Page 54 of The Goode Girls of Maple Lane
Aside from the uptick in vet visits, which I knew was coming, and some shuffling of meds that has unfortunate digestive side effects, Aggie has a good month. Over four weeks, she loses six more pounds, bringing her to ninety-five, for which she gets a lot of love from her fans, both live and online. Regina and Tegan decorate the wagon again, this time with sports-themed banners that sayChampionandWinner, along with brightly colored pinwheels that spin when I pull her through town, still cautious about how much time she spends on her feet. Johann bakes her a dog-friendly cake shaped like a bone. Arthur and Diana create a special-edition tea called Aggie’s Blend that’s mostly ginger and cinnamon like her coloring, with a hint of pepper for her lively spirit and licorice root for her sweetness. Khalil and his lab mates add a new feature to the robo-ball so it says “You’re amazing!” when she picks up more speed than she used to, chasing the ball down the hall. Phone Girl even pauses after exiting her apartment one afternoon while Aggie and I are waiting for the elevator and asks, “Is your dog, like, smaller than she used to be?”
“Yeah,” I say. “We’re working on it.”
“Okay. Cool.” She nods. Then she vanishes into the stairwell in a blur of flame-red hair, pale skin, fur-topped snow boots, and a sexy pleather coat that looks like it’s straight off the set of a vampire movie. Given how little I know about what Phone Girl does with her time, maybe she did play a vampire in a movie. Maybe sheisa vampire.
On a cold, crisp day at the end of the month, after gradually extending our daily walks along the Cascadilla Gorge Trail past thefrozen waterfalls and iced-over trees, Aggie makes it to our half-mile target without the wagon, sling, or harness. As she turns to look over her shoulder at me as though she wants to know if she should keep going, I drop to my knees in the snow and fling my arms around her neck, planting a million kisses all over her beautiful face. Four months ago, she couldn’t stand on her own. It took four of us to get her into the back of Everett’s station wagon from the emergency vet. Her first walking exercises with me were little more than short stumbles between long sessions of lying down. Now? She’s ambling along with me, stiffly and slowly but with purpose, sometimes even taking the lead, full of curiosity about her world.
“Do you know how much I love you?” I ask, still nose to nose and eye to eye.
She blinks at me with her brows twitching and her dog breath misting my face. It’s smelly but it’s her, so I kind of love it, like I love everything else about her.
I boop her nose with a gloved fingertip. “I said, do you know how much I love you?”
This time she sweeps her tongue from my chin to my eyebrows, and I wipe away the saliva, scrunching up my face and laughing as I give her more kisses in return.
“I had a feeling you knew,” I tell her. “But I’ll keep telling you, anyway.”
ON THE SECONDSaturday in February, Everett drives us to Aqua Paws, where I scheduled our hydrotherapy consultation. Things with Everett have also been mostly positive since New Year’s, though our time together is as limited as ever, making me resent using the time we do have to deal with sponsorships. Not that I’mnot grateful for his help. I am. Hugely. Deeply. I love how easily he identifies partnerships and navigates the correspondence. I love his ability to turn a short video into something I want to watch over and over again. I love that he’s full of fun ideas about telling stories and connecting with people. I love that he wants to use these skills to help Aggie, and to help me, but he’s always ten steps ahead of me, thinking about who else to partner with, how to use the branding he and Regina developed, or if Aggie’s progress has a benchmark we should be shouting about to up engagement. Sometimes I want our online celebration of Aggie’s progress to beonlya celebration, not part of a marketing plan.
Neil Diamond and Barbra Streisand are singing “You Don’t Bring Me Flowers” when we pull into the parking lot and I get caught up by the deep longing in the song. Not that I’d ever admit it to anyone but Hannah andmaybeEverett, but Aggie’s not the only one who’s changed over the last four and a half months. Apparently, I’m starting to like seventies light rock now.
Although truthfully? I think I mostly like Everett.
Before we get out of the car, I set my hand on his thigh.
“Hey,” I say, and it comes out like more of an alert than I mean it to.
“Hey.” He wraps my hand with his as his eyes go wary and his posture stiffens, like he’s trying to be chill but he’s worried I’m about to say something scary, and maybe I am, but only scary for me, and only because I don’t want to seem ungrateful and because I have no prior experience with relationships and I really,reallydon’t want to screw this one up.
“I have a favor to ask,” I say.
“Okay. Anything.” He nods, fidgets, waits, listens.
“I know we need to film some of this. So many of Aggie’s followers have asked about hydrotherapy and contributed to paying for it by buying Regina’s shirts. I want to share this with them. I also know we’re still trying to grow the account so the next round of sponsorships brings in more money. But Everett? Can we also enjoy some of this live, without worrying about getting the right shot or tying it in with branding or telling the perfect story?”
His shoulders drop as he lets out a slow exhale, tugging my hand to draw me into a hug.
“Of course,” he says. “I’m sorry. I’ve been pushing too hard.”
“Yes and no.” I hold him close for a minute. Then I pull out of our hug so I can see his eyes and play with his hair. His loose curls are so soft and springy, and I can’t imagine ever not wanting to touch them. “A couple years ago, when I visited Hannah in Swindon, we went for a run together. I max out at six or seven miles. She maxes out at over twenty miles, all of them at a much faster pace than mine. She didn’tpush meto run faster or farther, but I wanted to keep up, so I tried. She’d notice I was flagging and try to slow down, but no matter how often I sped up or she slowed down, we couldn’t match each other’s pace. I finally stopped altogether, and we had a good laugh about it as we walked home, but you can imagine how I felt at the one-hour mark.”
Everett takes my hand and plants a long, firm kiss on my palm.
“So, do a better job of recognizing when we’re going different paces?” he asks.
“Something like that. Or at least... stop for water when I say I need a break?”
He tips his chin toward Aqua Paws. “Which is what you’re doing now?”
I nod, smiling at my unintended double entendre. “Which is what I’m doing now.”
He kisses my hand again and gives it a reassuring squeeze before letting go.
“Understood,” he says. “I’ll get a few shots, and then my phone goes in my pocket.”
My smile widens and I feel a bit silly for being scared to talk to him. Although...
“What did you think I wanted to talk about?” I ask.
