The Dogs of Christmas (21 page)

“She keeps leaving,” Josh told the puppy in his arms. “I have to figure out what to do differently so she’ll want to stay here.”

Josh was tense the rest of the day, waiting for the people to show up for Rufus. The sun, blocked by a mountain to the northwest, left the sky early, and night settled down around Josh’s part of the hill without anyone pulling into his driveway.

“Just great,” he muttered, irritated that he’d basically done nothing all afternoon but stress about something that didn’t happen.

Rufus yawned and went to the door, so Josh let him out and he squatted in the yard, looking over his shoulder as if asking him to make note of the fact that he’d asked to be put outside to do his business. “I get it, you’re a genius dog,” Josh enthused.

Rufus sniffed at the grass a little, maybe smelling the scents of the rest of his family, and then trotted back over to Josh, who picked him up and carried him inside.

Josh heated up some macaroni and cheese and boiled a hot dog. Rufus slept on Lucy’s pillow, not interested in Josh’s culinary skills. After dinner, Josh settled down with a book, with Rufus lying on his chest. The little dog fell right to sleep.

Before he went to bed, Josh trooped out to his connectivity corner to send Kerri a text message with his cell phone:

I’m keeping Rufus.

She didn’t reply, so he didn’t know if she got it or not. He didn’t call her to find out, though. He didn’t want to talk about it.

If he’d used the PC to send the text, he would have had much more confidence that the message would go through without problems. He didn’t bother to wonder why he’d decided to use the cell phone instead.

The next morning Josh took a hammer and began dismantling the puppy box. He carefully withdrew the nails so that he could burn the wood in the fireplace without accumulating a pile of metal in the ashes. The boards he stacked to carry to the woodpile, the blanket he decided to leave right where it was, so if Rufus needed the comfort of something familiar, it would be there for him. It’s what Josh would want, anyway, if he were Rufus.

Just as he was finishing, he heard a very odd sound from the living room, a little noise that caused him to pause, cocking his head. He heard it again, and Josh grinned. Rufus was barking, pulling the sound out of the deepest part of his throat so that he sounded hilariously threatening.

“Okay, guard dog,” he called.

Kerri must be here. Josh ducked into the bathroom and made sure his hair looked okay. He brushed his teeth and swigged some mouthwash. He smelled under his arms and decided he passed inspection in that category, though just to be safe he applied another layer of deodorant. Then he splashed a tiny amount of cologne on his neck, sniffed, and then wiped furiously at the smell on his neck with a wet washcloth.

All this time he expected to hear Kerri’s steps on the front deck, and either her knock or the sound of the door opening, but he heard nothing.

Rufus gave another yip, abandoning the menacing tone and switching to an impatient, let-me-out-to-play bark.

“Hey, buddy, is it Kerri? Is Kerri here?” Josh asked, emerging from the bathroom. Rufus was at the big window, his little tail wagging stiffly. Josh walked up and stood behind the puppy to see what Rufus saw.

There were two cars parked side-by-side at the top of his driveway, and two people standing and talking to each other. Both were women. One of the women was Kerri.

The other one was Amanda.

Josh’s heart felt as if it were beating sideways in his chest. He swallowed, not sure he trusted his eyes on this one.
Really?

Amada’s hair was different—she no longer had bangs, and it only just touched her shoulders instead of descending past them. Other than that she looked the same. Josh even recognized the sweater she was wearing as one he’d bought her, a black one, and the jacket was the ski vest he’d purchased for her when he took her skiing in Breckenridge the last time. Both Kerri and Amanda were smiling at each other and chatting and nodding, which seemed to Josh to be a completely unnatural state of affairs.

“I don’t want to go out there, Rufus,” Josh whispered faintly. The puppy didn’t look at him—Rufus’s attention was fixated on the two women. Sighing, Josh opened the front door, Rufus scrambling between his legs and bounding down the stairs in a half-falling puppy gait.

“Hi, Rufus!” Kerri called. Rufus went to Amanda first, though, smelling her outstretched hands.

“So
cute,
” Amanda gushed. She straightened, tossing her head to sweep the hair out of her eyes, and smiled at Josh.

“Hey, stranger,” Amanda greeted softly.

“Hi,” Josh replied awkwardly.

