Woof!Meat barked happily, licking his ridiculous underbite as his wrinkly back end wobbled in the English bulldog version of a tail wag.
“I should’ve made Mason take you with him to Spain, you flea-bitten mutt,” he grumbled, gingerly taking the warm mug of coffee his uncle held out to him. “Thanks, Uncle John,” he managed. Because even though the smell turned his stomach, he knew if he could just choke down the tart brew, it’d go a long way toward mitigating the effects of the brown bottle flu he’d stupidly allowed himself to contract last night.
“Yep,” his uncle replied monosyllabically, leaning back against the trunk of a palm. He was humming softly and tapping his foot in rhythm to Bob’s jam.
When Leo glanced over, he was disgusted to discover the sea dog seemed none the worse for wear after last’s night overindulgence. “Just looking at that shirt makes my head hurt,” he groused.
“Now, don’t you go blamin’ your skull-pounder on me, son.” Uncle John adjusted the collar of his shirt and smoothed it over his chest. “Besides, you onlywishyou looked this good.”
Despite himself, Leo grinned. That is until—woof!—Meat barked again. It occurred to him that instead of chucking himself into the ocean, he might be better served by giving Meat the heave-ho.
Woof!
Cock-a-doodle-doo!
“Oh, for the love ofChrist,” Leo growled at the damn dog and his damn rooster companion. “I swear, it’s like we’re living in a motherfrickin’ zoo. I thought Romeo said he was takin’ that noisy-assed rooster back to Key West with him on his last run.” The island at the end of the chain of the Florida Keys was swarming with wild chickens, happily referred to by residents as feral fowl or jungle fowl.
“He did,” his uncle told him.
In the bleary, confused way only a jug-bitten man can pull off, Leo glanced down at the rooster pecking in the sand at his feet. The bird’s brilliant plumage was as much of an assault on his eyes as his uncle’s hula shirt. “Huh?”
“Romeo said the winged shithead—Romeo’s words, not mine—refused to stay in Key West. He just kept hoppin’ back on the catamaran.” Uncle John shrugged. “So I suppose that means we’re keepin’ him.”
“Keepin’ him?”
“Yep.”
“Sonofa—”
Cock-a-doodle-doo!
“Shut up, you little bastard, before I turn you into fried chicken!” Leo shouted. Taking a quick sip of the coffee, he winced at its bitterness and swished the liquid through his furry teeth and over his fuzzy tongue before spitting it on the ground.Fuckaduck.Thank God he didn’t have a mirror. Because he didn’t think he’d like to see the thing staring back at him.
Raking in a deep breath, he steeled his woozy stomach against what was about to enter it before he upended the mug and downed the remaining contents, welcoming the burn in his throat because it distracted him from his other maladies. His uncle liked to brag that his coffee was strong enough to walk into a cup all on its own, and Leo figured that pretty much hit the nail on the head.Comeon, caffeine. Work your wonders.
“And that’s what I’ve decided to call him, by the way,” Uncle John added.
Again, Leo went with the spectacularly witty rebuttal of “Huh?”
“Li’l Bastard. That’s what you and the others are always hollerin’ at him, so I reckon that should be his name.”
Leo once again lowered his gaze to the rooster. The annoying bird was obviously ready to let loose with another one of its ear-piercing crows. “Don’t you eventhinkabout it,” Leo snarled, stomping his foot in the sand. The rooster flapped its wings and let out a resentful squawk.
Woof!Woof! Woof!
“Oh, for cryin’ out loud. I’m goin’ to need a lot more coffee,” he warned his uncle. And as bad as he felt, he didn’t hesitate to take the half-empty mug when it was offered to him. Chugging what was left of his uncle’s coffee, he handed over both earthenware cups before squatting next to Meat. He’d promised Mason he’d look after the mutt. And even though scooping foul-smelling dog food from the sack they kept under the kitchen counter was something he looked forward to with about as much enthusiasm as a root canal, he was nothing if not a man of his word.
Besides, he knew one way to shut the silly dog up was to give him something to put in his mouth. “Are you hungry?” he asked the big, furry lunkhead, scratching the row of fat wrinkles that passed for Meat’s neck.
The bulldog immediately licked his chops, brown eyes sparkling with zealous canine fervor.
“Yeah? So what else is new?” Because as far as Leo could figure, Meat had three stomachs. The first was used for kibble. The second was used for Milk-Bones and the occasional morsel of human food the cunning mongrel managed to steal. And the third was used for any rank-ass smelly thing Meat happened to come across. In Leo’s estimation, each stomach had a limitless capacity.
“Come on, then,” he told the dog as he shuffled toward the house. The bracing effects of the coffee were beginning to take hold, making him feel almost human again. In fact, if the growling of his stomach was anything to go by, he might just be able to keep down some breakfast.
“What do you say to banana pancakes?” he asked his uncle as they trudged up the stairs leading to the pine-plank porch that wrapped around the bottom half of the old house. The whole structure needed a fresh coat of paint, but that was way down on Leo’s list of Shit That Needs Doin’. If itevergot done, that is, considering there was no real financial incentive to pretty up the place.
“You cookin’?” his uncle inquired.
