I don't have a problem with more than one chapter being posted. I will be adding the rest of this story to TheArchive as soon as I have it ready to add.

It may take me a day or two to combine all the chapters and sort it into the appropriate categories, but it will be there soon.

It would be nice if some of the other people here would write a short story to show what their ideas are on the subject of being locked-in or how the epidemic would impact a character or group of characters.

This is the conclusion of Adventures in Pandemicland, Scene 4.

The rest of The Ride-Share Driver - The Epidemic will be in the stories section as I write it.


The Ride-Share Driver - The Epidemic - Chapter 10

Rachel

I like what Candie has done with her pictures. My favorite pictures are the ones where she is revealing her braces and does a striptease. As she moves from in front of the cameras, I give my butt a wiggle before getting up from James’s lap and trade places with Candie.

There are little paw prints on the floor that show where to stand and I place my feet on them. My idea of what kind of pictures I want is a bit different from what Candie did. When 'Kitten' lets me know that she is ready, I try to keep my lips closed over my braces as I remove my mask. Just like Candie did, I want to make my pictures more about the reveal and seduction of my braces. With her having the face-bow, her reveal was more apparent from the start. I intend to make mine more about the surprise of the sudden unveiling. There is no slow removal of my mask, I just reach up and remove it.

Now is when the fun starts. James is watching me closely as the mask drops, and I have a pleasant, neutral type of smile that begins to become more seductive as the corners of my mouth turn up and I begin to part my lips slowly. The brackets on my upper front teeth rub against my lips as I raise them, revealing the band's that appear to be wrapped around them. My smile gets wider, displaying more of the sparkling metal on my upper jaw, before I part my lips more, exposing the bands on the bottom as well.

The next part is a little more difficult to achieve. I watch closely in the monitor as I part my teeth, trying to get just the right angle so that the light shines into my mouth and glints off the band's on the inside of my jaw. When the angle is just right, I run my tongue along the inside of my upper jaw and over the metal bands. Even though I don't think that the pictures will be useful as a mask, it is still exciting to do it in front of everyone. I finish off by running my tongue over the outside of my teeth, similar to what Candie did.

"Okay, Kitten, let's see what we have." Me calling her Kitten gets a chuckle from everyone. The screen fills with the sequence of pictures and I know right away which one I want. There are several pictures during the transition from when all the bands are showing on my teeth to when I finished opening my mouth that I really like. The two that I like best have the brackets and bands showing while still being partially covered by my lips. I point to those two and say, "Let me see these two. I like how they look."

Kitten puts them up side by side and then gasps. "They are spectacular. They seem to capture the beauty of the old-style braces wonderfully. Either one would make an amazing mask. Will you let me choose which one to use when I print your mask for you?"

I smile at her, letting her see my metal-clad smile again and nod.

James

I know that it is my turn next and that I can't match the dazzling display that the two girls have put on, so I decide that I am going to try for silly instead. When I take my place on the paw prints, the mask is already in my pocket. The way that Rachel revealed her braces was very appealing, so I try for a similar look, only doing it in a less sensual way. Rather than look at the people watching me,  I focus on the monitor and try to make silly faces. The first one is with my tongue sticking out of my mouth, just a hint of the braces showing. The next one is with my tongue hanging out the side of my mouth. Much more of my braces are showing, as well as the pistons of my Herbst. My smile gets bigger when I see how that looks and even more of my teeth are exposed.

By now, the girls are all laughing and that starts me going as well. This works well for the cameras as I try and get a goofy look for the final group of pictures and fail. I finally give up and tell Kitten I am done.

Once again, Kitten puts the pictures on the monitor and we all look at what has been captured. The pictures of me sticking out my tongue are good, but the group with my tongue hanging out the side of my mouth are better. There are a couple that have most of the Herbst visible and I get Kitten to put those up. One shows both of the Herbst pistons clearly, including the molar bracket at the top and the attachment point at the bottom. That is the one that I select for my mask.

While Rachel and I have already made our choices for our masks, Candie still hasn't. Kitten puts her pictures back on the screen and we all look at them. I like the group of her running her tongue over the outside of her face-bow, Rachel likes when she was running her tongue over the brackets behind the face-bow. Kitten says that she likes the poses where Candie has her hands beside her face and the braces are just coming into view. After looking at the pictures that everyone else likes, she points to one that has her face-bow in full view and most of her brackets showing, along with the lower ends of her Herbst pistons. With so many good pictures to choose from, it is not surprising that we all like different looks.

The next part of the process is both hard and easy. We need to pick out the color of our masks. We all decide that we want colors that match our normal facial skin tone. Mine is easy to match because it doesn't change shade. The girls have a harder time, because they don't always use the same shade of makeup every time. They finally settle on shades that match their current look at the suggestion of Kitten, that way they can adjust their makeup to the mask if they want to.

When the subject of payment comes up, Kitten tells us that all the merchants only take cash so that there is no record of the transaction and nobody has to deal with paying sales tax. If we need to pay with credit, there is one person who is set up as a mobile bank and will get us the cash. Rachel and I didn't bring enough cash with us and Candie needs to pick up some to pay for her earrings. This works out well for us, because it will take a while for Kitten to print our masks. This will give us more time to look around at all the other stuff for sale.

We take our time wandering around the complex, checking out the various stalls, not really planning on buying anything else. We locate the mobile bank in an old armoured car that has been retrofitted to serve as an ATM, right down to the machine. There are a couple of armed guards sitting nearby, and I can't tell if they are wearing costumes or the real thing. The guns do look real.

Candice

It is so cool wandering around and looking at all the neat stuff for sale. It is even more fun seeing what all the people are wearing and trying to guess if some of the uniforms are real. The security guard at the gate is probably real, my limo driver is real, unless he has a limo so that he can play dress-up. The uniform of the girl with him is hard to tell. It looks real to the casual observer, but it fits her just a bit too nicely, as if it has been tailored to fit. The security guards might be real, but with them, it's hard to tell. I'm pretty sure their guns are real and that they know how to use them. It is legal to openly carry a gun here. Many of the other uniforms are obviously fakes, even if they are very well made.

After stopping to get the cash, we walk back to the bus with the jewellery. She takes us inside and pulls out the lined box again. After wiping the earrings, she hands me the set I had her make for me. I remove the pair that I am wearing and replace them with the new studs. There is a mirror mounted on the wall and I take a look at myself, liking how the ligatures bring attention to my ears and the brackets.

As she is wiping the second set, I check out the reaction of the girl as she watches. Her eyes are glued to them, and as the lady holds them out, I turn to her and say, “Would you like to try them on?”

I can tell that she has a huge smile on her face, even with her plain mask on, her eyes have a shine to them and the mask can’t hide the lines that show how big her smile is. She takes them one at a time and slips them into place. The design is very clever, using the bracket as a stud that goes through her ear to attach at the back and hold the earring in place securely. The tube for the face-bow is mounted on the band and keeps the bracket and wire from turning. They are just slightly larger than a real molar band would be, yet all in perfect proportion. She has tears in the corners of her eyes as she looks in the mirror.

