All Creatures - 1. Chapter 1

I can do this. Only two more weeks of this hell and then it's over. I’m done and moving on. I can do this.

The same mantra that I had been chanting to myself for the past four years ran through my head while I cowered in the one remaining stall with an intact door in the men's restroom.

“Mike? Are you in here?” I hear my only friend Ally, calling from the door.

God damn it! Not the best place to hide apparently.

“Yeah, Alls, give me a minute.”

“You've been missing for thirty minutes. I think your client is about to have a fit in the lobby. Do you want me to finish the discharge papers for you?”

I sigh as I let my head fall back onto the pea-green metal wall of the stall. Ally has had my back since we started college eight years ago, with our bright naive thoughts and great expectations of life as veterinarians. Saving horses, cuddling puppies, swimming with dolphins. You don’t think about things like compassion fatigue when you’re eighteen.

I exit the stall to see Ally sitting on the counter by the sink. “No it’s ok. I’ll finish it, I know you have just as much work to do as the rest of us. What the hell are you doing in here anyway? Don’t y’all have your own bathroom?”

“What? And miss the only time I get to see you? No thank you! I blocked the door with an out of order sign ten minutes ago by the way. You're welcome!”

I look at myself in the mirror. My short brown hair luckily, can’t do much in the way of looking unprofessional. I have it styled in short spikes in the front of my head. But my brown eyes are red-rimmed and slightly puffy along the bottom lid.

Crap.

I let out a groan as I consider the volley of smart ass remarks that I will receive from Dr. Skivera, the resident over my cases this week. After throwing some cold water on my face, I give Ally a quick peck on the cheek and head back out to the clinic.

I sneak over to the fishbowl to quickly finish discharging my client. It is a small room, originally set up to receive records when the hospital had all their client information in paper files. Now it contains an ancient computer and a few rickety office chairs. One wall has a huge window about chest high that reaches up to the ceiling that earned it the nickname ‘the fish bowl’. Because of its size, and out of the way location, no one but me ever uses this room, making it a perfect location to hide from everyone while I worked. Usually I can work in here for hours without seeing anyone else.

As I sit down in the wobbly chair in front of the computer, I heave a sigh of relief at the thought of a few snatched minutes of peace. As I log into the database, I hear a voice I have come to loathe over the past year.

“Mike! What the fuck do you think you are doing?”

I turn around and face Dr. Skivera. I wish I was standing up, at least then I would have the advantage of size over this small Russian woman.

“Ma’am?”

“Why the fuck are you hiding in here? Have you even started the discharge papers for Red? I have never met a more incompetent student in my life! I can’t believe they are letting you graduate. If they listened to me, you would be kicked out of this program so fast, you wouldn’t even have time to cry in the bathroom. Now go fucking print off the lab results for Mr. Biggles, get Red out of here, and come up with a treatment plan for Duke. I want to see you in the rounds room in ten minutes.”

Two more weeks. Two more fucking weeks.

-----

I sink into my bed with a whimper at 1:30am. I need to get up in three and a half hours to get back to school in time to take care of all my patients that are staying in the hospital overnight and be ready for rounds to start at eight. My social life has never been one to inspire jealousy in my fellow students. Going to the same land grant college in the middle of the Bible belt, for undergrad and professional school, doesn’t really offer a huge gay night life. Before clinics, Ally and I would hit the bars every now and then. She would pick out a stranger for the night and I would watch the underage freshmen learn and exceed their capacity for alcohol with jager bombs and other lethal combinations of liquors. I’m not sure why watching ripped pledges puke on the dance floor was entertainment for me, but it never got old. Ally and I have barely seen each other in the past year, much less gone out for a little stress relief. My only entertainment lately has been a quick jerk-off before crashing. I reached down to fondle my flaccid penis. Fuck it, I was too tired tonight to even contemplate that. I rolled on my side and slipped into oblivion.

-----

I set my phone to play one of my favorite Nobuo Uematsu pieces as my alarm. I thought it would be a nice way to wake up and a hell of a lot less annoying than the typical whine of the digital alarm I had since high school. I fucking hated that song now. I slammed my hand on my phone with a grunt and rolled over on my back. Why did I think I wanted to be a vet again? I contemplated the minimum injury I would need to inflict on myself to have a legitimate reason not to go in today.

Stump my toe? Not enough. Cut off a finger shaving? Surely too far. Maybe I can go out to the large animal isolation barn this afternoon and see about contracting a little swine flu, maybe Salmonella?

I pull myself out of bed for a quick shower before I head out.

-----

I pick up the folder for my last case of the day. Bob, three year old, male, neutered Labrador mix with diarrhea.

Who names their dog Bob?

I say a quick prayer in my head that Bob ate last night’s left overs or has worms. Something quick and easy to diagnose and treat. I pray Bob’s owner isn’t some cute wobbly old man who just lost his wife, and by the way, Bob is dying of some horrific disease. I open the lobby door.

“Bob?”

A huge gentleman with a beer belly and food stains on his white dress shirt tugs on the leash of a lean brown pup. The dog rolls his eyes up to the gentleman and huffs as he rises before trotting over to give me a lick on my hand.

“Mr. Davey? I’m Mike, I’m going to be your senior student assigned to Bob’s case today, if you’d like to follow me?”

As I turn around the gentleman stops me.

“I ain’t Mr. Davey.”

I look back at the chart in my hand. Owner: William Davey

“Excuse me?”

