Dog on the Mind
Pacing back and forth in a brightly lit living room, a brown haired female waited impatiently.
"Where is she? She's been gone for so long..." She spoke to herself looking back at the front door again for the hundredth time.
A whimper escaped her mouth as she looked out the low window still seeing no sign of her most precious friend.
"I miss her. I miss her so much!" A pained cry came from her throat and her big brown eyes became teary.
"What if she never comes back? What if she left me forever?" She cried.
She continued her pacing and started crying as she began to panic.
"It must have been the shoes! I knew she liked them but I couldn't resist the temptation!" She whined some more.
"Now she HATES ME!" She cried even louder not hearing the tell tale sounds of a car pulling into the drive way over her crying.
"I'm SORRY!" She cried "Please come back! I'll never do it again I swea-!"
She suddenly caught the sound of jingling keys and the opening of the front door.
"Konoka, I'm back!" A woman holding a white shopping bag and keys appeared at the front door. Before the woman could even step into the house, she was tackled to the ground and licked profusely all over her face. "SetsunaSetsunaSetsuna! Oh I missed you so much! I'M SORRY!" The brown eyed dog barked excitedly upon seeing her best friend. Her tail wagged in the air in uncontained excitement.
Setsuna could not hold in her laughter despite wanting to be upset with Konoka for ruining her running shoes.
She giggled at the desperate attempt by the dog to make amends with wet kisses.
"Konoka, I've only been gone for fifteen minutes!" She continued to laugh as she started pushing her German Sheppard's heavy frame off her tiny body.
Once she was on her knees she rubbed Konoka's neck affectionately with both hands getting an even more excited tail wag then before in response along with another light lick on her nose making her giggle.
"Oh, I can't be angry at you." She cooed. She remembered coming home from work and seeing her favorite running shoes wet with slobber, chewed up in the kitchen and the cause of the destruction sitting innocently next to them looking up at her with just the cutest face. Upset that she couldn't get angry at the dog she stormed out of the house with wallet and keys to buy a new pair. She continued to rub her neck and said "You didn't mean to ruin my shoes, right? You were just lonely here all by yourself." She gave her a quick hug around the neck and stood up picking up the bag she had dropped. It was getting dark out now and the only light besides the street lamps around the neighborhood was her porch light. She gave a quick look around the quiet street shadowed in darkness that wasn't there thirty minutes ago and walked into the house followed by the sound trimmed claws stepping on the hard wood floor.
"I bet you're hungry, huh?" She looked down at Konoka who followed her into the kitchen.
The brown dog barked "YES!" in response. Setsuna smiled but then caught sight of the ruined shoes she hadn't picked up. She leaned down and picked them up and Konoka's ears lowered in shame. She let out a whine. "I'm sorry…"
Setsuna through the pair into the garbage and smiled at her.
"It's ok, I got new ones." She patted her head and seeing Konoka's tail wag slightly she went to grab a can of dog food she kept in one of her kitchen cabinets. She pulled the top off with the attached can top and grabbed Konoka's dog bowl, dumping the contents of the can into the bowl. Konoka paced silently behind her already having forgotten about her shame and was now excited for her dinner. She remained quiet, however, having learned that if she barked too much her master would get upset. Though Setsuna never said so herself, Konoka knew.
Now having the dog food in the bowl, Setsuna used the can top to squash the meat mixture until it didn't resemble a circle any more. She placed it on the mat were the dog bowls for Konoka went, and went ahead and picked up the water bowl so she could rinse and refill it. Konoka barked once in thanks for the food and began to eat.
When Setsuna finished with the water she contemplated what she should eat. She had not eaten since breakfast and was now quite famished. Her thoughts started to wander away with her when she recalled why she hadn't had lunch.
One of her co-workers at the gym she worked at asked if she could speak to them in private. Setsuna didn't have another class for another two hours so she had agreed. They went into one of the equipment rooms and Setsuna, having no idea what the man had wanted, just stared at him waiting for him to explain why he needed her in private. She didn't know him very well, only that he worked at the gym.
The guy started to fidget under her stare, and began to speak nervously. He had rambled for a bit about different things like the weather and something about the economy before he suddenly spat out.
