“Any idea what we will do now?” Aidan asked after a couple of minutes in silence. He wasn´t annoyed anymore, Mark had apologized enough.
Mark thought about it. “I don´t know, I will go home soon. But one idea I did have for a change for you. Aidan, you will strip out of your shirt now, and from now on you won´t be wearing any kind of outerwear anymore, as you want your torso to be naked. You never owned something like that and never learned how to put it on.” He started laughing, seeing Aidan turned red in embarrassment.
Aidan wasn´t that happy as his body removed his shirt on his own. “Mark, that is embarrassing. You know I´m not that confident to show my body. I´m not slim enough to show off.” By now, Aidan had dropped his shirt on the ground next to himself and resumed his former position, looking at Mark pleadingly.
Mark smiled at him. “There is no need to be shy for your body, but it explains why I have never seen you without one before.” Then his smile turned into a grin, as he knows what will follow.
Aidan protested to that: “Woof woof … Ruff?”, meaning “I´m not shy … Huh?”, not that Mark would know. Aidan had just forgotten what was the reason for being unhappy and embarrassed.
Mark turned back to the laptop, he had to erase Aidan´s various outerwear from existence. He also decided to add that nobody commented directly to Aidan´s barking, meaning someone could laugh over it, but not say that Aidan himself was barking to him. And if anyone asks something with one of the triggers, they would afterwards stop the barking and ask him to repeat. Not that many would ask him something. At last he switched to his own profile and added that he would know what Aidan barked. Then he saved the changes.
“I think I will head home now. We will speak tomorrow, bye Aidan.” Mark said as he got up. He wouldn´t need to force more barking from him, after all, Aidan would be alone and probably not speak anyway.
Aidan barked his answer, and Mark just knows it meant “Bye Mark” while he still only heard the barking. He headed out and home, thinking that soon, he would take Aidan with him.
Aidan got over to the table to get his book, deciding he wanted to finish it before the weekend. About an hour later, he got another can of his dog-food served for himself in the kitchen and, after reading another two hours, went to sleep, fighting a bit to get his jeans off.