Chapter Text
What Makes Us Human
She drove through the streets of Inverness as tears streamed down her face, much like the rain pouring outside. She looked over to the passenger seat where all she saw was a pink tongue lolling out of the black shadow beside her. “It’s going to be okay, baby I promise.” She sobbed, feeling her gut twisting and turning, already fearing the worst. .
Smokey gave her hand a reassuring lick, before returning his attention to the speeding world outside.
3 weeks earlier
“Hey bud, time for breakfast!” Claire muttered absently to the furry black mass laying beside her on the bed, while she ruefully extricated herself from under the security and warmth of the coverlet.
Normally, he would come running at the sound of his kibble being poured into the metallic bowl. Today though, Smokey only raised from his spot on the queen bed to turn around and plop down again in a decidedly more comfortable position.
“Still not feeling good?” Claire let out a small sigh and placed the bowl on the ground next to his water dish. “Well, it’s here whenever you decide you’re hungry.”
Claire went on to make her own breakfast: A piece of buttered toast and the last of the orange juice. She frowned as she looked into her refrigerator, a few half-empty bottles of various liquids were the only thing besides the off-white shelves.
She picked up one of the bottles, opened it and gave it a quick whiff, scrunching her nose at the smell and promptly throwing it in the trash. “Definitely time for more groceries.” Claire shook the liquid off her hands and turned her attention back to her breakfast.
She moved over to the small couch in her living room, conveniently just off the kitchenette of her small-ish flat. She settled in and started going through her phone.
Almost as if the object knew it had her attention, she received a text message.
“What is it now, Geillis.” Claire groaned and rolled her eyes, but opened the message anyway.
Hey doll, I know it’s your day off and I hate to be the one to ask, but could you come in? There was a pile-up on the parkway and we’re a bit short staffed. Could really use the help!
In usual Geillis fashion she ended the message with the kissing emoji.
Claire let out a deep sigh, getting up from the comfy spot on the couch and took a moment to stretch and hear the satisfying little ‘pops’ of her bones.
After she had gotten ready and was about to head out the door, she noticed Smokey still hadn’t come to eat his breakfast, which wasn’t like him. Claire brushed it off to him just having another off-day, and went out the door.
Her shift was longer than she’d expected, and she was exhausted. She was glad that she decided to bring an extra pair of scrubs, since hers were covered in blood and various other bodily fluids.
She closed and locked the door behind her, tossing her keys onto the counter and promptly passed out on her couch.
A few hours later she woke up, rubbing the sleep out of her eyes and looking at her surroundings. Realizing she wasn’t in her bed she got up and made her way to the small bedroom.
On the way, she noticed that Smokey’s food dish remained untouched.
The poor thing had been sneezing rather often in the past two weeks or so, accompanied by some discharge from his nose which Claire would gently wipe off.
If Smokey were a human patient, she’d chalk it up to just being a cold— maybe a flu. But dogs had no such thing as a cold or a flu, and while her medical knowledge was vast, it didn’t extend into the animal world.
How could she have known it would be something so much more than that?
The sneezing seemed to become increasingly more violent as the days went on. Something that racked through his entire body with the force of it. She figured he must have been exhausted.
When the symptoms had neglected to die down as she imagined they would, Claire finally made an appointment at the vet.
Other than the sneezing and the snot, Smokey was behaving normally. He was still a happy-go-lucky dog, eating and drinking normally, no accidents in the flat. It was only until a few days ago that Claire had become increasingly more concerned. Other than the one day he hadn’t eaten and all the aforementioned symptoms, he was fine.
Surely it was just something he had inhaled?
The first physical exam resulted in nothing abnormal: heart rate, respiration rate, temperature all normal. No swollen lymph nodes. Nothing to cause alarm. So they put Smokey on some antibiotics hoping that the symptoms would abade.
A week had gone by and the antibiotics had done nothing to alleviate the sneezing and now the occasional cough? It didn’t sound like a cough, but that was the best way she could explain it.
For the second visit, they had Claire drop Smokey off early in the morning and had her pick him up later. They then took radiographs of his skull (under sedation). There was something in his right nostril, but there was no way they could identify what it was with radiographs. They would need to get a clearer picture.
They had spoken to Claire as to the number of things it could be, and ultimately referred her to another clinic for a rhinoscopy.
They didn’t go through with the rhinoscopy, instead Claire and this new vet went over Smokey’s x-rays together after a preliminary exam. They decided the next course of action was to get a CT scan and a biopsy, to which she would have to go to yet another clinic.
“We’ll have to take a CT to figure out exactly what it is, but there is definitely something there.” The young, blonde vet explained to her, going over the X-rays of Smokey’s skull.
“ When can we do that?” This new revelation did nothing to alleviate the mounting fear and anxiety rising in her.
“Well, we don’t have a CT machine at this clinic, so we’ll have to set it up at our other location, which isn’t too far from this one.”
Claire let out a long sigh and folded her arms.
“Okay, can we set that up here or do I have to call them?”
“We can set it up right here! We’re the same clinic, just different locations. What’s the best day and time for you?”
“Just try and get him in as soon as you can, please.”
The vet smiled wide, and Claire noticed how it reached her eyes and wished that she could feel the same.
The days seemed to drag on as she waited for the results. Cancer was one of the possibilities, and Claire had already run through having to say goodbye in her head.
He was at the vet almost the entire day and he seemed completely out of it that evening when he got home.
Blood and snot leaked from his right nostril, and each time she spotted it she would gently wipe it away. He seemed to have trouble breathing that night, and the few days that followed.
He seemed miserable, and it broke her heart to see him suffer. She was anxious to know the results, hoping that it was nothing major or life-threatening.
But it was.