She's going to say yes. I know she is.
Chapter 9
Callie
I'm humming.
Linda notices first. She stops mid-filing, one hand frozen over the cabinet drawer, and stares at me like I've grown a second head.
"Are you feeling okay?" she asks.
"Fine." Elbow-deep in a golden retriever's mouth, scaling tartar, completely professional. "Why?"
"You're humming."
"People hum."
"You don't. I've worked here three years and I've never heard you hum." She leans against the counter, arms crossed. "What happened?"
"Nothing happened."
"You had sex."
The dental scaler slips. Not enough to hurt anyone, but enough that Daisy the golden gives me a look that sayscareful, lady.
"I did not—I'm not discussing this while I'm cleaning teeth."
"So you did have sex."
"Linda."
"With the pilot."
"I'm hanging up now."
"We're standing in the same room. You can't hang up on me."
Daisy's cleaning finishes in pointed silence while Linda watches with the smug satisfaction of someone who's absolutely right and knows it. When I'm done and Daisy's owner has taken her home with instructions about dental chews, Linda reappears in the exam room doorway.
"You look happy," she says, softer this time. "It's nice."
The words catch me off guard. Happy. Am I happy?
I think about last weekend—the lake, Dean getting yanked into the water by Ranger, both of us laughing until we couldn't breathe. Then this past week. Coffee he brought to the clinic. Dinners at Maggie's where we sat in the same booth and he stole fries off my plate. Thursday when he showed up at closing with Thai takeout just because he was thinking about me. Saturday night at the bar, seeing him across the room and realizing I didn't want to pretend I wasn't completely gone for him. Going home together. Yesterday morning waking up tangled in my sheets before reality interrupted—him heading to base, me racing to Sunday appointments. The texts we traded all day. The way he called last night just to say goodnight.
"Maybe," I admit.
Linda grins. "Good. You deserve it."
The rest of the afternoon is routine. A cat with an ear infection. A puppy so nervous its owner has to hold it through the exam. A ferret named Sir Reginald who steals my pen, shoves it under his owner's purse, and then proceeds to steal my stethoscope while maintaining unblinking eye contact like a tiny, furry criminal mastermind. The dark markings around his eyes make him look like he's wearing a burglar mask, which feels appropriate given his behavior.
"Sir Reginald, no," his owner says without conviction.
Sir Reginald does not care about his owner's opinions. Sir Reginald has committed to chaos.
I retrieve my stethoscope. He immediately grabs the ear thermometer.
"He's very social," the owner offers weakly.
