` Kristin
` Lo - Kristin's bestie
` Audrina - Kristin and Lo's friend, and also Brody's girlfriend
` Brody - Audrina's girlfriend and Kristin's ex
` Scott - Brody's friend
Kristin tightened the bright blue elastic that was twisted through her wavy hair and looked round the pet shelter. In her spare time she would normally volunteer at 'Health for the Paws', her local pet shelter. She leaned against the bare counter and sighed as the sound of a hose flicking on and off echoed through the shelter. Ryan, her manager was on washing duty since Cassy, who was doing hours for her police arrest didn't show up.
"Kristin!"
Kristin looked round and realized the noise had come from Ryan in the other room. She calmly paced to the other room and popped her head round the edge of the wall.
"Yea?"
"I forgot to tell you, but we have a new volunteer who'll be here in about 5 minutes, and he'll need some help with you know the do's and don'ts. So, since I trust you," he winked at Kristin, his brown hair covering part of his crystal blue eyes, " I thought you wouldn't mind just checking up on him and stuff like that."
Kristin giggled, "Sure boss." she mockingly gave him a salute and walked back to the counter.
Kristin was so distracted by looking down at her phone checking her texts, she didn't hear the telltale sounds the new volunteer had arrived. Soft footsteps approached the front, and a small gasp came from the newbie. Kristin still unaware, her thumb gliding over the screen. "Uh hum." The sound of someone clearing there throat woke Kristin out of her trance, she suddenly looked up, her jaw dropping.
"Holy shit." she whispered under her breath. "Um, hey Brodyy." she slurred nervously. She awkwardly put her phone back into her bag under the counter.
"Hey Kristin.This is a big surprise." With uncertainty he looked around the room, probably noticing the stack of neon bright fliers all around the walls.
"Yea, to say the least. So I'm guessing your the new volunteer?"
"Yep." he nodded.
She took a deep breath and plastered on that oh so familiar fake smile."Ok, so just come with me and I'll show you around and get you started"
Once Kristin had given Brody a tour of the whole shelter, she led him to the room where all the animals were kept. "Okay, so today since you're just starting out, you get all the easy jobs. All you have to do is refill their water and food bowls." She pointed to the large packet of dog and cat food in the corner and the sink with a dripping tap connected to it. "Sounds easy enough." he smiled, "Oh and I hope our situation and all that doesn't make us working together awkward." he added. "Oh, of course not." she lied for what seemed like the millionth time that week.
Kristin walked to the 'Extra Care' Room' where a small family of Huskies had been taken in. They were found outside in one of the local parks, and had been dumped in a small box. The mother Husky and her 5 puppies lay, all trying to become the warmest. Kristin smiled as she pet the mother who now was extra affectionate.
"Oh shit!" she looked up and rolled her eyes as she jogged to the room where Brody was, meeting Ryan along the way. They both entered the 'Holding Room' where Ryan stood helplessly. Evidently, the big packet of pet food, or what was left of it, had been spilled all across the wooden floors.
"This was not my fault." Brody put his hands up and backed away slowly. Ryan sighed, "Kristin, can you help him clean it up. All of this is gonna have to go back into the packet and be fed to the animals. We don't have enough cash to buy some more this month." Ryan stuffed his hands into his pants and walked back to the other room. Kristin turned back to Brody who had his back against the shelf.
"Great." she bit her lip and bent down, starting to pile the food back into the bag.
"I am so dumb, I mess up on my first day." Kristin looked up from the food and gave him a hopeful smile. "Well you're not alone. On my first day here I somehow managed to slip into dog crap, and ended up smelling like shit for the rest of the week." Brody smiled and started laughing,
"So what do you do now? As in a job?" he asked as he bent down to help her.
"Well, I'm an architect at this firm." She made sure that their hands weren't going to touch like in one of those sappy, romantic chick flicks, that were always so predictable.
"Ha, nice, I thought you wanted to be up there with all the stars."
"Well, I guess not all our dreams come true." she cleared her throat and sat down, "So what do you do?" she asked curiously.
Ever since high school Brody was the senior quarter-back. Always getting the girls. "I'm a mechanic, funnily enough."
Kristin started breaking out with laughter, "Are you serious?"
Brody looked into Kristin's eyes and nodded, "Yea."
"Wow. No offence but I would never have guessed that you were heading that way."
"Well, you know my parents. Always wanting me to get a steady and well payed job."
Kristin nodded. She remembered the first time she had met Brody's parents and grimaced. They were a very, let's just say, stern couple. Personally, the only reason she thought that their marriage survived was because they were always apart, on business trips or private get-aways. So they never got the chance to actually get together and talk about their marriage.
"You okay?" Brody questioned, the corner of his lips turning down.
"Yep." Kristin quickly nodded.
Within 10 minutes they had gotten all the food back into the bag triumphantly with ease and had moved on with their other jobs they had to do at the shelter, both a bit more relaxed.
