Sitting on the grass in the middle of the park with his eyes closed, Declán turned his face up to the sky as the rain fell in sheets. It was heavy enough to quickly soak through his guard hair and saturate his undercoat. Sometimes you were just so wet, you couldn't get any wetter and this was one of those times. Rather than shaking himself off, he stayed put and enjoyed the downpour as it beat a tattoo on the ground.

Five minutes later and the worst of the storm had passed. Declán stretched his limbs slowly and stood, bracing himself as he violently shook the water from his fur.

The rain had abated to a light drizzle as made his way home. He'd just rounded the corner of his street when he saw the labrador. The great goofy creature came bounding over to play, obviously seeing a large wolf as a brand new friend. Declán sighed as he suffered through the usual canine greeting.

Once the chocolate lab had settled down enough to make any sort of sense, Declán managed to find out that it was lost. He explained that if the lab turned around and stuck his nose to the ground, he could follow his own scent trail home. The lab blinked in slow comprehension, apparently following his own trail never occurred to him. Selective breeding had a lot to answer for.

Not trusting the dog to have an attention span longer than a goldfish, Declán thought it best to hold his paw and get him safely home. With the dogcatcher due in the area soon, Declán may be able to smell it a mile away, but he doubted his new friend could smell beyond the end of his snout. The silly sod would be sitting in a cell down at Battersea before he knew what was happening.

Getting the labrador home involved a long and circuitous journey that eventually ended a block over from where they'd met. Declán glared at the lab, who complete missed the look declaring him a poor excuse for a canine and bounded up the stairs to bounce noisily off the door.

A woman opened the door and was nearly flattened by her very wet and ecstatically happy dog. "Buster! I was so worried about you." She hugged Buster, who had his paws on her shoulders and was licking her face enthusiastically.

As she went to close the door, she noticed the wolf sitting quietly outside on the footpath. "Who's your friend, Buster." She waved Declán over. "You'd better come in and dry off, big lad."

Cocking his head to one side, Declán looked at the woman. With her long strawberry blonde hair tied back in a neat ponytail, she was certainly a cutie and she loved her big dopey dog. Perhaps Buster was on a good wicket after all. He made his decision and trotted inside, to be immediately wrapped in a warm, fluffy towel hot from the dryer.

He rumbled in pleasure as the women rubbed the towel through his coat. It looked like there were benefits to being a big, dumb labrador. Declán made a note to introduce himself to this woman when he was walking about on two legs. Someone who gave backrubs this good was well worth getting to know better.


15minuteficlets — word #58: drenched
Part of the Meetings!verse and the Wolf&Declán!verse