Let's Be Frank

by Brea Brown

  “Wait. There’s more.”

  I close my eyes and count to three, then open them and smile indulgently at Wilma. What’s another couple of minutes, right? At least then I can pretend I kept an open mind, and she can say she tried her best.

  Again, she steps to the front of Reba’s cage and taps the laminated card attached to the door by the latch. “Today’s Reba’s last day.”

  I gulp, hoping she doesn’t mean what I think she means. “Last day?”

  “Yeah. We can’t keep her any longer. If we don’t find someone to adopt her—someone with a nice yard and a high fence and someone who can keep her on a tight leash—then… Well, we’ll have to put her down.”

  Now I look more closely at Reba. She gazes balefully up at me, her chin resting on her paws, as if she knows what we’re talking about. My heart lurches.

  Desperately, I gesture to the family walking out with the pug. “Wait! Tell them Reba’s story. They’ll take her, I bet.”

  “Looks like they’ve already set their hearts on a different dog,” Wilma observes, waving at them and smiling. “Congratulations on your new family member!” she calls cheerfully to them before turning back to me with a somber frown.

  I point to Sherlock. “I already have my heart set on a different dog, too. And you knew that up-front. What’s the deal with the hard sell?”

  She shrugs. “I don’t know. I can tell you’re a nice, sensitive guy—”

  I snort.

  “And you may think Sherlock’s the only dog for you, but he’ll fit in with a hundred families. Reba’s… special. She needs someone special. And I could tell you were that someone as soon as you ran through the door.”

  Now I know the woman’s crazy, but before I can say, “No,” again, she implores, “Look at her! She’s sorry for being so much trouble, but with the right owner, she’ll be perfect.” Moving closer to me and lowering her voice, although we’re the only two people in the room, she says, “Between you and me, I think the little girls in the family who had her before kept leaving the back gate open and letting Reba out, then blaming the dog.”

  “That’s sad, but—”

  “It is! Reba was only doing what was natural, exploring.”

  I rub the back of my neck. “Listen, Wilma, I think it’s sweet that you’re lobbying so hard for Reba, but she’s not what I had in mind. It sounds like you’re pretty fond of her, though. Why don’t you take her home?”

  Her face hardens. “She’s not what you had in mind? She’s a living creature, not a china pattern.” With a subtle head-bob, her tight curls quiver. “And for your information, I’d take her home in a heartbeat, but I already have three dogs and two cats. It would be irresponsible of me to take on any more pets. But you… you sound like you have plenty of love and room at your place. And you’ve thought through your adoption and will be a wonderful, responsible dog owner.”

  I puff out my chest and stand at my full height. “I… I have thought a lot about it. I purposely bought a dog-friendly house with a fenced yard so I could get a dog. But not that dog.” I nod at Reba.

  “Please, I couldn’t bear it if they had to put her to sleep,” Wilma begs.

  “Are you like this with all the animals? How do you work here if you get so attached?”

  “It’s not all of the animals; but this one is special. It’s not her fault she’s here. She’s a sweet dog!”

  “We’ve established that, but…” I shift from foot to foot. “You have the rest of the day to adopt her out. It’s Saturday; I’m sure it’ll be busy later, and you’ll find someone.”

  Her eyes fill. “I don’t think so. We’ve had her three Saturdays now. Everyone wants a Lab. Or a puppy.”

  Helplessly, I look back and forth from Wilma to Reba and back. Reba lifts her head and cocks it at me, as if to say, “Please?” Oh, gosh. She is really cute when she does that.

  I consider taking home both Sherlock and Reba but instantly know it won’t work. Taking care of one dog is going to be enough of a stretch, especially on weekends when I work double shifts at Urgent Care. And I want to do this dog ownership thing right, which is expensive. I can’t afford two dogs.

  Like a true glutton for punishment, I study Reba. Her strawberry-blonde fur is thick and shiny. The white ring around her shoulders and chest is bright and contrasts nicely with the rest of her fur. Her dark brown eyes shine, hinting at a playful personality. Suddenly, I get a horrifying flash of her lifeless body on a steel table somewhere cold and sad on the premises.

