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It was a surprise to no one that the Langdon’s new puppy was firmly attached to Abby.
It wasn’t that the puppy didn’t like Frank- Abby was a stay-at-home mum and so the puppy was with her the majority of the day. She was the one to feed him, walk him, and play with him. The puppy liked Frank, but saw him less and considered him the backup human.
Well, maybe the backup backup human if you count Tanner.
“Goldie!”
Yes, Tanner had named the golden retriever ‘Goldie’.
The preschooler skidded around the corner of the kitchen after the dog.
“Careful, buba!” Abby called out after him as she descended the stairs to the main floor. “The floor is slippery and you’re wearing socks!” She had been trying to put down the Langdon’s youngest, Penny, for over half an hour.
“She go down okay?” Frank asked as Abby flopped onto the couch beside him.
His wife shrugged. “No one was maimed, so I consider it a success.”
The TV wasn’t even on. After cleaning the dinner dishes while Abby put Penny to bed, Frank had just collapsed onto the couch, brain staticky with fatigue. The previous run of shifts had been particularly busy, and both kids were in a sleep regression. “Give me two minutes to gather my strength, and I’ll put Tanner to bed.”
Hearing his name, Tanner materialised from around the corner. “I want mama to put me to bed,” he said, crossing his arms.
Frank tried to keep his face neutral. “Mama’s tired and needs a break. I’m going to put you to bed tonight.” Tanner started protesting but Frank kept going. “What book do you want to read after brushing your teeth?”
But Tanner wasn’t having any of it. “No!” he yelled as he stomped his foot. “Mama!”
“Tanner-”
“No! I hate you! I want mama!”
The terrible twos seemed to last well into being a preschooler. Frank took a steadying breath and pushed himself up off the couch. “Okay, Tanner, time to go to bed now. Say goodnight to mama.”
“No! No!” Tanner tried to push his dad’s legs and force him to leave. “I love mama! I hate daddy! I hate you!”
Ignoring the outburst, Frank grabbed Tanner under the arms and started shuffling them both towards the stairs. “We’re going to brush your teeth, put on your pyjamas, read a book, and then go to sleep.”
Tanner let out a shriek of anger and started trying to wail on his dad with his small fists.
Abby blindly reached over to the coffee table where she knew Frank had thrown his headphones. Noise cancellation was a god-send.
An indeterminate amount of time later, Abby was startled awake by Frank dropping heavily onto the couch beside her. She blinked blearily at him and slid off the headphones, tossing them back onto the coffee table.
“Tanner is finally asleep,” Frank said, his neck jerking backwards. “He woke up Penny in the process, but both gremlins are down for the night.” He looked at his noise-cancelling headphones. “I’m surprised my headphones are good enough to block out both kids.”
“I think my sleep debt is large enough that they could be dollar store headphones,” Abby joked, sitting up and studying Frank. He looked both stressed and tired, and his tics seemed more forceful than usual.
“My sleep debt rivals my student loan debt,” Frank groaned back. A series of neck jerks and sniffs followed.
“Come here.” Abby beckoned him to lay down on her lap. “Come relax with me.”
He breathed out heavily as his legs jumped, the motion rocking him into the back of the couch. “Don’t think I’m a very relaxing partner right now.”
“Which is exactly why you should come here.” She made grabby hands at him. “I have healing powers that rival Robby’s.”
He gave her a small smile before laying down with his head in her lap. “Oh yeah? Watch out, or Gloria will start putting you on the schedule.”
“Imagine how much power we’d wield if Dana and I joined forces. Watch out Gloria.”
Frank snorted as his head jerked against Abby’s legs. “I’d like to see you take her on.” There was relative quiet for a moment, save for Frank’s tics. They broke up the quiet sounds of the house settling. “Sorry,” he eventually whispered.
“Frank.” When he didn’t open his eyes to look at her or respond in any way, Abby poked him in the cheek. “Stop apologizing.”
“It’s just-” He was cut off by a full body tic. “I’m sorry you have to put with me.”
She leaned down and gently kissed him on the forehead. “Frankie, I love you- all of you. I don’t put up with you, I want to be here with you. I wouldn’t trade you or this life for anything.”
His head jolted back again, painfully hard, and he responded, “But I’m going to leave you with a bruise.”
“I’d take a hundred bruises to lay here with you.”
That made Frank blush, a small smile tugging at the corner of his lips.
Goldie chose that moment to join them in the living room, a toy pterodactyl in her mouth. She looked up at the couch and tilted her head. She often curled up on the couch in the evenings, but today, Frank was taking up all the room.
