Shady Snacks
“Picked a nice one out?” Jess asked as Shady and I approached the front desk.
“Yep. Can I get a heart-tag engraved too?” I asked.
“Sure thing. What do you want on it?”
I looked at Shady. Her silver eyes were enormous and vulnerable-looking.
“That silver heart,” I said, pointing at my choice. “Engraved with… ‘S&A’ inside a sideways eight.”
“Like an infinity symbol?” Jess asked.
“Yeah. More like a tipped hourglass though.”
“Draw it for me?” Jess handed me a pad and a marker.
I drew two triangles facing each other. The Dagaz rune of our pack.
Shady pressed her skull against my hip, antlers phasing through me. Her expression and tail wags suggested all prior collar-related trolling might, conditionally, be forgiven. I petted her head.
Jess engraved the tag in a few minutes on a small machine behind the counter. The tiny silver heart clinked as she threaded it onto the collar’s D-ring.
“Thirty-seven forty-two,” she announced.
I tapped my VISA on the G-pad. Jess handed me the collar and resumed her idle phone-browsing.
I stepped closer to Shady, went down on one knee and slid two fingers under her jaw, tilting her skull-face up. The freckles on her cheeks scattered, then reformed into flickering, violet-blue stars. Her breath hitched.
“Hold still,” I said softly with a wide smile.
I wrapped the collar around her neck, my knuckles brushing the soft fur beneath her jaw. She shivered, a massive, apex predator alien Princess trembling under the touch of a skinny human fastening a strip of leather.
The buckle clicked into place. I adjusted the fit, two fingers between leather and fur, checking the tension. My hands lingered, thumbs tracing the edges of the collar where it met her mane.
“How’s the fit?” I murmured.
“Tight,” she breathed. “Tighter than expected.”
“I can loosen it.”
“Don’t you dare.”
“Tighter it is then,” I tightened the collar with a click.
Shady let out a whimper, the air around us darkening and igniting with dancing static, as if my eyes were a camera bathed in nuclear radiation. The lights overhead flickered with a deep rumbling sound, like a whale song turned inside out.
“Looks amazing on you.” I commented.
“Rrrrrwwwrrr,” Shady replied, tail swaying wildly, eyes closed, feathers splayed in all directions.
Her fur lit up in cascading violet ripples spreading outward from the collar like rings on lake water.
“Someone’s happy.” I grinned.
“Mmmm… Ecstatic,” her voice caught. “Don’t tell anyone.”
“Everyone who can see you is gonna notice,” I said. “You’re getting more colorful than Galateya.”
“Shush you.”
I saw a leash display near the register and slid one over to Jess with a nod. Shady was thoroughly distracted admiring herself in a large mirror near the entrance, twirling left and right and pawing at the silver heart with a happy grin.
The salesgirl scanned the tag and I paid for and pocketed the leash.
“Thanks for shopping at Pet Paradise! Your girl is sooo GORGEOUS,” Jess waved as we headed for the door. “Bring her back anytime!”
“Will do. Say bye, Princess.”
“Brrrr,” Shady made a non-committed noise.
We stepped outside, enjoying the fresh ocean breeze and rays of sunshine breaking through the rolling clouds. Distant waterfalls sparkled, rushing down the glacier-capped mountains wrapping Cascade in their embrace.
We walked to my jeep. Shady flashed ahead of me and opened the passenger door with a whoosh of displaced air, nearly tearing the car door off its hinges.
“Hey, careful with the doo…” I began and found myself being pulled into the car by lanky, black hands moving at the speed of a jet engine. “Sha-!”
The jeep wobbled on its suspension.
Shady’s mouth found mine, silencing me, antlers phasing through the door. My back hit the seat and her weight pinned me there, her chest settling over me with the inevitability of a landslide. Her hands roamed across me, black paw pads warm, blade-claws dull.
I grabbed the back of her neck, fingers sinking into the feathered mane, pulling her closer by the collar. She made a sound into my mouth, half growl, half whimper, extra-long, ruby-bright tongue invading my mouth.
