Max's P.O.V.
I was trying to pick one of the puppies. I thought it would be just that easy. I would get to see all the puppies and which one I liked the best or that liked me the best and that puppy would be our new family dog. Only picking one was hard. They were all so adorable and lovable and loving too. I didn't know how to pick one.
I had gone out to the waiting room where my Aunt Stephanie was a little while before. She had said something about me being her son, and it seemed like she had told this guy who was in Mom's clinic that Tommy was also her son. It didn't make sense to me that she would do that. She'd been traveling the world until recently. Anyway, after she sent me back into the room with the puppies, she put Tommy and his stroller in with me. I went back to the puppies to try and decide on one of them again. Tommy had a couple toys in the stroller with him and was playing with them. He was hitting one of them on the table of the stroller.
I had finally picked a puppy. I told them all that the best licker would win and the best licker would be my new puppy. I had declared him the winner, but stayed in with the puppies because they were all so cute. I told the other ones that I would contact them if the puppy I picked wasn't able to perform his puppy duties.
I was still in there with them a few minutes later. The waiting room was quiet, but then I heard someone talking to Aunt Stephy. I heard her say something about a skunk and when I looked up, I saw one running into the room. "Ah! Tommy! Look out!" I exclaimed. It didn't do any good because Tommy couldn't move on his own in the stroller. "Skunk!" I exclaimed as well when Aunt Stephanie came running in to the room.
"No," she said as the skunk sprayed her, me, Tommy, and all the puppies. "Great," she added sarcastically. "Um, I'm going to get the skunk out of here first." Aunt Stephanie picked the skunk out and brought it outside of Mom's clinic.
"What do we do now?" I asked when she got back to the room. "We can't go home smelling like this. And we can't give Steve his puppies back smelling like skunk."
"Um. I guess I can Google something and see what you're supposed to do," Aunt Stephanie said. She pulled her phone out of her coat pocket and quickly Googled what she needed to. "So it says that tomato juice should get rid of the smell. We can't go to the store smelling like this so I'll just set it up to have it delivered. I think we can order a couple barrels or something for us to bathe in."
"What about the puppies?"
"Maybe a couple of kiddie pools, I guess," she spoke. She didn't sound confident of her decision but got on her phone to order the pool and tomato juice.
The room smelled really bad from the skunk but we didn't have much choice but to be in the room. If we left the room, the rest of the clinic would smell more like skunk than it already did. While we waited, Aunt Stephanie opened the window to try and get some of the smell that hung in the air out.
I think it was about a half hour later that a delivery person got to the clinic. "Stay here," Aunt Stephanie said to me as she went to get the delivery.
"Ugh, what happened to you?" I could hear the delivery man ask.
"Just be quiet and give me my stuff."
"It's all right here."
"Okay, take it over here into this room."
While I waited, the delivery man wheeled several boxes of tomato juice into the room where Tommy and I still were with the puppies. I think he was about to laugh seeing the problem Aunt Stephy had to deal with, but I gave him an unhappy look and he wiped the smile off his face. After a couple minutes, he had brought in all the tomato juice and a couple kiddie pools then eventually the two barrels for us. Aunt Stephanie closed the door and windows then moved the pen the puppies were in out of the way.
"I guess we'll get them in first," she said. "I'll get the bottles of juice open and you can pour them into the pools."
"Okay," I replied.
Aunt Stephanie started opening the boxes and then a couple of the bottles of juice and I started pouring them into the pools for the puppies to get into. Once there was some tomato juice in the kiddie pools, the puppies started to get in and drink the juice, but they got the juice on themselves too. Aunt Stephanie checked online to make sure we didn't need to stop the puppies from drinking the juice and she found out it was okay for them to drink it as long as they didn't have too much.
We got the two pools filled with the tomato juice and got all the puppies covered in the juice to get rid of the smell.
"All right, Max. I think we'll get one of the barrels ready for you first," Aunt Stephanie said to me once we'd finished getting stuff done for the puppies.
"Okay," I agreed.
"I'll keep opening the bottles if you want to pour it in. We'll fill it just over halfway and then you can get in." I nodded in agreement and took the bottle of juice she had opened and poured it into one of the barrels. Several more bottles of the juice later, we'd filled it about halfway. "All right, Max, time for you to get in. Here's a step to help you to be able to get in it."
"Don't you want me to help getting the one for you and Tommy ready?"
"Hmm," she paused in thought. "That would make more sense. We can start getting some in it, but I don't know how much more or less than what we put in yours I'll need. I'll probably have to get in and add more once both Tommy and I are in. Just like we might need to add more in yours."
"Okay." We continued filling the second barrel the same way we had with the pools and the first barrel. When Aunt Stephanie thought there was enough to start with, she put the rest on the table next to her barrel so she'd be able to reach them even when she got in.
"All right, Mighty Max, do you think you'll need any help getting into the juice once you're undressed?"
"No. I'll be fine, Aunt Stephy," I said, walking to beside the barrel for me and laying my suit coat down. I made sure the step for me to get in was in a good spot and took the rest of the suit off before climbing into the barrel while Aunt Stephanie changed Tommy's dirty diaper, which was hard to smell with all the skunk stink. "Look, I got in all by myself!" I said once I was in.
