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Not wanting to stay in a squat, I settled on the floor beside Taavi’s open kennel. The fact that it evenwasa kennel and not a bed—even a doggy bed—made me feel like the worst sort of person. I mean. Technically I hadn’t put him in there, but still.
I wasn’t really sure what to do as I watched him lying there unconscious, a heavy bandage around his abdomen and an IV taped to his front paw. It was weird. If he were in human form, I could hold his hand. That’s what people did in hospitals with sick or injured people. Been there, done that.
What do you do for a dog? Holding his paw seemed… stupid? I don’t know.
I settled for running my fingers over his ears and the crest of surprisingly soft—every time I touched it, it was surprisingly soft—hair on the top of his head.
The linoleum floor was chilly and uncomfortable, but it wasn’t my gut that had been just sliced open, so I told myself to put up and shut up. The least I could do was sit on an uncomfortable floor while Taavi recovered from having whatever the fuck that thing was pulled out of him.
I assumed it had been pulled out, anyway.
It took me longer than it probably should have to realize Doc was probably still in the waiting room.
I pulled out my phone and texted him.You can go. Taavi’s still out, but they’re letting me sit with him until he wakes up.
I set the phone back on my thigh, then reached out again, getting a couple more ear-pets in before my phone buzzed.
Okay. Call if you need anything.
I really didn’t deserve friends like Doc. And Ward. And Elliot, for that matter.
I pulled out my phone again.
Hey, dick. Remember my shifter friend? He just had surgery. He’s out, but
I sat there and stared at my phone, not knowing what to say. But what? But I’m worried about him? But I’m afraid he won’t wake up? But I’m afraid that the thing I insisted get taken out of him was keeping him alive?
There were so many possibilities, and I had no fucking idea which one of them to say. And I wasn’t sure how to explain to Elliot just how tied up in knots I was over this stupid dog. Shifter. Person I didn’t even really know.
Because it’s one thing to worry about your friends. If Elliot or Doc or Ward had surgery, I’d be worried. And being worried would make some fucking sense because we’re friends. I was in Doc’s and Ward’s wedding, for fuck’s sake. Elliot and I have known each other since we were five.
I’d only known Taavi for… seven weeks. Not even two months.
And, let’s be honest here, I didn’t know shit-all about him. I knew he was from Yuma, Arizona. His birthday was June 23. I knew he’d once been pulled over for a broken taillight and spent the night in an ICE detention facility. I knew he worked—at least sometimes—construction and that he’d taken a bus from Arizona to North Carolina to do it.
Stuff any cop could find out.
Of course, I knew a little more than that.
I knew he was a Xoloitzcuintli shifter.
I knew he was a morning person, and he liked his coffee sweet, but without creamer.
I knew he liked Korean food and Thai food and pizza, and that he was a total snob about Mexican. I knew he’d only had Indian food once and that he wasn’t a big fan of spinach, so the saag paneer had not been his favorite, but he seemed okay with chicken biryani and paneer makhani.
He liked ice cream and cookies and beer and eggrolls, and he didn’t seem to mind cooking shows or action movies.
Sometimes his feet kicked in his sleep. I don’t judge. Sometimes I wake up with my throat sore and in a cold sweat, so I know I’m not always sleeping fucking beauty.
But there was so much more about him I didn’t know.
I didn’t know his favorite color or food or movie, what kind of music he liked, or whether or not he had any hobbies. I didn’t know his favorite season or if he could swim or whether he preferred chocolate or vanilla.
I didn’t even know if he thought about me as anything other than a safety net, the wall between him and the people who wanted him dead or, maybe worse, in a lab somewhere hooked up to a continuous drip of beta blockers and God only knew what else.
But he was definitely more than just a dog to me.
Which, okay, he was more than just a dog. But you don’t see me sitting on a shitty linoleum floor waiting for most of my witnesses to wake up, rubbing their heads. I don’t usually even stick around the hospital.