  Toward my shoes, I mutter, “Eff me.”

  Wilma grasps my upper arm as if I’ve uttered a romantic marriage proposal. “You’ll take her, won’t you? She’ll be grateful to you forever and love you for it, you’ll see.”

  “That hasn’t been my experience,” I blurt but smile into Wilma’s suddenly-dry eyes. “Yes. I guess I’ll take her.”

  Before my agreement is even fully out, Wilma unclips a leash from the chain link of Reba’s cage and opens the door just wide enough to snake her arm through. Reba, as if in on the plan all along, jumps to her stumpy legs and waddles within arm’s reach, obediently standing and waiting for the sound of the metal clasp closing on the ring on her collar.

  “Let’s get your paperwork filled out and get you on your way,” Wilma suggests brightly, widening the opening to the pen and tugging gently on Reba’s leash to get her moving. She hands the nylon strap to me. “There you go, Dad.”

  Automatically, I grasp it. Reba, pulling the leash taut and yanking me forward, cheerfully follows no-nonsense, business-like Wilma. On my way past Sherlock, I give him one final, longing look, all my manly dog fantasies evaporating like fog on a hot, sunny morning. He gives me a parting endorsement bark, as if to reassure me I made the right decision.

  I’m starting to think word is getting around among females of all species that I’m the world’s biggest pushover. Or maybe they can spot me coming from the length of Lambeau Field.

  *****

  “First things first. Your name. It’s gotta go. I’m a modern, enlightened guy, but if you have a habit of getting loose, I can’t be heard calling for ‘Reba.’ People will think… Well, I don’t know. That I like country music, or something.”

  The Dog-Soon-to-be-Formerly-Known-as-Reba blinks at me, obviously bored with this conversation. I set a bowl of water in front of her on the floor, then lean against the kitchen counter. While I consider naming options, she laps lazily at her refreshment. I must say, I’m starting to think Wilma made up this dog’s backstory. I can’t imagine the Corgi doing anything close to running. She used up all of her pep at the shelter. Since we’ve been home, she’s barely shown interest in anything more energetic than sniffing her new environment.

  I cross my legs at my ankles and my arms over my chest. “So… let’s go a little less country and a little more rock-n-roll, shall we? Or even hip-hop. Shorty. Shorty’s a good name. And quite fitting. You wanna be my Shorty?”

  She collapses to the kitchen floor, which in her case means she lowers herself about three inches, her chin resting on the edge of her water bowl, as if she’s humoring me with this conversation.

  “Is ‘Shorty’ insulting? I didn’t realize dogs were concerned with political correctness. Okay. You want something that sounds like your current name but doesn’t make me want to wear a paper bag over my head every time I have to say it? Amoeba? Nah. Zebra? Tebow? No? Well, we can come back to the name thing later. I’m sure I’ll think of something in the shower. That’s where I do all my best thinking. But we have plenty of time to learn those intimate things about each other.”

  Her eyes droop, and she heaves a great sigh before wiggling her head, obviously trying to make herself comfortable.

  “Hey, I know!” I say, startling her awake. “Why don’t I give you a tour of the place? You should make yourself at home, you know. Like, I have a doggy bed for you, and everything. You don’t have to sleep on the kitchen floor.”

  She doesn’t rise but give
s me a huge yawn.

  “Here. I know you’re tired. I’ll just show you the basics for now.” I gesture to the flap at the bottom of the door that leads from the kitchen into the backyard. “That’s for you. You can use it as many times a day as you like. Out there is the yard, where you’ll do your business. Outside. Not inside. That’s one of the few rules I’m going to have. You can’t poop and pee in here.”

  Having said that, I don’t know what I’ll do if she does relieve herself in the house. I’m never taking her back to that shelter. And I’m not exactly the type of guy who kicks or beats his dog. I can tell by looking at Reba that she knows I’m a sucker with no actions to back up my tough talk, too. “I’ll think of something, trust me,” I answer her unspoken challenge. “No treats, or something. Just do me a favor and don’t test me, alright? Pooping outside is awesome. You’ll love it.”

