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mnyd · 29 days ago

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A dog is wandering the streets of Monaco. Oscar sees him when he's out for a run, pushing through the last bit before he's home. The dog seems familiar somehow, skittishly weaving through the crowds of people. Oscar narrows his eyes. Its coat is warm brown, a colour Oscar remembers from somewhere, spotted with white. The name tumbles out of his mouth before his mind makes the connection.

“Piñon!” He shouts and Piñon looks up and freezes. Oscar's only seen this dog on Instagram, so it's impossible that he recognises Oscar, but for a moment Oscar feels like he can see his owner's familiar scowl every time he's forced to acknowledge Oscar's existence.

“C'mere boy,” he tries and Piñon stays stuck to the ground for a long moment before he comes over, warily looking at Oscar all the way there.

“Are you lost?” Oscar asks and Piñon gives him a look that Oscar would say means are you really stupid enough to expect me to answer?

“Whatever,” Oscar mutters and pulls out his phone to text Carlos. I think I found your dog? He sends, snapping a pic to go with the message. Carlos hasn't been online since this afternoon. Oscar looks at his status for a few seconds, but it doesn't change. Your dog who is not like other dogs, Oscar almost texts after it, but it feels weird acknowledging something Carlos said–or didn’t actually say, but got dunked on for online. Not to mention it's basically admitting Oscar's Instagram page recommends him Carlos content. So instead, he pockets his phone and reaches out a careful hand. Piñon looks at Oscar doubtfully and lets Oscar scratch him behind the ear for half a second before he leans away.

Oscar rolls his eyes. Figures Carlos's dog is just as difficult as he is. “Alright then,” he says. “Come with or stay here, see if I care.”

He walks off and doesn’t look back. Oscar’s just wondering why exactly he’s choosing to be offended by a dog when Piñon appears, sullenly following Oscar home. *****

Piñon is one of the most well-behaved dogs Oscar’s met in his life. He comes up to Oscar’s apartment and just paces the living room uneasily before he sits down stiffly next to the couch. Whenever Oscar tries to pet him, he just gives Oscar the stink-eye and leans out of reach, which Oscar has to admit is kind of hilarious. He stares at the cut-up chicken breast Oscar puts on a plate in front of him and then eats it slowly and neatly, one piece at a time. Oscar tries to amuse him a few times, rolls a tennis ball his way, but Piñon just curls up on the floor, tucking his nose between his front paws. Carlos still hasn’t been online and doesn’t answer when Oscar calls him.

Near midnight Oscar gives up. He crouches down in front of Piñon, who eyes him warily.

“Wake me up when you need to pee, yeah?” He says and Piñon just stares at him. He’s a very strange dog. “And don’t chew up my couch.”

This time, when he reaches out, Piñon makes a noise that almost sounds like a sigh and lets Oscar stroke his soft head.

“Good boy,” Oscar says and Piñon blinks up at him with his big, brown eyes. “Sleep well, yeah? We’ll call Carlos again tomorrow.”

*****

Except Piñon’s gone when Oscar wakes up. “Fuck,” Oscar says. He thought he locked the door before he went to bed, but clearly he didn’t. “Fuck, fuck, fuck.” With dread in his chest, he finds his phone and hovers his thumb over Carlos’s contact before he presses call. “Oh,” Carlos says, when he picks up. “Sorry, yeah, Piñon is back.” “Um,” Oscar says intelligently. “He’s–what?” “He, uh,” Carlos pauses. “He showed up back home. Thanks for looking after him.”

“He walked–out of my apartment. And back home,” Oscar says faintly, just to confirm. “Does he do that often? Wander around on his own? Not very responsible pet owner behaviour, mate.”

Carlos doesn’t bite, just sighs. Somehow, Oscar can see him in his mind’s eye, scrubbing the back of his neck. “No, he just–with the contract negotiations, it has been–”

“What do contract negotiations have to do with your dog?” Oscar asks. This conversation is getting weirder and weirder.

“Nothing,” Carlos quickly says. “Absolutely nothing. So. Thank you, for, um. Keeping an eye on–on Piñon.”

“Okay, um, no problem?” Oscar says and then the call disconnects. Alright then. Very strange.

*****

Barely a week’s passed when Oscar comes back from another run and a familiar figure is wandering around along his route.

“Not you again,” Oscar says and Piñon looks up, patters towards Oscar, looking up at him with his big, sad eyes. “Where’s Carlos, boy?”

He just sits down at Oscar’s feet as Oscar fumbles his phone from his pocket. Again, Carlos hasn’t been online for hours. Oscar texts him anyway, but doesn’t wait for a response.

“Very weird that he goes off-grid like that, buddy. If he’s in the mob you have to tell me,” Oscar says and Piñon makes a huffy noise and nudges Oscar’s leg. “Okay, not funny, apparently. Where do you want to go?”

Piñon starts walking and Oscar follows. He takes the route along the harbour, stars reflecting in the quiet water, the coastline dotted with lights from boats. It’s a nice night, a nice route. Oscar only notices Piñon’s led them back to his own apartment when they’re rounding the corner to his apartment block.

“That’s some good memory,” Oscar says and Piñon’s tail wags, just once, a neat sweep from left to right. That evening, he still fussily eats the improvised mince meat Oscar serves him and doesn’t go on a rampage in Oscar’s apartment, just curls up at Oscar’s feet as he watches a movie.

“Hey boy,” Oscar says quietly when it’s really, really time to turn in. “Bedtime. You’re sleeping here, alright? Wake me up when you need something.”