"Would you mind going out to dinner with me this friday?" He looked at her with desperate eyes and a blush on his face.
Setsuna was surprised to say the least. She couldn't remember the last time she was asked out on a date and she was pretty sure she had never gone on any of them with men. Setsuna was gay and though she didn't go out and advertise it to the world with rainbow flags and butch style haircuts, she figured people just knew. Apparently she was wrong since this sorry guy was asking her out.
She had blushed getting ready to explain why she couldn't but something stopped her. Setsuna hadn't been with anyone in years and if she had to tell the truth she was getting pretty lonely. She had Konoka but it really just wasn't the same as human company. She needed something more and the perfect girl she had been waiting for to appear started to seem more and more like a distant dream.
She sighed as she leaned against the counter top in the kitchen. Out of some cruel whim she had agreed to go out with the guy at least once. She was disappointed in herself for being so weak but she couldn't change what she had done and decided to leave fate the chance.
'It is free food. Might as well enjoy it' She smiled to herself but then frowned when her stomach growled at the thought of food. She sighed again and said out loud, "Guess take out it is."
Konoka could still smell the Chinese food that was left on the coffee table. Setsuna had ordered and received the food awhile ago and was now watching T.V. Next to her sat Konoka, sitting straight up and, humorously, watching the glowing box as well. They were both lounging on the couch, silently watching the T.V. Konoka could tell something was wrong though.
'I wonder why she's upset.' She thought for a moment. 'The shoes maybe…? Naw that's not it'
Konoka peeked from the corner of her eye nervously and fidgeted when she saw the frown on her face.
'Hmm…'
She turned her body to face Setsuna and laid her head in her lap. Setsuna jumped a bit in surprise, having been lost in thought. She looked down to see Konoka peering up at her.
Konoka whined a bit.
"Why are you sad?"
Setsuna smiled at her and ran her fingers through her soft fur.
"I can't hide anything from you, huh?" Konoka's tail slowly thumped against the couch at the feel of soft fingers threading through her fur.
Thump, thump, thump…
"I just did something I shouldn't have. It will sort itself out later, I hope." She sighed and gave her dog another smile.
"You'll look out for me though, right?" She scratched Konoka's head and the dog lifted her furry head to look up at her.
'Of course I will. You're my best friend.' She sat up straight again and laid her head on Setsuna's shoulder.
Setsuna leaned into the dogs' warmth and comfort, closing her eyes. "You know, sometimes it feels like your actually talking back to me. That you really understand." That got a lick on her neck and she giggled.
"Thanks Konoka."
They stayed like that for awhile longer until Konoka yawned sleepily. Feeling the hot dog breath on her collar bone, she opened her eyes and stood up to clean the food up and get ready for bed.
With everything cleaned up they both went into her modest bedroom and got ready for bed. Once Setsuna was changed, she got under the covers and Konoka jumped on to the bed and took her place at the foot of the bed, laying her head on Setsuna's legs. Before they fell into deep sleep Setsuna muttered,
"Good night Konoka"
And Konoka thought, in reply,
'Night Setsuna.'
Later that night, Konoka awoke to the sound of a familiar mewing. It was just Setsuna muttering in her sleep again, but Konoka was already wide awake. She hopped off the bed and as quietly as the large dog could, she left the room, gently pushing the door nearly closed with her nose. That done she padded her way to the kitchen to get a drink from her water bowl. Lapping up the last bit of water, she was going to head back to bed. On her way back she stopped when she heard a scratching at the window in the living room. Her first instinct was to bark like mad and run in circles. She didn't though, thinking, 'I'm a smart pooch, yes I am.' She calmly walked over to the window. She pushed back the now closed curtain with her nose and both looked and smelled for the source of the sound. Her tail began to wag when she smelled her second best friend in the world. She found her sitting on the ledge, outside the window. An orange cat with different colored eyes looked back at her. Being a dog she really couldn't distinguish between colors, but that's what the cat had told her.
The cat meowed at her, "Hi Konoka." The cat seemed to almost grin at her like a human as she moved to sit directly in front of Konoka. "Hello Asuna." she grumbled lowly trying not to make too much noise. Luckily cats have even better hearing than dogs, so Asuna heard her clearly.
