The Ex Talk(22)

“Well then,” Flora says, “let’s see how he does with you.”

She unlocks the crate and bends to take him out, but he backs up into the corner. She has to get into the crate on her hands and knees and bring him out, and when she does, he’s shaking. I can’t imagine a creature that small being a problem dog.

“I’m right out there if you need anything,” Flora says after leading us to a room filled with treats and toys. And she shuts the door, leaving Steve and me alone.

I crouch down. Steve sniffs the air tentatively.

“Hey, little guy,” I say, holding out my hand, letting him know I’m safe. “It’s okay.”

He inches closer, his tan body still trembling. His underbite makes all his actions seem uncertain. Once he’s within licking distance, his pink tongue darts out and gives my fingers a swipe.

“See, I’m not so bad, right?”

He comes even closer, letting me stroke his back. He’s much softer than he looks, and his paws are white, like he’s wearing tiny boots. I scratch behind his ears until his eyes half close and he drops his head to my knee like this is the best thing he’s ever felt in his life.

Apparently I am doomed to fall quickly with dogs, too—because just like that, I am in love.



* * *



—

I sign the paperwork with Steve in my lap. I decide his full name is Steve Rogers. Steve Rogers Goldstein. A very traditional Jewish name. Flora gives me a leash and a collar and some information about local vets and obedience classes. I don’t want to set him down, even when I have to take out my wallet to pay the $200 adoption fee.

Flora is overjoyed but hesitant. “The dogs are usually shyer here at the shelter,” she says. “So don’t be surprised if his personality changes a bit when you get home.”

“Is the underbite anything I should be worried about?”

“He’s perfectly healthy. It’s just a little quirk.”

“I love it,” I say, and I turn to him. “I love you and your underbite.”

They tell me I have two weeks to bring him back for a full refund if it doesn’t work out. A full refund. For an animal. It feels cruel, like they’re almost expecting me to bring him back.

On our drive home, Steve vomits in the car carrier. When we get inside, he vomits again on a rug I never really liked, pees on my coffee table, and poops on the living room carpet. If my house felt empty before, now it’s teeming with chaotic energy. I set up his bed in my room, and he humps it for a solid forty-five minutes before turning around in a circle four and a half times and curling himself into a tight ball. When I try to get near him, he growls, baring his underbite.

Steve, it turns out, is kind of a hot mess.

“I am not taking you back,” I say adamantly, more to myself than to him. “We are going to make this work.”

I clean up the house, then chase him around for fifteen minutes before I manage to hook the leash onto his collar. But when I take him outside, he stands frozen in my driveway like he’s never seen the outside world before.

It’s nearly six o’clock, after he runs about a dozen laps around my yard, when he finally tires himself out and returns to his bed. He already knows it’s his, which I decide to consider a win. Once I’m certain he’s asleep, I take a photo and send it to Ameena. He starts making these little dreaming sounds, and I nearly die of cute.

Because I can’t stare at my dog all evening, I head to the kitchen to make dinner and call my mother, which I’ve been putting off since Dominic and I agreed to do the show a few days ago. And maybe this is one benefit of a small family: I only have to awkwardly lie to one person about my fake ex-boyfriend.

As much as I want to be honest with her, we both know how much my dad valued truth in radio. The idea of my mother calling me out, telling me my dad would be disappointed . . . I can’t go down that road. I have to stay in this place where imagining him hearing me through his car speakers would make him happier than I’d ever seen him. That means keeping the truth from her.

And I’m not sure I could handle the judgment if she knew I’ll be lying to my future listeners, too. No—not lying. Bending the truth. That’s what Kent said.

Besides, I can’t help thinking that if I can prove myself on this show, then maybe one day I’ll be part of something that doesn’t bend the truth nearly as much. That once I have this hosting experience, the career I always wanted will finally be within reach. Or, since it’s radio, within earshot.

“I was dating this guy and it didn’t work out and we’re going to be doing a radio show about it,” I say in one breath when she asks how work is going.

There’s a pause on the other end of the line. “A radio show about . . . what, exactly?”

I explain The Ex Talk to her on Bluetooth while unpacking one of this week’s meal kits. A white bean and sweet potato chili on a bed of couscous. Opening this box of ingredients is the most exciting part of my week. Love being single. Love it.

“You never mentioned him,” my mother says. “Dominic, you said? Isn’t that the guy you’re always complaining about?”

“The complaining, uh, may have been a side effect of our breakup.” The lie slips out so easily, and she buys it.

“I’m sorry, Shay. But it must be okay if you’re willing to do a show with him, right? It sounds like it could be a lot of fun.”