Vivian wants a dog, part three

Vivian had asked for a dog for her birthday, and Leta didn’t know how to tell her daughter that this was not possible. Vivian had never asked for anything like this. In fact, her requests had always been simple—a new doll, a game, a book. This time Leta was expecting her to request knitting needles and yarn, which would include the bonus of a couple of lessons from Leta’s Aunt Lydia. A dog posed problems, not so much because it needed to be cared for and loved which Vivian would do, and not because it would cost them to feed it which they could manage, but because Leta would not have a dog in the house or even at her house. A traumatic incident with three dogs that occurred when she was a child had forever sealed her heart against the animal.

So Leta had a dilemma. She knew that her husband would not object. He was rather fond of Vivian and often indulged his stepdaughter more than Leta liked. Telling Vivian’s father of the request meant little. He had recently re-married, so Vivian was feeling even less connected to him. In fact, she didn’t even want to spend any of the Christmas holiday with them this year.

Leta looked at her daughter, who had just finished measuring the flour for the cookies they were baking together.

“We’ll see,” Leta said, neither confirming nor rejecting her daughter’s request. “Now, add the flour.”

The next afternoon Leta broached the subject with her sister-in-law and best friend Florence. They had a standing weekly lunch to catch up, gossip and support each other. Florence accepted Leta’s dislike and fear of dogs, although she, her husband and two children had one.

“And you don’t think you can keep one even outside?” Florence asked, “like we keep Daisy?” While Leta felt no antagonism or fear about Florence’s sweet and well-behaved daschund, she simply could not bear to have more than a passing connection with her. She was also very grateful that they kept their dog outside in the back yard where she rarely ventured.

“Not at all, Flo,” Leta answered. “I don’t dislike Daisy, you know, but still, I simply can’t abide one in my own home. Yet it’s Vivian. She asks for so little. How can I tell her no?”

“And you’re sure she is not doing this to distress you?” Florence asked.

“Vivian?” Leta exclaimed.

“You’re right,” her sister-in-law sighed. “Well, you just have to tell her.”

“It’ll break her heart,” Leta noted.

“She’ll recover,” Florence said. “She’s like you that way.”

But Leta didn’t say anything. She just couldn’t. Instead, on December 29, she handed Vivian her birthday package of knitting needles and yarn. “I’ve made arrangements with my Aunt Lydia to teach you, just what you wanted,” Leta told her daughter.

“Thank you, Mother,” Vivian said, not registering one iota of disappointment, but the lessons never happened. Vivian never took up knitting, although she could embroider, crochet and sew.

And, furthermore, when she was a grown woman with her own husband and house, Vivian got her first dog, keeping one after another for the rest of her life.