The Leaving Kind by Kelly Jensen

Author:Kelly Jensen [Jensen, Kelly]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Riptide Publishing
Published: 2023-09-17T18:30:00+00:00

Cam was wrestling with the laptop Emma had gifted her penniless uncle when she’d started her second year of college. She’d bought herself a new and improved model, slightly larger, but oddly lighter. And the keyboard lit up like a rainbow. Pretty, but even glowing keys wouldn’t help him with the message currently blocking the screen of her cast-off piece of junk.

Input what software key? It’d been working last week. Why did he suddenly need a key?

Maybe the new and improved, rainbow-keyed laptop didn’t need keys.

“Fine.”

From under the table, Honey huffed. Probably a yawn, but Cam reached down to ruffle her ears. “I know. Stupid computer.”

Honey gave another huff and flopped her chin back over his socked feet. She had taken to following him from room to room so she could lie with some part of her extended over some part of him. At first Cam had found this odd. He was so used to being alone. Now he welcomed her company.

He canceled out of the program and searched for another. He just wanted to make a list. One he could rearrange and assign dates to. Maybe add a scheduling sort of affair. He and Jorge were taking on more garden maintenance and landscaping jobs each week, and Cam woke up every morning panicking that he’d forgotten something.

Maybe he could use the calendar? Plug all the details in there? Sync the contacts from his phone?

Hmm . . .

The chime of his cell phone interrupted his musing. Absently, Cam scooped it off the table. “Hello.”

“Mr. Zimmermann?”

Uh-oh. Calls that began with Mr. Zimmermann rarely brought good news. “Speaking.” Cam pulled the phone from his ear to see if Verizon had matched the number to a contact yet. It had not.

“Hi, I’m calling from Milford Animal Hospital. We’ve had an inquiry about your dog. The dog you found. Someone who believes she might be their dog.”

A pit didn’t actually open up in Cam’s middle, but he felt hollow all the same. As though someone had scooped a big old hand through his midsection and taken out everything that had mattered.

“Are you there?” the now faraway voice asked.

Cam looked down at Honey, who was gazing up at him. Her eyes reflected the confusing sorrow he felt. “Yeah,” he said into the phone. “I’m here.”

“Would you be available to bring her by the office?”

“Now?”

“If you have time.”

Cam checked the microwave display. Five thirty. His only plan for the evening had been to figure out a scheduling mechanism, eat the rotisserie chicken he’d bought on the way home, and queue up a movie or two. Or three. Why not take a trip into Milford to give away his only happiness?

Maybe we should schedule some time to brood over why you’re not happy.

Shut up.

“Yeah, sure. I can come now. I’ll be there in a few.”

After coaxing Honey into the back seat of the car (repaired once again, but wheezing oddly every time he approached the top of a hill), Cam ran back into the house for her favorite blanket and the two toys he’d picked up for her.

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