“Why don’t you wear them until we go and pick up our masks. That way they won’t get lost and I can see how good they look.” Turning to the lady behind the counter, I say, “I’ll take both sets. Don’t worry about packaging them up, we’ll be wearing them.” She hands us each a small box to put our other earrings in, then thanks us for shopping with her after I pay her.

It’s getting late for me and I am a bit tired after doing a shift at work, so I suggest that we head over to pick up our masks even though they probably won’t be ready quite yet. The girl has a bounce in her step that wasn’t there before and I suspect that it is because of the earrings. They fit snugly, and with the bottom of her earlobes sticking out the bottom, it looks as if she has molar bands on her earlobes. They do look good on her.

Kitten is putting her display table into the storage area underneath the bus when we arrive. When she turns to us, I see that she has changed her mask and each part of it looks familiar, yet none of it is completely recognizable. I see my face-bow, Rachel's bands and James’s tongue and Herbst pistons. The rest of her mask is still the kitten, just with the rest added to the kitten’s teeth. Even the bands look as if they fit on the teeth.

“I had a bit of time to wait while I was printing all of the masks, so I played around a little. I hope that you don’t mind, but I liked so many of your pictures that I had to make something for myself as well.”

Kitten reaches around the door of the bus, picks up three bags, each one labelled for us. Mine says ‘sexy’, the next one says ‘stud’, the last one ‘wild’. When I open mine, there are four masks inside, the three that we ordered and one of the masks with the window in it.

“I included that one so that you can all let the rest of the world see your real smiles whenever you want. I also included a disk with a copy of each of your pictures. You should have a copy for yourselves. There is one last request I have. Would you mind if I used some of your pictures to make some masks for me to sell? I could trade you some more custom masks of your choosing if I sell some.”

The idea of getting more custom masks appeals to me, so I turn to the limo driver and his assistant and wait for their response to Kitten’s offer. While I have been focused on Kitten, she has moved in front of him and they have been looking at the masks in their bags. She has exchanged her plain mask for the one that Kitten made for her. When I first glance at her, it almost looks as if she isn’t wearing any mask at all, that is how well Kitten has matched her face.

Rachel

When Kitten reaches out to hand us our bags, I step in front of James and take both. His arms come around me and take them from my hands and opens mine. There is just enough difference in our heights, even in my heels, that his arms end up just below my breasts and he tightens his arms slightly, causing my breasts to elevate slightly. I know that he is getting back at me for sitting in his lap earlier but that doesn’t mean that I can’t enjoy what he is doing now.

I push back against him slightly and take out the top mask. It is the one that has my lips partially covering my braces. It only takes me a moment to remove the plain mask that I am wearing and replace it with the new one. As I am looping the elastics over my ears, I play with the earrings that Candie has let me wear for the time being. There is something about how my earlobes are sticking out below the band of the earring that is intriguing, as well as how the bracket and headgear tube feel against my fingers.

I feel his breath against my cheek and neck and know that he is watching me play with my ear. Just to tease him a little, I tilt my head slightly and look down at the bags in his hands. My free hand reaches into his bag and rummages around until I find the mask with Candie’s face-bow printed on it. Trying not to let him see which one I have, I remove it from his bag and turn in his arms so that I am facing him.

He has to loosen his arms to let me turn, and before he can tighten them again, I reach up and take off his mask, replacing it with the one with Candie’s face-bow-enhanced face on it. I haven’t been paying attention to the conversation going on around me, but when I hear ‘free masks’, I turn around again to find out what I missed.

Kitten and Candie are looking at me as if they are waiting for me to answer a question.

James waits a couple of seconds before answering the question. “I think that I can speak for both of us when I say that we are willing to participate, but with one condition, the masks that we have printed for our use are not to be sold to anyone else.”

Then he whispers in my ear, “Kitten wants to know if we would be willing to let her use some of our pictures on the masks that she sells in exchange for free masks.” His lips are so close to my ear that they are brushing against the earring on my earlobe. The sensation of feeling them brush above and below the band causes me to shiver slightly in his arms. His answer seems to satisfy them and I don’t have to say anything. The thought of having my mouth portrayed anonymously on other people’s faces and being able to get free masks in exchange is an appealing idea

Candice

The driver’s assistant changes his mask so fast that I don’t see which mask she puts on him. With the two of them being willing to accept the deal, I turn back to Kitten. “How do you want to keep in contact with us?”

“I have a website that I use to sell my products on. It has an email address that customers use to ask questions. You can use that one for now. If things turn out the way that I hope, we can work out a better way to maintain contact. Come inside with me and I will get you some cards that you can hand out if anyone asks where you got the masks.”

My two escorts are still distracting each other, so I follow Kitten back into the bus. After putting business cards in three bags, Kitten takes one last card and turns it over to the blank back. "I'm going to give you my personal number. I hope that you will keep it to yourself and consider giving me a call sometime. Maybe you would be willing to do another photo session with me and let me see more of your fascinating smile."

I don’t know what to say. While I am thinking about how to politely decline and explain that I am not into girls, I take a closer look at Kitten and realise that Kitten is a male. The well-done makeup, the petite build and the clothes that Kitten is wearing all made me think that I was talking to a girl. Even the way that Kitten had been talking and the soft voice gave that impression. I take a better look at Kitten, this time as a male and realise that I would be okay talking to Kitten again, on a more personal level.

It isn’t often that I find people that are interested in my braces the way that Kitten is and today I found three people. It’s obvious that the first two have each other. I tell Kitten that I will think about the offer and get in touch with a more definite answer sometime, not saying ‘No’, and giving the impression that I might be interested without saying ‘Yes’.

I notice that the driver and his assistant are waiting for me. I finally see which masks they are wearing and am a bit disappointed that he has my mask on. I don’t want to wear the same mask as him and she is wearing the one with her face on it already. Kitten sees that I am a bit upset with which mask is left for me to wear and takes my hand.

“I hope that you don’t mind, but I printed off one more mask from your photo session. I was going to wait until you left and then wear it myself, but I think that you need it more than I do.” Kitten brings out a mask from below the counter, it is one with my tongue running over my teeth behind the face-bow, and hands it to me. “It is different enough from the other mask that most people won’t even notice that it is the same mouth. Besides, they won’t be looking at his mask when they see how alluring you look with this one.”

It's been a long day and I have been fighting the urge to yawn for a while already. As I reach up to take off my mask and change it for the one that Kitten has for me, the urge to yawn is too great and my mouth opens wide. I reach above my head as I am yawning and stretch. Kitten’s eyes drop to my chest briefly and quickly return to my mouth.

I'm intrigued that he finds my mouth more interesting than my chest. Just to test Kitten's reaction, I close my mouth partially, hiding my brackets, and move my arms back, stretching my blouse tighter over my respectable breasts. Kitten's eyes don't leave my mouth. This is someone that I might want to get to know much better.

