Fic: Practice Made Perfect
Title: Practice Made Perfect
Fandom: The Practice
Characters: William Hinks
Rating: Explicit
Word count: 2555
Summary: William Hinks didn't always collect his souvenirs in mint condition. This time, though, he has done them so nicely.
Additional tags:[Spoiler (click to open)]Serial Killers, Misogyny, Implied/Referenced Body Dismemberment, Bad Things Happen to Fingernails, Scratching, Oral Fixation, Masturbation, no love for the wicked, but there’s a dog
The fine arrangement he has fanned out on the table looks magnificent. It makes a splendid addition to his collection-which, although still modest in numbers, already features a variety of specimens. These? These are graceful. Well-groomed, well-shaped…
And he has done them so nicely.
Leaned on his elbows with his chin propped up in his hands, William admires his latest souvenir. Lit by the pointed spotlight of a desk lamp, they shimmer beautifully, deep purple glitter on lusterless ivory.
A full set of a woman’s fingernails.
He takes the longest one and gently rubs it with his thumb. Cleaned off of gore and grease, its sleek, unblemished smoothness feels exquisite on his fingertips. He lifts the fingernail closer to his eyes, examines its delicate curvature. A small, crooked smile quirks up the corner of his mouth.
He has perfected the removal, hasn’t he. Even the nail polish remains perfectly undamaged this time.
Gaping at the flawless fineness of the nail’s square tip with breathless fascination, he contemplates the sharpness of its pointed edges. Closer, closer… He angles his head and nuzzles at the middle part of the nail plate. A pleasant shiver slithers down his spine. Turning the thing over in his hand, he pinches its raw, ragged end between his jointed thumb, forefinger, and middle finger. Settles it against his skin. With careful and precise attention to the amount of force exerted, he applies pressure.
The manicured tip trails along the side of his face. Slowly, gently, it grazes down to the hollow of his cheek. Traces the line of his jaw.
William closes his eyes.
The focus of his perception rearranges. Time stretches around the light, wandering touches: crawling along the ridge of his eyebrow; brushing over his temple; flitting up into his hairline. The soft, repetitive swishing ignites the sparks of goosebumps prickle on his skin. There’s a hypnotic quality to this contact: indirect but under William’s full control, it creeps up on him, takes over and wraps itself around him with the irrevocable persuasiveness of a self-imposed spell, a lulling tide of warmth and relaxation.
Scratch… scratch… scratch…
The undiluted sensory stimuli awaken some dormant yearning and he allows himself to lean towards it, drift into it, the weird and wonderful aberration of senses: a chimera of doting tenderness, uncanny mimicry of amorous caress. A teasing stroke along the groove between his nose and upper lip. A jiff of lingering temptation by his slack mouth. A titillating trouble against his bobbing throat…
If those nails were to dig deep into one’s skin, that would have hurt.
A splinter of memory slashes across William’s mind’s eye, breaking the spell. His parted lips clamp shut; his eyes snap open, wild and glassy. The gesture stops halfway, hanging mid-air, and after a faltering moment his hand drops into his lap. Jaws set, he ducks his head and scowls down at his closed fist.
Now, really. This is ridiculous and he knows it, and must he remind himself? The stupid cow didn’t have a single chance.
How could she? He has been tactical, astute in his advances. William does know a way around a woman, that’s the thing. It’s taken some doing to learn the ropes, but with observation and practice, he has picked out a few most potent ones. He mastered them to perfection. He had…
His mother taught him too damn well. Just take the deep-rooted contempt down a notch. Feign interest, sham innocence; play the part of a perfect gentleman. His lures have been working like a charm. The flippant bitches fall for the most primitive of baits, never suspecting a thing-loving with their ears, quite in line with the corny saying. And while the hardware for his hobbies might be costly, words are cheap. Patience, he has in excess. For all the time and mental sufferance he puts into the groundwork arrangements, it ultimately pays off in spades. Every single time.
When all is said and done, they all end up the loveliest little darlings imaginable: scared witless, nice and malleable in the face of their imminent death. Won’t talk back, won’t fight back… Won’t hurt him back, indeed. What’s not to love?
He rolls his shoulders, takes a deep breath. Forcing himself to shake off the fit of discomposure, he utilizes a piece of soft tissue and places the wiped fingernail back in a row with the rest. His eyes are fixed on them, feasting on them, and he feels as the tension in his body slowly dissolves.
Such tiny, puny little things. So frail… so utterly harmless under his thumb.
