"Saaaaaaaaannnnnnnng!" A yell cut through my peaceful slumber and I shot up in bed with a gasp. He faint light streaming in from the window told me it was early morning, a glance at the clock confirmed this. Next to me Nathan groaned and shifted under the covers. I sighed and ran my hands over my hair that was falling from the ponytail I had put it in last night then climbed out of bed to find the source of the yell.
Who on earth was up this early yelling at me?
Shuffling into the next room I tugged my tee shirt down over the hem of my cotton shorts and looked around to see Gabriel camped on the couch typing away on a laptop.
"What are you doing?" I asked, yawning into my hands as I padded over to join him.
"Trouble," he said, looking up and spotting me, "come here, come here!" He said excitedly patting the seat next to him. I rolled my eyes but did as he said, plopping down and leaning my head against his shoulder.
Looking at the computer's screen I saw it open to a page with a picture of a golden retriever puppy with the words ADOPT ME on a button under it.
"A puppy?" I said softly, "you want to adopt a puppy?" He just smiled, "you can imagine what Kota would say can't you?" At this his grin got wider.
"That's why we aren't fully adopting it!" He smiled and his eyes lit up making my heart do a weird little skip.
"What?" I said, cocking my head to the side, not fully understanding what he was talking about.
"They have a program on here where you can foster a puppy for a short time until it finds a home of its own." His excitement was contagious and I soon found myself grinning ear to ear.
"Are you sure about this?" I asked, I probably already knew the answer but I had to ask.
"Kota has been saying we need a reward for awhile now anyway." He pointed at the screen, "look, they only need someone to keep this one for a week while they check out the new owners."
A golden fluffy puppy with its tongue rolling out of its mouth with the name Falcor under it showed. I smirked.
"Falcor?"
"I'm not so sure about this Gabriel, I mean, just going off and doing this without permission?" I said from the passenger seat as Gabriel and I drove to pick up Falcor.
I had changed into a pair of light jean shorts and a gray top because I anticipated puppy fur in my future.
"Oh trouble, you underestimate me. I do have permission." I looked over at him in question, raising an eyebrow and he answered, "yep, from the big guy himself." It made me feel slightly better knowing you know who has given the ok already.
We pulled into the parking lot of the local animal shelter and the second he parked the car he jumped out and ran around to open my door for me. I rolled my eyes but took the offered hand. Leading me inside the door, I smelled dog and heard the sound of many different barks coming from the kennel.
Gabriel didn't seem fazed and strolled right past a dog laying in the lobby and to the information desk.
"Yes, can I help you?" A woman in her early twenties with curly brown hair pulled back into a bun and warm hazel eyes asked. She had on the shelters logo on her light blue shirt. Her name tag read 'Avery'.
"I'm Gabriel Coleman, I talked to you earlier about fostering the golden retriever puppy..." more was said, but by then my attention had wandered to the dog laying by the door. He was a big dog with long white fur and black ears.
He seemed content to just lay there by the door, but his tail started wagging when I walked toward him.
"Hey there big guy."I cooed. I had never really grown up around dogs, but our old neighbours had a big black lab that would sometimes wander over into our yard then Marie and I would play with it. Once our mom found out she put a stop to it though.
I reached out a hand and rubbed his head, feeling the silky fur under my fingers.
"Sang, come on!" Gabriel said, I looked up and saw him and Avery waiting for me.
"Oh, sorry." I said, standing and following them behind the door and down a hallway before we entered the kennel. The barking bounced off the walls and as we passed every cage I wanted to stop and cuddle the dogs jumping for my attention. I forced myself to follow Gabriel and the lady as they continued walking down the row.
"Here he is," Avery said, stopping at a cage with a puppy jumping against the bars, "careful because he's a little jumpy." She manuvered herself in front of the doors then opened it up and swooped the small golden ball of fluff into her arms before he could make an escape.
"Here you go." She said, dropping him into my arms. I struggled to get used to his weight and wriggling and adjusted my arms until he calmed down. As he painted in my arms I took a moment to appreciate how soft his fur was.
"Aww,look at this little cutie pie." Gabriel said, rubbing Falcor's ears. "Just wait until the others see you. They're going to flip out, yes they are." He said in baby talk. I giggled as he fawned over the puppy in my arms.
"He's fully house broken, and we just had a volunteer take him for a walk right before you guys arrived so he should be good for a couple of hours. If everything is good then I can give you his stuff and you can get going." Avery said, a warm smile on her face.
About 25 minutes later we pulled into my neighbourhood once again, with the cutest little puppy in the world sticking his nose to the window as he looked out.
We rode in Kota's car, which Gabriel had 'borrowed'. Which left me wondering...
"So who brought you over this morning?" I asked, stroking Falcor's head and clipping on the green leash and collar as we pulled into Kota's driveway.
"Victor had some stuff to do this morning so he dropped me off." He answered, unbucklng his seat belt and stepping out of the car before running around to my side to open the door. I rolled my eyes and let Falcor jump out before me.