"Hey, is it ok if you come outside for a bit? I'm so bored." the dog tilted her head. "I guess its ok, but how do I get out?" Asuna thought for a moment her tail twitching as she realized dogs suck at escaping their houses.
"Oh! I know!" She remembered how she met the big dog in the first place and asked, "Did Setsuna ever fix that hole in the basement wall?" Konoka tried to get her feeble dog memory going to recall what Asuna was talking about, and with a little effort she remembered but was confused.
"No but I'm pretty sure I can't fit through their Asuna." Asuna just lifted a paw as if to wave her off and hopped down from her perch leaving Konoka confused. She sat down and her ears drooped sad that the cat left her alone. "It's not my fault I'm a big dog. It's not like I enjoy being gargantuan." She grumbled miserably. She sat there glumly for a moment contemplating whether she should cut down on the doggie treats, when she suddenly jumped letting out a surprised bark when something swatted at her bushy tail. She turned around to see, Asuna innocently licking her paw. "How did you get here!?" she grumbled.
Asuna lazily began to walk toward the couch and jumped up on to the armrest and laid down so she was eye level with the dog. "Through the hole silly. Don't you remember how we met?" That memory wasn't as hard to bring to the surface and she quickly recalled finding Asuna wet from the rain in the basement. It was hurricane season at the time, according to the glowing box, and the cat had taken shelter in there. When Konoka first discovered her she barked and chased the intruder all around the basement. Hating cats was practically encoded in a dogs DNA, but once the cat got high enough away from the angry dog, she just laid down and lazily blinked at the barking dog and waited for her to stop. The dog barked for another ten minutes pacing back and forth in front the shelf the cat was watching her from. She got tired after a while and just sat panting and whining desperate for the cat to come down.
"Hey," the cat called down to pretty pure bread dog, "I'm not here to cause trouble. I just want to stay out of the rain." Konoka barked back, "Go away cat!" she growled futilely. "Nope sorry. Can't do that." the cat meowed licking her paw trying to clean up her wet fur. She stopped licking and looked back down at the obviously upset K9. "Besides, I'm not just any cat. I am the familiar of the Thousand Masters." The cat stretched. "I wouldn't mess with me, if I were you." Konoka recognized the name from the stories her mother would tell as a puppy when she was on the street still. All animals, unlike most humans, knew of the existence of magic. Even if most animals had never seen any magic, it was so accepted as fact that it was the same as talking about air. Magic just was.
Konoka, for one, was always fascinated by the stories her mother told about the human magicians and their familiars. Being the innocent soul she was, she immediately believed the cat without question and the dog was excited to hear about the most powerful magician in the world.
"Really?! That's so cool! What's he like? Is he nice? He's got to be nice! What kind of magic can he do? Can you do magic? You have got to show me something! Come on come on! I want to see your magic!" Konoka was talking so fast without pause that Asuna couldn't get a single word in. She just watched the dog run in excited circles wagging her tail as she continued to bark about how awesome this was. She stopped listening to the dogs rambling after a minute and just stared. 'What a weird dog.' she thought. Eventually she noticed a pause in the dogs rambling and notices it just staring at her.
"Did you say something?" She sat up straight looking down at the dog.
"I said I was sorry for talking so much." the dog's ears laid flat against her head embarrassed by her uncontrolled behavior.
"Ah, don't worry about it. Most people get at least a little excited when I say I know the Thousand Masters." The cat did this weird thing with its mouth that looked like a grin. "Before I go talking about that guy, first let me introduce myself." The cat jumped and landed lightly in front of the dog. "My name is Asuna, the familiar cat of the Thousand Masters." She sat and looked up at the dog. "Now, who are you?" The dog sat, then laid down with her head up so they were eye level.
"My name is Konoka and I live here with my master, Setsuna. She's not here at the moment though."
Asuna nodded.
"Well, now that you're not trying to bite my head off, it's nice to meet you. Let's be friends, okay?"
Konoka was excited for a new friend and immediately said yes.