Dark hands slid under my shirt. Pads felt hot and electric against my bare stomach. Traceries of bright stars ignited wherever she touched, visible even through closed eyelids. Blue. Violet. Orange. The air sparkled, crackled audibly between us with otherworldly violet lightning like St. Elmo’s Fire twisting into sprites in the upper reaches of the atmosphere.
I broke the kiss long enough to gasp.
“Public parking lot,” I managed.
“Don’t give a fuck,” she countered, slamming the door shut with her tail and resuming her attack. “Can’t stop, won’t stop.”
The edges of the car interior wobbled precariously, stretching into the distance.
I grabbed her antlers. She froze, eyes going solar-eclipse wide, wreathed in a corona of silver fire at the edges. Her entire body shuddered once, hard, the auroral light show erupting across her feathers like the northern lights having a panic attack. Violet, aquamarine, orange explosions sparked, rippling where my fingers gripped the bone.
“Harrrrrdrrrrrr,” she breathe-growled.
I pulled her closer by the antlers, tilting her skull-face down to mine. She made a whimper-growl noise, tail slamming against the passenger window hard enough to crack the glass.
The crack wobbled then resealed itself as if rewound backwards in time.
“Ashyyy…” The phase-shift softened her elongated features as she ground herself against me. Teeth retreated, lips formed, fuller, darker, parting slightly. I kissed her again, more fiercely, biting the large, dark lip.
She melted into me with a loud moan.
All the bravado, the teasing, the extra-bossy posturing dissolved, leaving a girl pressing her body against mine and making tiny, desperate sounds against my mouth. The jeep’s interior steamed up like Darkfall fog from the heat radiating off her. The collar’s silver buckle and dangling heart glowed violet-blue as if it was bathed in Cherenkov radiation.
The car seat and interior became even bigger as her claws dug into the leather, tail thrashing madly, leaving off-colored, echo-trails in the foggy, dim atmosphere.
“Shady, the Greens are gonna see my car turning into a magic bus from space.”
“Ughhh,” she let out, pulling back slightly. “Whatever. Let them be jelly.”
We stared at each other, faces about three inches apart. Both breathing hard. Her silver eyes were almost entirely pupil. The newly acquired collar rose and fell with the pulse hammering visibly in her throat, the Netherweave fireworks popping between us like violet sparklers someone forgot to extinguish, stretching into extradimensional, sideways-distance that wasn’t there physically.
Neither of us moved for another ten seconds.
“Come on, off me, you freaking oversized, sparkly loaf,” I said.
“You first. I’m on top.”
“Exactly why you should move first.”
“But this is comfyyyyy and nice,” she whined. “Don’t take away my happppyyy.”
“It’s only comfy because you’re warping reality like a black hole. Car seats are the opposite of comfy for making out on, while lying down.”
The Wendigo licked and then bit my neck softly, letting out growl-pants. “So mean.”
“Not mean, focused. We have a plan.” I stated.
“Plan-smawn. Let’s make out till the sun explodes instead.”
“Pretty sure humans don’t live that long.”
“I’ll make you live that long then.”
“How?”
“Rewind magic? I dunno. Quit being a distracted-butt and gib’ more kissu.”
“No. We follow the plan,” I insisted. “I want to find the gate to Neverland.”
“Waaaaa,” she whined, making desperate whimper-sounds. “But kissuuuuu.”
“Later,” I promised. “Lots of kissu. Along the way. Then, all the kissu… An ocean of kissu when we find our clandestine fairy circle!”
“Okkay.” Looking despondent and tormented, Shady released me, allowing me to climb out of the car and into the driver’s seat. “Seriously tho’. You can’t just GRAB a Wendigo’s antlers and expect civil behavior.”
“Noted.”
Shady sprawled across the back seat, legs folded, tail draped over the headrest, looking like a very large, relaxed cat pretending nothing happened. Only her rapidly rising and falling, perky chest gave her away.
Another memory crawled out of the abyss of my sheared mind. A small, adorable Shady demanding a particular kind of snack, practically begging me for such, threatening me with absolute destruction if I failed to fetch it for her.
I turned the car on and drove it about three blocks to “Hole Lotta Love,” a donut shop featuring a hand-painted sign of a silly-looking donut cop wearing sunglasses.
