Her lip quit bleeding quickly. The skin melded over like new within a minute. Val brushed away the last remnants of blood and made sure to wipe her hand on the inside of her shirt. Golden blood stains could give her away just as well as golden blood on her lips, so Val checked that she looked entirely presentable in the camera of her phone before continuing on with her afternoon plans.

She fed Foofy a final carrot through the links of the fence and sang, “Wait just a minute, Foofy. I will be there to walk you soon.” Val got up and turned to walk away from the fence.

Foofy stood up too, staring at her with those pleading eyes. He walked along the fence to stay by her for as long as he could, but then he ran out of space in his outdoor kennel to follow her any farther. A whimpering whine sounded from his throat.

“I said that I will be right there,” Val insisted, even if Foofy could not understand her. To minimize the time that he had to miss her, Val hurried into the animal shelter.

“Hello, Val,” the shelter worker greeted her again. “I was worried that you would not show up.” Apparently, not all volunteers must come back very regularly for the shelter worker to keep thinking that she would be unreliable every day. “Did you get out of school later than yesterday?” he asked.

“Yeah, I did. I’m sorry,” Val said. “I had run into some other students.” That happened to be true enough. “I still want to walk the dogs! Can I take Foofy out?”

“Yes, of course. Foofy is in one of the outdoor runs today,” the shelter worker said. “I was hoping that he might feel more relaxed in that environment, but I have heard him barking a lot out there.”

“Okay. I am sure that he will feel better after a walk!” Val cheered. She could not help but feel a twinge of guilt since her altercation with Gina had been the cause of him barking so much. Val left her things behind the desk like yesterday and went to retrieve Foofy for his walk.

Foofy rushed to the door as soon as Val came into sight. Excited whines escaped past his jowls while Val got him out of his kennel. His nose stuck up in the air, trying to get some good sniffs of her.

“Yes, hi there. Hi there!” Val hooked on his leash. Then, she had to struggle to hold him back as he charged for the doors.

The walk passed like usual. Val made sure to take a different route from any of the previous days, maximizing all of the new sensations that Foofy could experience on this walk. This made him react more intensely to the stimulus of the area, hence giving Val more practice with Keep the Peace. Nothing notable happened on this walk, except that Foofy looked as cute as ever when he crunched on his baby carrots.

Once they had looped back around to the animal shelter, Val returned Foofy to his kennel. If only Val could pass all of her volunteer time with Foofy, she might just enjoy her time spent here more. No other dog was as big or intense as Foofy neither, so he provided the most rigorous practice for her power. Sadly, Val could only spend an hour with any given dog at most, so she needed to pick another dog to walk, for now.

When Val looked around for her next friend, the cute white ball of fluff that was Polar was nowhere to be seen. A knot twisted around in her stomach while her steps quickened throughout the animal shelter. Hopefully, Polar had just been moved to a different kennel like Foofy.

Val checked every last cage of dogs, yet he was nowhere to be seen. Her heart started to race fast. Polar could not have disappeared for the same reason as Gigi. He simply could not have, or else Val’s heart might burst for that sweet, wonderful dog.

While she did not mean to interrupt the shelter worker’s job, Val approached him timidly. She needed to know what had happened to Polar. In her best effort to keep her voice level, Val asked, “Where is Polar at? I could not find him anywhere.”

“Polar was adopted earlier today!” the shelter worker cheered.

Val lifted her downcast chin. Her eyes widened so that she could feel the glimmer in her own eyes. “Really? He has been adopted?”

“Yes. He went to a family with some little kids, so he should get lots of love and attention!”

“That’s wonderful!” Val found herself unable to stop smiling. Truly, she could not feel happier for Polar having found what would hopefully be his forever home.

On the next walk with a dog, a little skip had snuck its way into Val’s step. After Gigi had been euthanized due to no one wanting to adopt her from the shelter, Val had feared that the same fate would befall other dogs. At least Polar had made it out of the shelter with a happy, new family. The dogs at the shelter definitely had some hope.

Now, Val’s primary worry would be whether Foofy should find a family. Perhaps allowing herself to grow attached to the dogs in the shelter had not been the wisest decision on her part. From the moment that she had first laid eyes upon him, Foofy had become her favorite of all dogs that she had ever known. If any dog would find his way out of the shelter into the house of a loving family, Val sure hoped that Foofy would.

Maybe if he found himself in the shelter for a long time, Val might just be the one to adopt him. At the end of the month, her mother had promised her a dog, after all. This hope made Val smile broadly for the remaining time that she volunteered at the animal shelter today.

The rest of the day passed peacefully. The relaxing atmosphere of the evening almost made Val forget about the earlier confrontation with Gina—almost. When she would have to return to school tomorrow, Val would never be able to ignore the fact that her identity had been compromised by the one person that she hated most in her life, to date.