Page 13

M att woke suddenly before he could fully process where he was. The small office cot creaked as he sat up, disoriented for only a moment before the events of the night rushed back to him. The storm. The rescue. The puppies.

Lynda.

He checked his watch. It was half past four in the morning.

He’d slept longer than the planned three hours.

Swinging his legs over the side of the cot, he stood and rolled his stiff shoulders.

The storm didn’t sound as loud as when he’d gone to sleep, but the rain was still hitting his office window.

When he opened the door to the exam room, Lynda was bent over the incubator. “Is everything okay?” he called softly.

She turned quickly, relief washing over her tired face. “I was just about to wake you.”

He frowned and crossed the room. “What is it?”

“It’s Star—the smallest pup.” Lynda stepped aside to let him see into the incubator. “Her breathing changed about ten minutes ago. It’s shallow and too rapid, and her temperature’s dropping again despite the warming pad.”

Matt leaned in to examine the tiny puppy with the white chest patch. Even in the warm light of the incubator, he could see the bluish tint to her gums. Her tiny ribcage heaved with the effort of breathing, each inhale a struggle.

“Respiratory distress,” he murmured, his mind already cycling through what could be causing the issue. “It could be Pneumonia.”

“That’s what I thought, too.” Lynda looked down at the tiny pup. “Her breathing was normal at four o’clock when I gave her something to eat. But when I checked her a few minutes ago, I noticed the change. Her temperature’s dropped from 97.2 to 95.4 in the last twenty minutes.”

Matt carefully lifted the struggling puppy. “Let’s move her to the treatment table. We need to get a better listen to those lungs.” Lynda had already prepared the table, laying out a warming pad and the pediatric stethoscope he kept for his smallest patients.

They worked in silence—Lynda stabilizing the tiny body while Matt listened to the congested sounds in the puppy’s chest.

He looked at Lynda. “Star definitely had aspiration pneumonia. It’s probably from the formula entering the lungs during feeding.”

Lynda opened a cupboard. “I’ll suction the airways and start antibiotics. Are you happy for me to use Amoxicillin?”

Matt nodded. “Once you’ve done that, I’ll set up a small oxygen tent.”

As they worked over the next thirty minutes, Matt appreciated Lynda’s steady hands and positive outlook. The pup would need more than a few prayers if she were going to survive.

“Pulse is steadying,” Lynda reported as Matt carefully inserted the smallest suction tube he had into the puppy’s airway. “Oxygen saturation coming up slightly.”

“Let’s move her into the tent,” Matt said softly. He gently placed Star inside, adjusting the flow rate to the optimal level for her tiny body. Creating a small support from towels, he gently placed it under her back. “This will help her breathing.”

Lynda was already preparing the nebulizer treatment, her movements efficient but gentle. “I think we should start fluids. She’s still dehydrated.”

“Good call,” Matt agreed, preparing the smallest butterfly needle he had. “I’ll give her just enough to support kidney function without overloading her system.”

For the next hour, they focused on the puppy’s care, barely speaking except to exchange vital information or treatment adjustments. The other four puppies remained stable in the incubator, occasionally whimpering but generally sleeping through their littermate’s crisis.

Finally, Star’s oxygen levels stabilized, and the bluish tint to her gums faded to a healthier pink. Matt inserted a tiny IV catheter for fluids and medication, securing it with the lightest possible bandage.

“I think she’s turning the corner,” he said softly, watching the now-regular rise and fall of the tiny chest.

Lynda nodded. She looked tired but happy. “She’s a fighter.”

They carefully transferred Star back to the incubator, keeping her chest slightly elevated to help her breathe more easily. Matt adjusted the monitoring equipment to alert them to any changes in her condition.

He looked at Lynda. “You must be exhausted. Would you like a cup of coffee?”

“That sounds wonderful,” Lynda replied, checking the remaining puppies one more time before following him.

As Matt made two mugs of coffee, he thought about the last few hours. Looking after a litter of wolfdog pups was the last thing he thought he’d be doing, but that was life when you lived in a small town.

He poured coffee into two mugs and handed one of them to Lynda. “Careful, it’s hot.”

Lynda held the mug carefully in her hands. “Thanks. It smells delicious.”

“I bought the blend from Sweet Treats,” Matt told her as he searched another cupboard for his secret stash of cookies.

“Brooke got a new shipment in last week.” When he found the shortbread cookies, he filled a plate with them and sat beside Lynda.

“If you hadn’t caught the change in Star’s breathing when you did. ..”

“We would have lost her,” Lynda finished quietly.

Matt pushed the plate of cookies closer to Lynda. “Try these. Mrs. Pemberton makes the best shortbread I’ve ever tasted. I’m hoping she’ll share her recipe with me, but she said it’s a family secret.”

Lynda chose a cookie and sighed as she bit into it. “It reminds me of the shortbread my nana used to make. She used to send a small box of cookies to Denver each week.”

“She sounds like a nice person.”

Lynda nodded. “She was the best.”

Matt chose a cookie for himself and bit into the gritty shortbread. “Why did you stay in Denver after your divorce?” he asked, the question emerging before he’d fully formed it in his mind. “Was it for your practice?”

Lynda looked surprised by the sudden change in topic but not offended. She stared into her coffee for a long moment before answering.

“Partly,” she admitted. “The practice was successful, and I’d built relationships with clients over decades.

But honestly? I stayed because I refused to be the one who left.

