My Boyfriend and Friends Stole My Heart Surgery Fund for Their Trip novel · Chapter 6 of 32

Chapter 6: The Jar

On Tuesday morning there was a pickle jar on the front desk with my name on a strip of tape.

Somebody had drawn a heart on it in marker, and somebody else had put a twenty-dollar bill inside.

I carried it into the back and set it in front of the practice manager.

"No," I said.

"It's not charity."

"It's a jar with my name on it."

"It's a jar for the people who work here to put money in, if they want," she said. "Nobody asked your permission."

"I don't take money from people."

"Then it's a good thing I'm not people," she said. "I'm your boss."

"Please take it back."

She did not take it back.

The vet came in then, a tall woman in scrubs who had delivered half the dogs in the neighborhood, and she looked at the jar and looked at me.

"Okay," she said. "What if it's not a jar?"

"What?"

"What if it's a dog wash? Tomorrow after close. Twenty dollars a dog. You work it, we work it, everybody tips. It's a fundraiser. For the clinic's emergency fund."

"Whose emergency?"

"Whoever's," she said. "This month it happens to be yours."

I looked at the three of them, the manager, the vet, and the tech who was already hanging a hand-lettered sign on the wall that said SUDS FOR SURGERY.

"That's the worst name I've ever heard," I said.

"It tested well," said the tech.

I laughed.

It was the first time in four days, and it hurt my chest, and I laughed again.

On Wednesday at five o'clock we had four kiddie pools in the parking lot and a line of dogs down the block.

I stood in rubber boots with a hose and a bottle of oatmeal shampoo.

Biscuit sat on a folding chair with a bandanna that said SUPERVISOR.

The old man from 2B had come with the hot dog grill.

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