Shoot

Chapter 16: Puppies.

After a while of driving down road after road, I realize that he's driving us in circles. Well, more like squares. He makes a right at every light, acting like he's going somewhere new but then I see the same road that we were on about ten minutes ago. Eventually, he stays straight, going toward the bad part of the city.

"Just talk to me," Jack says, turning down the music that he put on about an hour ago.

"About what?" I ask, looking over at him.

"I don't know, whatever's making you like this." Jack says, and I shrug.

"I'm just drunk. I have no idea what I'm talking about." I lie, I mean, yeah I'm drunk but I know what I'm saying.

"Fucking spill everything," Jack says, slowing down the car in front of a shitty building. "Never ever fucking come here again. This is a shitty area and you will get fucked over if you come here alone, okay?"

"Okay," I say, and Jack turns off the radio completely.

"Keep your head down and walk into that door right there, alright? I won't let anything happen to you but you have to get in there before me so keep your shit together and walk as fast as you can. Go."

I get out of the car, and ignore the occasional person down the road, feeling their eyes on me as I walk to the doors. The cold December air whips around my body, making me shiver as I walk down the sidewalk. I feel a hand on my shoulder and jump, but it's only Jack. He's in protective mode right now, scanning the area and resting his hand on my lower back. When we reach the doors, Jack opens it and I slip in.

There's a broken concrete staircase going up, and Jack starts walking, he gently grabs my arm so I keep pace with him. We go up a few flights of stairs until we reach a door that he pulls out a key for. It opens to a hall that we walk about halfway down until there's another doorway with another number on it. D14.

He unlocks the door, and walks in. I follow him into the room, and he shuts the door behind me and locks it.

We're in his living room right now, and it's open with a kitchen to the right. There's a couch against a wall to the left, and a TV in front of it, and it's strangely clean. Well, maybe not clean, but not insanely dirty like I thought it would be. Sure, there's some clothes laying around, but at least it's not a dump. There's no open food or cigarette butts, so at least that's good.

He walks over to his old, slightly torn couch and sits down, waiting for me to sit too. I sit down with my back against the arm of the couch, facing him.

"So, you gonna tell me what's wrong or what?" Jack asks, and for the first time I notice how long his dark eyelashes are.

"I don't know," I say, and Jack stares at me through the darkness. A light from what seems to be his bedroom is on, he must've forgotten to turn it off when he left.

"You don't know what's wrong or you don't know if you're going to tell me?" Jack's getting frustrated, his words a little sharper and his eyebrows lowered.

"If I'm going to tell you," I say, and he huffs in annoyance.

"I won't say anything shitty, okay?"

"I don't want you to treat me differently," I say, and he watches me, trying to figure out what's wrong.

"I won't. I'll just try to help because you're acting weird and I fucking don't like it." Jack says, rubbing an eye.

"Well, I go through these periods of depression. Like they last a few weeks, and I get really down and I'm sad and feel shitty and tired all the time and I just want to lay in bed and forget that there's even a world outside and I want some drugs to knock me out and make me sleep and-"

"Don't cry," Jack says softly, and for the first time I realize that there are tears running down my face. "It's okay."

I wipe under my eyes, and do one of those stupid horrible sounding gaspy sobs on accident. I look away from Jack as I use my sleeve to dry my face. I don't cry in front of people so when I do I feel extra uncomfortable.

"Well," Jack says, moving closer to me. "What makes you happy?" He looks uncomfortable and it's obvious that he doesn't deal with crying girls very often. My hunch is that he doesn't talk much to girls, he fucks them and he's done.

"I don't know," I say, and he scoots even closer so he's by my feet. I'm still leaning my back into the arm of the couch, and he rests his arm over my knees.

"Come on, just name something that makes you happy."

"I don't know, puppies I guess." I say, and Jack pulls me off of the couch. "What are you doing?"

"You'll see," he says, putting his shoes back on. I do the same, and follow him out of the door.

He locks it behind me, and then we walk back to where he parked. My head is down while we're outside, but I feel safe, I know Jack won't let anything happen to me. Jack steps on the gas, and we're flying down his street. I don't know where we are or where we're going, but I feel better now that I'm with Jack. He makes me happy. But also he makes me angry, and frustrated, and-

He whips the car around so we're driving down a back ally where people aren't supposed to drive. He turns left so we're behind buildings, and then finally, he parks.

"Do you have one of those things in your hair?" Jack asks as we get out of the car and walk up to a back door.

"A bobby pin?" I ask, and he shrugs. I take one out of my hair, and hand it to him.

"Actually, do you have another one?" He asks, and I take my other one out and hand it to him.

I decide to just put my hair into a ponytail because it's annoying me right now anyway. I watch Jack get onto his knees, and tinker with the lock. He mumbles some profanities occasionally, but eventually, he steps back and opens the door.

"How did you do that?" I ask as we walk outside, and he shuts and locks the door behind us.

"It's in my blood," he says, and I smile.

It's too dark to see anything in here, and I have no fucking clue where we are. And then Jack turns on the light, and I look around.

"You brought me to a puppy store?" I laugh, and he tries not to smile.

He walks over to another door, messes with the lock, and then begins removing puppies from their glass cages and putting them on the floor. They run as best they can, but they're so little that they don't have very good balance. They run up to me and sniff my legs, some lick, and some just stare right up at me.

I sit down,- careful not to squish any- and begin playing with the little fuckers. Jack pets some of them as gently as his can, but I can tell that he's not used to being so careful with things.

"They're so cute," I laugh, laying back so they climb on me and lick my face.

I don't know how long we're in there, playing and petting and cuddling with them, but eventually, we wear them out. There seems to be a million puppies passed out of the floor, and for a while, I pet them while they sleep or until they fall asleep.

"We should probably put them away," I say, and Jack nods. "Oh, shit, how are we gonna know which they go in?" I say, pointing at the containers.

"There's a picture of them taped to the front," Jack says, looking down at the mess of babies. "I can go grab them and you can put them in the cages and say bye."

"Okay," I say, standing at the doorway to the puppy cages.

Jack hands me them one by one, but sometimes he grabs a few and I scold him in fear that they'll fall. They're all so cute and pudgy, not really sure how to work their limbs. I lay them down in their appropriate cage, and pet them goodbye, and then go get the next from Jack.

Once we finish, I shut the door, and Jack leans against the wall, waiting. I don't know how many layers one single man can have, but I know that I want to see all of his.

"Thank you," I say, and then for the first time, I hug him.

He's strong and most of his body is muscle or bone, but he's still oddly satisfying to press against. He hugs me back with one arm at first, pressing his hand to my lower back. Then he adds his other arm, and holds me closer to him.