"Awesome. Is there enough of the juice in there for you to sort of wash off with?"
"Yeah. I think I can just get down in it a little more to be covered," I explained.
"Okay. Can you look away and hold Tommy while I get undressed? Then once I get into the barrel for me and Tommy, I'll take him back from you."
I nodded and she handed Tommy over to me. I didn't have any reason not to listen to what Aunt Stephanie said so I turned away from her while she got undressed and I held Tommy.
"Max," she said, drawing my attention a few minutes later. "I can take Tommy back now," she finished.
I turned back around to give Aunt Stephanie Tommy. "This has been fun," I spoke a few minutes later when I sunk a little lower in the juice.
Aunt Stephanie laughed. "Well, you'll never forget the day you picked out your puppy," she commented. "Do you know which one of them you picked, or hadn't you picked one yet?"
"Um," I looked down to the puppies. "No, at least not from just looking at them," I replied. None of the puppies had a collar on for me to be able to tell which one of them had been the best licker. "Maybe when I can see them better I can tell, otherwise I'll need to pick one of them over again," I said.
"I'm sorry the skunking ruined getting to take the puppy you picked home."
"It's not your fault. You couldn't know it would happen," I replied.
"Well, I guess, but if I had been paying closer attention I might have noticed they brought in a skunk sooner and I could have had them get it out of the clinic before it ran into the room and skunked you, Tommy, and the puppies."
"And you," I added.
"Maybe I could have been the only one who got skunked."
"Or everyone else in the clinic could have gotten skunked. Better us than them. The clinic and Mom doesn't need to lose clients because they got skunked."
"Yeah, I guess you're right," Aunt Stephanie said while laughing.
For a little while, we continued talking while we soaked in the tomato juice until we heard the front door of the clinic opening.
"Hello," a voice spoke. I knew instantly that it was Mom. I looked over to Aunt Stephanie and saw her eyes widen. She knew it was Mom too. "Ste–" Mom cut herself off at the next word. "Uh, oh." There were a couple seconds of silence following. I think Mom realized that the clinic smelled like skunk. "Stephanie?" she asked.
Aunt Stephanie's eyes were wide again, but she came up with a lie to try and stop Mom from coming in. "Uh, don't come in here. I'm wrapping a present for you," she said. I furrowed my brow in confusion then looked to her and she gave a slight shrug in response.
"Oh. My. Lanta," Mom said when she opened the door. Her eyes scanned over the room and they landed first on the puppies in the pools and then on me, Aunt Stephanie, and Tommy in the barrels. "What's going on?"
"More importantly, why did you come in here when I said I was wrapping a present," Aunt Stephanie began. "You could have ruined the surprise," she explained to Mom even though it was a lie.
"How did this happen?" she asked raising her hands. She seemed to be at a loss.
"We were the victims of a drive-by skunking," I explained, standing up in the barrel. I sank back down up to my neck after I finished speaking.
Aunt Stephanie nodded her agreement. "Google said tomato soup would get the smell out," Aunt Stephanie explained, though we had substituted juice instead. "Are you mad?"
"No," Mom laughed. "But this is going to look hilarious on my Facebook page," Mom said as she pulled her phone out of her purse and turned it to get a picture of all of us. "Say cheese."
I didn't say cheese. I wasn't very happy about the situation and wasn't happy about having my picture taken, but there wasn't anything I could do to change the situation. Aunt Stephanie minded as well and I knew she didn't like the situation either. I don't think Tommy minded and the puppies were more than happy to continue drinking the juice from the pools.
"Mom," I groaned after the picture was taken.
"Okay, okay. That's all I wanted to do. I got it uploaded. I can help now."
"Great. You know, that's the problem with people now days, they take pictures before they help," Aunt Stephanie said.
"Like you haven't done that before."
"Never."
"Remember that time Joey fell and ended up with pie all over him a few years ago."
"Okay, fine," Aunt Stephanie gave in.
"Now let me just take Tommy and get him in some of the extra clothes that are packed for him on. We'll figure out what to do from there," Mom said. She took Tommy from Aunt Stephanie. "Did you get any towels?"
I turned to Aunt Stephanie and her eyes were wide again and her lips were pressed into a thin line. "I didn't think about that when we were getting everything ready."
"Then maybe you should sit there while I run down the street to the store and grab some towels quick a minute," Mom said. She handed Tommy back over to Aunt Stephanie and left the clinic.
"Well, this has been an adventure," Aunt Stephanie said once Mom had left.
"Can we not do this again?" I asked. I guess this would be something to tell people about that not many other people would have to tell. Even though it hadn't been a fun day from getting skunked, it was interesting.
"I'm sorry this happened to us," Aunt Stephanie spoke to me a minute after Mom had left.
"It's okay," I replied. "I might stink, but at least we didn't get hurt."
"I would never hear the end of it if you got hurt on my watch."
"I think we don't smell quite as bad as we did at first," I said after a minute. "Or I've just gotten used to the smell so it doesn't bug me as much as it did at first," I trailed off.
