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It was a q-word shift today, and everyone was well-aware and wise enough not to say anything about it, even Ravi (who might have had the fear of his life put into him by Hen and Chimney after what happened three years ago). So far it was nearing 1 p.m. and the bell hadn’t even gone off once.
They had all finished their assigned station chores hours ago, Buck had helped Bobby cook lunch, and all the dishes had been cleaned and put away, and they were all left with absolutely nothing to do until they were called out.
Hen and Chimney were in the middle of another race on Mario Kart, Buck had been kicked off three races ago after coming in fifth for the fourth time, and had Eddie take his place. So he was bored, and only slightly sulking on the corner of his couch when he felt a notification chime from his phone in his pocket.
He fished his phone out and saw that it was some dude he went to the Academy with and hadn’t talked to in months (probably years) that had liked a photo he posted last week. He clicked on it, and before Buck realized what he was doing, he was in a rabbit hole of watching random reels on instagram.
Over half of the reels he had no interest in. Some mid-twenties girl posting a shopping haul, someone ranting about their job and the likes. Then a video of a dog popped up that made him watch the entire thing. Buck didn’t even know why, it was just a video of the probable owner recording the dog’s butt on a walk as they probably had some voice in the background talking about who knows what since Buck had his volume muted.
But something must have tripped on his algorithm that noticed the amount of time he had watched that video, for more videos of dogs started coming up, videos that Buck couldn’t find it in himself to skip.
Buck didn’t know what it was about the dogs that drew him in, over half of them only had the dogs sleeping on couches or dog beds, but ever since he had met Bean three weeks ago, Buck found himself fascinated by the species. And it didn’t matter the breed either - golden retrievers, huskies, german shepherds, and of course the little wiener dogs.
“What’s got you smiling over there?” he heard Hen’s voice suddenly ask and he could feel her stare on him, knocking him out of the trance Buck had fallen into.
“What?” he said, turning his gaze away from his phone to her.
She leveled him with a gaze. “You’ve been looking down at that thing and smiling for the last five minutes,” She said as she quietly made her way over to him, Eddie and Chimney still focused on the videogame. “Let me guess, You’re talking to Tommy.”
Buck’s face flushed. “No,” he said. If anything could make his day better, it would be being able to talk to Tommy. But he was on shift as well today, and Harbor was actually busy. “I’m not.”
Hen obviously looked like she didn’t believe him. “Then what are you doing?” she asked.
“Just watching funny dog videos,” Buck said.
Hen rolled her eyes, but didn’t press the issue any more. “Sure, I’ll believe that,” she said as she walked away.
When Buck was fairly confident that she was leaving him alone, he turned back to his phone. The next dog was cute, a small beagle that was just learning the consequences of knocking his water bowl over. Buck smiled as he watched it, giving the dog a like. Then he moved onto the next video.
It was a dachshund, and looked very similar to Tommy’s dog, Buck couldn’t help but think. Same coloring and everything. The video was of the dog and it’s owner on some sort of hike, they had come across a muddy puddle the owner was trying to coax the dog across, and the dog obviously wasn’t having any of it.
Then Buck noticed something else, The dog was wearing the same green and blue collar Bean wore, and the same orange harness Tommy put Bean in when they went on walks. And was that… that was the leash Tommy used!
Hell, that dog was Bean!
What was Bean doing on instagram?
Tommy wasn’t one of those people that was one for social media. Sure, he had all the regular accounts: Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, and Buck had friended and followed him on all of them. But that didn’t mean that Tommy was on social media a lot.
He had maybe fifteen pictures posted in all of the ten years he had an instagram account, and two of those Buck forced him to post. Before those, the last post Tommy probably made was the day he got Bean.
Buck swiped right on the video of the Bean doppelganger, but sure enough, it wasn’t a doppelganger.
Bean had an instagram account.
A surprising successful instagram account.
Only 98 posts with over 1,200 followers. The last one was a video posted this morning.
So that left the question…
Why hadn’t Tommy told Buck about this?
How dare the man keep this secret.
Buck took a screenshot of the account page and then went to the text thread he had been talking to Tommy on earlier. He sent the man the screenshot he had just taken along with a message.
Evan: When were you going to tell me about this?
Tommy texted back ten minutes later.
Tommy: Oh
Tommy: you found that
Oh?
… Oh?
What did Tommy mean ‘oh’?
Buck tapped out a message back in response.
Evan: Why yes, I FOUND it.
Evan: So again… when we’re you going to tell me about this?
Buck watched as the bubbles popped up, indicating Tommy was typing out a response. Then they disappeared. Then they came up again. Before disappearing.
Then Tommy’s response came through.
Tommy: I was just trying to figure out a way to tell you about it.
And what in the world did that mean?
Another message from Tommy popped up before Buck could ask anything.
Tommy: some people just make it a big deal
Buck wasn’t really sure what Tommy meant by that either. That Tommy felt Bean was important enough to warrant him making his dog an instagram, or that apparently 1200 other people felt that Bean was important enough to warrant an instagram account for a dog as well.
Evan: of course it’s a big deal
Evan: Bean is worth at least 10k followers not 1200
Evan: just let me help you and we can get his follower count up
Buck then found himself back watching more dog reels, trying to come up with more ideas for videos to feature Bean in. At least until Eddie came over and knocked him out of his concentration.
“What’re you doing there Buck?” he asked.
“Huh?” Buck looked up from his phone at Eddie.
“You’re looking at your phone pretty… intensely.”
“Oh it’s just that I was looking into this thing for-”
“If it’s another one of your research spirals, I’m alright,” Eddie cut him off as he held his hands up.
“It’s not that,” Buck said. “Or not exactly. I want to help Tommy with his instagram account for Bean.”
“Tommy made an instagram account for a bean?” Eddie asked. “What?”
Buck rolled his eyes. “No Eddie, not ‘a bean.’ Bean. Tommy’s dog.”
Eddie lifted an eyebrow. “Tommy has a dog named Bean? He’s never mentioned it.”
Buck held up his phone to show Eddie a picture of the dog. “Well he does. His name is Bean, and he’s a little dachshund.”
Eddie looked at the photo. “Huh,” he shrugged. “Out of all the dogs I can imagine Tommy having, I wouldn’t have imagined one of those.”