WITH FEELING // SAGE TRYOUT

[GARRETT]

[align=center][div style="width: 500px; text-align: justify; font-family: arial; font-size: 9.5pt; line-height: 1.4;letter-spacing:.1px"]In Garrett's mind, there was nothing wrong with a simple lesson. This was the sort of thing that everyone needed to know and could benefit from. Who really needed to know about complicated herbs for fevers and stomachaches and all those other strange things? This was to make sure that there was someone else who knew all that stuff, but if you needed to teach, you needed to find something that people needed to learn. Maybe it's his fault for assigning his own perspectives to Pip — maybe he did do this because it was easy, or because he didn't have to worry himself about it. If he did, the dog would never know. But he seemed like the sort of person who wanted to help, that's all. This was something he could remember.

So the small canine pays rapt attention to the other's instructions, eyes focused firmly on the injury and how Pip treats it. His paw almost jerks away at the liquid poured over it, but it's more instinctive than out of pain. His mother used to use things that stung, though she would lick the top of his head and tell him to settle down. It was the only gentleness he got, through no fault of hers. His whole family had hard paws and scarred bodies, there was never a day that they weren't covered in dirt. Without them, Garrett still carries that legacy with mud smudged on his sides and a bit of oil on his face, making the young dog seem older than he is. A weird twinge hurts his heart, and he glances from the ground back to Pip to find that it's done now, he's all bandaged up.

That was quick. "Where'd you learn that?" he asks curiously, head tipped. "The plan–plantains."