If you don't want to break a friend's heart...

I feel as retched as a pile of horse shit. I knew last night I would have to do it.

Return the little dog to the shelter.

Yet even last night, he was starting to warm to me. This morning, he would come running to me, tail wagging high in the air. Demanding to be touched. And I couldn't rub him, massage him, scratch him enough.

But there are others in my world.

My mother. Last night she was raising all the reasons he could not live here. It was more about the cat. And the lack of access through the pet door for the cat. And the inability to have a fenced, secure, outside area where the dog could have ad hoc access.

This is her house. I am a guest here.

Rusty let me pick him up and cradle him in my arms. He sensed that something was amiss. When I set him on the car seat, he started to panic.

Eventually we arrived at the Animal Shelter. I explained what had happened. I had prepared a page of observations of his behavior, his fear of men, his acceptance of elderly woman, his lack of bad habits.

We went back to the cacophonous room. I was choking the tears as I placed him back into a cage.

Rusty didn't bark.

He just looked at me.

Those eyes.

Did I ever say that he stares?

"I trusted you."

Those rejected eyes. "Why?"

I had to turn and to leave quickly.

**********

I had gone to the shelter in the first place, seeking a companion. Something to love. To hold. To touch. To be touched by.

As is so frequently the case. Now two hearts are broken.

The Refectory Manager