Free Solace by Sierra Riley

glass door. The grass was brown in clumps, and thinned and gone in others, revealing sand beneath. It was overgrown by a few inches, despite the existence of a push mower in the garage. That, at least, he knew how to use. He just needed to get his shit together long enough to do it.
    But then, a dark, cynical voice reminded him: Why even bother if Becca’s never going to be able to stay here?
    He pushed that voice aside and listened to Aaron’s instead. He didn’t hear a lecture like he expected. Instead, Aaron just launched right into the training session.
    Aaron taught him basic commands. Ones he already understood, like sit—which Buttercup knew, but sometimes chose to ignore—stay, come, and heel. There was “wait,” too, which to Shane just seemed like a variation of “stay,” but Aaron treated as something really important, so he didn’t question it. He wasn’t the dog trainer, after all.
    After a couple of hours—longer than Shane would have thought—Aaron seemed to realize the time. Or rather, the sun started to sink beneath the horizon, forcing Aaron to notice it. He flushed, then looked at Shane. He’d learned to appreciate the look of a flush in a man’s skin, but not like this. A flush of heat, of passion, yes. But embarrassment? He never thought he’d enjoy seeing that so much, and yet he found himself wanting to invent ways to make it come about more.
    Apparently he just needed to control the rise and fall of the sun and he’d be in business.
    “Sorry, I was supposed to keep this to an hour. You probably have other things you need to be doing.”
    Shane arched a brow at that. Funny. He’d thought the same thing of Aaron.
    “You are really cutting into my TV time.”
    Aaron shrunk a little at that and mouthed another apology.
    “I was just being a dick, man. I appreciate you spending extra time on me. I’ll probably need it.”
    “Oh.” A hint of a smile before it scampered away. “Sure. Of course.”
    “How long do you figure this all will take? A few months?”
    A few months of not seeing Becca through anything more than Skype—if Shell would even allow that—might just kill him. But he didn’t have much of a choice. If it took a few months, it took a few months.
    “Usually it’s two years, actually. Obedience training on its own takes a few months, and more repetition beyond that.”
    Two years. If he didn’t have a few months, he definitely didn’t have two years. In two years, Becca would be nine years old. Almost into double digits. She’d be in, what? Fourth or fifth grade? About to go to fucking junior high. From there, it would be a short jump to preteen, then teen. By then she’d want nothing to do with him.
    And maybe— maybe —they’d reconnect fifteen or twenty years later, when she was an adult.
    Some part of his mind told him that line of thinking was the doomsday scenario, and not reality. But he’d been trained to think about the worst thing that could happen; to plan for it so he wouldn’t be caught with his thumb up his ass.
    Back then, it had been so he didn’t get a bullet lodged in brain. This fate, though… this inevitability was far more painful.
    “It won’t take that long. Not if we’re working on it as often as we are, one-on-one. I can probably cut that down to a year, and I’ll help you train Buttercup in skills that will assist you as we go.”
    Aaron must have noticed something was wrong, which meant Shane’s face was being a lot less impassive than he wanted. The trainer’s voice was apologetic, his words coming out a bit fast, as if he’d scrambled to say them.
    Shane didn’t want to look the way he felt inside. He didn’t want Aaron to see his panic. He couldn’t afford to let anyone see it. That, too, was something he’d been taught.
    So he found a way to bolt that mask in place, giving Aaron his most charming—and mischievous—smile.
    “Guess that means we’ll be spending a lot of time together, then. Should I fix you up a