This meeting is concluded and the board has decided that rubbies were, indeed, the proper course of action under these circumstances…
The dog barked again, three times, much louder, and the cat released a long, high yowl, this one of the “Just-letting-you-know-I’m-here” variety.
When I looked at the cat now, I noticed for the first time the small blue plastic tag attached to the back of its ear.
In the back of my brain, something fumbled for a light switch and cleared its throat: Ah-hem. Hello. Over here. Anybody?
Where did I know this from?
Across the street, the hound dog lay down, its great floppy ears spreading out on either side of its head. I could not make out whether or not it also had a blue tag attached, but that thought fled with its tail between its legs as soon as I heard the guy back in the alley cry out.
The animals had moved into the alley and surrounded him. He was still ass-down against the wall, and a couple of the larger dogs-one of them a seriously grim-looking German shepherd-loomed on either side of his head, their noses so close to his ears I wondered if he could hear anything besides their wet, heavy breathing. The rest of the animals pressed near his sides and legs; every few seconds one of them would reach up and gently swat him with a paw, seemingly just to watch him jump or hear him yelp.
He saw me looking and said (not loudly, but with great panic nonetheless): “Hey, buddy… no hard feelings, okay? Could you”-He jumped as the German shepherd, with a low snarl, nuzzled his face for an instant-“gimme some help here? Call the cops or the fuckin’ pound or Wild Kingdom or someone?”
Though there was nothing overtly threatening in the way the animals stood, there was no doubt in my mind that this guy was going to be in a lot of painful trouble if they decided they didn’t like him; at least half of them, as far as I could see, had a small blue plastic tag attached to the back of their ear.
Hello? Anybody home? (Tap-tap) Is this thing on?
The cat nudged my leg again, then growled. Not at me; at the animals in the alley.
I remember this next very clearly: The animals, as one, turned their heads to look at the cat, the cat gestured with its head toward the hound dog across the street, and as soon as the animals’ attention was on the dog, it rose from the steps and crossed the street to take its place on my other side.
It sat there for a moment, then yawned, shook itself, and licked my hand.
The animals in the alley focused their full attention on me. If they’d had arms, those arms would have been parted before them, silently asking: Well?
Life gives you many odd and marvelous gifts on a daily basis, if you take the effort to notice: the tinny, distant chords of music from an approaching ice-cream truck; the geometrically perfect formation held by a gaggle of geese as they fly overhead; being the first person in the morning to see the streetlights turn off; scanning through radio stations on a car radio and suddenly coming across a favorite, back-then song you haven’t heard or thought of in twenty years; the sound made by your teeth as they bite into a fresh apple; the scent of newly baked bread or pastries wafting from the door of a bakery; the way an attractive woman passing you on the street holds eye contact a few moments longer than is really needed… gifts. Common enough, but strange and wonderful when you catch them.
And then there are rare moments when the odd, strange, and marvelous gifts decide to tag-team your ass: getting a phone call from a person you’ve only just thought of after many years, and finding that they’d only just now thought of you, as well, and figured what the hell; finding an old photograph that you had convinced yourself long ago you’d imagined as having existed; knowing exactly, precisely what someone is going to do or say several minutes before they do; or finding yourself in the middle of a downtown square one afternoon with a dozen animals silently asking if they should let this guy walk away unharmed or not, it’s your call.
Gifts wonderful and strange and not to be questioned too much when they’re bestowed upon you.
I almost laughed from the craziness of it, then simultaneously shook my head and waved my hands forward in a quick gesture of dismissal: He’s not worth it.
I turned to go. The hound dog and cat where nowhere to be seen.
When I looked back down the alley not three seconds later, Drop-Kick was completely alone. The animals had vanished as silently and as quickly and totally as they’d appeared.
He looked at me with an unreadable expression on his face.
For some reason I had the sense Dad had just said You’re welcome to me.
I shrugged at Drop-Kick and walked off toward St. Francis de Sales where my widowed mother waited among the mourners for her son to return and Mabel was probably chewing through the back of a chair because she still didn’t have her smokes.
Just as some mistakes are too monstrous for remorse, some moments of wonder are too sublime for anyone who wasn’t there to understand. I never told anyone about what happened that afternoon; it was mine, only mine, and would always remain so.
Beth and Mabel stayed at our house for a couple of days until things started to settle, but despite all good intentions we started getting on each other’s nerves. There are, in my opinion, three stages to helping the grief- stricken: 1) Is there anything we can do?; 2) What else do you need?; and 3) Christ, what is it now?
We were skirting dangerously close to stage three when Beth pulled me aside one night and said we needed to talk. Mabel was in the living room teaching Mom to play pinochle, so we decided to sneak out for something to eat. We ended up at the A amp;W Drive-In where a roller-skating waitress brought us a tray of root beers, hot dogs, and onion rings. There was something comforting in the way that plastic tray hung on the side of the car window, something of the old days, high school weekends, all-night record parties, dancing with your girlfriend in the autumn moonlight, maybe stealing a kiss in the lilac shadows.
“How are you feeling?” she asked.
“Like maybe you want to smother me in my sleep but are too polite to say so.”
She smiled. “For as big as that house is, it has sure seemed cramped the last day or so, hasn’t it?”
“Yeah, I guess.” I took a bite from the steaming hot dog. It tasted like the end of all summers.
“I think Mabel and I should go back home tonight.”
“I figured as much.”
“Are you mad?”
“No, not really. I mean, no, not at all. I understand.”
“It’s just… you and your mom need some time alone. We’ve done all we can but we’re just getting in the way.” Which was true; I’d lost count of how many times I’d nearly walked in on one of them in the bathroom or opened the refrigerator to find my last bottle of Pepsi had been drunk by someone else.
“Can I call you if I need you?”
“Of course. Any time, you know that. And you’re still going to give Mabel rides to and from work, right?”
“Right.”
“So it’s not like we’re never going to see each other ever again.”
There was something she wasn’t telling me and I said as much.
“I wanted to ask you something,” she said, not looking at me. “You remember all the stories I told you about my mother? How she was this famous stage actress?”
“Let me guess-you were lying?”
“Wow. You figured that out on your own and everything- of course I was lying. My mother is an old barfly who’d screw a crippled walrus if it bought her a drink. The last Mabel or I heard, she was living in a flop house in Kansas City with some biker. That doesn’t matter-the thing is, I always sort of wanted to try my hand at being an actress. I did some plays in high school and I wasn’t bad-”
“-you never told me you were in any plays. I would’ve come to see you if-”
“-I didn’t want to embarrass myself in front of you, all right? But things are a lot different now. I want to do something else in my life, something different, something… I don’t know… more. Welsh Hills Players are having tryouts for Pippin next week and I thought I’d give it a shot.”
“That sounds great! ” I said, turning toward her and taking her hand. “ Man, I bet you’ll have fun.”
“The thing is, there might be a lot of rehearsals, which means a lot of evenings where we won’t get to see each other, and I don’t want that to be a problem.”
I shrugged. “I don’t see why it should. I could even come and watch you rehearse, if you wouldn’t