  Clearing my throat, I push away from the counter and walk through the dining and living rooms and down the hall to my bedroom. When she doesn’t immediately follow, I whistle and try, “Here, Jane,” thinking a nice, generic name will suffice for now.

  My call gets nothing.

  I sigh. “Reba, come.” Immediately, I hear the clack of nails on the hardwood floor, and she appears around the corner, her tiny legs working in a blur to get her to me not-so-quickly.

  When she finally stops at my feet, I say, “Listen… I know you’ve had the name Reba for three years now. But whoever did that to you wasn’t a nice person. So, we’re going to change it. You’ll have to get used to answering to something else. When you hear me whistle, come, no matter what I call you. You’ll get the hang of it.” To soften the news, I give her a scratch behind her ears.

  She grunts and slides to the ground, rolling onto her back.

  I laugh. “Maybe later. I mean, we just met. You don’t want to get a reputation, do you?”

  She remains posed with her legs in the air—or as far in the air as they can get. I have to admit, I like this a lot better than the hard-to-get act she put on at the shelter. I can relate to this more. Love me.

  Still, it’s fun to make her work for it just a little. “Do you want to see your bed, or what?”

  No reaction.

  “It’s in here,” I walk into the bedroom, leaving her in the hallway. “See? I was expecting a bigger dog, so you’ll have plenty of room on it.” I pat the green-and-navy plaid dog bed next to mine.

  Finally, she joins me and sniffs the stuffed mat, then turns up her nose at it.

  While she blinks at me, I say, “I’d offer to let you sleep on my bed, but it’s a bit of a jump for someone of your… stature. You might be better off sticking with the cushion on the floor. It’s an improvement over that concrete pen at the shelter, right?”

  Apparently not. She turns and leaves the room.

  I follow her down the hall, back to the living room, where she hops neatly onto the loveseat, turns a couple of times, and curls up in one of the corners.

  I rub my neck. “Yeah, see… About that… I wasn’t planning to let you up on the living room furniture. It’s nothing personal, but I was thinking… with your fur and everything… it would be best if you stayed on the floor in here. You know, when people come over, they don’t want to get hair all over their clothes after sitting on the couch. I can move your bed out here, if you’d prefer. We don’t have to share a bedroom.”

  She closes her eyes.

  “Or whatever. I mean, I want you to feel at home, so… We’ll see how this goes. I guess I can always vacuum before having company.” I watch her ignoring me for a few seconds. “Okay, then. Well… I can show you the other stuff later. Or we can go for a walk. Or play in the backyard.”

  Tentatively, so as not to disturb her, I sit on the cushion next to her and retrieve my e-reader from the coffee table. It’s not exactly how I pictured my life with a dog, but it’s not a bad picture, either. Like Wilma said, Reba’s sweet, in a low-energy way. Sure, despite being labeled a “runner” by her former owners, I don’t think she’ll be game for the kind of runs I like to take, but as far as companionship is concerned, I think she and I will get along just fine.

  Eventually, I tear my eyes away from her and turn on my e-reader, tapping to the first page of a brand new chick-centric book.

  Page One, Chapter One.

  Less than five minutes later, my arm flinches when something cold and wet nudges against it. I glance down and see No-Name has edged closer and closer to me in her sleep and is now bumping against me with her face. I lift my arm and rest it along the length of her body, giving her rump a tentative pat. She rests her head in my lap.

  Warmth spreads through my chest while a smile takes over my face. I guess this is the closest thing to love I’ll be experiencing for a while.

  I think I might be okay with that.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Long shifts at work, long runs, long baths, long, lonely nights… er, I mean… Long, uninterrupted reading sessions. That’s my new life. It’s… peaceful (a.k.a., “almost as boring as football”). But peaceful is good. Boring is good. Beats living a double life with a lying, cheating girlfriend. That’s what I tell myself every evening when I eat alone, watch TV alone, read alone, and go to bed alone. Well, not completely alone.

  I’ve fallen in love again. My new girlfriend is hot, too. Often. But she pants for a while and lies on the floor near an air conditioning vent, and that seems to take care of it. She also has four legs and a tail. I’ve always been a leg man and have been known to chase some tail now and then, so it works.