Exactly how they are supposed to be.
Most fingernails William had the pleasure of acquiring so far tended to look rather incongruous once they were unattached. Not these. Such a commendable disparity.
He preens and swells with a rekindled pride in his neat work.
‘Love,’ though. To William’s mind, that would be way too charged a word. Lust has never made it to the top of his preferred sins. Even in his youth he hadn’t been the one to be consumed by blind passion of carnal desires. He sees nothing arousing in the process of killing itself, and most certainly not in the abject objects of his acts. Quite the reverse. As a matter of fact, taking bodies apart the exact way he wants it is a scrupulous, surgically calculated, adroit handiwork, so focused it becomes borderline meditative. Toilsome as well. There’s no place for moods and fancy; no time to get distracted on the scene. Every move, every cut demands his utmost orderliness-artfulness-precision.
Were his meticulous procedure removed from the equation, William would harbor no interest, no freaking love for bodies of these women whatsoever, no matter living or dead.
He doesn’t bother to remember their names any longer than the matters of practicality require. Not after their vivacity fades, their vitality ceases, eyes go from bright to dim to dull to vacant. Not beyond those inspiriting moments when their greedy limbs and bird-brained heads are deftly removed by William’s own sure, steady hands.
But after that? He has no care for a mangled carcass. Or, well. With one to, ideally, ten pretty, little exceptions.
The papers’ headlines take plenty of care in the remembering department anyway. He’s been keeping a close eye on the media coverage. In every single article he had read since, the focus inevitably skewed to a predictably boring angle. How tickled he was then to observe the users of online newsgroups and bulletin boards: much more generous, much more genuine in their responses. Plenty appalled and outraged just as well; as they should be. But also-curious. Wondering. About so many different particulars…
The missing fingernails seem to stoke the most of that curiosity: idle, agitated, producing endless threads of speculation and discourse. William finds it baffling but infinitely amusing that this private indulgence of his-of all ungodly things-became the public’s favorite high horse to ride. Why and how exactly he took them, and how such a monster can sleep at night, and what deranged intentions he might have had for his sick trophy afterwards...
If only they knew.
If all his rigorous endeavors were to come to light one of these days? Impossible. Unless he stoops to getting sloppy and neglectful…
He snorts. A glimpse of a smug grin ripples across his face. He never is. He can’t imagine that he ever could be.
Blinking dreamily, William moves the mementos of his recent prey over the desk like the tiles in a sliding puzzle, pressing them down gently with the pad of his fingertip, arranging them into a radiant, floral-like shape. Arranging the oddly mussy thoughts in his head.
There’s a time and place for a cold-blooded execution of a task, and then there’s a time and place to enjoy the hard-earned fruit.
He did it.
He did it and the fourth time was the charm.
He did it with immaculate perfection, and now…
And now, an odd, sweet stirring is pulsing in his gut, spreading warmth throughout his body, a welcome plummet to an overactive mind. He swallows thickly. His mouth can’t stop watering for some reason.
The play of sparkles from the lighting glares glossily on the lacquered nails’ surface, the glint and texture of the shapes strongly reminiscent of hard candy.
This is for him. For him alone.
William bends forward over the desk, surveying the selection. He bites his lower lip.
He picks up a fingernail.
The cool air dries his tongue even as it flicks out in a swift motion. Just a quick dip: testing the waters, knowing the feel. The next sweeping touch along the length of the nail lingers, exploring; finding the flawless texture of the silky coating pleasing his senses, its faint tang titillating his taste buds.
The moistened varnish glistens in the cradle of his palm, a delectation for the eyes.
His nostrils flare with deep and slow, measured breaths as thin lips wrap gingerly around the slight thing, holding it with only a minuscule amount of pressure that feels both urgent and precarious, that verges on tempting and-
William doesn’t finish forming this thought through. What loopy impulse provokes the pursing movement of his lips, he can’t tell either. His mind is blithely blank. His muscles twitch and- in it slips.
Heart thudding, William sinks back into the chair. Palms flat against the desk, eyes half lidded, he concentrates on pushing the thin plate around slowly, pressing it into his tender inner flesh. Cataloging the sensations. Processing the experience.
It’s light and smooth. It’s smoother than the surface of his teeth.
That finding sets the mood and spurs the action. Lapping at the fingernails, one after another, picking them up, popping them in in a methodical progression. His tongue darts out and in and out again until the whole brittle bunch is tucked inside, nice and secure. William puts a hand to his locked lips and feels them up with shaky fingers. The way his cheeks appear to puff out must look so blatantly, deliciously obscene. He squirms as the image transpires in his mind.