I slip the mask into place as I am leaving the bus. "If you two are ready to leave, I am too."

They lead the way back to the limo. She keeps playing with the earrings as we are walking and I can tell that she likes how they look, because, every time that we pass a reflective surface, she looks at them.

The driver opens the door for me when we arrive at the limo and steps back, allowing space for social distancing. It is interesting how the epidemic has changed how people interact with each other now.

I have to fight to stay awake on the drive to my place, so to pass the time, I use the intercom to talk to them. They explain to me that I am the first person that they have picked up using the RideShare app, and that they did mainly because of me having braces.

She has the webcam angled mainly towards her, although I can still see a bit of his face from time to time. The earrings do look good on her ears and look as if they were made just for her. Just before we arrive at my place, I decide that I have an offer that can benefit all three of us.

"Would you be willing to make an off-the-books deal? If I let you keep the earrings, would you be willing to provide me with another trip or two at no cost, as long as I keep the trip short?"

She looks at him and says, "That is an offer that we can't refuse." The smile on her face is so big that I can see all of the jewelry on her teeth, including the bands on the inside of her teeth and the tubes on her molars at the back of her mouth. His smile is just as big and I get a good look at the pistons of his Herbst.

He pulls into the driveway at my place and opens the door for me, letting me out and waits until I am inside before getting back into the limo and driving away. This has been a very good day and I have met three people who I hope to get to know better.

Nice job!

Seeing Her Through The Eyes of a Dog.  Chapter 2.  Becoming the Dog

Obviously I was very excited about the adoption, as was Teresa, and I decided to go with Charlene's advice and not do anything about it until I had written my last exam.  Temporarily becoming the dog would have been good practice, except if there were complications switching back, I might find I could not go to write an exam if I was stuck in the body of the dog.  Sometimes these meditations took several attempts to work and were exhausting, requiring periods of rest before additional attempts.  To make the wait even harder, I was not able to run into Teresa at all during exam week.

Following my last exam, I explained to my roommate that I was going to attempt the mind swap with the dog.  He had finished his last exam the previous day and was just going to sit in his room, reading a book.  I settled in my room with the dog and began to meditate.  I came to, several hours later and when I opened my eyes, I was looking at fluffy paws.  I had to wake the dog, I mean the human.  It looked at itself and seemed happy with the result, not having any idea what was going on.  He was going to roll over and continue sleeping but I jumped onto the floor and tried to get him going.  I pushed my nose into his waste, licked his hand and finally he got up.  We were not sure what the result would be.  Would I try to walk around on my hind legs and he crawl on hands and knees?  Would he continually want to lick everyone while I would only offer a paw to shake?  I took his hand in my mouth, gently, and attempted to lead him into my roommate's room.  I think it mostly worked because the dog wanted to see my roommate, as this was his primary caregiver.

To explain the interaction that then ensued, I need to refer to each of the bodies by their new names.  I was now Ralph, the dog, but my old body would answer to that name, so it was to be used for him.  Rudy, my roommate quickly addressed his roommate by the name he usually used for him, which was Darin.  When he did this, I perked up my eyes and the human beside me did not react.  Rudy then said, "Ralph, come!"  My old body excitedly pranced over to Rudy and did a Hindi squat at Rudy's feet.  He then grabbed a dog cookie and gave it to my old body and petted its head.  I continued to stand at his door and looked at him.

Rudy said to me, "Darin, so did it work?"  I had no idea how to answer, so I gave a little bark and jumped my front feet off the floor once.  He said, "Yeah, just as we suspected, you can understand but not talk."  By this time my body had stood back up and was looking at Rudy for what would come next.  Rudy looked at him and said, "Ralph, speak!"  He blinked his eyes, opened his mouth and sighed.  Rudy said, "Well, at least I don't have a barking human to take for walks twice a day.  Okay, so Darin, do you want your dinner now?  How about a walk."

I led Rudy and Ralph to the bathroom.  I was able to lift the toilet seat up with my nose and then stood beside the toilet an lifted my back leg.  This worked mostly because of my height and everything went into the toilet.  I then went to the kitchen, again with both following me, and got my dog dish in my mouth and handed it to Rudy.  Ralph was following and looking interested in everything.  The problem was that if Rudy put dog food in the dog dish, would Ralph assume it was for him?  No, Ralph went and sat at the kitchen table and looked hopefully at Rudy.  I then found dog food was quite appetizing.

We had one more whole day to get used to this before I got delivered to Teresa and Charlene.  Ralph had to be walked in the wilderness behind the house to do his business, but I had to be walked so we could try leaving Ralph alone in the house to see if he tried to get up to anything.  When we peered in the windows, we found Ralph did much of the same thing he did as a dog.  He laid around on the couch mostly.  The problem came at bed time.  Ralph would sleep with Rudy, normally, although had tried sleeping with me a few times.  Rudy felt uncomfortable with a human male curling up in bed with him.  Not having fur, Ralph found it colder than before and was not able to sleep on top of the bed.  Rudy had removed his pants for the night as the belt would scratch against things if left on in bed.

The next morning I was waiting in the kitchen for my breakfast when Rudy came out with Ralph following.  He said to me, "That was really uncomfortable.  Ralph had the normal guy testosterone thing going on in his groin when he awoke, but then his canine personality did the normal process of licking the owner to wake him up for breakfast."  He laughed, but I did not seem to have a way to express laughter except to jump up and down a bit.  Ralph got his breakfast first since he was now coordinated enough to get his own, and he was as hungry as always.  After watching the other two get bowls of oatmeal, I got the same old bowl of dog kibble with some canned dog food on top of it, but had to smell the oatmeal while waiting for my own meal.  I was pleasantly surprised, however, to see Ralph could handle a spoon to eat with.  Switching bodies seemed to leave a lot of the appropriate abilities with the body.  I wondered, since I could understand speech, but could not speak myself, did this mean Ralph could speak but not understand?  I considered it and realized that I could make out sentences in my head, but the body did not have an ability to form the words.

After breakfast, Rudy had to take Ralph out for a walk and to do his business, while I was left in the house.  I guess I could have gone with them but I wanted to use the bathroom.  It took me some time to work out a way to walk up to the toilet and stand with my bum facing it, then back up and put each of my back feet on the toilet seat.  I could see this wasn't going to work.  I'd make a mess of the tank.  Then I pushed the seat up with my nose and was able to press the back of my legs against the toilet so my butt was slightly over it.  It worked and I did my business in the toilet.  The problem came when I had to flush.  I had to push the seat until it slammed down and then use my paw to pull down on the flushing lever.  What was stranger still was not using toilet paper, but soon after, needing to lay down and clean myself up in the backside with my tongue.

