For as much as he doesn’t understand, Floyd does know what’s going on, and it’s why he does what he’s been doing the last twenty minutes. He knows, he cares, and ultimately, he wants to make sure I walk out of this bathroom relatively unscathed.
“I’m sorry,” I say with a sigh as I finally open the door. “I know you’re worried about me and I appreciate it, but I’m fine.”
Floyd gets to his feet as I walk out, tilting his head to listen with his good ear before we head to the kitchen.
“It was a rough one.” I pour myself a cup of coffee, grateful for the daily timer, then get him some water and lean against the counter as I watch him drink. “The worst in a while.”
I rub the back of my neck and shake my head.
It was, it was awful, and so fucking vivid it felt like I went back in time twenty five years right to that crackhouse in Illinois.
I shudder as it replays through my mind, the nightmare I lived until I was old enough to leave coming back to haunt me in my sleep. I feel like I’ll never fully be rid of that place no matter how many years or miles I put between us.
Quickly moving through what’s left of the morning, I opt to take our walk before breakfast, keeping it short as we circle the block twice and when we get back upstairs and settled, I can tell Floyd is still leery about me leaving.
“It’s just for a bit,” I say softly as I scratch behind his ears. “I’ll be back up for lunch and we can go for another walk then, too.”
My King Charles Cocker Spaniel thumps his tail against the floor, but those cloudy eyes never leave my face.
How can this animal pull so goddamn hard on the heartstrings I didn’t think I even had?
“Okay, maybe, and I do meanmaybeif you’re a good boy, I’ll bring you down to the shop with me after lunch.” His tail starts thumping harder and I smile. “Sound like a deal?”
He lets out his raspy, crackly, barely audible bark as he hops to his feet, giving me his lopsided happy dance in agreement.
I have no idea how I wound up at the animal shelter, granted it was five years after moving here and I’ve never had a pet in my entire life, but I did, and when I saw this tiny little puppy with bald spots, a limp, and only two teeth wearing the cone of shame, I was both horrified and madly in love. There was something about the misfit pooch that spoke to me, and he clearly felt it too because he’d been lethargic to the point of catatonic before I walked through the dog kennels and when I did, he perked right up. Even tried to bark, but it sounded more like a busted squeaky toy and that’s when I knew he was going to be mine.
What I did not know when I decided to adopt him was that the bald spots, limp, and cone were the least of his problems. He'd been bitten in the head and face enough times to makehim mostly blind and partially deaf, and he had a mild form of narcolepsy that is now much more pronounced. But he chose me, and I chose him, and I can honestly say Floyd is only the second thing in my entire life I’ve been one hundred and fifty percent sure of.
Which is how the nameless puppy who was born in a mill and had been used as a bait dog before he was even six months old became Pretty Boy Floyd Jones, and we’ve been together ever since.
“Be a good boy for me. Protect our apartment while I’m downstairs, okay?”
Floyd licks my hand and gives me another of his warped barks then runs at an angle to his favorite window above the front doors of 88 Keys to watch for any threats while I’m working. He’ll watch closely, too, while he lays there sunbathing, just like the dutiful guard dog he thinks he is.
Smiling to myself, I lock up and head down the narrow staircase, taking the first set with ease but by the time I hit the bottom of the second, I realize my thigh hurts a lot more than I thought it would. I probably should have taken some ibuprofen with my blockers.
Oh well.
I’ll endure the pain like usual. I’m just grateful I didn’t forget those meds, otherwise I’d have to close the store today in preparation for doomsday. Which is a gross exaggeration but still. I’d rather not get a whiff of some alpha and have my body react when there’s no way in hell the rest of me would. Just because I’m generally a prick doesn’t mean every single person through my doors hates it. Most do, but there’s always one or two who think they can charm their way right into my pants and without the blockers, I’m more inclined to throw caution to the wind.
Because being an omega kind of sucks sometimes.
With an annoyed huff, I lock up the door for the stairs then make my way through my music store, turning off the alarm and opening windows. I give the small selection of instruments a good dusting, tidy up the thousands of vinyls, straighten the CDs and cassette tapes, then fire up my dual screen POS system.
I’ve done pretty well for myself since moving to Minnesota.
I was eighteen when I came out here with next to nothing, but in a matter of about five years I found a job, a shitty apartment in a semi-shady part of town, adopted Floyd, and started taking business classes. Eventually I was able to buy this building; an ancient, mostly free standing hole in the wall that was once a general store and saloon, and has been here—attached to the opera house I’m hoping to own one day—since the dawn of time. I remodeled the inside, stripped the walls, and tore up the floors so the original wood and brick could complement the original molding and filigree along the ceiling. The basement is for inventory. I kept the weird saloon style counter and mirror for the checkout, used the shelves that still had candy jars on them for my personal collection of albums and music memorabilia.
Then, after fixing up and sort of modernizing the loft so I could live in it, this became 88 Keys, my home and music store, and has been for the last ten years.
I’m pretty goddamn proud of the place.
Which is why, when I open the shades on the front door and the big picture window, I immediately scowl at the enormous man standing out front on the sidewalk, playing a guitar and singing his heart out like it’s the fucking Fillmore or some shit.
I don’t fucking think so, buddy.
Today is not the day, and I am not the one.