There’s just something about this peculiar experience of taking in-the absolute dominance it reaffirms, the utter subjugation it encompasses. The nimble tip of his tongue turns the almost weightless relics over and over, making them crunch and clash with one another, sending throughout his teeth a tiny, wispy chime that echoes into his bones, through his entire wired system.
Such a merry, jolly sound. Not unlike a celebratory clink of glasses.
There’s such decadent joy to this, this special kind of intimacy; an undeniable, unbidden eroticism in holding the medley of scrappy oddments of a person confined within the wet enclosure of his mouth. Warming them with his saliva. Caressing them with his tongue.
Owning them.
A shudder runs through him; toe-curling, breath-stealing. He wasn’t really expecting that this would be so pleasurable, so sensual… so grossly, bafflingly exhilarating. Not that he minds it now, because this is exactly what it is: a glorious, ravishing excitement that thrills William to the core.
The underlying scare of one false move, one careless slip. One involuntary gulp… He’s running hot just thinking about it. His face is burning up, the side-swept forelock sticking to his dampened brow, undone. Abruptly, he becomes aware that his pants have become distinctly, distractedly constraining.
The reason why doesn’t matter. Even if he never planned that his reward ends up this wickedly raunchy in its wake, it would be hypocritical and utterly self-deluding of William to pretend that he won't enjoy the side effects.
He may very well enjoy them.
He would, however, be absolutely loath to make a mess.
The only variety of latex he has at hand is an unopened pack of powder-free gloves. Well-proven for his other needs-so, good enough for this. The ten precious pieces tumble out of his mouth stacked up in a wet clump; they will be dutifully preserved at a subsequent time.
His prudent sense of caution thoroughly assuaged, William slumps back and lets himself tend to the surging onset of his arousal.
His fingers curl and slide along the encased length, giving it a tentative squeeze. His breath catches. It’s been a while. He’s out of practice; a little slow to get into the rhythm. As muscle memory kicks in to guide his grasp, he handles his erection without haste, with clinical dexterity, a familiar sequence of movements charged with one uncomplicated purpose.
It does feel good.
However sensually rewarding, it’s not enough to bring him to a climax.
His mind remains devoid of any piquant visions, but the phantom residue of the filling presence still lingers on his mouthparts. Latching onto that memory, he whips up his pace, no longer in the mood for delay. Panting and breathing out ragged, plaintive moans, he keeps jerking off until his eyes sting with involuntarily shed tears and the mounting tension finally erupts and William comes, crying out, seeing stars.
Once the waves of cottony bliss ebb away and the rush of blood in his ears dies down, William registers a small, whimpering sound. Ow, sheesh.
He inhales deeply, sits up straight, and turns to look.
Linda is here, standing by his side. She woofs and wags her tail, happy to finally have her master’s full attention.
Should he be really surprised that Linda, who is accustomed to the solitary quiet of the house, got curious about all the romp and noise he must've been making in his paroxysm of lust? As well as, he supposes, a good deal of smells.
William pulls a face. He really must have lost his head in the heat of the moment, but oh boy, that his elderly dog managed all the way to this remote corner of the residence to check on him…
How embarrassing.
And yet so pure and endearing.
First things first, William takes care of his waste. He removes the gloves for disposal, wipes down and readjusts himself. Linda keeps staring, the brown little beads of her soulful eyes faithfully fixed on his face. He murmurs absently, “Good girl,” and reaches out to fondle one of Linda’s floppy ears. She licks his hand, then butts her muzzle at his crotch and puts her paw up on his lap, nudging for cuddles.
The faintest quiver in his hand still hasn’t abated. The sweat-soaked fabric of his shirt clings to his skin, icky and sticky. The timing isn’t ideal at all, but William obliges docilely. He would feel cruel to deny her.
His Linda isn't just a good girl-she’s the best. Intelligent, affectionate, perceptive. William's most dear, devoted old companion.
He scratches Linda under her chin and smooths his other hand over her back, relishing the silky feel of fur.
Soon, very soon. He’ll take her to the dog park once again. Perhaps a different one, this time. They’ll have a nice, long, stimulating walk: playing fetch, sniffing around… Paying rapt attention to other dog walkers they will meet on their way.
He’ll take his SLR camera. He will act affable, be generous with film. It may so happen that a new friendship will be forged. He hopes it will.
