Family

Animal Shelter

"Kids! Downstairs! Now Please!"

The sounds of thunderous feet pass through the house as the kids rush to come down. Amy looks, to put it bluntly, like a mess. Her hair is covering her face and it looks like she found Katherine and Christina's makeup drawer. Her hands are covered in various strange colors including green, orange, purple, and red. It looks like a neon rainbow eyeshadow palette threw up on her.

Hey... Amy... Hon... Why. Why don't you go wash up a little?

She looks at me with a small face of confusion, processing my ASL, but then nods, rushing to the bathroom to wash her face. I look at Kath, giving her a look to follow her. She nods and grabs a washcloth from the closet near the bathroom. The rest of the girls look up at me with deep piercing eyes and I sigh in response. They are begging me WITH THEIR EYES to tell them.

I'm not telling you anything. Just get ready to go... Shoes, light jacket. That should be good enough.

After Lisa translates it to Dani, they nod uniformly, like synchronized dancers or swimmers... without the water, which genuinely creeps me out a little bit.

A few minutes later everyone but Kath and Amy is ready, as they are currently putting on shoes and a jacket. We get in the car, the kids whispering about what they thought was going to happen. Except for Amy who was talking in a much louder voice. We drive off, me driving.

After a few minutes, Amy cracks and asks the question that they have been wanting to say.

"Where are we going?"

Katherine seems to respond as calmly as possible, hoping not to get any yelling.

"Now, there will not be any yelling and we will be very calm when we get there ok?"

"Ok." They respond full attention to her as I occasionally glance at the car mirror to see their expressions.

"Mom and Mommy have decided together that, since you all were so good at therapy today, we will be getting a pet. We don't know the exact breed yet, but, we will be going to the animal shelter to pick up up someone, whether it be a cat, dog, or bird. Then, we will go to a pet store and get some things." Katherine stops to take a breath and all the kids look VERY excited.

"HOWEVER, you must be on your BEST behavior. We are planning on only 1 animal, Ok?"

They nod vigorously and I can almost feel the car shaking in excitement.

When we finally pull into the parking lot the kids are jittering with elation. As soon as the car stops they rush out of the car, barely giving Kath enough time to tell them to wait, and to stop running. We get inside and ask to browse the animals. As soon as they show us where all the different animals are, the kids scatter. Lisa and Lauren go to the cats, Amy goes to the dogs, and Dani rushes to see the birds.

I take a deep breath and prepare myself for the cuteness. We first go into the dog room and admire all of the dogs. None of them really pop out to me... as the 1. Until we reach the end of the line and Kath looks a little overwhelmed. Until we see HER. She is an adorable afghan hound puppy, who was found with her head trapped in a small fence hole. They rescued her and estimate her to be around 2 months old. She has the most hopeful brown eyes and both Kath and me gasp when we see her.

"C-can we hold her?" Katherine asks. I can feel her excitement radiating from her body.

The employee nods and unlocks her cage. I pick her up and she licks my face, making me laugh. I look at Katherine and she nods.

"We will take her." Katherine adds when she takes the puppy into her own arms.

The employee nods and then asks, "Is she all?"

I shrug but then nod no.

We should go check on the kids and see if they find anything.

"Umm. No? We have to go see what our kids want as well. Wait, babe... I thought we were only getting one?"

"Ok. I'll get her adoption ready and come to the front, with any other animals that you want to adopt... if you want to adopt them."

We nod and reluctantly give the unnamed puppy back.

Look. I feel like we haven't let the kids have any decision in the matter so... I feel like we should at least see if there is anything they are very interested in. If not... Then we won't but, Therapy animals have been proven to help people and kids so if they find an animal that may help them, even if its just support, then we should get it. We should get the kids as healthy as possible, right?

Katherine thinks it over a few minutes before reluctantly agreeing.

"Alright... Fine but... Don't you think that that's... very ambitious."

I would take on Anything for the kids.

After we agree, we begin walking back as we see Amy speedwalk out of the room. We follow but, not knowing where she went next, we go toward the cat room, where we saw Lauren and Lisa go next. There we find Lisa holding a black and white cat. She is cuddling it lovingly and smiling. My heart melts on the spot. It is rare to see her smile and if this cat does that for her then maybe, we can adopt 2 animals instead of only 1.

When Lisa sees us both she carefully gets up with Charles and walks over. She looks a little nervous before hesitantly asking.

"C-can we adopt him? Please?"

I can hear the practical begging in her voice as Lauren then comes up and gently pets Charles' leg. I decided to sign before Katherine declines (if it were possible for her to decline anything to Lisa).

Yes. Yes, we can.

Lisa's face lights up with joy and Lauren looks content with the decision.

"W-wait... Really? You haven't found anything else? We can keep him?"

Katherine looks between me and Lisa, then she sighs, she gives me an 'I trust you not to be an idiot' look then leaves, probably going to check on Dan and find Ames.

We have. We have found a dog that we are adopting. I see Lisa's face fall.

"Oh... sorry... I must have misunderstood."

However, before she turns away and puts the kitten back, I quickly snap to get her attention.

BUT, I think we can make an exception and adopt this little one. Sound good?

The look of pure happiness and joy on Lisa's normally blank face fills me with happiness and joy.

"OH MY GOSH!!! Thank You! Thank You!"

I nod.

Carry that little kitten with us, we have to go find Mom, Dan, and Amy.