Around the house
Doug had been looking for something all week.
It had started one day some days ago, when he had rolled over on the floor and watched what looked like a serious conversation between Aidan, Carin and Rosie. They'd been eating food, which had smelled very interesting, and were so deep in conversation that even Aidan only absent mindedly swatted at Doug when the beast got his nose covered in half-molten cheese. Doug hadn't really understood what they were talking about, but he knew they were looking for something. Doug understood looking for things, and had resolved firmly to help, although Carin only smiled absent-mindedly at him when he'd said this, before going back to his conversation.
He'd started looking the day after he'd licked the cheese off his nose. He'd have started that night, but he'd been busy protecting the house from anything that would sneak in and lock his friends up. He'd cornered an intruder in Rosie's room, but it had turned out to be Rosie herself, sleeping in her bed for a change, who had turned over in her sleep and murmured something Doug didn't understand. He'd seen that Carin's door was shut, and had almost gone to check that Carin wasn't locked in, only to have the noises from the other side of the door remind him that Aria was in the house that night, and Carin had said... something.. about not opening the door during those nights. So instead Doug had slept fitfully across the step, occasionally waking to listen anxiously to the moaning and gasping from the bedroom, wanting to go in and help his friend but paralysed by the very firm tone of voice Carin had used the last time Doug had intervened.
Rising early, he'd cornered in the lounge room an intruder beast that was very reluctant to flee, and had just begun to work himself up to attacking when a sleepy Rosie had come in, chasing the intruder away. He'd decided that he would go and track down the intruder, chase him all the way back if necessary, and then Rosie had decided to spend some time with him, and that was much more important. He loved Rosie very much. He loved Aidan too, but his fellow beast never seemed ready to play in the morning - and besides, Doug found the constant pretending to understand Aidan's morning grunts a little tiring. Doug would never hurt his friend's feelings by ignoring him, and so he had to guess at what Aidan was saying and provide the correct response, which never seemed to make Aidan as happy as it should.
He'd have gone looking during the day, but neither Rosie or Aidan liked it when he followed them when they left in the morning, and they had asked him a while ago to stay in the house. He sometimes snuck out to the garden to croon softly at the plants, but he never quite dared leave the garden for the wild expanse of the park. It would make them unhappy.
He'd spent the afternoon in Rosie's room with his face in the top of Squeak's bowl, talking to him and apologising again for eating the other fish. Rosie had put Squeak's bowl on the top of the wardrobe, but like so many people seemed to, she'd forgotten that Doug was actually rather tall and could reach it with ease. Doug didn't like the thought of Squeak being lonely, and so he retrieved the bowl to talk to the fish, carefully putting it back on top of the wardrobe before Rosie came home.
He hadn't really meant to eat Bubble. He was talking to the pair of them, and then he'd just had a fuzzy moment, and before he knew it he was chewing. He wondered if perhaps their open and close mouth gestures had given him the idea.
Later on, it was another day, and Doug hadn't found what he was looking for in Rosie's room. He'd spent some time in his gallery, smearing paint across paper with his nose in a distracted way, but it didn't really look much like a fish yet, so he'd gone to find Carin. Carin was surrounded by piles of paper, and had seemed grumpy, so after a brief and badly-received attempt to surprise him by jumping on to the table, Doug had settled down by his friend and just quietly supported him.
Probably some days had then gone by, and Doug by now had thrust where his muzzle once was into many closed places in the big house. He'd found many strange things, some of which smelled quite intriguing, but like many intriguing things other people had talked at him and then taken them away. He hadn't found anything that he was looking for, which he supposed would have made some sort of sense except that of the others only Aidan was as good at finding things as Doug was, and Aidan seemed to be far too busy having low serious conversations with Carin that stopped whenever Doug entered the room. Occasionally they pushed pieces of paper at each other, but trying to make sense of them gave Doug a headache, and he'd gone off to find something else to do.
It hadn't been until a while later that he'd realised that the pain wasn't from the paper but from the collar around his neck. He'd writhed for most of the night, struggling with every piece of him to think about what would happen if he obeyed his instincts and obeyed the tugging of his leash. It had only been the low, steady voice of his motley-mate that had stayed him from running, had helped him remember what they had promised to do if he ran. He loved his motley. He didn't want anything bad to happen to them.
It was light when Rosie and Doug went exploring. He'd laughed in delight at the wide open green space and had briefly run just for the joy of running, but Rosie had been frightened for some reason and so together they had climbed a tree. This was surprisingly difficult with paws, but Doug had fingers. After they had reached the top the wind had blown the branches around them into a cage, and Doug had stayed stock still, frozen in terror at the notion that the thorns might touch him and scratch away more of his mind whilst Rosie sat beside him, lost in thought. He wasn't sure he wanted to climb any more trees.
It was dark when they were back in the big house. The house was empty of Carin (it was always easy to tell, despite all the other people), but Aidan was there with many papers in front of him. Doug was worried that Aidan would have a headache too, so he leaned supportively on his motley mate, and was rewarded with an affectionate scratch, and food. He liked food, and Aidan made some of the best food.
It was much later after that when Doug had mostly forgotten his search. Instead he was sitting with his nose pressed up against the glass, watching the odd shapes his panting made on the cold glass. His motley mates had another of those serious low conversations, and then the three of them had set off from the house, walking up the path as Doug watched through the foggy glass.
He didn't know where they were going. He hoped they'd be back soon.