Annie And Jake Quotes

“Once we'd balled up our burrito wrappers and tossed them into the trash, Jake and I walked several blocks from El Farolito to the home of Gus, a rescued shepherd mix that I walked a few afternoons each week. Jake sat on the stoop while I ran upstairs. As usual, Gus was waiting for me at the door of his apartment,; I could hear his tail pounding the floor as I turned the key in the lock. Once I got inside, he hopped around me, nipping delicately at my fingers, nails clackety-clacking at the floor, his tail an ecstatic black blur. I knelt down in front of him, pressed his floppy, expressive ears flat back against his head, and planted a kiss on the side of his long, black schnoz. He whined happily, his whole body shimmying. Gus was one of those dogs who had an entirely different personality at home, where his sense of security gave him the confidence to be joyous and goofy. Out on the street, the shelter pup in him came out and he turned skittish and sorrowful, his tan quotation mark eyebrows pressing together to turn his forehead into a series of of anxious wrinkles. Needless to say, I was gaga for Gus and his layered personality.
Downstairs, I could see right away that Jake loved dogs as much as I did. I had to warn him not to try too hard with Gus; too much attention from a stranger would only make Gus more nervous out there in the big loud world. Jake managed to restrain himself for half a block, but soon was cooing down to Gus, running his hand down the length of his silky black-and-tan coat, and passing him a little piece of chorizo from a napkin that he'd somehow slipped into his pocket at El Farolito without me noticing. Gus pressed himself against Jack's leg and looked adoringly up at him as he gobbled the meat, his tail for a moment wagging as freely as it did at home.”
― Meg Donohue, How to Eat a Cupcake

“The expensive wine coated my throat with warm notes of fig and vanilla. Mozzarella melted like cream on my tongue and a jumble of lacy and tubular wild mushrooms lent an earthy heartiness to a glistening plate of homemade pappardelle.The dessert- my litmus test for any restaurant, of course- was a flourless chocolate cake so dense and rich that most people would have put down their forks, happily satiated, after a few bites. But Jake knew to untangle his hand from mine when the waiter set the two plates down on the table. Within minutes, I'd finished my entire slice. 'Be still,' I thought, 'o heart of mine,' when I looked up to see that Jake had also scraped his plate clean. 'Finally,' I thought, grinning at him, not caring that my teeth were probably stained a lovely shade of dark chocolate. 'A real man.”
― Meg Donohue, How to Eat a Cupcake