Finally it was time to go to my new home.  Ralph had been the kind of dog that you can walk with a leash or not and he would stay beside the person walking him until he had to do any business.  For some reason, Rudy felt with all the unknowns of our switching bodies, he would be better to walk me on a leash with a collar around my neck.  Interestingly enough be had no hesitation in walking Ralph as usual with no leash and he certainly did not want to put a collar on him.  But he did have to fuss a lot trying to get his pants back on and then to put shoes on him.  This time Ralph got left at home, but he was happy to rest after running around his owner in the woods for half an hour.  As I walked along the side walk beside Rudy, I found my excitement building.  My mind was eagerly anticipating being able to be with the beautiful Teresa and to study her braces and for that matter, the rest of her body, to study it in various states of formal and not-so-formal, or even an absence of, clothing.  I would be spending time with her in private while she dropped all her inhibitions.  Hormones were no longer working the same way, however.  I was getting quite excited, but dogs don't get extra firmness in the loins.  Rather, they just start to walk them selves into a kind of pelvic thrust stance, which Rudy mistook at one point for my having to poop.  It seemed my legs would not move at a constant speed and kept trying to take extra quick steps every time I had a thought of Teresa and spending time with her in private.  The leash was quite short and Rudy kept jerking it to keep me in pace.  It seemed he was treating me more like a dog than a roommate, but then, he'd never done this mind swap thing so had no idea exactly what had swapped.

Getting to Teresa's, her father was the one who answered the door.  I got the feeling, now seeing him and having met his wife earlier, that they had Teresa when quite young – could they have been in high school then?  As a guy, I could see myself perhaps playing a round of squash with him, or partying, or whatever, and feeling he was just one of the guys, rather than a generation older.  And he seemed really cool, too.  Both he and Rudy now had masks on.  Instinctively I walked up and held out my paw to him, with my salutation coming out as a kind of quiet 'woooof'.  He introduced himself to Rudy, "Hey, I'm Derek.  So you must be Darin."  But he was looking at Rudy when he said this.

Rudy said, "No, the dog is call Darin and I'm Teresa's friend's roommate.  My roommate is also called Darin.  I'm the one who fosters these homeless, rescued pets.  But Derek, I cannot come in because of the pandemic, so all I can do is to hand you the leash.  Are you sure you'll be okay with him.  Do you need any help or advice?  Keep in mind he is trained and is mature, so it would just be you guys that have to get accustomed to caring for a pet."  He handed an envelope to Derek saying it was a standard set of literature on adopting a dog as well as all of Darin's medical records.  He had to explain that in his last home, his name was apparently Ralph but that now he answered to Darin.  I then went back to Rudy and tried to thank him but it came out as a quiet 'woof' and a rubbing of my head against him.  I took his end of the leash in my mouth, which he let go of, and took it to Derek.

Upon seeing this, he smiled big and commented, "The dog seems to understand what is happening.  And don't worry about us.  I had a dog as a child and my parents were quite strict about how we looked after him.  I'm going to be the same with Teresa and Charlene.  Darin may not need training, but they will."

Rudy left me and Derek took me into the house.  Charlene was out in the back on the deck and Teresa came down the stairs quickly, all excited that their new dog had just arrived.  Derek was just taking off his mask and must have dropped the leash for a moment because when I saw Teresa, I suddenly felt excitement and my body expressed that by my bounding over to the foot of the stairs to greet her.

Seeing Her Through The Eyes of a Dog.  Chapter 4.  Starting to Take Control

The family had lunch but as a dog I was not included as I ate only twice a day.  I went and lay in the bed they had arranged for me in the living room.  This was all very well but I could not see them and so I was not impressed with my bed's location.  This whole adventure with changing bodies with a homeless dog was all designed to get me attention from Teresa, so it made no sense to spend much time in the living room unless she was there.  No, I had to convince them to move the bed to her bedroom.  But then all of a sudden I realized the answer.  I simply grabbed the end of it with my mouth and dragged it up the stairs and into her bedroom.  The only space for it was where I had been laying by the window.  It took a bit but eventually I got it straightened out and I lay in it.  I knew better than to go and bug them at the table and anyway, seeing, hearing and smelling whatever food they were having would only make me hungry.

Teresa eventually came upstairs and went right past her open bedroom door without noticing I was there and headed straight for the bathroom.  A real dog would have been quite concerned about the length of time she was in there, but as a former human and connoisseur of braces, I was well aware of the time one spent after eating to clean all the stuck food out from between them and between the teeth above the arch wire.  I might have gone in to just watch her do this, but she would probably do something like abort the procedure and leave it incomplete.  Charlene called to her husband to ask where the dog bed went.  He said he didn't know and I heard no more.  Then I heard her call up to Teresa but she could not hear her mother while in the bathroom with the water pick going.  Soon I heard more feet on the stairs and shortly Charlene was standing in the doorway.

She smiled, twinkling slightly across her smile from her high-mounted braces, as she said, "Awwww, Ralphie, you got your bed moved.  Teresa will be so happy you have taken to her so well.  She was the one who wanted a dog the most of all of us.  Derek was almost against it."  She must have assumed Teresa moved the bed up after lunch.

Just then, Teresa came back from the bathroom as her Mom was looking into her bedroom door.  She said, "Mom, I was in the bathroom," assuming her mother was looking for her in her bedroom.  Her mother repeated the comment she had just made to me, which I had just blinked to and shaken myself.  Teresa replied as she entered the bedroom, "Oh, I didn't move it.  It must  have been Dad.  But that's good.  I'll be glad of Ralph's company when I'm in here."  I gave a little 'woof', which was the best I could vocalize in response to my intended response of 'and I'll be even more glad of yours, Teresa.'  But instead of coming in and laying on her bed to catch up on social media on her phone, or sit at her desk and do something on her laptop, she announced, "Okay, I'm taking Ralph for his first walk now."

Teresa bent at the knees, leaned over and said to me in an upbeat tone, "Okay, Ralph, let's go for a walk!"  Well, I didn't feel a walk was that important, but started to get up.  She added, "Hey, we'll stop by and visit Carol who you saw on the laptop this morning."  Oh yeah, of course, you get in with one of the girls and they quickly introduce you to the rest of their gang.  This could get exciting to some extent."  I then jumped the rest of the way to my feet with energy and bounded toward Teresa as her mother backed away from the doorway to let us pass.

