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“Right,” Kevin said, clearing his throat. “I’m sure you know why I’ve called this meeting.”
Brendan panted happily from where he was sprawled across the sofa. Officially speaking, Brendan wasn’t allowed on the sofa. It had been part of the house rules that Kevin had shared with him when he first brought him home.
Unofficially speaking, the rules had been suspended for the better part of their time living together.
“I just wanted to make sure that we were on the same page,” Kevin told him, seemingly unconcerned that Brendan appeared not to be paying him any attention. “We’ve quite an important visitor coming, and I want things to go well. Not the least to prove that I’m not at all the dangerous stalker that Mr Flounder seems to think that I was. Or am, I suppose, though I hope this meeting will perhaps finally change his mind.”
Despite his words, there was genuinely no bitterness in Kevin’s voice, and he grabbed one of his laptops and pulled up a picture, turning the laptop to show Brendan. “This is Mr Flounder,” he said. “It’s not a terribly good picture, but it is difficult to find one of him online. He hasn’t got much of a social media presence.”
Kevin didn’t have much of a social media presence either, unless you counted the subreddit devoted to the television programme ‘Shake It Up’, of which he held the longest streak as Top 1% Poster.
Brendan didn’t have social media either, because he was a dog. Kevin had been surprised to learn that people created social media accounts for their pets, even going so far as to impersonate their animals online. It seemed rather a waste of time to him, especially as he was working through his 8th complete rewatch of the entire run across both iterations of ‘Shake It Up’.
He’d watched certain series far more frequently than that, of course – it was only natural for a fan to be partial to a certain series, whether because of a particular contestant or even just some peak banter between Stevie and Andre. He was particularly partial to series 5, and in a long-standing feud with a fellow redditor about the merits of series 5 versus their preferred series 4.
Kevin was fairly certain that Brendan preferred series 5, too. A far more cynical take was that he’d simply been Pavlov’d into enjoying it, but Kevin didn’t go in for cynical takes much these days.
“Now,” he continued, turning his laptop back around and closing out of the blurry, pixelated picture of Hugh Flounder he’d managed to source, “Mr Flounder is a friend, despite trying to send me to prison. He was just trying to protect Stevie.” He paused. “Not that it worked, of course, since Stevie is now quite dead.”
Brendan’s nose twitched, and Kevin nodded. “I know,” he said heavily. “I wish we’d gotten invited to the funeral as well, but I think the memorial we held in the garden was quite nice.”
Even if Brendan had decided the middle of the eulogy was the perfect time to have his morning poo.
Kevin couldn’t blame him, of course – they’d not discussed the importance of the memorial ahead of time, which was an oversight he was determined to rectify ahead of Hugh’s visit.
As such, he cleared his throat. “Now,” he started, in his sternest voice, “we’re on the same side as Mr Flounder. We want to get justice for Stevie, which is why it’s vital that I’m able to accurately convey the information that I’ve gathered.” Meticulously gathered and delicately culled from weeks of footage before being carefully collated to present to the PI.
Kevin only hoped that Hugh would be open to his theory.
“Because of how important this is,” he continued without waiting for a response from Brendan, “I need you to promise that you will be on your best behaviour. When he is here, later on, I need you to show some restraint. No barking, no sniffing Mr Flounder in any place untowards, and absolutely no drooling on him. Is that understood?”
Brendan yawned widely, which Kevin took as agreement.
“Excellent,” he said briskly, swiping on the trackpad of his laptop. “If you’ll just, er, sign here to acknowledge that we had this conversation—” He held the laptop’s touchscreen display, showing the document he’d drafted for this purpose, up to Brendan’s face. He’d been rather delighted to learn that dog noses worked on touchscreens, and arguably, as a dog’s nose print was as unique as human fingerprints, this was even more secure than an actual signature. When Brendan made no effort to touch the laptop, Kevin moved it closer so that the screen pressed against his nose. “And here, to indicate your agreement—”
Again he held the laptop up. Again Brendan paid it exactly zero heed, so Kevin again tapped it against his nose before settling back in his chair in a satisfied sort of way. “Excellent,” he repeated. “Well, that’s done, then.”
He stood, replacing the laptop back in its usual spot and glanced up at the clock, brightening when he saw there was enough time to get at least one episode of ‘Shake It Up’ in before Hugh was due to arrive. He grabbed the remote and turned to the sofa, where Brendan let out a long-suffering sigh before lifting his head just long enough for Kevin to sit next to him before resting his head on Kevin’s knee.
“Good boy, Brendan,” Kevin said automatically, before clicking play on the remote.
Brendan’s tongue lolled out of his mouth in a contented sort of way, and he closed his eyes as the familiar theme music started, undoubtedly happy most of all that Kevin was so immediately engrossed in the episode that he didn’t even notice Brendan drooling on his knee.