He’ll do his most ingenious to make sure that it does.
Fandom: The Practice
Characters: William Hinks
Rating: Explicit
Word count: 2555
Summary: William Hinks didn't always collect his souvenirs in mint condition. This time, though, he has done them so nicely.
Additional tags:[Spoiler (click to open)]Serial Killers, Misogyny, Implied/Referenced Body Dismemberment, Bad Things Happen to Fingernails, Scratching, Oral Fixation, Masturbation, no love for the wicked, but there’s a dog
The fine arrangement he has fanned out on the table looks magnificent. It makes a splendid addition to his collection-which, although still modest in numbers, already features a variety of specimens. These? These are graceful. Well-groomed, well-shaped…
And he has done them so nicely.
Leaned on his elbows with his chin propped up in his hands, William admires his latest souvenir. Lit by the pointed spotlight of a desk lamp, they shimmer beautifully, deep purple glitter on lusterless ivory.
A full set of a woman’s fingernails.
He takes the longest one and gently rubs it with his thumb. Cleaned off of gore and grease, its sleek, unblemished smoothness feels exquisite on his fingertips. He lifts the fingernail closer to his eyes, examines its delicate curvature. A small, crooked smile quirks up the corner of his mouth.
He has perfected the removal, hasn’t he. Even the nail polish remains perfectly undamaged this time.
Gaping at the flawless fineness of the nail’s square tip with breathless fascination, he contemplates the sharpness of its pointed edges. Closer, closer… He angles his head and nuzzles at the middle part of the nail plate. A pleasant shiver slithers down his spine. Turning the thing over in his hand, he pinches its raw, ragged end between his jointed thumb, forefinger, and middle finger. Settles it against his skin. With careful and precise attention to the amount of force exerted, he applies pressure.
The manicured tip trails along the side of his face. Slowly, gently, it grazes down to the hollow of his cheek. Traces the line of his jaw.
William closes his eyes.
The focus of his perception rearranges. Time stretches around the light, wandering touches: crawling along the ridge of his eyebrow; brushing over his temple; flitting up into his hairline. The soft, repetitive swishing ignites the sparks of goosebumps prickle on his skin. There’s a hypnotic quality to this contact: indirect but under William’s full control, it creeps up on him, takes over and wraps itself around him with the irrevocable persuasiveness of a self-imposed spell, a lulling tide of warmth and relaxation.
Scratch… scratch… scratch…
The undiluted sensory stimuli awaken some dormant yearning and he allows himself to lean towards it, drift into it, the weird and wonderful aberration of senses: a chimera of doting tenderness, uncanny mimicry of amorous caress. A teasing stroke along the groove between his nose and upper lip. A jiff of lingering temptation by his slack mouth. A titillating trouble against his bobbing throat…
If those nails were to dig deep into one’s skin, that would have hurt.
A splinter of memory slashes across William’s mind’s eye, breaking the spell. His parted lips clamp shut; his eyes snap open, wild and glassy. The gesture stops halfway, hanging mid-air, and after a faltering moment his hand drops into his lap. Jaws set, he ducks his head and scowls down at his closed fist.
Now, really. This is ridiculous and he knows it, and must he remind himself? The stupid cow didn’t have a single chance.
How could she? He has been tactical, astute in his advances. William does know a way around a woman, that’s the thing. It’s taken some doing to learn the ropes, but with observation and practice, he has picked out a few most potent ones. He mastered them to perfection. He had…
His mother taught him too damn well. Just take the deep-rooted contempt down a notch. Feign interest, sham innocence; play the part of a perfect gentleman. His lures have been working like a charm. The flippant bitches fall for the most primitive of baits, never suspecting a thing-loving with their ears, quite in line with the corny saying. And while the hardware for his hobbies might be costly, words are cheap. Patience, he has in excess. For all the time and mental sufferance he puts into the groundwork arrangements, it ultimately pays off in spades. Every single time.
When all is said and done, they all end up the loveliest little darlings imaginable: scared witless, nice and malleable in the face of their imminent death. Won’t talk back, won’t fight back… Won’t hurt him back, indeed. What’s not to love?
He rolls his shoulders, takes a deep breath. Forcing himself to shake off the fit of discomposure, he utilizes a piece of soft tissue and places the wiped fingernail back in a row with the rest. His eyes are fixed on them, feasting on them, and he feels as the tension in his body slowly dissolves.
Such tiny, puny little things. So frail… so utterly harmless under his thumb.
Exactly how they are supposed to be.
