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“I’m so excited!” Becca raced up the steps towards Zoe, her mum following behind. She flung her arms round her. “Please can we see all the dogs? And the cats? I know we don’t want a cat, but I’d like to see them anyway. And the guinea pigs!”

“I’ll show you everything,” Zoe promised, giggling. She hadn’t seen her friend so hyper since her birthday party. She took them all round the shelter, saving the dog pens until last.

“You’re so lucky, getting to help here all the time,” Becca told her, cooing at the guinea pigs. Then she looked excitedly up at her mum. “Please can you show us the dogs now, Zoe? Mum and Dad said we might be able to get one really soon. That’s what Dad’s doing today – mending our garden fence so that there aren’t any holes round the bottom of it, and it’s safe for a dog to be in the garden. He said if we found a dog from somewhere like here, the shelter would want to come and check that we’d look after it properly.”

Zoe nodded. “Yes, Auntie Jo and the other staff go and look around everyone’s houses. They wouldn’t let you have a cat from here if you lived on a really busy road. Or if you had small children. You’ll be all right,” she added. “You want a dog and it’s only really small children that are a problem – you know, too small to understand about not pulling tails.”

Becca nodded.

“Doesn’t your dad want to help choose a dog?” Zoe asked curiously.

Becca’s mum smiled. “This is just a first look – so we can think about what sort of dog we’d like. Becca’s dad will come and see them if we tell him there’s a dog we really like the look of. But he started worrying about the fence last night, and he was determined to get it done. He didn’t want us to miss out on a lovely dog because the house wasn’t ready.”

Zoe smiled. It sounded as though Becca and her mum and dad were really serious about getting a dog. They weren’t just deciding to adopt one without thinking it through, like some people did. “OK, look, well here are the dog pens. It can get a bit noisy!” she warned Becca, as several of the dogs started to bark excitedly when they realized they had visitors.

“Oh, look…” Becca whispered, glancing from side to side. “So many! Freddie… Luca – he’s gorgeous, Mum, look! He looks like a German Shepherd. Oooh! Trixie!” Becca crouched down by the little spaniel’s pen. “She’s so pretty…”

She glanced up worriedly at Zoe. “How do people ever choose? She’s looking at me, like she really wants us to take her home, and I haven’t even gone halfway along the pens yet!”

“It is hard,” Zoe admitted. “If you think you really like any of the dogs, tell me, and I’ll ask Auntie Jo if you can go into the pen and meet them.”

“If I did that I’d never be able to say no,” Becca’s mum muttered. “What if we cuddled a dog and then said we didn’t want him? It would be heartbreaking!”

Zoe wrinkled her nose. She supposed she was more used to the shelter than most people. “I know it’s sad. But Auntie Jo and the others do find homes for all the dogs in the end. It does take a while for some of them, though.” She led Becca and her mum along the row of pens. “And these…” she stopped by a pen, “are the puppies we found abandoned.” She laughed as all three of them raced towards the wire of the pen. “The one with the darker brown patches is Choc and that one’s Biscuit…” She pointed to the puppy with the brown eyepatch. “And this one, with the pale brown patches,” she paused, “is Cookie.”

“Oh, wow…” Becca murmured. “They’re all so beautiful!”

“They are lovely,” her mum agreed. “They look very little, Zoe. Are they old enough to be rehomed?”

“Not for about another week,” Zoe explained. “But then it will be fine, although they still can’t go outside for a while after that. All the dogs in here have been vaccinated, but puppies have to have a last lot of vaccinations when they’re about twelve weeks old. Then they can go for walks. They’d be OK in the garden though,” she added.

“You know loads about dogs,” Becca said admiringly. “Please can we meet them properly? Mum, do you want to?”

Her mum nodded, smiling. “Definitely.”

Zoe swallowed hard, and opened the catch on the pen. It was a good thing that Becca and her mum liked the puppies. But it was one step closer to them leaving the shelter, and Zoe.

Cookie scrabbled excitedly at the wire. Zoe had been playing with them that morning, and then she’d disappeared. Now she was back!

But there were other people too. Another girl, like Zoe, and someone else. Cookie had never seen them before. She stopped wagging her tail quite so hard, and backed up a bit as Zoe opened the door. She wasn’t used to different people.

Zoe let Becca and her mum in, and Biscuit and Choc sniffed cautiously at them. Becca picked up the last bit of the rope toy, and whisked it along the ground, right in front of Choc, who quickly pounced on it, pretending to growl.

“He’s so funny!” Becca giggled.

“I think he’s the friendliest of the pups,” Zoe told her. She looked round for Cookie, who was almost hiding behind her, watching Becca and her mum with big, anxious eyes. “It’s all right, Cookie,” she whispered.

Cookie pressed herself against Zoe’s side, and sniffed cautiously at Becca’s mum’s fingers when she held them out. The new people smelled nice, but she didn’t know them like she knew Zoe. She didn’t mind if this lady stroked her though.

“She’s very sweet,” Becca’s mum said. “Is this the one you bottle-fed, Zoe? You can see that she adores you.”

Zoe smiled sadly. She loved it that Cookie acted like her dog, even though she wasn’t. She sighed. Cookie was going to have to learn to love somebody else. Gently, she lifted Cookie up, and put her on Becca’s mum’s lap.

Cookie froze, and sat motionless, her shoulders all hunched up under her ears. She looked round at Zoe worriedly, but she didn’t wriggle off. It was all right. Zoe was still there, very close. The lady stroked her ears, which was nice. She relaxed a little, and licked her hand.

“She’s a tiny bit shy, but she’s very loving,” Zoe said, trying not to mind someone else cuddling Cookie. She took a deep breath. “She’d be a brilliant pet. Any of them would.”

Cookie watched sadly, her ears flattening back, as they all got up. They were going, she could tell. She missed Zoe so much now that she didn’t stay all day the way she used to. Zoe had been here for longer today, but Cookie still hadn’t had her tea. Cookie liked it when Zoe brought her food, and sat with her while she ate. She always ate more when Zoe was there, because Zoe liked to see her eat, and she would tell her what a good dog she was, eating so nicely.

As Zoe was shutting the front of the pen, Cookie raced after her, scrabbling her claws against the wire netting and whining sadly.

“It’s OK,” Zoe whispered to her. “I’ll be back tomorrow. I promise.”

Cookie didn’t know what that meant, but she understood Zoe’s comforting voice. She stopped whining, and just stood up against the wire, staring after the girls as they walked down the passageway between the pens. She watched until the doors swung shut, and she couldn’t see Zoe any more. Then she dropped down, and sadly padded over to their basket, her claws clicking against the worn lino on the floor.