The dog walk went rather as I expected except that in all my dreams of spending time with her in the past, I never imagined her connecting a leash to a collar around my neck and using it to give me directions to her friend's place.  To say there was a bounce in her step was correct.  I sometimes walked right behind her, admiring the wiggle in her bottom, something which would simply be rude if I were still in a human body, and then other times I went ahead of her a little and looked back as I trotted, admiring the small bounce in her chest, transmitted from the bounce in her step.  At one point we met a girl whom I knew but apparently she only just recognized.  We stopped so this girl could coo over me and pet me.  I had always been pretty sure she had some kind of steel in the back of her mouth, but did not know her well enough to ask.  Now as a dog there was an easy way to find out.  I simply, although gently, jumped up onto my hind feet and put my paws carefully on her shoulders and looked into her mouth.  The mouth opened wide with surprise and I saw an expander like Teresa's connected to molar bands and then lingual braces all around her top arch.  Before I could find out if there were tubes on the outsides of her bands, something I usually tried to survey if I got to talk to someone with molar bands, I was yelled at to get down.  Now that I think about it, Teresa had to yell my name twice, even though 'Darin' would have got my attention first time.  The girl brushed off her shoulders and then talked to Teresa about some exam.  It started to get boring so I did something that I had seen dogs do in the past.  I walked around the back of the girl and gave her a little nudge in the butt.  This got a squeal out of her followed by laughing with a counselling from Teresa to not do that to her.  Since they kept talking, I went around and did it to Teresa.  She had the much more perfect butt, but as a human I would not have been able to compare them in this much detail and from this angle.  Teresa then realized I was bored and we were on our way, and my curiosity had been settled about the girl's steel, even if I would have preferred that she just had bands and would get some dazzling sparkle shortly.

Eventually we got to a house and I was led up to the front door.  Teresa rang the bell and soon a lady came to the door, from whom Teresa asked if Carol could come and see the dog.  The mother called back into the house and shortly after, Carol came to the door.  She came out after grabbing a coat and then I was led along the porch.  The girls sat on a kind of patio love seat and Teresa gave the command to sit, facing them.  As a human, Carol would have said hi to me and that would be about it.  As a dog, she cooed to me, patted me, rubbed my tummy and let me put my paw on her knee.  She leaned toward my face and I was able to lick her on hers.  The dog in me felt satisfied that I had expressed myself, but the human in me would have preferred we talked about something more interesting, like the results I was getting in the gym with my new work-out routine.  As they talked, Teresa let my leash go as far as she could as I sniffed around the porch.  I concluded that they had two raccoons that frequented the place, some mice and a bunch of squirrels.  I didn't need to know this, but I felt the dog in me was eager to find each of these.  The human in me took over and expressed the boredom in it by laying down, managing to press on all four of the human feet.  This got some patting, but no wrapping up of their discussions.  I then took in a big breath and let out the biggest, loudest sigh I could.  There was even some hint of a growl at the end, or was it a moan.  When this didn't work I got up and started to lay my head on each of their laps in turn.  Carol had a nice scent coming from her privates – woops!  That was the dog in me again.  Okay, this was way too much information.  Carol had not been with a guy in ages.  She had thought about a guy way too much recently.  And Carol needed to shower after those kinds of private moments in her room.  This information came to me as she was telling Teresa how she was getting thick with a football player on the college team – all lies, but only Teresa's dog knew for sure.  I stopped myself from sniffing when I put my head on Teresa's lap.  I didn't want to know anything from her scent right now.

Our walk back was uneventful and I concentrated on walking while always keeping the leash a little slack and staying beside her left leg.  I even ignored a squirrel that spotted me too late and which I could have almost got if I had managed to pull away from Teresa's grip fast enough.  Really though, what would I do if I got the squirrel.  I was not hungry for a rodent that ate what ever garbage it could scavenge and I was not interested in playing with a live and terrified damn squeaky toy.  I barked at it just to make it look right.

Getting home, Teresa bragged to her parents how well behaved I was, not mentioning jumping up or poking girls in the butt, and she didn't even know about the private info I collected about Carol's love life.  I was not sure what was to happen next.  I might have suggested an early dinner, but Derek was working from home and had a report to finish from his office in the corner of the family room, while Charlene worked from a similar make shift office in their bedroom.  Both were prepared for the possibility of a formal lock down of society and were using that as an excuse to get out of their respective commutes.  Teresa started to prepare the family's dinner.  She was done exams and would have nothing to do until next semester, as did I.

Teresa had the TV on in the kitchen and the news was airing while she worked on dinner.  I was sitting watching both she working on dinner and watching the news.  Little did she know I could comprehend everything in the news.  Much of it didn't affect me in either a dog's body or my own human one.  The main story, however, was huge to me.  They announced that commencing in a couple of days and extending past Christmas, our country would have a stay-at-home order, meaning that you could only go out for essential trips like grocery shopping.  This meant college would only resume after the break in an on-line format except for certain lab classes that could not be conducted on-line.  This affected Rudy more than me.  I had told Rudy that if we got the stay-at-home order, then I wanted him to go on-line and cancel my enrolment in college.  I would resume my education after the pandemic was over.  This meant I could remain in this dog's body longer than the break if I wanted to.  I wished I had an easier way to communicate with Rudy.  I had to meditate and switch back to my old body in the middle of the night and wake him up to speak with him.  We decided we could not do this for very long as the real dog Ralph might get confused about being in a different house.

I listened as Teresa called a friend to talk about the lock-down and heard her discussing the same arrangement as I had made.  While she was on the call I heard Derek call from the family room that he was done work and could someone bring him a beer.  I was able to nudge open the fridge and pick up one of the beer bottles in my mouth, then push the door shut and jog into the family room.  I walked up to Derek's desk and sat looking at him with the beer in my mouth.  I needed to score some brownie points with this guy as he had originally not been in favor of the family getting a dog.  He seemed impressed as he took the beer from me and stroked me on the head.  His comment suggested he assumed Teresa had got the beer for him and got me to deliver it.

In getting dinner ready to serve the family, somehow a bowl of dog food was prepared and it was presented to me by Charlene to eat in the kitchen while the family ate dinner in the dining room.  I was finished a lot faster, of course, and spent the second half of their dinner period sitting watching them eat.  Derek seemed to think I was begging, but the ladies suggested it wasn't begging if the dog sat well away from the table.  I was listening to their dinner table chatter.  Some comments from Derek were quite interesting.  He was saying, "Well, getting Ralph for free was critical.  With you two in braces, there just would not have been money for adoption or breeder fees for a dog.  I don't know why you two had to decide to do them at the same time.  It's quite a strain on the budget."

Charlene clarified, "Derek, I keep telling you.  I could not go through with it unless someone else was doing it at the same time.  Nights would have been unbearable if I went through it separately from Teresa."  I wondered what was up with nights.

Seeing Her Through The Eyes of a Dog.  Chapter 6.  Seeing Teresa's Morning Routine

With lock-down in effect, Teresa did not have anything to have to get up for, but shortly she looked at me and said, "Well, Ralph, I guess I have to get up and get you out for a walk so you can do your business, won't I boy."  I cringed inside but any reaction I had in my dog body probably did not show.  I did in fact want to go to the bathroom, but the door was shut to her bedroom and I did not have the appendages to be able to turn the knob.  And I certainly was not looking forward to the prospects of doing my business outside in public!  I would simply have to watch for an opportunity and jump at it, so to speak.

