Total pages in book: 177
Estimated words: 163209 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 816(@200wpm)___ 653(@250wpm)___ 544(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 163209 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 816(@200wpm)___ 653(@250wpm)___ 544(@300wpm)
There were bird cages in the front two corners. Past the desk was a kennel with a half-dozen clumsy kittens. Jean honestly wasn’t sure which side of the room was producing more noise right now. The room stank of air freshener, presumably to cover up the messes such beasts were creating. Jean breathed as shallowly as he could and wondered if he ought to wait outside until Jeremy was done. He glanced Jeremy’s way just as the two finally wrapped it up, and Jeremy motioned to him with an uncharacteristic nervousness.
The kennels in the next room seemed to be primarily smaller rodents, and here the smell of bedding and wet little bodies was a little more prevalent. Jean heard the dogs long before they passed the second room of cats, and at last they pushed through a final door. One wall was all kennels, two rows atop one another. The other had filing cabinets and three metal tables for checkups and grooming. The assistant handed off her notes to the young man filling food bowls.
“Apartment with students,” she said. “Smaller breed, preferably a few years old so it’ll require less hands-on care and is used to being left alone for a few hours. Gender unimportant, usual restrictions otherwise.” When he nodded, she turned a perky smile on Jeremy and said, “Christian will recommend the best fits for you based on our current selection and walk you through the rest of the process. I’ll be up front if you decide to move forward.”
“Thank you,” Jeremy said, already distracted by the kennels. She’d barely left the room before he was poking his fingers through the grating of the nearest one. “Hi,” he said, in a soft tone Jean didn’t recognize. “Hi, how are you? Yeah, I love you too, you’re so cute. I’d take you home with me but you’re a little big for us, baby girl. Yeah.”
Jean glanced from him to the worker, who didn’t seem at all unnerved by this silliness from a grown man. Christian was comparing his coworker’s notes to his own files, and he wrote a string of numbers across the top of his page. Kennel numbers, Jean realized a moment later, because Christian scooped up his clipboard and offered Jeremy his hand.
“Hi, I’m Christian,” he said. “Let’s find you your new best friend.”
“Jeremy,” Jeremy said, accepting his hand.
Christian glanced toward Jean, noticed how far back he was keeping, and beckoned to Jeremy. “We’ll start at this end,” he said, and Jeremy hurried after him.
Jean went the other direction, hoping the barking would drown out Jeremy’s adoring conversations with each of his prospects. His gaze went unbidden to the kennels, with their assortment of beasts in every color and size. One dog was tearing a stuffed toy to shreds, filling the corner of his kennel with piles of cottony fluff. Three fist-sized little pups were sharing space, two barking at each other for no discernible reason while the third tried and failed to scale the grating. Each cage had a card pinned to it with information about the dogs trapped within.
Jean made it to the far corner at last and leaned against the wall to wait. He checked his phone, saw a string of missed messages from Renee and Cody, and decided he didn’t have the energy for conversation right now. He put his phone away and looked up to see how far Jeremy had gotten, and in so doing accidentally made eye contact with the dog across from him.
At first glance he thought it was sleeping, it was so still and flat on its side, but its gaze tracked his face with unblinking calm. Jean waited for it to look away, but he bored of the staring match first. Jeremy was in an animated conversation with Christian, so Jean turned back to the dog. It was still watching him, and this time its tail thumped a few times in either warning or approval. It was an uneven mess: its tail and ears were scraggly, but it had short fur everywhere else, black and white most everywhere with brown splotches on its face and legs.
“I don’t see the appeal,” he told it. Its tail thumped harder, and Jean reluctantly crossed the room to study it better. In French he said, “He has so many distractions already, and not enough time to sleep as it is. You are an unnecessary complication. He ought to wait until graduation.”
One ear went ramrod straight, as if the dog could understand him. That was ridiculous and offensive, and Jean poked a finger through the grating to press it flat. “You are fooling no one,” he said, as the tail went thump-thump-thump against the bottom of the kennel in earnest. The dog finally half-rolled onto its stomach, and Jean snatched his hand to safety. It watched him for a few moments, then curled in on itself to kick at the ear he’d touched.