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"I guess he's ours for now." I take off running with him again, this time holding his leash.
"Ours?" She follows behind us and catches up.
"He wants to run with us. Let's run." An energetic dog has decided to join us on our run. I'm okay with that so I go with it.
Back at the parking lot, we catch our breath and drink some water. The dog drinks right out of my hand. "Good boy."
That's all I had planned for today, but I'm not ready to say goodbye to Mila yet.
"Want some ice cream?"
Her eyes light up as she's wiping the sweat from her neck. "Sure. Probably not healthy after a workout, but who cares?"
"Exactly. No rules."
"Let's go to Gina's Gelato down the block." She points down the road toward a small shopping center.
"Gelato? What's that?"
"It's like Italian ice cream."
"What? You only eat Italian ice cream?"
Her brow scrunches. It came out a lot more accusatory than I intended, and I might have been projecting some of my fears onto ice cream.
She sounds a little offended when she answers, "No. I'll eat any ice cream, but there happens to be a gelato shop right there and it tastes mostly the same, a little better if you askme. Creamier. But if you won't eat Italian ice cream, we can take the bikes out and find arealice cream shop."
Oh yeah. She did not like my jab about Italian ice cream. "Any ice cream is fine. Let's go." She puts on her shades again and pulls the ball cap down over her eyes.
We walk with the dog over to the shop. It's a cute place. Not as pretentious as the rest of the Hamptons. People are lounging around on the lawn and there's lots of dogs outside. The dog we picked up trots happily beside me like he's part of our team. We tie him to a small table outside.
Inside, she orders a red velvet waffle cone with double dark chocolate ice cream. She smiles at me when I order the same thing. "You copying me?"
"No, I happen to love red velvet and double dark chocolate too. That's exactly what I would've ordered."
"Hmm." She blinks and smiles as she takes her cone from the guy who runs the shop. "Thank you."
We sit down with our new dog at the table and eat our ice cream. "You're right. Gelato is better than ice cream," I admit.
"See? I told you." She's grinning again. Proud of herself. I'm glad I made her smile so much today. She looks down at our new furry companion. "What do we do with him?"
"Take him to the shelter?"
"No. They have so many dogs. We can't do that to him."
"You take him." I purposefully drop a dollop of my ice cream into the grass and he licks it up happily.
She frowns as she watches him lick. "I've always wanted a dog. I would love to take him. My dad would never allow it."
Ahh. Her dad. She brought it up so this is my chance to pry a little. "You're an adult. You can have a dog if you want."
She shakes her head no. "Trust me. No dogs." She looks down at him longingly.
"I'll adopt him then." I didn't really think it through, but if she wants a dog and I have one, we can hang out together and he can run on the beach with us. This date keeps getting better and better.
"You'd do that?"
"Yep. I was a stray myself once."