That was how the unlikely friendship began a year ago. Konoka hadn't seen much of Asuna in the past few months. It was nice having another animal friend around. She loved Setsuna to death but she couldn't have a real conversation with her like she could with Asuna. She wishes she could though. She sometimes even wished she was human herself. She wanted to give Setsuna a human hug, hold hands and have real conversations with Setsuna being able to understand her. She didn't want to just be her dog. She wanted to be ... something. She wasn't sure what but definitely more than a pet.
"...onaka? Konoka?" Asuna had to wave a paw in front of her eyes to bring Konoka back to reality. Konoka shook her head and looked back at Asuna.
"Sorry, Asuna." She said sadly looking down at her paws.
Asuna asked worried for her normally cheerful friend, "Hey what's wrong, Konoka? Something happen?"
Still looking down she replied, "No, I'm just thinking about silly stuff."
Asuna sat up and patted Konoka's head with a soft paw.
"Oh it can't be that bad. Tell me about what you're thinking."
Konoka looked back up at the cat to see caring eyes, and decided to reveal her most secret wish to the cat.
"I want to be human."
She looked down again embarrassed by her puppy like dreams. But was surprised to not hear laughter. Instead Asuna said, "Oh, is that what you're thinking about? Well if you wanted to be human all you had to do was ask!"
Konoka looked up in a flash of surprise. "Really!? You could make me human!?" Konoka barked sharply in shock.
"Hey! Keep it down. You want to wake up Setsuna?"
Konoka wasn't listening though and began to blabber away loudly. "Oh my god! Oh MY GOD! I CAN BE HUMAN!" She kept barking to excited to realize that Asuna had now run away in fear of getting caught in there by Setsuna. Konoka stopped barking when she heard Setsuna running down the hall.
'Oh crap.'
Reaching the living room, Setsuna turned on the light to look for what had Konoka going crazy in the middle of the night. Seeing nothing out of place she looked to the now silent dog staring at her with ears drooped flat to her head. She sighed.
"Konoka, what the heck are you barking about? There isn't anything wrong." she walked up to the dog and petted her head softly.
"Come on, let's get back to bed. It's late." Setsuna turned out the lights and walked back to her room followed by Konoka. Neither of them noticed the orange cat looking through the window watching them with bi-color eyes go. Seeing the reason behind Konoka's wish she looked up to the crescent moon in thought.
"Human, huh?" She grinned a weird toothy grin, "I can arrange that." She hopped off the window pane and began the long walk back to the home of her own master, who just so happened to be, the most powerful magician on the face of the planet.
Two days had gone by since the night Asuna came to visit, but there had been no sign of her or a confirmation of what she had implied to Konoka. The dog was beginning to think the cat was just joking with her and that she had gotten her hopes up for nothing. She was so bummed out at this point that she didn't even get excited when Setsuna brought out the leash to go on a walk. Setsuna noticed Konoka's behavior change when it first started and she was beginning to get worried about her usually bubbly K9. She easily clipped the leash onto Konoka because she seemed to not even be aware that Setsuna was there.
'I hope she's not sick. Maybe I should take her to the vet this today after work- Oh crap! I forgot.' Today was Friday, the day she agreed to go on a date with her coworker. She began to panic as she realized she didn't have anything wear and that she really didn't want to go. She began to think of ways to get out of the date entirely, maybe look for the guy and tell him she had an emergency and had to cancel, but, to her dismay, she had no idea where to find him or what his name was.
"What the heck is wrong with you Setsuna? You don't just agree to go on dates with strangers especially strangers who don't happen to be beautiful women but MEN!" Her ranting seemed to pull Konoka out of her stupor and Konoka whined realizing she hadn't noticed how stressed her master was becoming because she was moping around acting like a puppy. She had no idea what was wrong and couldn't do anything to make it better because she was just a dog and couldn't ask about it. She grew frustrated at herself and began to suddenly pull on the leash that Setsuna was holding to get her attention. If she couldn't make her friend feel better then she would at the least take her mind off the problem for awhile. Setsuna was jerked forward to the front door and Konoka looked up at her.
'Are we going on this walk or not?'
It was the first time she had seen Konoka really look at her since two days ago and that was enough to get a smile out of the human.
"Let's get this walk started then, shall we?" She pulled opened the door to be greeted by cool morning air, the smell of humidity and wet earth. For now Setsuna would concentrate on the walk with Konoka, leaving the problem of the date for later that day. Right now she would enjoy the company of the only living thing that seemed to understand her even if she was only a dog.