I assumed Teresa would get up, stretch, go to the bathroom, do some grooming type rituals on herself and return to her room.  Not quite.  She got out of bed, while I lay where I was to watch, ready to jump up the moment she headed for the bathroom.  My plan was to stay there after she left and hope she did not come back for me.  To my surprise, she went to her closet and started to select an outfit for that day.  Undies, bra, top, jeans, which I assumed she would put on when she returned from the bathroom.  No.  She removed her pants.  Then she removed her top.  She had worn a bra under her tank top in bed.  It was a nice supportive one, but it revealed a lot of cleavage, and all blemish-free.  She then almost made me put my paw over my eyes with her reaching around to undo the clasp for the bra at the back.  When she pulled it away, I realized that she needed very little support from a bra.  Unbelievable!  And the cool morning air on a relaxed female body that just woke up caused her nipples to stand out dramatically, and large they were.  I knew it would be polite to turn my head or something, but somehow I could not do this.  She quickly reached for her hips and grasped her panties to remove.  This was even more against decency to watch, however I did recall a human expression about collar and cuffs matching, which applied to her, before I had moved my big, doggy gaze to the floor.

Moments later she was dressed.  She removed her headgear and placed it in the drawer of her bedside table and headed for the door to her bedroom.  I followed her, tail wagging, to the bathroom, where she immediately sat on the vary plumbing fixture I was myself longing to use.  And I had to once again turn my gaze away as some clothing descended.  As a human I would have noticed the aroma of a female's urine, but as a dog I seemed to find it full of information and to be a glorious bouquet that was all about my owner.  When she was done and getting to her grooming rituals, I jumped up onto the toilet seat and admired her as many dogs do to their owners.  She looked at me and giggled, but did not tell me to get down.  I watched as she tied her hair up out of the way, washed her face and then began to apply powders, colours, eye liner, lipstick and so on.  She talked to herself, or was it me, while she did this.  She questioned why she was doing it during lock-down.  When she got to the lipstick, it was as though she had only just noticed again that she had braces on her teeth and pulled her lips together more forcefully to keep them hidden from her view, saying, "Oh Ralph, I couldn't have picked a better time to finally bite the bullet on these teeth.  I'm in almost all the time and when I am out, I wear a mask so much.  And Mom, I don't know how she brought herself to do this.  Dad's been really supportive of it all."  And then she screwed up her face at the sight of her lips, teeth and part of her braces as she did a smile to herself in the mirror.

She seemed to leave the bathroom without noticing I did not follow, then came back and looked in to see me still sitting on the toilet seat.  She said, "Okay, Ralph, back to the bedroom," leaving again.  I got off the toilet and went over to move the door almost shut and then went back and put the toilet seat up, and got into position.  I did my business as fast as I could and flushed it, hurrying to her bedroom.  As I entered she laughed, "I guess Dad had to use my bathroom.  Mom was probably taking too long and he couldn't wait any longer.  Did he make you finally leave and follow me?"  She then left again and headed downstairs, saying that Mum and Dad should be down soon and she would get breakfast for everyone, probably intending they would hear this.

I decided it was proper for the family dog to go check on the parents now.  I wandered over to their room and found the master bedroom door not completely shut.  I pushed it open and found that, contrary to Teresa's assumption that they were up and using the bathrooms, found it was all quiet and the two were still in bed.  I decided that if Derek had not been all that keen on a dog in the first place, perhaps jumping on him and licking his face was a little risky.  I jumped up on the bottom corner of Charlene's side of the bed and waited.  Nothing happened.  I carefully walked up between the two bodies and started to sniff Charlene's neck just behind her ear, which was hidden by her shoulder length hair.  This started to wake her.  She started to roll from the side that faced her away from me, onto her back.  As she did this, I was met with a most unexpected site.  Charlene also wore headgear in bed!

If I had been in a human body, she would have screamed and put her hands over her face and told me to go away, feeling mortified by being caught in her night time appliance.  However with me in a dog's body, she reacted with not the slightest bit of shame.  She just said, "Oh, Ralph, Teresa sent you in to wake us up, did she?  You'll be wanting someone to take you out for a walk, then."  No, I was not.  I had been ready for breakfast, but now, I was just frozen, staring without shame at this beautiful, mature woman, wearing headgear as she slept beside her husband.  When she had spoken, I watched her lips moving up and down her teeth, revealing none of her braces, yet with this large arch of steel from the face bow trying to impede her lower lip from meeting the top.  As she yawned, I studied the fit of the headgear.  The face bow seemed to go in closer to her teeth than Teresa's.  When she closed her mouth her lower lip had more trouble than Teresa's in moving behind the face bow and up over the top teeth.  It kind of stuck just under them, yet when she had previously spoken, it seemed to squeeze itself a little higher with the top lip coming down more than when she was not wearing it.

It was not my conscious human mind, but my dog mind that gave her a lick on the mouth.  I had not pressed hard so the lips did not move off the braces, but I moistened the face bow for her, which she dried immediately with her fingers.  She then pulled back the covers and got out of bed, with Derek finally starting to stir.  I jumped off the bed quickly after her and followed her to their en-suite bathroom.  It was big and bright and had separate shower and Jacuzzi tub.  I sat beside her as she looked at herself in the mirror, standing at the counter.  They had double sinks, so the counter was long enough for a dog to sit and watch the human looking at themselves in the mirror.  She moved her fingers to the strap near one ear and fumbled as she tried to unhook the strap from the face bow.  Considering she would have had over a decade of experience at applying makeup to herself, she showed no dexterity at operating a headgear's neck strap when it needed to be disengaged.  I noticed she even was slow to unhook the second side with the traction released, and then she pulled the strap out from behind her neck.  She put it in a drawer under the counter where she had all kinds of grooming tools.  Next she put her hands to the face bow.  Whereas Teresa would just slide it out, Charlene seemed to labor at hers, wiggling it and jiggling it and after a period in which I was almost getting bored of sitting watching her, she wiggled it out and put it in the drawer with the strap and grooming tools.  I considered: for some reason the daughter puts off treatment until she starts college, even though it would involve wearing headgear with her braces.  Her mother, prescribed a similar treatment, starts at the same time so she would not be going through it alone, and yet the two never let each other see each other wearing their headgears.  I suspected that this doing braces together for mutual support started out as a good idea, but then didn't go beyond the fixed appliances.

I did not wait for Charlene and Derek to get up and dressed.  I headed downstairs at this point and was glad I did, as I realized how much more uncultured it would be to hang around the mother of the girl of my dreams as she probably used the toilet and then changed from pyjamas into clothes, probably having no concern with standing in front of me completely naked.  I could not play my role of a disinterested dog around a naked parent of my girl.