Rufus ran to Kerri and started obsessively sniffing her boots, probably smelling all the dogs at the shelter. Kerri stooped and stroked Rufus but her eyes were steady on Josh.

With a little laugh, Amanda held out her arms and stepped up to him and Josh stiffly hugged her. She offered her cheek for a kiss, but as Josh moved in, she switched it up on him so that they were briefly mouth-to-mouth.

“We pulled in the driveway at the same time. I kept looking in my mirror, thinking, why is that car following me? Anyway. That is the cutest puppy,” Amanda said. She lingered, holding Josh for a few seconds after his arms dropped.

“Cute puppy, what a concept,” Josh replied. He felt a tremor pass through him, as if his body were under tremendous pressure, about to blow. Amanda’s car, he noticed, was filled with boxes in the backseat, looking very much the same as it had when she’d moved out.

What did
that
mean?

But, of course, he knew what it meant. He’d already fantasized the scene countless times since that day last April when she’d left.

Josh felt seasick. He wanted to close his eyes and open them and be somewhere else.

Amanda was beautiful. Everyone said so, and everyone was right. And wasn’t it her whimsical and capricious desires that he loved most about her? She might always be dissatisfied with things, but wasn’t that itchy wanderlust what had led them on so many fun adventures in their time together?

All this he processed as if someone were sending a text message directly into his brain. He gazed at Amanda with something akin to remorse filling his heart.

“Your friend was telling me about you fostering the puppies. That’s so cool,” Amanda praised, her smile flashing.

Josh cleared his throat.

“I wish I could have been here to see all of them,” Amanda continued brightly. “You know how much I love dogs. Has fostering puppies changed your mind about getting one, Josh?” Amanda glanced over at Kerri. “I’ve wanted a dog, but so far he’s been resisting me on it.”

“Is that so,” Kerri responded politely.

“Amanda,” Josh interrupted, finding his voice.

She looked at him expectantly. Josh nodded at Kerri. “Kerri isn’t a friend, exactly.”

Both women watched him with unreadable expressions, waiting.

“Kerri is my girlfriend.”

Amanda and Kerri looked equally shocked. “Oh,” Amanda said finally.

Josh looked at Rufus, who was still sniffing Kerri’s legs. Then he looked up at Kerri, who smiled. Josh smiled back.

“I’m sorry,” Amanda apologized to Kerri, flustered.

Kerri waved her hand. “No problem.”

Amanda nodded to the house. “So do you…”

“No, I’m not living here or anything,” Kerri answered.

Yet,
Josh wanted to say, but he didn’t.

“I see.” A brief calculation passed through Amanda’s eyes, and if Josh hadn’t known her so intimately, he probably would have missed it. But he spotted it and, when he glanced at Kerri, he knew that her ability to read minds was fully intact on this one as well.

“This is, well…” Amanda laughed, as if they all knew what she was going to say, and there was an extent to which Josh thought they probably did. “I’m sort of moving out. I did move out. Of the place in Fort Collins,” she explained.

Josh looked at her. Amanda bit her lip, and then her eyes danced merrily at him, the way they used to when she would suggest on a Saturday afternoon that maybe they should go back to bed for a “nap.” “Let an old friend sleep on your couch?” she asked him softly.

Josh could feel Kerri watching him. “Probably not a good idea,” he responded.

Amanda looked wounded. “Josh, it’s Christmas Eve, and I … I really don’t have any other place to go.”

“Oh,” Josh replied. “Of course. What was I thinking?”

TWENTY-ONE

Josh reached in his pocket for his wallet. “I’ve got two hundred,” he stated, counting it out. “That should set you up for a night or two somewhere.” He held the money out to Amanda, who was doing her wounded-look thing. There’d been a time when Josh would do anything to make that look go away.

“It’s Christmas Eve,” Amanda protested faintly.

“You know where I would go if I were you is the Brown Palace,” Kerri suggested helpfully, naming one of the area’s oldest hotels—and one located conveniently all the way down the hill in downtown Denver. “At Christmas the lobby is beautiful.”

“I don’t need
money,
Josh,” Amanda said, almost but not quite keeping the anger from her voice. She pointedly didn’t look at Kerri. “I wanted to see you.”

“It was nice to see you, too, Amanda,” Josh agreed.

