Summary: Despite the strangeness of the situation, Tayen finds herself charmed by the warm brown eyes of someone unexpected.
a/n: Written to fill a prompt that I can’t find anymore. Sorry to the prompter. But I remember it being a dialogue prompt for this line: “No, you’re cute. End of Story.” I could be kind of wrong. I’m sorry, I’m really missing my own dogs right now (though my last precious died about 15 years ago, and lately I’ve been wishing we could have a pet here).
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Cutie Pie
The truck ran out of gas about two miles back, but Deputy Tayen Quick wasn’t worried about it and to be fair Boomer didn’t seem too concerned either. He was far more well-behaved than she expected dogs could be and was taking the chance to enjoy the wilderness it seemed. He’d dart from one tree to the next, sniffing everything in turn. Every now and then his nose would take him over a rise or a hill.
“Boomer,” Tayen would say rather conversationally. He’d reply with a bark and head back toward her. Usually circling around her stride once or twice. With a scratch behind the ears, he’d be off again.
When she got back to the states, her counselor suggested she get a dog. Tayen had thought the guy was out of his mind, which was still a possibility, but after a few hours with Boomer she realized he might have been on to something.
Stopping, she fished her canteen out of her pack. From beneath a copse of pine boughs, Tayen crouched and looked around, studying the landscape, then finally looking for trace of her companion.
“Boomer,” she said again, not yelling or talking louder than her normal conversational volume. She wasn’t about to start yelling for no damn good reason. There was no immediate response, and she opted to give him a little time to realize that the human had stopped following him. She slipped her pack off and dug out the frisbee that had been in the bed of the truck they’d abandoned. This time she whistled, it was quite a bit louder than her previous call.
She heard the movement before the responding bark. Boomer hugged tight around a large bramble bush and sped toward her with purpose. He looked like a dog on a mission, and he was. He leapt and licked at her face, jabbing her cheek with his wet nose.
“Thanks,” she laughed rubbing her cheek against her shoulder. “You need some water?” Boomer sat down and let his tongue loll out of his mouth. “I’ll take that as a yes. I could use a little breather myself,” she admitted.
As she poured a little puddle of water in the frisbee for Boomer, he started lapping at it immediately.
“Maybe I should take a water break more often,” she mused, scratching the dog between the shoulders as he drank the water fast. Tayen stole a quick drink from the canteen and poured more out for her companion.
“Gonna need to carry more water,” she mused taking a deep drink from the canteen. “Not as bad as the desert, but with two of us going at it. Need to be prepared, huh?”
Taking another drink she waited as if he might just suddenly become capable of speech and answer her. Instead, he merely kept lapping at the water with loud splashes. It only took a moment for her to realize Boomer needed more of a splash zone when refreshing himself.
She capped off the water and peeked into the pack she’d confiscated from Rae-Rae’s along with some supplies that would serve them both. She pulled a handful of the dry kernels of dog food from the ziploc bag in her pack. She’d only taken a little, a pound at best. Once it was gone he’d be eating whatever the two of them could scrounge up. She wasn’t sure how good that was for dogs, but they were omnivores, she thought.
“Don’t eat too fast,” she warned repeating the warning she’d gotten at some point in childhood that she couldn’t quite remember anymore.
He ignored the pieces for the moment, though she wasn’t sure if he was really drinking any of the water or just getting it … everywhere. Going back to her thoughts, she figured that if it came from the forest and she could eat it; he should probably be fine. She hoped. Dusting her hands off on her pants, she grabbed the apple off the top of her pack. There had been some jerky, dried fruit, and nuts at the pumpkin farm, but Quick knew to save that stuff. The fresh things wouldn’t keep. So, those she ate first.
After polishing the green apple with a clean bandana, she bit into it. Boomer crunched some of the dry food, and let a few of the other pieces just soak up the water, which was part of Tayen’s plan. She thought it might keep the waste to a minimum. They sat there in the shade amongst the leaf litter and pine needles, listening to the forest as they rested.
From that vantage point, Tayen thought, you almost couldn’t tell that hell was breaking loose in the county. It was not a comforting thought. Quick wondered how many people like Rae-Rae were being caught unawares at that very moment while she lounged under the tree cover. It was a thought that didn’t sit well in her head, or her gut. With a sigh, she picked up the empty frisbee and closed her pack. Despite her movement, Boomer still laid there next to her leg, though he had turned his head to watch her. One eyebrow shifted and the corresponding ear flicked.
“You trying to be extra cute?” she asked.
His little eyebrows with their long whiskers shifted as he tipped his head and looked at her upside down.
“This how you won that title, huh? Gave the judges the eyes?”
He offered a little rumbling growl that made her smirk.
“Too cute.”
He barked at her and shifted onto his tummy, looking back at her over his shoulder.
“I don’t draw, so your French dog pose is lost on me, Cutie Pie.” She said the term of endearment like a tease.
He barked and put his paw on her leg.
Tayen grinned and leaned closer. “No, you’re cute. End of Story,” she pronounced with finality.
Boomer’s tongue darted out before she could escape and he managed to get her on the mouth and somehow licked inside the her nostril.
“Damnit,” she giggled wildly. She brushed her mouth across the back of her sleeve. “You got your tongue up my nose, man. Not cool.” All the while Boomer wallowed into her lap and she rubbed and petted him. “We’re going to have talk about the mouth kisses. And up the nose is a hard pass. I’m cool with cheeks. But I’m not sure we’ve known each other long enough for you to be getting so fresh.”
Boomer leaned up like he’d lick her again and she lifted her head in time to only end up with a tongue across the underside of her chin. She rubbed him like she was trying to tickle a child and the dog wriggled in her lap trying to sneak in well placed laps here and there.
“Crazy dog,” she told him when he finally tumbled out of her lap and pressed his chest to the ground. His butt was still in the air, tail wagging with abandon. Tayen playfully swiped toward his head to pet him and he jumped at her hand. She got to her feet and when she pulled her pack back on Boomer leaped again, almost high enough to reach her shoulder.
“Let’s go, boy. We got some ground left to cover before the sun gives out on us.”
He circled her legs once then took off in the correct direction. “Too fucking smart,” she mused as she set out in his wake. Boomer hopped over logs and clumps of weeds with surprising grace while she just trudged along in his wake, wishing she could muster have his enthusiasm for the walk. She wanted to reach that lumber yard before sun down and a trek through some rough country stood between the two of them and that goal.
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