As we walked up to the house, we were greeted by Max, Kota's golden retriever, who took a moment to curiously sniff the new arrival. Once he deemed him friend, he sat back and stared at us expectantly. Gabriel complied with a pat on the head Before taking my hand and pulling me towards the door. I ended up tugging the puppy behind me.
"He's allowed in the house right?" I didn't want to just show up with a puppy if he wasn't.
"Yep. Max stays in the garage now but when he was little they let him stay inside, and before the garage was heated they'd bring him in in the winter." He explained. It took us a minute to make it to the door because Falcor wanted to stop and smell everything, but we made it to the front door.
I hesitated for a second, but Gabriel just walked right in.
"Kota! Are you awake?" He yelled through the house as he walked in, closely followed by Falcor then me. Gabriel wandered off but Falcor had stopped to smell everything. I kept a close eye on him, even though the lady had said he was fully housebroken I had read somewhere that puppies pee when they got really excited, I didn't want him having an accident in Kota's house five minutes after getting here.
I stood close to the door in case the pup needed to be rushed back outside but he seemed content to sniff. I heard talking and looked up to see Kota being corralled from his room by Gabriel, he looked over and spotted me almost immediately and a smile made it's way on his face as his green eyes lit up. Then his gaze traveled down to Falcor who was looking at him too.
They both just sat there and stared at each other for a minute with their heads cocked to the side until Kota squatted down and held his hands out. Falcor ripped out of my grasp and flew into his open arms, making him laugh.
"What did you do Gabe?" He asked through his laughter as Falcor jumped up on him and licked his face. I smiled at them, it was so unusual to see Kota completely loosen up and go all soft like that. Not to say it never happened, but it was rare.
"Well I was browsing the other day and I came across this little guy, he was looking for a foster home until his forever home was ready to be moved into, so I thought, 'why not', so after a few phone calls and about half an hour of begging, I got the ok and Sang and I went to pick him up this morning." Gabriel told him, looking over at me.
"His name is Falcor." I put in because he hadn't been introduced yet.
"Falcor? Like the luck dragon from the Never Ending Story that they used to show every year at the end of school in elementary?" Kota asked as Gabriel nodded saying something like 'that's what caught my eye.' Kota turned back to the golden fluff ball and ruffled his ears much to the pup's delight, "Is that what you are? Are you a big luck dragon huh? You sure don't look like one." He cooed causing my smile to grow and I raised my hand to my mouth to stifle my giggles.
Who knew Kota talked baby talk?
Gabriel had a smug smirk as he leaned against the wall, as if he knew this would happen. Maybe he remembered when they got Max.
"Well Gabe, you sure did plan this well, all the guys are coming over later to hang out, we've got him for a week you said?" Kota asked, while standing to Falcor's dismay. He let out a series of tiny, displeased puppy barks to which Kota smirked, "oh hush, you'll have more attention than you know how to deal with soon." As if he understood what Kota said, Falcor plopped onto his butt and let his tongue loll to the side in a happy puppy grin.
Even puppies listened to Kota, who knew?
After that they spent a lazy morning playing with Falcor, Erica was of course super excited and agreed immediately to let him stay for the week before she went off to work, he was just waking up from a nap when they heard a knock at the door, sending him flying and barking towards the front door. Kota and I got up to follow him and I scooped him into my arms as North, Luke, Nathan, Victor and Silas all filed in with shocked and curious expressions.
When they were all inside Luke stepped up to get a better look at a wriggling Falcor, who I set down before he jumped up on his leg.
"And just who are you?" He asked in amusement.
"This is Falcor," I told them, "we're fostering him for a week." They all started talking at once after that, saying things like 'why', 'when did this happen', and 'this was Gabe's idea wasn't it.'
After they all settled down, we sat around the living room and played with Falcor some more, who was simply overwhelmed with all this attention and was more than happy to be pet on by everyone. About an hour later he was wore out and napped on the floor by my feet, I could tell that if this is what it would be like to have Falcor around, it was gonna be a very fun but long week.
There you lovely people go, the latest one shot from the mind of Luke. I really love making one shots for this series so if you guys have any ideas for some I could do I'd love to hear them, I could make this a longer story and include all the guys keeping Falcor for one day but I'm not as good at the longer stuff but I will if you guys want me to so tell me what you think!
FUN FACT: The puppy was originally going to be named after one of the golden retrievers in had as a kid but they were named, get this, Dakota and Luke and we called them Kota-bear and Lukester Dukester. But I eventually went with Falcor which was the name of the dog we were going to get before we got our current dogs Annie and Tippy.
As usual tell me what you guys think and leave a comment or PM me with questions, tips, or requests if you have them, I was finally able to get back on after my kindle broke and I lost my password so I'm going to try really hard to update everything but just know that I'm not dead it just takes forever to use my phone and I can't always use my mom's laptop.
Have a nice day! B-)