Most fingernails William had the pleasure of acquiring so far tended to look rather incongruous once they were unattached. Not these. Such a commendable disparity.
He preens and swells with a rekindled pride in his neat work.
‘Love,’ though. To William’s mind, that would be way too charged a word. Lust has never made it to the top of his preferred sins. Even in his youth he hadn’t been the one to be consumed by blind passion of carnal desires. He sees nothing arousing in the process of killing itself, and most certainly not in the abject objects of his acts. Quite the reverse. As a matter of fact, taking bodies apart the exact way he wants it is a scrupulous, surgically calculated, adroit handiwork, so focused it becomes borderline meditative. Toilsome as well. There’s no place for moods and fancy; no time to get distracted on the scene. Every move, every cut demands his utmost orderliness-artfulness-precision.
Were his meticulous procedure removed from the equation, William would harbor no interest, no freaking love for bodies of these women whatsoever, no matter living or dead.
He doesn’t bother to remember their names any longer than the matters of practicality require. Not after their vivacity fades, their vitality ceases, eyes go from bright to dim to dull to vacant. Not beyond those inspiriting moments when their greedy limbs and bird-brained heads are deftly removed by William’s own sure, steady hands.
But after that? He has no care for a mangled carcass. Or, well. With one to, ideally, ten pretty, little exceptions.
The papers’ headlines take plenty of care in the remembering department anyway. He’s been keeping a close eye on the media coverage. In every single article he had read since, the focus inevitably skewed to a predictably boring angle. How tickled he was then to observe the users of online newsgroups and bulletin boards: much more generous, much more genuine in their responses. Plenty appalled and outraged just as well; as they should be. But also-curious. Wondering. About so many different particulars…
The missing fingernails seem to stoke the most of that curiosity: idle, agitated, producing endless threads of speculation and discourse. William finds it baffling but infinitely amusing that this private indulgence of his-of all ungodly things-became the public’s favorite high horse to ride. Why and how exactly he took them, and how such a monster can sleep at night, and what deranged intentions he might have had for his sick trophy afterwards...
If only they knew.
If all his rigorous endeavors were to come to light one of these days? Impossible. Unless he stoops to getting sloppy and neglectful…
He snorts. A glimpse of a smug grin ripples across his face. He never is. He can’t imagine that he ever could be.
Blinking dreamily, William moves the mementos of his recent prey over the desk like the tiles in a sliding puzzle, pressing them down gently with the pad of his fingertip, arranging them into a radiant, floral-like shape. Arranging the oddly mussy thoughts in his head.
There’s a time and place for a cold-blooded execution of a task, and then there’s a time and place to enjoy the hard-earned fruit.
He did it.
He did it and the fourth time was the charm.
He did it with immaculate perfection, and now…
And now, an odd, sweet stirring is pulsing in his gut, spreading warmth throughout his body, a welcome plummet to an overactive mind. He swallows thickly. His mouth can’t stop watering for some reason.
The play of sparkles from the lighting glares glossily on the lacquered nails’ surface, the glint and texture of the shapes strongly reminiscent of hard candy.
This is for him. For him alone.
William bends forward over the desk, surveying the selection. He bites his lower lip.
He picks up a fingernail.
The cool air dries his tongue even as it flicks out in a swift motion. Just a quick dip: testing the waters, knowing the feel. The next sweeping touch along the length of the nail lingers, exploring; finding the flawless texture of the silky coating pleasing his senses, its faint tang titillating his taste buds.
The moistened varnish glistens in the cradle of his palm, a delectation for the eyes.
His nostrils flare with deep and slow, measured breaths as thin lips wrap gingerly around the slight thing, holding it with only a minuscule amount of pressure that feels both urgent and precarious, that verges on tempting and-
William doesn’t finish forming this thought through. What loopy impulse provokes the pursing movement of his lips, he can’t tell either. His mind is blithely blank. His muscles twitch and- in it slips.
Heart thudding, William sinks back into the chair. Palms flat against the desk, eyes half lidded, he concentrates on pushing the thin plate around slowly, pressing it into his tender inner flesh. Cataloging the sensations. Processing the experience.
It’s light and smooth. It’s smoother than the surface of his teeth.
That finding sets the mood and spurs the action. Lapping at the fingernails, one after another, picking them up, popping them in in a methodical progression. His tongue darts out and in and out again until the whole brittle bunch is tucked inside, nice and secure. William puts a hand to his locked lips and feels them up with shaky fingers. The way his cheeks appear to puff out must look so blatantly, deliciously obscene. He squirms as the image transpires in his mind.
