Barry

Barry is the returning owner of Duke and the employer who hired CJ to care for him. His brief appearance turns CJ’s precarious situation into an immediate rupture: Barry wants to resume his relationship with his dog, while CJ has no home to return to and must leave Duke behind when her time caring for him ends.

Identity and Introduction

Barry enters the story after six months away. He remarks that Duke does not seem to have missed him, while CJ counters that six months feels like a long time to a dog. The contrast establishes the difference between Barry’s expectation of reunion and CJ’s understanding of the separation from Duke’s point of view. Max, who narrates the encounter, registers Barry first through smell: oils and fruits. When Barry looks him in the eye, Max growls, giving the reunion an immediate tension that Barry’s own attention to Duke does not resolve.

Barry had arranged for a person to stay in his house with Duke rather than put the dog in a kennel. He explains this as a practical choice and expects it to count as evidence that Duke was cared for during his absence. CJ points out the limit of that reasoning: Duke does not know that Barry made such arrangements. The exchange places Barry’s actions and Duke’s experience side by side without suggesting that they are the same. Barry may have organized care, but his return does not erase the dog’s long separation from him.

Employer and Owner

Barry had hired CJ because she said she had extensive experience. On returning, he objects that he does not remember giving her permission to have a dog and complains about Duke’s behavior. His response makes clear that CJ has been caring for Duke in a household where Barry expected to set the rules, even though he has been absent. Max is a source of friction in this arrangement: Barry had expected a kitten, not a dog, and does not welcome the additional animal.

Barry’s focus is on getting back to Duke and settling into his home. He asks CJ to leave so that he can unwind and get to know his dog again. CJ’s answer changes the practical stakes of the conversation: she has no place of her own. Barry is surprised by this revelation. CJ offers to sleep on the couch and look for somewhere to live the next day, making clear that she is not asking to remain indefinitely.

The exchange reveals how sharply their circumstances differ. Barry can return to his house and decide when he wants privacy; CJ’s work and temporary access to that house have been bound up with where she can sleep. When she asks whether she has been fired, he confirms that she has. His decision ends her employment at the same moment that her lack of housing makes the loss especially consequential.

A Temporary Reprieve and a Farewell

Barry does not insist that CJ leave immediately. He says that he is stressed: he has worked for a year toward something and was knocked out in the second round. He plans to go to Hawaii with Samantha and allows CJ two weeks to find a place. He also intends to arrange for someone else to care for Duke while he is out of town. The offer gives CJ short-term shelter, but it does not restore her job or establish a lasting home. Barry’s departure and CJ’s deadline proceed together: he can leave on a trip, while she has to use the time he grants to find somewhere to go.

Before the separation, CJ introduces Barry’s dog to Marcia, who will take over Duke’s care. Max observes CJ speaking gently to him and sees her and Marcia talk while the two dogs chew lazily on each other. When CJ announces that Marcia will care for Duke, her sadness breaks through the ordinary handover. She bends over the couch and holds Duke’s head; his ears drop, and his tail first wags and then droops. Max does not understand why Duke cannot come along, but he notices CJ’s grief and tries to climb into her lap.

At the door, CJ leaves with Max but not Duke. Duke lunges after her, and Marcia struggles to hold him by the collar. CJ blocks his way and tells him to stay. Once the door is shut, Duke paws at it until it rattles in the frame, barking as CJ walks away. The scene gives the consequences of Barry’s return a form Max can perceive even when he cannot understand them: a closed door, a dog trying to follow, and CJ crying as she leaves.

Narrative Role and Significance

Barry appears in a short but consequential stretch of the plot. His absence had left CJ caring for Duke; his return restores his own claim on the house and the dog, while also exposing that CJ has nowhere else to live. He is not shown pursuing a long dispute with her: he fires her, then offers a two-week stay as he prepares to travel. Those actions make his generosity real but limited, and the resulting uncertainty falls chiefly on CJ.

The episode is narrated by Max, whose attention to smell, bodily movement, and changes in the dogs’ behavior shapes how Barry is presented. Barry’s explanation that he had paid for care cannot answer Duke’s distress at being left behind, just as the practical terms of CJ’s temporary stay cannot soften her immediate loss of Duke. Barry’s return thus marks a transition in the household: CJ’s place as caretaker ends, another person takes over Duke’s care, and CJ leaves with Max while Duke remains behind.