Frank just shook his head fondly before shifting to lay on his side, head still in Abby’s lap. He patted the newly created space beside him. Goldie jumped up immediately. But, instead of trying to force her way past Frank to lay with Abby, she curled up beside Frank. The pterodactyl fell from her mouth.
“Aw, look, she does love you!” Abby teased, carding a hand through Frank’s hair.
Frank hummed in response, body suddenly still.
“Frank.” She knew what he was doing. “Don’t supress just cause you don’t want to disturb the dog.”
“I’m not-” He breathed in sharply as a wave of needToReleaseNeedToRelease pounded against his sternum. “Okay, fine, you caught me.” He reached out to pet the dog. The motion was jerky in a way that was unusual for him. “She just never chooses to lay with me.”
“She sees you as a play buddy cause you’re always riling her up.”
“I don’t always rile her up.”
Abby raised an eyebrow at him. “You chased her around the house with the tongs while making dinner tonight.”
He pursed his lip, amused. “Not my fault they click open and shut like a mouth,” he said as he twisted his head so his face was hidden in Abby’s thigh. Whatever he said next was muffled and unintelligible. A fine tremor was running through him at the effort of supressing.
“You know, Goldie lays with the kids, even when they’re being chaos monsters.”
“Not a chaos monster,” Frank mumbled, still muffled.
“You are, but that’s okay.” Abby tapped him on the top of his head and he obligedly turned so she could see him. “But what I’m saying is that Goldie hasn’t minded your tics so far, and I don’t see why that would change now.”
Pulling himself up to rest on his elbows, Frank’s eyebrows furrowed. “I’m pretty sure she’d stop laying with me if I got all loud.” His head jerked back and he sniffed in hard. “Ugh.”
“Penny was having a full-blown meltdown yesterday and Goldie didn’t even move rooms.” Abby reached over and gave the good dog a gentle pat. Goldie’s eyes didn’t open, but her tail thumped happily against the couch. “I think she can handle you sniffing.”
He breathed out heavily through pursed lips, trying to calm the storm inside him. It was like someone left a radio on halfway between stations in his brain. It was all static. He let himself fall back against Abby’s lap.
“Wanna watch some terrible reality TV?” Abby asked quietly. “I haven’t seen the latest episode of Love is Blind yet.”
Frank hummed affirmatively in response. Terrible reality TV sounded like the perfect way to cover the wet blanket that was his brain. He and Abby made a point of watching whatever trashy TV show was airing together at night, as a way to relax and chill together after long days and even longer bedtimes.
He drifted, head pillowed on his wife’s lap, brain giving up on consciousness.
Something wet was on- no, licking -his face. Frank blinked a bleary eye open to see Goldie staring at him. Her tongue darted out towards his face again and he groaned. “Gross”
From above him, Abby laughed gently. “Good alarm clock?”
“How long have I been asleep?” Frank asked, glancing around the room. The TV was still playing, but he couldn’t tell how many episodes had passed. “I didn’t miss the big reveal, did I?”
“It hasn’t even been ten minutes.” Abby ran her hands through Frank’s hair. “And I think Goldie here was trying to resuscitate you.” The puppy wagged her tail in agreement, settling back to lay to down beside Frank now that he was awake.
Frank stared at the TV for a moment. “Does she do that to you when you fall asleep on the couch?”
“No, but you started doing your sniffing tic in your sleep, and I think Goldie thought you were dying.”
“Oh.” He looked at the dog. She looked back at him, tail thumping on his leg. “Well…good Goldie, I guess.” He reached over to her and gave her a head pat. “Maybe you do like me after all.”
“Or she just knows you bring in the money for the treats she gets,” Abby said with a grin, pinching Frank’s ear.
Frank pouted his lips in fake sadness. “I really am just the wallet in this house, aren’t I?”
Abby pretended to think about it for a moment. “But like a really fancy wallet. A Louis Vitton or something. You know, the ones people have to show how rich and fancy they are.” She paused. “I think I just called you my trophy husband.”
With a head turn so Frank could see his wife, he smiled. “Well, you are the rich one in this relationship. You don’t have hundreds of thousands of dollars in student debt.” A yawn cracked his jaw open. “But we both have waaaay too much slept debt.”
“Finish this episode tomorrow?”
That was a bit of a joke. They never finished episodes the next day, always choosing to turn on the next one. “Tomorrow,” Frank promised. “I’ll take Goldie out to pee and get her crated for the night, and then we can work on our sleep debt.”