Keith (Hathaway House #11) - Dale Mayer Page 0,24

reached out a gentle hand, letting the rabbit sniff it; then he gently tugged on one of its long silky ears.

“This is Hoppers,” Robin said in a bright tone.

He looked up at her, down at the rabbit, and asked, “Why?”

“Why what?” she said, laughing.

“Why would somebody give this rabbit nuclear steroids so he looks like this?” he said in disbelief. “It’s as big as I am.”

“Not quite,” she said.

At that moment, Hoppers stretched right out, as if really enjoying Keith’s bed. Dropping his head down beside Keith’s waist, Hoppers snuggled in.

“Good Lord,” he said in astonishment, but he couldn’t stop touching him. “He’s beautiful. And is he always this calm?”

“Always,” she said, with a roll of her eyes. “He’s a semipermanent resident.”

“How does somebody become a semipermanent resident?” he asked, frowning at her.

“He didn’t used to be here, but he’s so big that he requires a certain amount of care, and we haven’t found the right adoptive home, so we’ve built a run for him. Or rather, Iain did.”

“Ah, the mythical Iain,” Keith said. “I have yet to meet this guy. You know that, right?”

“I’d love for you to meet him,” she said warmly. “He was in the same position as you were not that many months ago. I forget how far he has come.”

“He probably wasn’t quite so bad though,” he said.

“He was bad, Keith,” she said.

Something in her tone made him look up and study her face. “How bad?”

“Different than you but ugly bad,” she said. “I did wonder, for a long time, if I could handle a relationship like that,” she said. “I didn’t feel very good about having those questions go through my mind, but the good news is that Iain is in wonderful shape now. He’s recovered beautifully, and—even if, down the road, he has a setback and ends up in a wheelchair again—I already know that I can handle it. Those thoughts came in fleeting moments of doubting myself, wondering if I was capable, if I was a big enough person to do this. I can tell you that I’m just so happy to have found him.”

And, indeed, she was positively glowing. He’d never seen his sister like that. “He appears to have had a pretty strong effect on you,” he said in surprise. “I’ve never seen you look so happy.”

She nodded. “And that’s exactly it,” she said. “I am happy. More than that, I’m thrilled with the way my life has turned out.”

“Are you still happy to be working with animals?”

She chuckled. “I’m taking my buddy Hoppers to visit the patients and my brother,” she said. “How hard can my life be?”

“Yes, but any given morning you might have to put a dog to sleep,” he said. “And I know the little girl I watched grow up would find that to be very difficult.”

“It was a cat this morning,” she said with a sad smile. “She got hit by a car. We couldn’t save her.”

“I’m sorry,” he said gently.

She nodded. “Unfortunately we have to put animals down on a regular basis. We do the best we can, but we aren’t infallible.” She looked at him with searching eyes. “Just like you. The doctors did the best they could, but they aren’t infallible either.”

He winced at that. “Thanks for the reminder.”

“You’re welcome,” she said. “You know the animals also remind me of how much we can do. We took the leg off a pup this morning that was so badly damaged he was dragging it behind him. Our plan is to put a peg into it down the road. At the moment it’s healing, and, when it’s better, we’ll get him set up. He’s got a big screw-pin system, so we’ll pop on a leg and adjust it for the right height, and that guy will barely even notice.”

“Is it that simple?”

“No,” she said, “but it’s not that much harder.”

Her words resonated long after she left. He curled up with the blanket, his hand still resting where the animal had laid on his bed. One of the orderlies had come in and asked if he wanted his sheets changed because of the bunny hair. He had immediately shook his head and told him that tomorrow would be soon enough.

Smiling, the man had given Keith an understanding nod and left.

But Keith had to wonder if he could finally adjust, as all the animals did. Even his sister did because she hadn’t been the person to deal with hurt and injured animals, but even she had