When I got downstairs, Teresa was sitting in the living room, watching TV, waiting for her parents to come down so they could start breakfast.  Me?  She seemed to think I would be fed with the others.  She offered to take me out for a walk, but I just laid on the floor and gave a big sigh.  She seemed to accept this as an indication that there was no rush.  I guess her parents didn't take a long time to come down, by human standards, but for me the wait for breakfast was unpleasant.  As soon as Charlene emerged, Teresa started to work on breakfast while Charlene started to work on the more important task, of getting food for me.  They went with the standard diet of kibble, just enough that I would not gain weight, plus a meagre helping of something from a can that had a photo of a happy dog on it.  I ate this as you would expect – rather similar to inhaling it, but in fact I crunched on several of the kibbles before swallowing.  When the family sat down to breakfast, I sat a decent distance off and looked mildly interested.  In fact I really wanted what they had, but remembered as a human how I hated it when Ralph would do that to Rudy and I back in our house.  When Charlene got up and said she was going to brush teeth, I felt the need to accompany her.  I realized in the logical, human side of my mind, that it was Teresa that I was there to be around all the time, but the my doggy brain said that the one who fed me was special and must receive special attention also.

Sitting in her bathroom and watching her use her special braces cleaning tools, I got a special documentary accompaniment from a very pleasant female a few years older than me on the intricacies of oral hygiene when that female had darling sparkly dazzle high on her beautiful but slightly protruding white teeth.  I have to admit that I was actually kind of getting into this, with her calming voice that kept talking on the subject that she was sure I would not understand, and the display of all that beautiful and sophisticated dazzle that she was wearing in conjunction with her daughter as a kind of support.  It got rather surprising when Charlene finished off her hygiene activities by pulling out her headgear and, with a lot of trouble, inserted the face bow and connected the neck strap.  She looked at me, looking about as dorky as a mature lady looks in one of these, and by the way, sexy as hell to the mind of a guy that got off on these appliances.  She explained that she could wear it while she walked me because she would have to wear a face mask and would wear a stretchy, round-the-neck-and-face one that completely hid the headgear, back and front.  I'd mostly seen guys wearing these neck wraps that were originally created as outback hiking wear against mosquitoes.  She grabbed one from the drawer and put it on.  She was correct.  She had obliterated everything that made her attractive to me.  Oh, but wait, I guess she really did have a decent body, now that this was all there was to consider.  And to the human in me it seemed fine to me to lust after stainless steel on two different ladies, it was still wrong to do so to the Mom of the girl I found so ultimate in the body department.

She squeakily urged me to follow her down stairs to the front door, hardly bothering to explain to the other two what was up and where she was going.  Teresa did make a comment about she not being able to take the dog into most malls or stores and so the lavish face mask might not be that necessary.  Charlene grunted and ignored that comment and we were soon off.  Every so often Charlene would make a comment that sounded like she was urging me to do my business.  Sorry to say, I was fine as I had already gone in the main bathroom of the house, but at one point I lifted my leg at a tree that had obviously received tonnes of other sprays from those who regularly walked this route.  Charlene kept me away from other dogs who were anxious to greet me, and soon we were back home – soon being almost an hour in human terms but somehow it seemed only a few minutes to me.

Upon getting into the house and wiping my feet, Charlene was confronted by her daughter, who asked, quite innocently, "Mom, I don't know why you wore a face mask for a dog walk, and why you don't whip it off the moment you are back inside."

Charlene said to her daughter, "It's not about spreading virus during the pandemic.  That is just a convenient reason to be seen wearing one.  I got an extra hour in wearing my headgear because this face covering masks it from everyone."  Teresa gave a big 'um' sound.  She certainly had not liked the idea of family seeing her in her headgear and so understood her mother's technique.  Charlene then said, "Teresa, is it possible we might get up the nerve to wear these during the day, out of our rooms?  It's lock-down, so we are just locked up in this house all the time except when someone goes for groceries."

Seeing Her Through The Eyes of a Dog.  Chapter 8.  Rudy is in Distress

Around five that afternoon, the doorbell rang and Derek announced to us that it was Rudy at the door and would someone get the dog.  I bounded up to the door and Derek put a leash on me and opened it.  Rudy was standing six feet back from the door and was wearing a mask.  Derek dropped the leash and I was able to walk over to Rudy, who petted me just like he had always petted this dog when it was his.

He knelt down as he was doing this and spoke quietly into my ear.  However just as he was about to speak, Derek said, "So Rudy, take all the time you want.  I'm sure you miss him.  Just ring the bell again when he is ready to come back inside.  Maybe you want to take him for a walk."

Rudy looked up and thanked Derek, then walked me out to the street and down the road.  He then knelt beside me again and started to pet me, just so it would look good to any passersby.  He said, "Look, Darin, it's getting really hard with Ralph in your body.  He gets way to cuddly with me in bed every night and even if I try to sit on the couch to watch TV.  He is trying to get into everything now that he has discovered he has dexterous hands and stands up erect.  I had to put child safety locks on all the cupboards in the house.  And he has learned to make a bark with your vocal cords.  It's kind of like a wretch sometimes.  Is there any way you are ready to switch back?"

I wanted him to know I understood so I turned my head towards his and licked his mouth.  Somehow this reminded me of what he must be going through with my old body.  This felt natural to my doggy brain but my human mind felt it was much the same as it must be for Rudy when my body was like this with him.  I couldn't say much else.  I started to walk toward home until the leash was taught and then stopped waiting for Rudy to follow.  He commented that he hoped I understood.  He also stated assumptions.  He said, "So you'll attempt a switch-back maybe over night?"  I barked.  He said, "So we'll check in with the family tomorrow to see how Ralph handled living with them after the switch back?"  I barked.

I might have been very disappointed at all of this, but in fact it was a combination of boring and frustrating being in Ralph's body .  The boredom is probably obvious.  The frustration came from being with a really hot chick, who had braces and wore headgear no less, but then my arousal to all this was limited to a mind recalling how my human body would react if I was in it.  I needed to build on what I had done.  I needed to use the fact that Teresa had adopted our dog, and the fact that the dog would act rather strange starting tomorrow, to offer to help them to deal with him.  No, wait.  I could go further.  I could explain the mind swap and then appeal to her on the basis that she had already spent the night with me while wearing headgear.  I'd have to break all this to her slowly.

Getting back to the house and being admitted, I ran to the kitchen.  Charlene and Teresa were working on dinner and Charlene immediately started to get my own dinner ready when she saw me.  Teresa came and petted me and even gave me a hug.  I licked her while she was smiling at me just so I could run my tongue over her braces again.  This was an experience that I soon would not be able to have.  I then did the same to Charlene when she put my food dish down.

Soon after I had eaten and before the rest of them had finished, I was able to sneak off to the bathroom and do my business.  But sitting and watching them doing dishes, seemed even more boring as I thought of the prospects of returning to my own body that night.  I guess I rather made a fuss of Charlene when she had finished dishes and she correctly judged that I wanted to be walked.  She commented to Teresa that since she had fed me, she was the one I approached when I needed my walk.  She said to Teresa, "It worked out well last time I walked him.  I'm going to wear my headgear again on the walk.  I really need to wear it more and this is the one chance I get other than when sleeping.  I really wish I was brave enough to wear it in front of you guys."  To make it look right, I chased Charlene up to her bedroom, as she tried to explain to me why we were not heading for the front door.  I sat at attention in the bathroom and watched this erotic show of a mature woman clumsily putting her face bow onto her braces and then securing it with a neck strap, after which she covered the whole lot up with a pandemic face covering.  Charlene petted me and thanked me for being so patient, assuming the sitting at attention was a continuing campaign to get her to walk me.

