Chapter 4 : Oliver and Sophie

Oliver

I grinned as Dottie, the puppy, put her paws up on the passenger side window and tried to jam her little black nose through the narrow opening at the top. She snuffled, whining her excitement as I turned off the main drag. Reaching over to scratch behind her ear as my Jeep rumbled toward home.

“We’ll be home soon, girl. Then you can run and romp and all of that goodness. That vet tech sure was nice, wasn’t she?” The puppy turned her head and woofed before returning her attention to the window. I took that as a yes.

“Now, my girl, Sophie, doesn’t always come across quite as nice, but I’m sure, once you get to know her, you’ll love her as much as I do.”

My gut wobbled at the thought. I hadn’t actually told Sophie about the puppy yet. Given that I trained dogs for a living, though, I didn’t think it would be a total shock that I’d finally brought one home with me.

The truck rolled onto the smooth black pavement of the subdivision where Sophie and I lived. We hadn’t even made it to the driveway when I noticed a stack of cardboard boxes sitting by the mailbox next to the curb.

“Is it recycling day or something?”

The puppy didn’t have an answer, of course, not that I expected her to. Parking the truck, I left the puppy inside the cab, windows cracked, while I jogged to the end of the driveway to check out the boxes.

A frown etched my face as I moved toward them. A splash of vibrant color peeked through one of the handle holes, capturing my attention. I recognized the cover of X-Men, issue 210 through the box’s handle hole. I’d been collecting comics since I was knee high to a grasshopper and I treasured them.

That’s the first issue of the Mutant Massacre, one of the perennial story arcs in the entire series!

I had expected to find trash and junk in the boxes. I flung the lid off a box. My comic book collection, one of the few things I had left from my childhood, each & every one a prized possession, filled the box to the brim.

How could Sophie throw them out?

Dottie whimpered, and I momentarily forgot my outrage in the face of her plight.

“It’s all right, Puppy. Trash collection doesn’t come until tomorrow. My comics will be safe enough until then. Let’s get you inside and sort all of this out with Sophie, huh?”

I opened the Jeep’s driver door, and the puppy leapt into my arms and started licking my face.

“Now, stop that.” I laughed, even though I didn't want her to get in the habit of licking people’s faces. Unfortunately, that turned out to be a bad move, because it left my mouth open. Dottie managed one lick of my mouth before I got her happy face away from mine.

I remembered what the doc had said and carried her in my arms all the way to the front door. I finagled the door open with one hand and pushed my way inside. The place smelled of Sophie’s quick-made vegetable soup. My stomach roiled in all the wrong ways.

“Hey.”

She called out to me from the open-concept kitchen. Sophie stood in front of the pot of burbling soup, taking a selfie in a sports bra and a pair of yoga pants. Her thick makeup and perfectly teased hair would no doubt make for a great selfie.

“Hey, yourself. Um, why did you throw my stuff out?”

“I went on a cleaning spree. It was time to get rid of the old and move onto the new.”

I blinked. Sophie’s careless dismissal of my things, specifically things so important to me, felt impossible.

Is this really happening?

“I told you how much they mean to me Sophie… They are some of the few things that survived the house fire…”

Then I noticed that she’d completely rearranged the living room. Gone was my comfortable stuffed chair, replaced with some modern, steel-and-plastic thing which made my ass hurt just looking at it.

All of my certifications and awards had disappeared from shelves and walls where I had displayed them. I realized what else must have been in those boxes outside. Hurt and betrayal crept into my voice, drawing the normal booming tone down into a growl.

“Are you kicking me out? You could have just talked to me. Removing every trace of me from the common areas feels like an extra shitty way to break up.”

A frown crossed her face. She filled the air with an expulsive sigh and she dropped the phone to her side. Sophie turned a narrow-eyed glare my way.

“No, why would you think that? I redecorated for better energy. And, as far as ‘throwing out your stuff’ goes, it was just some of your old comic books. Why do we need a box of kid’s stuff? Don’t you think you’re being melodramatic?”

“Melodramatic? My certifications? And some of those comics are older than I am! They’re some of the last things my Uncle Jeff-”

“Gave you before he died of pancreatic cancer.”

I closed my mouth, a bit miffed she had chosen to use that particular trauma against me.

“Look, Ollie.”

She padded over to me on bare feet, reaching out as if to touch my shoulder.

“Comic books are fine for kids and teenagers, but sooner or later you have to grow…”

Her gaze fell on Dottie. Sophie stopped dead in her tracks, both verbally and otherwise.

“What. Is. That?”

I winced at her stiff tone. I had hoped she would be happy to see the puppy.

I mean, who sees a puppy and doesn’t immediately smile?

“Sophie, meet Dottie.”

I offered up the furry bundle for her to hold.

“Dottie, this is Sophie. She’s the other woman in my life. Besides you.”

“Um, I’m the only woman in your life.”

Sophie put her hands on her hips and shook her head, blonde curls bouncing.

“No way is that mongrel staying here.”

Fire flared in my cheeks.

“She’s hardly a mongrel. She’s a registered German Shepherd. She cost the training program thousands of dollars and she has to stay here, Sophie. I’m training her. I signed a contract.”