  Yeah, yeah… my main squeeze is a dog. Literally, not figuratively, like so many of my former girlfriends, according to my older brother. She’s a dog, and she’s the best thing in my life. After all, the only time she hurts me is when she tries to jump on me when I come home from work, and her claws scrape down my legs. Oh, and there was that time she stepped on my balls in bed when she was trying to get comfortable. That hurt pretty bad. But I got over it a lot faster than anything a human female has ever done to me. And I learned an important lesson: cover thine balls with thine hands whilst thine pooch is walking in endless circles on thine bed. Hasn’t happened since. I wish I was as fast a learner with members of my own species.

  Reba the Wonderdog. I’ve given up on renaming her. For one thing, she won’t answer to anything else, no matter how hard I’ve tried, no matter how many treats I’ve used to bribe her. After I got over the frustration of not having any control over the situation, I realized something: I respect the hell out of her for persevering. She’s Reba. She’s not going to let anybody—not even the person who saved her from Doggie Death Row—change that.

  As for her escape artist reputation, she does run out the front door every chance she gets, but she rarely ventures farther than the front lawn or driveway. Only once did she wander as far as the street, where she collapsed onto her side as soon as I caught up to her with her leash. I think she’s simply putting me on notice that she can run if she wants to. I’m glad she doesn’t seem to want to right now. Her company has been a vital component in my life.

  I have a reason to get up in the morning (she paws at my hand to “remind” me to feed her at exactly 6:30 every single day). I have someone to come home to at night. She makes me laugh. She keeps me company in the kitchen when I make my dinners for one. She loves to snuggle. I mean, what more can a guy ask for?

  Well… I can think of a few things, but…

  No. She’s enough. Really. I’m enough. Life is good. At home and at work.

  They may not be my own flesh and blood, but the kids at the clinic are the next best thing, and I’m enjoying my job again. I have the energy to enjoy it, now that I’m not moonlighting as Frank. The kids notice the difference, too. One of the patients who comes in bi-monthly for allergy shots actually said to me the other day that he was glad I wasn’t “sad” anymore. He never mentioned noticing I was sad, in the first place, that I can remember, but it must have been bothering him for him to
remark about the positive change in me.

  When he said it, I ruffled his hair, laughed, and said, “Me, too,” like I’d been suffering a silly stretch of bad moods based on nothing deeper than getting up on the wrong side of the bed every morning for half a year. But it stuck with me the rest of the day—hell, it’s still sticking with me—how unpleasant I must have been for one of the patients to notice it.

  I spent the rest of that week trying to make it up to my co-workers, bringing in breakfast the next day, giving each of them a bag of their favorite candy the day after that, and taking everyone out for drinks that Friday. It was an expensive, tiring week, but it was the least I could do.

  At the pub, Lynette—after a few too many appletinis—wrapped me in a hug and gushed, “I’m so glad you’re back to normal!”

  Around Lynette’s headlock, I could see Dr. Reitman looking on with amusement. The doctor raised her glass in salute and gave me a subtle wink before turning away and joining some of the others at the dart boards.

  I’m glad I’m back to “normal,” too, whatever that is. I may be boring, but it’s because that’s who I am, who I want to be right now. There’s a comfort in giving myself permission to be whatever I want to be. My evenings and weekends are my own again. Sometimes they’re too much of my own, but… never mind that. Most of the time, I’m okay with getting to know myself again. Homeostasis is a beautiful thing.

  So is healing. And I’m doing that. I beat myself up pretty good for a while after learning the extent of Frankie’s betrayal, until I realized I wouldn’t change anything, if I had the option. I don’t want to be less trusting. I don’t want to be smarter, if it means being cynical. Maybe that makes me dumb. So be it.

  As for what Frankie told me about Betty, how unfair would it be to believe a pathological liar’s account of someone who never gave me a reason to doubt her? At the same time, it’s unlikely I’ll ever talk to Betty again, so I may never know the full story. I’m confident, however, that the full story doesn’t involve Betty scheming against me. Reading Girl Noir banished any remaining doubts I may have had on that subject.