The Typical Insanity

i can see big, colgate smiles

I'm standing in front of the retro diner and I don't want to go in. The truth of the matter is, I don't want to do anything at all. The events of tonight felt like excess plotline an author decided to put in so that the story would make sense but it doesn't. My life suddenly feels rushed and unappealing.

Once, a long time ago, my school counsellor had asked me what I want in my life, I told her I wanted a car and a nice house I can go back to after working at my nice job. I was nine and even though I gave her an answer, I actually didn't know what I wanted. I feel like I'm nine years old again, I don't know what I want and I don't know what I have. There's a neon sign across the street that advertises a pawn shop and I stare at it until my vision blurs and my eyes sting. I'm about to turn away and, I don't know what I was going to do but I hear someone sobbing.

"Nemo?" Clementine? "I'm so glad you're back, I was so scared, they were everywhere, it was so scary." Oh, it is her. And she's crying again. And she's snuggling into me again. How do I keep letting this happen? I pat her back as reassuringly as I can. Okay, either she's also scratching my chest or she's holding something. I look down and find two different coloured eyes staring unblinking back at me.

"Is that the dog from earlier?"

Clementine nods against my tear soaked hoodie. "I got her cleaned up and gave her a collar, see?" She takes a step back to raise the dog up. Honestly the dog looks like it's just sick of wearing pink bows on her collar already, she's kind of got that constant condescending look on her face.

"Did you name her yet?" I ask, scratching her behind the ear because that's what my brother always did and dogs just seemed to love him.

"No, I thought you would want to do that since you know, you found her." At least the topic of the dog seems to have calmed Clementine down, I can't imagine dealing with that again.

"It's alright, you can go ahead and name her. Besides, I suck at name-giving." Not that I've ever been given the chance to name something except for my car. I named him Bob.

"No, no, you've got to do it! You're like her official owner, right? Even if you say no, you still have to take her. Look how cute she is!"

She's more, interesting than cute.

"But we'd have to fly her all the way back to New York."

"Which is perfect because she's a husky and it's cold back home! She had no reason to be here in the first place, no?"

"What about supplies? We'd have to buy dog food, a bed, who knows what else."

"Ugh, Nemo, please! We can manage! I'm there too!"

I look at the dog, ignoring her puppy dog eyes and back to Clementine, trying to ignore her puppy dog eyes but failing miserably.

"She can stay with me but I refuse to do any work for her."

Clementine squeals and hugs me with the dog in the middle. I wonder briefly if giving Clementine all the work would kill the dog. Probably.

"You still need to name her, Nemo."

The puppy reminds me of someone, another condescending female dog.

"Nadia."

Clementine smiles. "I don't get what you mean by sucking at name-giving, that's a lovely name."

"Yeah, yeah, it's pretty late right now, we should be getting inside. Our flight's at eight so we'll need to get up early tomorrow."

She nods and I could swear the dog nodded too.