I enjoyed the walk.  Charlene cooed nice things to me and even started thinking out loud.  She said, "I just have to get up the nerve to wear this headgear around the family.  It would really help if Teresa were to wear hers.  Derek's had a few glimpses of me in mine, so he would not be so hard to wear it in front of, but Teresa is a different story.  Humiliating yourself in front of your offspring is just devastating.  I should just bite the bullet when I get home.  Watching TV in the evening is the perfect time to wear it.  Everyone is watching the TV, not me.  Well, Ralph.  At least I don't have to feel self-conscious in front of you.  It probably doesn't mean anything to you."  I turned my head and woofed at her but she did not interpret it as my contradicting her.

Getting in the front door, Charlene knelt down and fondled my feet... I mean she wiped my feet with a rag so I would not track dirt into the house.  But she cooed nice things about how good and so patiently I was to let her do this to my feet.  Then she stroked my head before getting back up.  I took that opportunity to press my nose into hers and then to move it to one side and grasp the strap to the face-mask in my teeth.  I pulled and it came off her ear and then I continued pulling and it came off her other ear.  Charlene let out a little squeal and I whipped my head around so she could not get the face-mask back.

She was standing by this time and Teresa had seen her Mom in headgear for the first time.  She said, as Charlene placed her hand right over the front of her face in shame, "Oh Mom, your headgear doesn't look so bad.  Wait... take your hand way."  Charlene did so and Teresa considered it, "I feel so dorky in mine, but it looks fine on you."

Charlene said, "Well honey, I have been telling you we need to get comfortable wearing them in front of each other.  Look, why don't you get yours and we can all watch TV together."  I then handed Charlene back her face mask which she took as she made a huff at me in reaction to my bad behaviour.  I followed her into the family room with Derek behind me.  Charlene sat on the couch and patted the seat beside her to invite me onto it.  I lay on it with my head on her lap and then lifted it to look into her face and headgear as she said, "Ralph, I would not have got up the nerve to just go put on the headgear and come down to watch TV when Teresa was refusing to wear hers, but that stunt you pulled with taking my face mask off after the walk seems to have done the trick after all."

Derek had stopped in front of her and was taking in the sight of his wife in cervical headgear in the better light of the family room and said, "Yeah, we're paying so much each month, if you can just wear it to watch TV in the evening and shorten the treatment time, it could really help our family budget.  That Dog seems to be pretty useful, what with getting me a beer and now getting you and Teresa to speed up your treatment, I'd say he is becoming quite an asset to the family."

Charlene looked up at her husband and complained, "All you think about is money.  You said nothing about how bad I look in this."  And as she was saying this, I leapt off the couch and went to the fridge to get a beer for Derek.  This freed up the spot on the couch beside Charlene and he took it.

He replied to her, "Honey, it's a headgear, not a fashion accessory.  I would not be able to compliment how you look in it with a straight face.  It looks like you are getting your teeth fixed.  But Teresa maybe said it best, 'you look okay in it.'"  I handed Derek his beer and then Teresa entered the room.  I looked over at her after Derek took the beer from my jaws and saw that she had put her headgear on as her mother had been urging.  I trotted over to her as she was approaching us and she stopped to pet me as Derek commented, "Oh Teresa, good for you.  I was just saying to your Mom how it will really help the family budget with you two speeding up this teeth fixing, and yours looks fine on you, too.  You don't need to be hiding away in your room all the time to wear it."

As Teresa was heading for another shorter couch, Charlene said, "Oh, honey, you actually look good in yours.  I guess your youth helps."  Teresa gave her mother a look that said she had just been told a pile of dog poop.  I jumped up on the couch beside her, sitting and facing her, then I licked her lips and face bow.  Charlene quickly said, "Oh honey, watch the dog doesn't break your braces."

Teresa sneered and said, "Mom, he's been doing that since we got him and he is never rough on me.  It's not doing any harm."  She paused and looked at her father who was considering her, probably thinking what a pity it was that his daughter had to look such a dork just because their family had not been able to put her through this when she was in middle school.  She then said, "Dad, would it be okay if I had a couple of beers while we watch TV?"  He nodded and grunted 'uh huh.'  I then jumped off the couch and ran to the fridge.  I was finally able to get a beer for my Teresa.  I ran back, jumped on the couch and lay down with my head over her lap and dropped the beer.  Okay, this was not quite romantic because the bottle dropped between her legs with the cap at her crotch.  Nevertheless, she smiled big and gave me a big thank-you as she picked it up and unscrewed the top, taking a big drink by holding it to her face bow and puckering her lips around it.

Charlene had watched this, expecting having the beer was just an excuse to remove the headgear in order to drink, so she could leave it off for most of the movie.  She cautioned, "Oh honey, watch you don't dribble it all over yourself!"  Teresa swallowed the beer and put the bottle down on the coffee table and then smiled at her Mother, who then said, "Well, I think I might as well join you two, but what is the command to the dog to get you a beer?"  I needed no command.  I leapt off the couch and ran to the fridge for my third beer-fetch run.  Charlene cooed wonderfully to me as I held the beer in front of her and she praised me with the face bow sticking out over her lower lip and her top lip pulled back in a big enough smile to show her entire chain of braces.  I stood and watched this for a moment as though I was waiting for a tip, so she petted me on the head and I ran back to lay on the other couch next to Teresa.  Given that this was my last evening with these two lovely headgear-laden women, I wished I could have a beer also, but Rudy had always reminded me how bad alcohol was for dogs.

Charlene had removed the top to her beer and was carefully trying to replicate the pose of the mouth that Teresa had done while her husband watched with curiosity.  She took a wee little sip first try, then took the bottle away and wiped the face bow with thumb and forefinger.  She then wiped the lips with the back of her hand.  She tried again and this time was able to take a decent drink without getting dribbles on her lips.  It was easier for Charlene to drink from a beer bottle than Teresa because the former had her face bow projecting a little less and the latter had her face bow a little lower relative to her top teeth.

When the movie was over and we went to bed, I was perhaps a little too affectionate with Teresa.  I watched her intently as we lay in bed and she worked on her Smartphone.  I kept scooching my body up so my head could touch hers and then gave her little licks around her face bow.  She giggled, partly from intoxication and partly from my attention, and accused me of liking the taste and smell of the beers she had drunk while watching the movie.  She eventually put the light out and after she was asleep, I crept out of bed and to the dog bed by the window on the floor.  I curled up in it and began to meditate.