She gave him a tight smile at his response, her eyes cold. Josh remained there and took it, knowing that she expected him to fold. The wind kicked up, rocking the trees with audible creaking sounds, and the three of them stood silently.

“I’d better get going,” Amanda finally decided, her eyes on Josh.

“Merry Christmas,” Kerri said happily.

Amanda turned and focused on opening her car door, pressing her lips together in a thin line. Josh scooped up Rufus and stood next to Kerri as the car started and drove off. He waved, but Amanda didn’t.

When the sound of Amanda’s car had completely faded away, Kerri turned to Josh, shaking her head. “I’ll say this, with you it’s never dull,” she admired.

“You told me one time that nothing I’d ever done suggested any kind of thing between us,” Josh explained. “I wanted to correct that.”

She tossed her head at him. “So I’m your girlfriend now? Because it’s sort of the first I’ve heard of it.”

“Sorry if I was presumptuous,” Josh apologized, not sounding sorry.

“That’s okay. I liked it.” They smiled at each other. “Sort of blew Amanda away, though,” she observed.

“Oh, let’s
not
talk about Amanda.”

Kerri laughed.

“Come on,” he suggested. “Let’s go inside. I have a Christmas present for you and I can’t wait until tomorrow.”

“Me, too, but wait.” Kerri went to the back of her car and lifted the hatch. She opened the sagging dog crate, reaching inside for a puppy.

It was Cody.

When she put the little dog on the ground, Rufus romped up and bowled right into him, the two of them rolling together in a hilarious tumbling jumble.

“Cody!” Josh called, slapping his knees. “Here, Cody!”

Cody and Rufus were far too involved with greeting each other to pay any attention to Josh. Kerri pulled a small package out of her car and stuffed it in her coat pocket and the four of them—two people and two dogs—went into the house. Cody followed where Rufus led him, only stumbling at the first and last steps on the wooden stairs to the front deck.

“Did you get my text?” Josh asked.

Frowning, Kerri pulled her phone out. “No, I didn’t. When did you send it?”

“Last night. Probably it’s in my phone and you’ll get it next time I drive down the hill and back into cell range.”

“I didn’t get your call, either.”

“Huh. Was I supposed to call?” He gave her a sideways glance.

“So what did your text say?”

“What happened?” Josh asked instead. “With Cody, I mean.”

“Oh. That was the message I got last night. The family that adopted him was way out of their depth. They didn’t realize what a huge difference it would make for a sightless dog to be blind from birth. The dog they had before was more than half a year old when she went blind, so she already knew the layout of the house, where the furniture was, and was already housebroken. Poor Cody has spent the last two weeks bumping into things and crying all the time. He couldn’t find the puppy pads they put out for him, and he kept getting lost. I guess the whole family was one big nervous breakdown. They didn’t even call, just showed up yesterday and handed him to Madelyn like they were returning a pair of shoes or something. I don’t get people.”

“So what happens now?”

Kerri blew out a puff of air. “So now we put him back on the website, I guess. He’s so cute; we had a lot of inquiries about him. We just have to sort through them all and find the people who are able to take care of a blind dog.”

“I guess no, that’s not going to happen.”

A smile played on Kerri’s lips. “What do you mean?”

Josh nodded to where Rufus and Cody were playing on the floor. “This is as happy as Rufus has been since Cody left. I wouldn’t think it was possible for a puppy to be depressed, but now that they’re back together I see what was missing. Rufus needs Cody, and Cody needs Rufus.”

“I thought it might be something like that.”

“Far as I’m concerned, the people who were supposed to come yesterday lost their option when they didn’t even bother to call. I don’t care if they were kidnapped by aliens—they missed their opportunity.”

“Right. You sure you’re up to it, though? Two puppies, one of them blind?”

“Will I have help?”

“You mean from Rufus?”

“I mean human help.”

Kerri grinned at him. “Do you
want
human help?”

“Yeah. I do. A
lot
of help.”

“Right.”

“Like, constantly.”

“Understood.”

Now they were both grinning. “So, hey, I want you to open your gift!” Josh exclaimed.

Underneath the tree was a big wrapped package, easily eight times the size of a bread box. “That’s for me?”

“Yes.”

“What is it, a new refrigerator?”

Josh laughed. “Just open it.”