The Beginning of After

needed vitamin K for another two weeks. The arthritis wasn’t related to the poisoning, but Dr. B felt it had probably come on recently.
    “Stress can trigger it,” he was saying on the phone to David, down the hall but loud enough so I could hear his end of the conversation from where I sat at the front desk. I could tell that Dr. B was prodding for some more information, and I was hoping David wouldn’t offer anything up.
    “Well, I’ll find a pharmacy near you and call in a prescription,” he continued, then added a reminder to keep Masher on the vitamin K until it ran out.
    Then he was quiet for a few moments, listening to David. I wished I could hear a little of David’s voice on the other end of the phone, but I was too far away.
    “Let me ask around for some vet recommendations in that area,” said Dr. B. “There’s got to be someone good you can go to so you don’t have to drive an hour every time he needs to be seen.”
    Something in me lurched. Did David ask for that information, or did Dr. B volunteer it? Did David not want to come back here?
    I couldn’t let it go. Every time I saw the bench outside, I relived those moments. David scooting over to make room for me. David and I sitting together. That comfortable silence and the strange almost-freshness of the air between us.
    When Suzie asked me about work during one of our sessions, I found myself omitting the story of David’s visit. She knew I’d seen David and that we’d apologized, and that he had Masher now. She stopped asking about him, which made sense. Why would he matter? On paper he was just a footnote.
    A few days later I gave in once again to the email drafts in my head, and sent Masher a message.
Hi, Masher. I hear you’ve got arthritis now. That sucks. But I’m sure David’s taking good care of you and I’m here if you need anything.

    I wasn’t sure what kind of response I was hoping for. I just wanted a response, period. Something to grab onto, although I didn’t know what I’d do with it once I did.
    The reply came the next day: Thanks. I’ll be okay.
    It wasn’t exactly an answer I could grab. But I could touch it, and that was enough.
    The rest of July passed quickly. It was a busy time at Ashland, with people going on vacation and boarding their pets, animals getting dehydrated from the heat or infested with fleas. Dr. B had another vet come part-time to fill in the gaps.
    I’d mastered the phones and the filing, and loved walking the dogs because they reminded me of Masher and because it forced me to explore the streets around the hospital. Unfamiliar houses owned by unfamiliar people, and I didn’t mind looking up to say hi when someone passed me on the sidewalk, because I knew I was a stranger to them. It still amazed me that even though I was less than ten miles from my neighborhood, I might as well have been in another state.
    Eve found a nice family—blond parents, blond boy, blond girl, right out of a magazine—for the tabby cat twins Bryce and Denali. Then she placed Ophelia in a temporary “foster home,” aka a friend of hers who got suckered in, because the hospital needed the kennel space.
    One day, we were all so busy that we had to work through lunch and Dr. B ordered in pizza for the staff. A bunny came in that had been attacked by a dog, and a cat who had a hairball stuck in its digestive system needed emergency surgery. When these kinds of life-and-death dramas swept through, I felt almost ill on adrenaline but tried to be as useful as I could. Please don’t die , I’d think while we waited for the outcome, watching the pet’s owner in the waiting room, planning to disappear if Dr. B came out with bad news. A few times, he did. I’d go into the bathroom and spend a long time making it really, really clean.
    When we were finally caught up, and Tamara said Eve and I could go home, Eve turned to me and said, “I need a little coffee after that one. How about you?”
    We stepped out into the late afternoon heat, and I followed her down the street to a strip mall. There was a café where we often had lunch.
    After we ordered, I instinctively scanned the room to see if I recognized anyone, expecting that relief I’d gotten used to here.
    Except I did see someone I knew.
    Joe Lasky, sitting at the back of the room, staring at me.
    I was so surprised that there was no way I could pretend not to see him. I smiled briefly at him, and he smiled back.
    Okay, maybe that was that. I turned to