” Her voice hardened slightly. “Ray wanted everything to be easy. He wanted me to quietly disappear so he could move Melissa—his receptionist—into our house without any messiness.”

“How long had it been going on?” Matt asked gently.

“The affair? Almost a year when I discovered it.” Lynda’s laugh held no humor.

“And I only found out by accident. I saw a text preview on his phone. If I hadn’t walked into my office at that exact moment, I might still be married to him, blissfully unaware that he was sleeping with someone half my age. ”

Matt winced. “That’s rough.”

“The worst part wasn’t even the affair,” Lynda continued, her eyes distant.

“It was realizing that I’d been completely blind to it.

We ate dinner together most nights. We still went on vacations.

I thought we were happy, or at least as happy as most couples our age.

” She shook her head. “Finding out I’d been so wrong about my marriage made me question everything—my judgment, my perceptions, my worth. ”

“He’s the one who should have questioned his worth,” Matt said, surprising himself with how upset he was. “Cheating isn’t a reflection on you. It’s a reflection on him.”

Lynda looked up, meeting his eyes. “That’s what my therapist said.

It took me a long time to believe it.” She sighed.

“After the divorce, I threw myself into work. I built a shell around myself that kept everyone at a safe distance. That way, there was no risk of being hurt if I never let anyone close enough to matter.”

The honesty of her confession touched something in Matt. “I know something about building shells,” he said quietly. “After Maria died, I did the same thing. I focused on my daughter and the clinic. It was easier than facing the emptiness of the house every night.”

“How did you manage?” Lynda asked. “With a child to raise alone and your grief?”

Matt considered the question. “One day at a time,” he said finally. “Some days were just about surviving—getting Stephanie to school, seeing patients, making dinner. Other days were better. Stephanie helped—children have this way of pulling you back into life whether you’re ready or not.”

He took a sip of coffee, gathering his thoughts.

“The hardest part was learning to sleep alone. From the day we were married, I always fell asleep with Maria beside me. After she was gone, the bed seemed enormous, impossibly empty.” He looked down at his hands.

“I slept on the couch for almost six months.”

Lynda’s expression held no judgment, only understanding. “I rearranged all the furniture in my bedroom. I bought a new bed, new sheets, new everything. I couldn’t bear to sleep in the same space where Ray had been lying to me for so long.”

“Did it help?” Matt asked.

“Not really,” Lynda admitted with a small smile. “But it gave me something to do with all that anger.”

Their conversation continued as dawn crept toward them.

They shared stories of their lives—the triumphs and failures, the moments of joy and heartbreak.

Matt told Lynda about raising Stephanie and about the challenges of being a parent to a grieving child.

Lynda spoke of her daughter Amy’s initial anger about the divorce and how it had taken years to rebuild their relationship.

They talked about their careers—complex cases, memorable patients, and the evolution of veterinary medicine over the decades they’d practiced. They discovered shared mentors and similar training experiences despite having taken different paths in their specialties.

Every thirty minutes, one or both of them would check on the puppies, particularly Star, whose condition remained stable but delicate. They worked together to feed the healthy puppies, clean them, and monitor their temperatures.

Matt couldn’t remember the last time he’d opened up to someone this way.

When they checked on Star again around five-thirty, Matt felt a surge of relief. The tiny puppy’s breathing had eased further, and her temperature had stabilized at a healthy 99.2 degrees.

“She’s going to make it,” he said, watching her little paws twitch in sleep.

“They all are,” Lynda agreed, her tired face brightening.

As they stood side by side at the incubator, Matt became acutely aware of Lynda’s presence—the faint scent of her shampoo beneath the antiseptic smell of the clinic, the warmth of her arm barely touching his, the gentle rhythm of her breathing.

“Thank you,” he said, turning to face her. “For staying. For helping. For...” He gestured vaguely, unable to articulate everything he meant.

“For talking through the night?” Lynda suggested with a smile. “I should be thanking you. It’s been a long time since I’ve had a conversation that honest with anyone.”

A soft glow began to filter through the blinds—the first light of dawn breaking through the storm clouds.

Matt moved to the window and raised the blinds.

The rain had stopped, though water still dripped from eaves and trees.

The rising sun saturated the puddles on the wet sidewalk with a golden glow, making the world seem ready for a new day.

“The storm’s passed,” he said to Lynda.

She joined him at the window, their shoulders touching lightly. “It was quite a night.”

Matt turned to look at her, struck by how right she seemed standing there in his clinic. “I’ve told you more in one night than I’ve told anyone in years,” he admitted softly.

Lynda tilted her head, holding his gaze. “Sometimes it’s easier to be honest with someone new than with people you’ve known forever.”

“Is that what we are?” Matt asked. “New to each other?”

Lynda considered the question. “New in some ways. But it doesn’t feel like we just met a few months ago, does it?”

“No,” Matt agreed. “It feels like...” He hesitated, searching for the right words. “Like we’ve known each other a long time, just not in this life.”

The sentiment might have sounded foolish in another context, but here, in the quiet dawn with five tiny lives they’d saved together, it felt like a simple truth.

Lynda smiled, the rising sun illuminating her face. “I know exactly what you mean.”

A small alarm beeped from the incubator. It was time for another feeding. The moment between them stretched, fragile and perfect, before reality gently reasserted itself.

“Duty calls,” Matt said, reluctant to break the connection but conscious of doing their best for the pups.

As they moved back to the incubator, Matt took a deep breath. Whatever happened next—with the puppies, with the clinic, and with his life—sharing it with Lynda made everything brighter.