Aunt Stephanie laughed. "Well you did get out of school for the day, because I'm sure we'll need to go home and shower again to get the rest of the smell off us," she said, taking another sniff of the room. "I'm sure Tommy will be thrilled. But, I don't think this is the worst thing that's ever happened. I mean, Jackson did end up basically running away under mine and Kimmy's watch. And there are things that happened while Uncle Jesse and Joey were watching us when we were kids that went way wrong."
"So if Mom gets mad at you, you can say it's not the worst thing that ever happened?" I asked.
"No," she shook her head. "There are some things I'm pretty sure I'm not allowed to tell you about that happened when DJ, Michelle, and I were kids that shouldn't have happened because the guys didn't know what they were doing."
I wondered what it was Aunt Stephanie was unwilling to tell me about. What kind of trouble did she and Mom and Aunt Michelle get into when they were kids that could be worse than getting skunked? Then again, the skunk hadn't really been Aunt Stephanie's fault, so if Mom said anything about it, I could tell her it wasn't Aunt Stephy's fault.
A couple minutes later, Mom got back with the towels. She took Tommy from Aunt Stephanie and helped me out of the barrel. While Mom got Tommy dressed and I dressed myself, Aunt Stephanie waited still soaking in the tomato juice. "Not going to get out, Steph?"
Aunt Stephanie rolled her eyes. "I think I'll wait until you guys leave the room to get out," she replied.
"All right," Mom replied. "I figured you would though," she added as she finished getting Tommy changed.
As I got dressed again, I neglected putting my tie and jacket on and only put the shirt and pants back on because they still smelled like skunk. I figured the less of my skunk smelling clothes I had on, the less I would smell like skunk when we got home. A couple minutes later, Mom was done getting Tommy dressed and I had finished getting dressed again. We left to go to the waiting room while Aunt Stephanie got out and got dressed.
"So, Max, what happened?" Mom asked me when we were in the waiting room.
"Well, I was still in by all the puppies. I had just picked one when I heard something about a skunk in the waiting room. The next thing I knew, there was a skunk walking into the room and it was spraying me, Tommy, and all the puppies as Aunt Stephy came running in so she got sprayed too."
"What about everyone else that was here?"
"I don't know. You'd have to ask Aunt Stephanie," I replied.
Mom nodded and we waited another couple minutes for Aunt Stephanie to open the door of the examining room she had been in. "Well, I guess now all we have to do is get the puppies cleaned off from the tomato juice they have on them. Unless we just want to let them lick it off," she jokingly suggested.
"We'll have to rinse them off in a tub and dry them. Max, you want to be on puppy drying duty?"
"Yes!" I exclaimed. Drying the puppies off sounded like fun because I could pet them and try to figure out which one of them it had been that I picked in the first place. And if I couldn't figure out which one that had been, I could pick a different one. We all headed back into the room where the puppies were and poured the juice from the pools down the drain before Mom and Aunt Stephanie started to clean the puppies up.
As the puppies got put down once they looked golden colored again, I got to dry them off. I started the licking test over again to see which one of them was the best licker. Once I had helped get all the puppies dry again, I figured out which one was the best licker. "This is the one, Mom," I said once we had finished everything.
"Great. I'll let Steve know that you've picked your puppy out. Steph, you guys should head home and get some clean clothes on. I'll take care of the rest of the stuff that needs to be done here," Mom said.
"Mom, didn't you want to know what Aunt Stephanie said happened?" I asked before we left.
"Oh, right. Steph?"
"Well, I was in the waiting room and this guy came in asking if we could take care of a stray pet. Next thing I knew his aunt was taking a skunk in. Everyone else ran out and it ran in by Max, the puppies, and Tommy then sprayed them and me when I followed it in there."
"And that's it?"
"That's it."
"All right. You guys might as well head home. I'll see you later," Mom said before we left.
When we got home with our new puppy a little while later, I helped Aunt Stephanie give Tommy and our new puppy a bath. We put the puppy in a carrier crate thing and Aunt Stephanie had Tommy in her room with a baby monitor while we took showers. After that, we finally had all the skunk smell off us.
"It feels good to be clean," I commented to Aunt Stephanie when we had all finished getting clean.
"Agreed," she said.
A little while later, we met everyone in the living room where I introduced them to our new family dog whose name would be Cosmo T.D. Fuller. Soon after that, Aunt Stephanie left for a date, claiming again that I was her son, like I had heard her saying before. This time she added that Jackson and Ramona were also her kids and that Mom and Kimmy were the housekeeper and something else. Jackson, Ramona, and I went along with it and they left. We laughed and joked about it once they were gone, and laughed about everything else that had happened that day. I guess living with Aunt Stephanie, Kimmy, and Ramona was going to mean life was interesting. I think it will be fun.
A/N: I likely wouldn't have written this if 1 hadn't brought the idea up. It was a fun challenge because it's been a while since I wrote anything from the point of view of a character rather than in 3rd person. I hope everyone enjoyed it and I'd love to know what you thought or any constructive criticism you have. Thanks for reading,
-CrazyHayniac