Саманта Сильвер - Just Horsing Around

Before I got a chance to look further, though, Ellie let out a cry of triumph.

“Here they are!” she said, digging out a pile of 5x7 photos. She handed one to me. I looked down at a beautiful chestnut brown mare and an adorable black foal. The foal’s mother was completely brown, from head to toe. She was beautiful, and the foal was the cutest little thing.

“Awwww,” I said, smiling.

“Please, keep the photo,” Ellie told me when I tried handing it back to her. “It’s the least I can do, and we have a few of them. The head of the stables sent them over when Touch of Midnight was born, and I don’t know what to do with them.”

“Thanks,” I told her, tucking the picture into my purse. I liked putting pictures of my patients up on the wall of the vet clinic, and this was close enough. “Would you mind if I took one of these as well?” I asked, motioning to the pile of pictures of Touch of Frost. “For the wall of the vet clinic.”

“Of course! Help yourself! Mom hated it when people did that sort of thing, but…” Ellie’s voice trailed off into nothingness. “Thanks for coming. I’ve already taken up enough of your time.”

“Oh, it’s no problem,” I told Ellie. “Where’s Susan, by the way?”

“Oh, she’s out tonight. I don’t want anyone around here seeing me like this, so I told her to just take the week off. Plus I think mom’s death, and now Corey’s, really affected her. She hasn’t been herself. But then, neither have I.”

She laughed, a hollow laugh that sounded almost manic. “I’m sorry. You go home. Thanks for talking to me, I really appreciate it.”

“You take care of yourself,” I told Ellie as we headed back towards the front of the house. “I know it hurts, but it will get better. I promise.”

Ellie nodded, a single tear streaking its way down her face. “I know. I keep telling myself that. This too shall pass. My mom always used to say that. This too shall pass.”

I gave Ellie a quick hug before heading home, a feeling of melancholy passing over me slightly. I thought of my own parents, the parents I never got to know well enough to really feel at their deaths. After all, to a four year old, what even is death? It’s an abstract concept. I didn’t know what Lisa meant when she said mommy and daddy had gone to heaven. I knew I was sad they weren’t coming back, but that was it. A little bit of sadness. Like when a client moves away and I know I won’t see their pet again. That was the kind of sadness I remembered feeling when I heard mommy and daddy weren’t coming back. I remembered it being more of a slow release, the grief, as I got older and began to understand that they really weren’t ever coming back. But the older I got, the less I remembered them.

I wiped a tear that I didn’t even realize was there off my cheek. I really needed that bottle of wine, now.

Chapter 15

The first thing I did when I got to work the next day was to put up the new photos I’d gotten from Ellie the day before. Behind Karen’s receptionist desk was a large corkboard where I put up any Christmas or thank you cards I got from clients, as well as pictures of their happy and healthy pets that they sent me. I grabbed a couple of thumbtacks and carefully put the picture of Touch of Frost up, along with the one of the mare and his foal. Sure, the latter two weren’t exactly clients , but I didn’t have any other horses whose pictures I could put up. It wasn’t like Touch of Midnight was recognizable yet, anyway. He was still a foal, he had a long way to go before he would reach the same fame as his father.

“First you abandon me for a dog, and now a horse. Why do you hate my species so much, you racist?” Bee asked. As soon as we got in that morning she immediately curled up into a little ball in her bed on the counter, but apparently wasn’t so tired that she couldn’t complain about Touch of Frost.

“First of all, I’m fairly certain the term racist doesn’t apply to inter-species dislike. And secondly, I haven’t abandoned you for a horse. Touch of Frost is a client. I put lots of client photos up here.”

“You don’t have photos of me up there.”

“That’s because you’re not a client, you’re my special little kitty-poo,” I told her, walking over to where she was and giving Bee a big, exaggerated hug that earned me a hiss in return.

“I still have my claws, and I will use them,” Bee muttered angrily, and I laughed as I stood up and left her in peace.

“You can’t complain that I don’t like you, and then complain when I give you affection,” I told my cat, glancing at her side-on.

“I can too. I want your love, but only when it suits me, and only a limited amount.”

I laughed as I saw Karen coming up the street and into the clinic.

“Oh, is that Touch of Frost?” she asked when saw the pictures, dropping her bag off on the little shelf under the receptionist desk.

“Yeah, it is,” I replied happily. “And his foal, Touch of Midnight.”

“What a little cutie patootie.”

“That little cutie cost his owner half a million bucks. Apparently that’s the going rate for Touch of Frost’s sperm these days.”

Karen’s mouth dropped open. “Wow! I guess that explains how they were able to pay you so much for a consult when he was sick.”

“Definitely. So who’s my first appointment for the day?”

Karen opened up the appointment program on the computer.

“You’ve got Natasha Klein, bringing in Deko. The little Jack Russel who broke his leg?”

“Awwww, I do. That little dude has so much energy, he just doesn’t know when to stop. He jumped out a second story window, onto the garage and then down onto the ground, right?”

Karen reviewed the notes and nodded. “Yeah. Luckily he landed in the garden and not on some concrete.”

“Good. He should be healed up by now so I’ll give him some X-rays to double check.”

“And then second you’ve got… oh, yeah. You remember Gloria, that talkative old lady with the cat that likes Bee?”

She didn’t make any other movement, but I could have sworn I saw Bee’s ear twitch when Karen said that.

“Yeah?” I replied.

“Well, it turns out he’s got a patch of fur missing, and he’s been licking at it for a bit. So she called yesterday afternoon and she’s the second appointment of the day.”

“Ok, perfect, thanks Karen,” I told her. A missing patch of fur and excessive licking was usually a sign of stress. We’d have to see, anyway. Maybe Buster wasn’t adjusting well to the move.

I didn’t have too long to think about it, because ten minutes later I heard the familiar yips of a certain overactive terrier who knew where his owner was taking him and wasn’t happy about it. I smiled to myself. Poor Deko. At least nothing bad was going to happen today, he was just going to get some X-rays and a checkup to make sure his leg was fine.

Forty-five minutes and a confirming X-Ray later, Deko was back out in the world with a completely healthy leg, ready to go out and create even more chaos. I was helping Sophie clean the exam room and get it ready for Buster when I heard Gloria’s voice out in the waiting area.

“Oh hello there Karen, how are you doing today? Isn’t the weather just lovely this time of year? I absolutely love it.”

I heard Karen reply. “If you want to go grab Buster I’ll bring up his profile,” I told Sophie, going over to the computer in the corner where we kept the files on all our animal clients. The program was slow to load, and by the time I finally got Buster’s chart up, about two minutes later, Sophie still wasn’t back.

“Uh, Angie?” Sophie said, coming back into the room. “I think you may want to come out here and see this.”