I went back inside, only because Goose sat there watching. My hand never left the doorknob, though. The moment he pulled away, out I went, back the other way, into the muggy summer muck, after flipping the sign against the glass to Sorry, We’re Closed.
A pattern developed over the next two weeks. For the first couple days, Goose continued to drop me off. We’d kiss. He’d leave, and so would I, to pace up and down the sidewalk and read my name on the front of the building again and again. When that got boring, I headed for the back alley to listen to critters and birds that lived in the woods behind the dumpster there. More than once, I hid from customers behind it, too. As time went on, my walks got longer, down the street, around the block, all the way across state lines. Connecticut to N
