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my dog in an unsettling baby voice. Brock lowers his head and whimpers. The receptionist smiles at me, and I avert my eyes. “I’m going to need you to fill this out.” She hands me a clipboard with a stack of documents. I retreat to the corner of the waiting room. My dog follows behind obediently, keeping the chirpy receptionist at a safe distance.
    “Here boy.” I give him a treat so he’ll stay still while I fill out the paperwork. He laps it up out of my hand and swallows it whole, much to the disgust of a pug-owning lady sitting across from me.
    “Ugh.” The little dog looks up at its master and licks the lady’s face. The little flicking tongue leaves wet marks on pasty skin.
    There is a man next to me with a colorful bird in a cage. On his other side, a woman carries her cat in a plush-lined bag with the name Chloe embroidered on the side. The cat sticks its tiny head out of the bag and studies the bird.
    “What kind of cat is that?” asks bird man.
    “It’s a Siamese,” she says in the matter-of-fact demeanor that cat people have. She doesn’t want anything to do with bird man, and her bluntness quiets him for a moment before he turns to me. I keep my head down and try to look busy so I don’t have to talk to him. He addresses the question to my dog.
    “And what kind of dog are you?”
    Bird man sticks out his hand for my dog to sniff, but Brock doesn’t fall for it. Instead, his attention is fully on the bird. He emits a low growl.
    “No, Brock,” I say and pull his leash tight, but the man keeps patting his lap and making kissing sounds, beckoning my dog. “He’s a mutt,” I say, trying to get the man to stop. “A mix of a lab and a … .”
    Bird man doesn’t pay attention to me. He’s moved from kissing sounds to whistling, which causes his bird to squawk. Brock perks his ears to the sound, and the cat in the plush bag sits high, ears tuned like antennas. The man, eyes black behind his glasses, reaches out to pet my hypnotized dog.
    As if awoken from a nightmare, Brock snaps at him. The man pulls back and Brock lunges for the cage, knocking it off the man’s lap. The Siamese jumps out of its bag and grasps the cage with its claws. The menagerie of dog, cat, and cage tumble to the hard tile; and the cat struggles to reach through the wires of the cage while fighting Brock for the treat inside. The bird bounces off the sides of its cage in a pitiful display of confusion.
    “ No! ” I pull Brock’s leash until his front paws lift off the ground.
    Bird man shrieks and descends upon the cat, which is still trying to claw at the fluttering creature. He grabs the cat by the scruff and winds up to throw it against the wall.
    “ What are you doing?” This time it’s cat lady who’s screaming. She stands up and hits bird man with the empty cat bag. “Let her go you sonofabitch!”
    I lead my dog back up to the receptionist, who alternates between thumbing her phone and watching the fight with indifference. “I think I’ll come back later.” She takes the forms back without looking at me, and we leave.

Believing in Ghosts
     
     
    Once Steve learns that Ally’s filming with us today, he goes home to change his shirt. He comes back smelling like cheap hair product. I look pretty good too, but give myself a once-over just in case: black sneakers, black T-shirt, and jeans with holes. My hair stands up in spikes from a lack of washing. I make Steve come with me into my room while I put a fresh tape in the camera. I’d rather not do it alone. I still handle the machine like a wild animal.
    “I don’t understand why you keep insisting that we use that old thing,” he says, removing his phone from his pocket. He taps on the screen a couple times and brings up the built-in camera. “Just as good of quality, and without the tapes.”
    “Get out of my face with that,” I say. “That’s pretty much like a homing device— anyone or anything can find or follow you. No thanks.” But