Sophie sniffed, turning back to her soup.

“Then put her in a kennel or something.”

My lungs refused to breathe. My mind reeled at the suggestion.

“What? I can’t do that. That would just be irresponsible. She’s too young. The bonding process is the basis of her future training, and she needs to be socialized.”

Sophie’s eyes rolled to the ceiling behind fake eyelashes.

“OMG. It’s not a ‘she’, it’s a dog, Ollie. They’re, like, able to take care of themselves from birth.”

“No… that’s not even scientifically accurate. What the fuck? Don’t you know anything about dogs?” I struggled to keep my tone calm, though hurt by her attitude. The last thing I want is yet another fight. Seems like we’ve been having a lot of those lately.

“You’re thinking of certain reptiles, Sophie. Dogs need time to develop. They’re next to helpless at this age.”

Sophie grunted and turned back into her soup. She again took up position in front of the stove, snapping photos of herself in different poses. “Fine, fine. Whatever. But it’s not sleeping in the house. It can sleep outside.”

“Outside?” Anger bubbled up inside me like a red tidal wave.

Outside? When Dottie can’t even let her paws touch the dirt without potentially getting sick and dying? The very idea set my mind spinning. Sophie’s heartless, callous attitude soured my stomach. Nausea quivered my gut.

“Is there an echo in here?” Her fake smile remained pasted on while Sophie spoke, though her voice held plenty of contempt.

“Yes, outside. It’s an animal. Outside is for animals. Inside is for people. I’m not about to smell like dog all the time and there’s no way I’m dealing with dog hair on everything I own.”

“She’s just a puppy, Sophie. I’m not making her sleep outside in Montana. It could be lethal and it's just cruel.”

Sophie set her phone down and rounded on me. She loomed over the kitchen counter, leaning forward as if it would make her glare all the more pointed.

“Do you know how grossed out my followers would be if I was constantly covered in dog hair? I don’t know what's gotten into you lately. You didn’t even ask how I felt about it. This is my place, after all. I mean, it was, before you moved in your dust-magnet furniture and…”

My head spun.

“What do you mean? You knew I trained dogs for a living…”

My heart pounded in my ears. Sophie spun back to stare me down, her arms crossing over her chest. “You think you have to argue with everything I say.”

“I do not argue with everything you say.”

One of her hands darted out to point at me, as if Sophie had found a chink in my logic.

“See, Ollie? See what I’m talking about?”

Sophie followed her pointing finger with a smirk. “You just did it again.”

I wiped a hand down my face and gathered my composure. “Sophie, be reasonable.”

She thrust out her bottom lip, eyes smoldering with defiance. “The dog sleeps outside, or you can find somewhere else to bed down yourself.”

Put up with this or go?

I looked down at Dottie, busily sniffing at a moth perched on the wood panel wall.

“Are you saying it’s you or the dog?”

She snorted. “That’s exactly what I”m saying.”

I needed less than a minute to decide. “Okay, fine. Guess me and Dottie are moving out.”

Sophie’s mouth fell open. She stared in shock as I went into our bedroom and took the suitcase from the closet. Fortunately, most of my stuff is already by the curb.

“What are you doing… Are you seriously packing up to leave?”

“You told me it was you or the dog. You gave me the ultimatum.” I cringed a moment at the sharpness of my snappy response, but I refused to give in now.

“Yeah, Ollie, but you weren’t supposed to choose the dog!”

“The dog is my career, my life’s work, Sophie. You put yourself against me. You made me choose.”

“How could you choose a dog over me? I’m a real person, Ollie!”

Sophie followed me around, continuing to berate me as I gathered up clothes and folded them into the suitcase.

I felt bizarrely calm. Her words melted together and rolled off my consciousness. Every ounce of anger and resentment I might have felt melted away the moment I had decided to leave.

Sophie didn’t follow me outside as I struggled with the wiggling Dottie and my suitcase at the same time. I could feel her watching me, though, as I loaded the rest of my stuff, including the boxes she had deposited on the curb, into my Jeep.

As soon as I climbed in the cab and shut the door, the fact I didn’t feel sad about the sudden break up struck me. Well, maybe I feel a little bit sad, but not depressed or despairing. The time has simply come for my relationship with Sophie to come to a close.

Relief washed over me. I smiled at Dottie and realized something important.

“We need a place to stay, girl.”

She woofed, tail wagging. I dug the phone out of my pocket. I went through my list of contacts.

Lucas. Lucas has all that space at the ranch… Lucas will have the room.

“Hey, old buddy. Listen, I’ve got myself into a bit of a jam…” Lucas didn’t even make me explain beyond needing a place to stay.

“Well, shoot, brother. I guess you’d better bring your ass out to the ranch, then. Ethan’s already taken the guest house, so you and Dottie will have to bunk in the Big House.”

“Thanks, Lucas.”

“We’ll see if you still thank me when you find out you’ll have to do all the chores Chase keeps putting off.”

This was definitely going to be interesting, but I was looking forward to what would come of it in the end. With Sophie gone, I was a single man, and with that thought process, I didn’t understand why my mind drifted once again to the vet tech at the clinic.

Why couldn’t Sophie have been like her?