There’s just something about this peculiar experience of taking in-the absolute dominance it reaffirms, the utter subjugation it encompasses. The nimble tip of his tongue turns the almost weightless relics over and over, making them crunch and clash with one another, sending throughout his teeth a tiny, wispy chime that echoes into his bones, through his entire wired system.
Such a merry, jolly sound. Not unlike a celebratory clink of glasses.
There’s such decadent joy to this, this special kind of intimacy; an undeniable, unbidden eroticism in holding the medley of scrappy oddments of a person confined within the wet enclosure of his mouth. Warming them with his saliva. Caressing them with his tongue.
Owning them.
A shudder runs through him; toe-curling, breath-stealing. He wasn’t really expecting that this would be so pleasurable, so sensual… so grossly, bafflingly exhilarating. Not that he minds it now, because this is exactly what it is: a glorious, ravishing excitement that thrills William to the core.
The underlying scare of one false move, one careless slip. One involuntary gulp… He’s running hot just thinking about it. His face is burning up, the side-swept forelock sticking to his dampened brow, undone. Abruptly, he becomes aware that his pants have become distinctly, distractedly constraining.
The reason why doesn’t matter. Even if he never planned that his reward ends up this wickedly raunchy in its wake, it would be hypocritical and utterly self-deluding of William to pretend that he won't enjoy the side effects.
He may very well enjoy them.
He would, however, be absolutely loath to make a mess.
The only variety of latex he has at hand is an unopened pack of powder-free gloves. Well-proven for his other needs-so, good enough for this. The ten precious pieces tumble out of his mouth stacked up in a wet clump; they will be dutifully preserved at a subsequent time.
His prudent sense of caution thoroughly assuaged, William slumps back and lets himself tend to the surging onset of his arousal.
His fingers curl and slide along the encased length, giving it a tentative squeeze. His breath catches. It’s been a while. He’s out of practice; a little slow to get into the rhythm. As muscle memory kicks in to guide his grasp, he handles his erection without haste, with clinical dexterity, a familiar sequence of movements charged with one uncomplicated purpose.
It does feel good.
However sensually rewarding, it’s not enough to bring him to a climax.
His mind remains devoid of any piquant visions, but the phantom residue of the filling presence still lingers on his mouthparts. Latching onto that memory, he whips up his pace, no longer in the mood for delay. Panting and breathing out ragged, plaintive moans, he keeps jerking off until his eyes sting with involuntarily shed tears and the mounting tension finally erupts and William comes, crying out, seeing stars.
Once the waves of cottony bliss ebb away and the rush of blood in his ears dies down, William registers a small, whimpering sound. Ow, sheesh.
He inhales deeply, sits up straight, and turns to look.
Linda is here, standing by his side. She woofs and wags her tail, happy to finally have her master’s full attention.
Should he be really surprised that Linda, who is accustomed to the solitary quiet of the house, got curious about all the romp and noise he must've been making in his paroxysm of lust? As well as, he supposes, a good deal of smells.
William pulls a face. He really must have lost his head in the heat of the moment, but oh boy, that his elderly dog managed all the way to this remote corner of the residence to check on him…
How embarrassing.
And yet so pure and endearing.
First things first, William takes care of his waste. He removes the gloves for disposal, wipes down and readjusts himself. Linda keeps staring, the brown little beads of her soulful eyes faithfully fixed on his face. He murmurs absently, “Good girl,” and reaches out to fondle one of Linda’s floppy ears. She licks his hand, then butts her muzzle at his crotch and puts her paw up on his lap, nudging for cuddles.
The faintest quiver in his hand still hasn’t abated. The sweat-soaked fabric of his shirt clings to his skin, icky and sticky. The timing isn’t ideal at all, but William obliges docilely. He would feel cruel to deny her.
His Linda isn't just a good girl-she’s the best. Intelligent, affectionate, perceptive. William's most dear, devoted old companion.
He scratches Linda under her chin and smooths his other hand over her back, relishing the silky feel of fur.
Soon, very soon. He’ll take her to the dog park once again. Perhaps a different one, this time. They’ll have a nice, long, stimulating walk: playing fetch, sniffing around… Paying rapt attention to other dog walkers they will meet on their way.
He’ll take his SLR camera. He will act affable, be generous with film. It may so happen that a new friendship will be forged. He hopes it will.
He’ll do his most ingenious to make sure that it does.