.”
The innuendo wasn’t lost on Dmitri. He bit the inside of his lip as arousal rushed through him. Ever since their kiss, the passion between them had cooled off, but his attraction to Arthur hadn’t.
“That’s not right, Arthur,” Dmitri said, as timid and innocent as ever. “Why don’t we go about this calmly? Let me take you somewhere quiet, and we can butt heads there, okay?”
&nbs
p; A flash passed through Arthur’s eyes, and Dmitri was pretty sure he’d clued into the subtle flirtation.
“I want to butt heads with you right here,” Arthur said, jaw clenched. The anger rolled off him in waves. “I’m not going to wait. I need you to give in to me right now. I don’t want to work this out. The only thing I want to do is work my frustrations out on you, you selfish, arrogant, prick.”
The duplicity of their words thrilled Dmitri. Celeste heard a fight, and she likely read nothing more than that into what they were saying. Dmitri read something else entirely.
He wasn’t sure if Arthur was coming on to him because it was fun, or because he really meant it. If they weren’t currently engaged in acting, Dmitri would have kissed him hard and found out for himself.
“I didn’t do anything.” Dmitri lifted both hands, palms toward Arthur.
“You didn’t do anything, my ass.”
Dmitri would do plenty to Arthur’s ass, given the chance.
“Guys, I’m—” Celeste tried, but Arthur cut her off.
“No. Forget about it. He’s not worth my time. He can kiss my ass if he thinks I’m giving in to him and forgetting about what happened.”
“I wish we could work this out,” Dmitri said softly.
Arthur shot him a look of pure venom. It almost made Dmitri laugh out loud. To see Arthur’s face scrunched with rage was so unlike him that it was comical.
“Well, we can’t, so get over it. I’m out.” Arthur stormed past Dmitri and let himself out through the back door. It slammed shut.
For a second, Celeste stood in stunned disbelief. Then she looked at Dmitri, eyes wide. “What happened?”
“I think he’s upset because I left three seconds on the microwave,” Dmitri admitted with a sigh. He dropped his gaze, mocking disappointment in himself. “I should have been more conscientious. I’m such a terrible person.”