"Okay, Konoka, how do I look?" After the much needed relaxing walk around the neighborhood, the day went by too fast for Setsuna's liking. At work, before she could find the guy to tell him to buzz off in a nice way, he found her and asked for her address so he could pick her up around 7:00. He looked so pathetic trying so hard that Setsuna could not find it in her to call it off. Instead she gave him the address and asked him for his number. She didn't really want the number but it was a discreet way of getting the guys name without having to ask for it. His name turned out to be Negi and Setsuna had a hard time not laughing at the guy for being named after an onion. They talked for a bit and Setsuna learned that he really wasn't such a bad guy. He was actually really nice and, under different circumstances, would have loved to have him as a friend. She figured at least the date wouldn't be so bad and that later she could let him down easy with out to much trouble. And, she reminded herself, free food. She was used to paying for the dates with the few women she went out with in the past so it was nice to have the tables turned for once. All in all, she would make the most of it and hopefully get a new friend in the process.
Now home and it being thirty minutes to 7:00 she turned in a circle around her dog, finally having settled on wearing skinny jeans and a white button up shirt, deciding to be as modest in dress as possible. She had her hair down, which had grown out a little more than she was used to, and it now reached the middle of her back and her side bangs hung a little over her eyes. She didn't own any makeup besides (if you would even consider it that) chap stick and so didn't wear any. She did have some jewelry on though but it mostly consisted of what she usually wore, which included earrings, which were two silver studs on each earlobe and one tiny silver hoop earring on the helix* part of her right ear. She also wore a white watch that matched her white shoes and a silver necklace with a tear drop pendant hanging just above her visible cleavage.
Normally, Konoka could care less about how her owner looked, just loving her because she was her friend, but tonight there was something noticeably different about Setsuna's appearance, and watching her spin around in front of her from her view on the bed, something in her dog brain told her she liked it. She liked it a lot. So she barked once in approval and wagged her tail behind her in an attempt to communicate as best as she could that Setsuna looked wonderful.
Setsuna grinned getting the message, "Thanks Konoka."
With that she was ready to go and waited for her date to arrive.
So far the night had gone smoothly, with Negi being the perfect gentleman. He arrived exactly at seven exactly to pick Setsuna up and greeted her kindly commenting sincerely that she looked lovely, even though he himself appeared over dressed in a suit and tie for the pizza place he said they were going to. He brought out all the works, holding doors open for her, pulling out her chair, and actually listening to what she was saying. If she was ever tempted to jump the fence or even straddle it, it would be now. But sadly it just made her miss having a girl to do those things for. Over all she had lots of fun with him and at the end of the night when she told him about her sexuality, instead of getting upset he just laughed.
"Really? So that's why Kotaro was laughing at me when I told him who I had plans with today." They both laughed as Negi recounted his conversation with his friend who obviously knew about Setsuna but decided to mess with the sweet young man for kicks.
By the time Setsuna got home she was crying from how much she had laughed at the irony of the whole situation. It turned out that Kotaro had asked Negi out himself the day before he asked Setsuna to go have dinner with him. Apparently Negi wanted to prove that he wasn't gay by asking her out. That just made Setsuna laugh even more and now that Negi was walking her to her front door tears were freely running down her face as she gasped for breath.
As they reached the door Setsuna finally got control of herself. She smiled sadly at Negi, wiping away the tears left on her cheeks.
"Negi, apologies I wasn't honest with you earlier about this. I was just getting tired of not having anyone in my life at the time and you caught me at a moment of weakness. I'm really sorry." She looked down at his feet.
"Oh, it's alright. I guess I was kidding myself anyway. Maybe I'll go take Kotaro up on his offer later." Setsuna looked up at his smiling face and he extended a hand to her, "Friends?"
Setsuna reached out and shook his hand, "Yeah, friends." The touching moment was ruined though, when a mysterious naked woman came crashing through the front door yelling at the top of her lungs.
"Get away from her!"
Oh damn! who the hell could that be, I wonder? If You can't guess, find out next time who the mystery woman is and why she's freaking out.
P.S
Tell me what You think of my new story.