“Why are we…” Shady stated as she emerged out of the car after me. “Waaaait a minute. I know this place!”
As we approached the entrance I noticed that there was a sign on the door “no dogs allowed”.
“Welp, that’s rather rude. Must be new owners,” Shady huffed. “Guess I’ll sit here then.” She plopped herself on a large mossy rock behind the sidewalk. “Fetch me my snaccoss.” She dismissed me with the air of a Valley girl from the Mean Girls movie talking to her valet.
I looked at Shady and then noticed a green sign on a lamp post, visibly vibrant against the slightly gloomy pacific rainforest backdrop: ALL PETS MUST BE ON LEASH.
I looked at Shady.
“What?”
I pointed at the sign.
“No,” she said.
“Yes.”
“Wah.”
I pulled out the leash from my pocket. Shady stared at it as if I’d produced a live grenade.
“I will never forgive you for this.”
“Your tail is wagging.”
“What? No!”
Shady turned her head back, made a bothered face and swatted her tail. “Traitor.”
I clipped the leash to her new collar. “Stay.”
“If ANYONE pats my head…”
“You’ll wag your tail and accept it because you’re a GOOD GIRL.”
“RRRRRRRRR.”
“That’s the spirit!”
“You owe me a billion kisses for this grave indignity!”
“Sure, sure.” I looped the leash around the metal post and gave her an exaggerated pat on the head. “Be right back, Princess Snugglebottom! Don’t bite anyone!”
Smiling at her bothered growl-whine, I slowly and dramatically walked into the donut shop.
I took my sweet time in the restroom, washing my hands twice, checking my hair, examining the shirt in the mirror. Emotional Support Human indeed.
The fox-eye dot above the i blinked at me. I turned around, making my back face the mirror.
The fox on the back of the shirt was laughing wildly and rolling about like an animated Garry Cotter magic painting.
“Are you entertained?” I asked Sage.
The fox nodded giddily, winking at me. I gave her a thumbs up.
Finishing with my restroom business, I ordered a half dozen assorted donuts.
Through the window I could see Shady sitting ramrod straight beside the post, glowing eyes tracking every passing human with the intensity of a prison searchlight. A mother with a stroller gave her a wide berth. A teenager paused to take a photo, sticking his tongue out. Shady endured the human attention, tail lashing a measured tempo of contained homicidal ideation.
An elderly man in a fishing hat approached her.
The man said something. Shady’s ears rotated toward him. He produced a tinfoil package and unwrapped it, offering half a breakfast sandwich to Shady.
Shady’s rigid posture softened by approximately two degrees. She accepted the sandwich with the genteel grace of a duchess receiving tribute and chewed it, staring daggers at the donut shop.
A few more people approached and chatted at her while my order was put together.
“Someone’s a popular girl,” I said, emerging from the donut shop.
“I am a regal doggo, such mortal appreciation is to be expected,” she waved a hand at me, standing upright.
“Sure you are,” I agreed.
Shady’s nostrils flared the instant I walked closer to her. Her ears shot forward. The tail went from angry metronome to full helicopter rotor.
I opened the box, and held it up to her. The scent of warm glaze and maple icing billowed up between us.
“Ta daaa!” I declared giddily. “Princess tax.”
Shady stared at the donuts. Then at me. Then at the donuts.
“Rrrrr. You tied me to a freakin’ street light and then brought me donuts from mah fav shop?”
“The duality of man.” I shrugged. “Do you accept your tribute… Miss Longstocking?”
There was no verbal reply.
Shady’s maw dove down and absorbed the donuts like a black hole consuming a star system, muzzle buried in the box, making noises that fell somewhere between “starved wolf eating prey” and “child at a birthday party.”
I untied the leash from the post. “See, that wasn’t too bad.”
“Uh-huh. One woman asked if she could follow me on Instagram. I’m a DOG. How would I have an Instagram and how would I even give it to her?”
“You DO have an Instagram. You used it to stalk me.”
“DOGS don’t have Instagrams though!”
“Tell that to every singing Siberian Husky with three million followers.” I chortled. “She was probably making a joke.”
“The humans of your planet are very silly.”
“And you love us for our silliness.”
Both of us laughed.