“I said, I ain’t Mr. Davey. I’m Adams, Mr. Davey will be back to pick up Bob tonight. I just work for ‘im during the day. I found Bob here rollin’ in a pile of shit in the den and just want to drop the mutt off.”

“Alrighty, well Mr. Adams, if you can come this way and answer a few question, talk to the doctor in charge, provide a contact number, and we can have you on your way.”

“It’s just Adams.” The man grunted.

“Adams, right. This way please.”

We got Bob checked in and Mr. Adams, excuse me, Adams, off without any trouble. It looked like for once things were going my way. After some blood work and fecal tests, it seems as though Bob had probably got into the trash or got some food slipped to him under the table. Five o’clock rolls around and I am done with everything, just waiting on Bob’s owner to come and take him home. Dr. Skivera strolled by the rounds room where I am sitting and chatting with Ally.

“You didn’t fuck anything up today, Mike. Congratulations.” She continued on out the door to the parking lot.

Fucking bitch.

“God, what a witch. What is her deal with you? You do just as well as the rest of us on this rotation.”

“I had my first rotation with her when we started our clinical year. I truly did fuck up and forgot to submit a blood sample in the craziness of the first day. She decided after that I was useless.”

“Well, sweetheart, we'll be out of here soon! I still have three clients waiting on results to be discharged so I'm going to get busy!”

As Ally, left the room I cracked open a medical book to review while I waited.

Eight o'clock rolls around and the front desk finally pages me to meet Bob’s owner. I grab the chart with a sigh.

Three fucking hours I have been waiting for this guy. Three hours on the one day I may have gotten out at a decent time. But no, Mr. Davey apparently had more important things to do than pick up his fucking dog. I should have checked Bob into the hospital hours ago, fuck this guy.

I walk around the corner and stop in my tracks. Oh my.

“Mr. Davey?”

The tall man at the front desk turns toward me.

Holy fuck! Never mind, this was totally worth the wait.

He has his hands stuck in the pockets of dark chinos with a crisp crease down the front. His skin is a pale alabaster. Looks like a vet student, no time for the sun, I quip in my head. A pale blue polo covers the wide expanse of his chest and matches his eyes.

God damn! Those eyes! What I wouldn’t do to wake up next to those every morning.

His hair is cut military short, not my usual preference, but with a body like that, who the fuck cares about hair?

“I go by Bill.” He extends his right hand to me.

“You can come in this room…um… wait in this room and I’ll go get Bob. Um, yeah, Bob.” I shake his hand weakly while I feel my face, ears and chest heat through ten different shades of red.

Fuck, I haven’t been this tripped up over a crush since high school. Snap out of it.

Bill gives me a slow smile and follows me to a private exam room.

Holy fuck! That smile is even better than the eyes. Kill me now and I’ll die a happy man.

I feel my breath catching in my throat as my chest tightens and my stomach begins to dance the east coast swing in my abdomen. The thought of the beautiful man two feet behind me is causing an unfortunate reaction in my briefs. I attempt to turn away and adjust my growing problem into a less noticeable position as I open the door to the exam room. The smirk on Bill's face leaves me with the impression I was not as sneaky as I hoped.

Smooth, Mike. Way to act like a professional, popping wood on a guy picking up his sick dog.

I roll my eyes at myself but still grab Ally on the way to get Bob.

“Hey Alls, run by exam room nine. You'll thank me later!”

When I get back to the exam room with Bob, I see a crowd of five girls from my class who haven’t made it home yet, ogling my client from afar. As I close the door to the exam room behind Bob and me, I hear a sigh from the crowd.

Bob goes berserk when he sees his owner. He runs in tight circles and jumps onto the pristine pants leaving wet circles from his paws. I stumble a bit through our test results before I settle into my professional manner and finish explaining the diagnosis and treatment plan for Bob.

As I escort the pair out of the hospital with a wave, I feel better than I have in a year. That was a nice pick-me-up to get me through the week!

-----

I settle into bed at a reasonable time for the first time in a month. I have been half erect since meeting Bob’s owner and now I allow myself to drift into fantasies featuring deep blue eyes and a strong muscled chest. As I pull on my hard cock I imagine his hands gently tugging my short hair while massaging my scalp. I can almost feel the scrape of teeth and salve of wet tongue tweaking my nipples while they harden into sensitive nubs. I allow one finger of my free hand to tease my left nipple, causing that entire side of my chest to contract as it throbs with sensation and sends a spark of electricity straight to my cock. In my mind, Bill continues to caress his way down my body, my arms and stomach are covered in goose bumps and my abdominal muscles begin to quake as his hand reaches between my thighs to firmly grab the muscles of my ass. My breath begins to quicken and my heart rate accelerates as I imagine one of his pale warm hands wrapped around my cock in a firm grip, rubbing my copious precum up and down the shaft while the other hand slides into the crevice of my cheeks to circle my anus. Without any warning, I feel all my muscles tighten and a loud groan escapes my mouth as cum flies out of my cock to coat my chest and neck in a warm splash. My heels dig into the sheets, pushing my hips up into the air as my body contracts and relaxes in cycles, leaving me covered in a week’s worth of slowly cooling semen. With one final sigh, my legs flop back down on the bed and every tense muscle in my body gives way to deep relaxation.

Damn, I haven’t had that kind of hair trigger in years. I didn’t even have time to pull out any toys. I think I have a new favorite fantasy!