Piñon wags his tail again like he wants to tell Oscar got it and curls up again, tucks his snout between his front paws. Oscar makes sure he locks the door this time and goes to sleep. He has a dream that he hears Piñon’s nails tick against his hardwood floors and suddenly, the sound changes into that of the gait of a man. The next morning, Piñon’s disappeared again. For a long moment, Oscar frowns at the lock on his front door before he texts Carlos.

Did you teach your dog to pick locks?

He’s a special dog, Carlos just sends back.

Not like other dogs

You could say that

*****

Two days later, Piñon is waiting at Oscar’s front door when he comes home.

“Hey buddy,” Oscar says. “Come on in.”

Here again, he sends Carlos and then puts his phone away to charge in another room. Piñon’s good company, more now that he has apparently decided he trusts Oscar. He puts his two front paws up on the couch and looks at Oscar questioningly.

“Aw, whatever,�� Oscar says. “Come on up.”

Piñon’s tail wags and he jumps on the couch, curls up in the middle. He quietly watches as Oscar fires up the Playstation and gets schooled at FIFA by some middle schooler from Iowa. Only after Oscar turns it off, he unfurls and scoots closer.

“Oh,” Oscar says, surprised. “Yeah, come here.”

Very gently, Piñon puts his head on Oscar’s knee. He doesn’t react when Oscar rests a hand on his warm neck, just closes his eyes and lets Oscar pet him in long, slow strokes from the top of his head to the middle of his back. When Oscar brings out a bag of treats and a bowl of dog food later that night, he blinks and Oscar shrugs.

“What, you’re here all the time anyway.”

His sullen demeanor returns when Oscar rips open the bag of treats and waggles one in front of Piñon’s face.

“C’mon boy, sit,” Oscar says and Piñon scowls. “Oh, don’t be such a baby. You’re a good boy, aren’t you? Sit.”

Piñon plops his ass down with a look that seems to say happy now? He does take the treat from Oscar’s fingers, very carefully.

“Shake,” Oscar says, holding out his hand. Piñon looks to the side and up in a gesture that’s so Carlos when he’s annoyed that Oscar can’t hold in a laugh. He does, then, offer Oscar one of his paws.

Oscar tries to remember which commands he taught his dogs in Australia. Down, heel, fetch. Rosie always used to do the cutest thing when he told her to beg, put up two of her front paws and if she didn’t get a treat that instance, collapsed dramatically.

“Beg,” he tells Piñon. For a long moment, Piñon doesn’t do anything. Then he drops to the ground, puts his head on Oscar’s feet and lets out a long, low whine. It’s such a pitiful sound Oscar instinctively crouches down, running his hand over Piñon’s head.

“It’s okay,” Oscar stupidly says. “Good boy, yeah?”

Piñon butts his head against Oscar’s hand until he resumes petting him and wags his tail.

That night, Oscar locks the front door and takes the key with him into the bedroom, puts it under his pillow. He’s not even surprised, really, when a noise wakes him up in the middle of the night and Carlos is sitting on his couch, dressed in a pair of Oscar’s old running shorts, left to dry on the radiator.

“Hey Piñon,” Oscar says.

“It is–” Carlos scrubs the back of his neck. “I don’t know why it happens. Only that it does when I am–stressed or–I don’t know. It has not happened since I was in my first year of F1, but now with the contract negotiations–”

“Inconvenient,” Oscar says and Carlos scowls, stands up. He paces the living room in a way that’s so Piñon Oscar feels weirdly fond about it. “How are you going to handle it when we’re back racing?”

“I don’t know,” Carlos snaps. “It is just–somehow my body thinks being a dog is more relaxing than being a human, so every time I’m stressed I turn into–and when I think about what to do when I am back in the paddock makes me even more stressed and it is–I don’t know, okay?”

“Maybe–” Oscar says and then snaps his mouth shut before he says the weirdest thing he’s ever said in his life.

“What,” Carlos says warily.

“No,” Oscar says. “It’s a bad–it’s not even an idea.”

“At this point,” Carlos says, striding up and down. “I am willing to entertain even the stupidest–”

“What if you act like a dog,” Oscar says and regrets it immediately. “When you’re–hey, don’t give me that look, I said it was a bad idea.”

“That is the dumbest thing you have ever said,” Carlos says loftily. “And it is not for a lack of–”

“You’re not being a very good boy right now,” Oscar says, just to be annoying, but Carlos freezes and–oh Jesus. Oscar’s going to do something so fucking stupid. He considers not doing it, but that’s Carlos, for Oscar. Somehow his proximity turns Oscar into the dumbest idiot alive. Oscar stands up and Carlos swallows audibly. His wide eyes are locked on Oscar’s face, hands balled into fists along his side.

“Sit,” Oscar says.

Carlos drops to his knees. They stare at each other. Slowly, one hesitating step at a time, Oscar goes to stand in front of Carlos.

“Shake,” Oscar says and holds out his hand, palm up. Carlos’s jaw moves once, from left to right, expression tight, before he raises his hand and puts it in Oscar’s.

“Good boy,” he says and Carlos closes his eyes, jaw tensing like he’s trying to hold in a sound before it cuts out of him anyway, a drawn-out, low whine. When he opens his eyes again, he looks so anxious Oscar wants to reach out and put a hand in his hair, pet him

“Remember the next command?” Oscar says and Carlos nods shortly. “Go on, then.”

“You have to,” Carlos says. He looks mortified, but powers through. Something very tender and raw strikes at the centre of Oscar like lightning. “Say it.”

“Okay,” Oscar says, quietly. He squeezes Carlos’s hand before he drops it. Carlos’ entire body is straining, like he’s anticipating the release of tension. “Beg." Bonus:

#nana's fic recs #carcar #i feel a bit ill and sick and shky and um i thnk i have covid #OH MY GODDDDD

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