The waiting room is small and dark and cramped, the brown linoleum floor is peeling in the corners, and any available breathing room is filled with shelves of dietary pet food and supplements with names like Rimadyl and Glycoflex. I’m not sure why I still go to this vet, other than that it’s close to my house. This is a pattern in my life I need to rethink: Jenny the therapist, this dumpy veterinary office. I will say there are new doctors here who are better than the last rotation, who disappeared suddenly after some unflattering Yelp reviews.
I find a seat on an empty bench made of wood and wrought iron. It makes me feel like I’m waiting for a trolley. The shelves tower over us, which would be our doom in an earthquake, but also mercifully provide at least the illusion of privacy. Veterinary offices can be a grab bag of emotions. Cats are always frightened and in crates, their owners equally skittish. There are happy dogs here for simple things like checkups, excited to be out in the world and scenting the lingering promise of a biscuit. There are nervous dogs who hate the vet under any circumstance. There are sick and injured dogs with fretful owners who may bark and lunge and bite. There are owners leaving with no pets, having just received some kind of devastating news. And then there’s us. People with dogs with octopuses on their heads. We, apparently, are the worst of the lot. Since we are too horrific and deformed to look at, others who pass through give us a wide berth.
After some time, we are led into an examining room to wait for the doctor. I set Lily down on the table and she flinches as her pads make contact with cold metal. I stroke her back to get her to stay calm. This room is also small. On the wall is a poster promoting pet dental care with photos of dog teeth in varying stages of decay. The wallpaper, somewhat ironically, is the color of gum disease.
The vet enters with a smile. He’s the cutest of the newer staff and I’ve named him Doogie in my head because he looks too young to be a doctor, even an animal doctor, which may (or may not, who really knows?) require fewer years in school. His khakis have pleats and I wonder if I should mention something about how outdated they look, but maybe he wears them in an attempt to look older.
“What brings you in today?”
Flabbergasted, I stare at him square in the eye. If he was reading a chart, or looking at notes from Lily’s patient file, that would be one thing. But he’s looking right at my dog with that grin. This is probably where his inexperience cuts against him.
“Are you serious?” It’s all I can stammer.
“How is Lily?” He pulls back her lips and stares at her teeth. What’s he getting at? I know they are old. I know they’re rotting. I know both her teeth and her gums are victims of my tight budget and neglect. But are they worse than what’s on her head? Is that really what he’s saying? What is the obsession in this place with teeth?!
“Well, for starters, she has an octopus on her head.”
The vet lets go of her jaw, looks at Lily’s head, and blanches.
“Oh.”
Yes, oh.
The vet crouches down to get a better view of the octopus.
“How long has that been there?”
“I first noticed him late last week.”
He grabs Lily by the snout and angles her head around to get a good look at it from all sides. “And an octopus, you’re calling it.”
“What would you call it?” I begin to scan the room to see if there is a framed veterinary degree of some kind on the wall that might inspire confidence. I remember Internet-stalking Doogie after our last visit because I thought he was handsome. I think he went to school in Pennsylvania, but now I’m not so sure. The pants, his cluelessness. Maybe he just purchased a degree from a fake school in Guam. I won’t be Internet-stalking him again.
Doogie doesn’t break his study of the octopus. He touches it, taps it, and then reaches for a few gauze squares and tries to squeeze it. “Octopus is as good a word as any.” His tone suggests that he’s trying to keep me calm.
“Careful,” I tell him. “You’re going to make him angry.”
He gets his hands fully around the octopus. “I’d say he’s already pretty angry.” Doogie stands up, steps on a lever to open the lid of a covered metal garbage can marked Medical Waste, and tosses the gauze away.
“Well, what are we going to do about it?”
“First, we need to know more. I’d like to take Lily into the back and see if I can’t get a needle into it and extract some fluid. Then we can run some tests to see what we’re dealing with.”
Lily looks up at me, annoyed as I am. This makes me lose my patience.
“We’re dealing with an octopus!” I’m red in the face and I can feel sweat forming on my back even though I don’t want to be this worked up. So help me god, if he wants to look at the octopus’s teeth.
“I know that. But the more we know about the octopus, the more we will know how to fight him.”