Elvis and the World As It Stands

by Lisa Frenkel Riddiough

  Clementine gives me another nod, and I follow her back out to the main sidewalk and past the pet store.

  “How’d you get so popular?” I ask, as we continue down the block.

  “Humans can’t resist my charm,” she says.

  “All humans except Mommy,” I say, walking faster to keep up. Then I immediately want to take it back. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean that.”

  “Don’t talk about her!” Clementine says. “And stop asking me so many questions.”

  Mo leans over my eyebrow whiskers again and whispers, “Careful. She’s sensitive and—” But I jolt to a sudden halt because Clementine has stopped, and I can’t believe my eyes. The most beautiful building ever constructed in the history of the world is standing in front of us, just across the street. Three glorious stories of red brick. Wide windows. Old Glory, shifting smoothly in the breeze at the tip-top. It should be in the Big Book of American Architecture.

  I whisper in awe. “It’s the City Shelter of Care and Comfort.”

  “So it is,” Mo says.

  “I told you I’d get you here,” Clementine says. “All we have to do is cross the street.”

  I look at all the cars, and my stomach churns. I start to shake, and that uncontrollable mewing comes out of my mouth in small bursts. I lift my paw slowly and place it timidly onto the black surface of the road.

  “Wait!” Clementine yelps. “We have to wait for the light to turn green. Are you crazy?”

  “I know. I know,” I say. Of course I know. Please.

  “You didn’t know, and I’m here to tell you,” she says.

  “Please, just be careful,” Mo says.

  A car pulls up along the sidewalk next to us and of all things in the world—it’s Bambi! He’s barking and barking and barking and drooling out the window.

  Before I can grasp what is happening, Jasmine jumps out of the car and runs around to us. “What are you doing here? Oh my goodness.” She grabs Clementine with one arm and me with another, and Mo clutches my scruff for dear life. “Mo?” Jasmine says. “Oh my goodness. Is Laverne here, too?” She looks around as if we’d brought a traveling fishbowl with us. Then she opens the back door and practically tosses us in.

  Bambi jumps from the front seat to the back, squashing us all. “I’m so happy to see you,” he says. “Are you going to the shelter? Because we just came from the shelter. I finished at camp and I’m in a new class. I’m doing so much better. I do exactly what Jasmine tells me to do, and I almost never get in trouble. Isn’t that great?”

  I knew this day was too good to be true.

  “You blew it, Bambi,” Clementine says.

  “Now, everyone just calm down,” Mo says. “Bambi, we were trying to get to the shelter.”

  “You never came back to take me,” I yelp. I want to cry. But I don’t even know what good it would do. I’ve done everything I can do to try to get to the shelter. And in my heart, I know that Etta isn’t even there anyway. It’s all been a big, huge waste. And I hate everything about all of it.

  To top it off, Bambi is just pitiful sitting there between us. I don’t want to talk to him. I don’t want to even look at him. Or anyone.

  “I’m trying to do what Jasmine says.” He flings his slobber around and tries to bite it out of the air. “I just want to be a good dog. That’s all I want. I’m sorry.”

  I crawl onto the floor of the car and curl into a ball. Mo is still hanging on to my scruff, and I wish he would just get off of me. But it doesn’t matter anyway, because we are already back at the Pemberton’s house, and I am never going to get to the City Shelter of Care and Comfort. Never.

  Chapter 20

  Jasmine brings us to the front door. To say that Mommy is surprised is not saying much.

  “How on earth did they get downtown?” she says. “And Mo, too? This is outrageous!”

  “I have no idea, Mrs. Pemberton,” Jasmine says, setting Clementine on the floor and handing me to Mommy. She pulls Mo out of her pocket. “I’ll take him upstairs for you,” she says. I stand there unmoving and unhappy.

  “Clementine, thank god you’re okay. And Elvis, where is your splint? This can’t have been good for your leg.” Clementine circles Mommy’s legs, and for a minute, I think Mommy might pick her up. “It’s a good thing you made it back before Georgina gets home. I wouldn’t want to upset her. I just wish things were normal around here.”

  Mommy always wants things to be normal. I don’t know what that means.

  I pass by the kitchen and don’t even stop for water before slogging up the stairs to our room. Mo is back in his plastic palace making fluff, I guess. Not that I care. I just want to go to sleep. So I crawl under the bed and look for my pile of wrinkled clothes. But it’s gone. I close my eyes and try to disappear.

  When I wake up again, I don’t know where I am. I don’t know what day it is. I don’t know what the point of anything is at all.

  I hear Mo on his wheel and snap back to the reality of this stupid house and poke my head out from under the bed.

  “You slept a long time,” Mo says.

  “Whatever,” I say. “I’m done with these shelter shenanigans.”

  Mo stops and steps off his wheel. I’m not looking at him, but I know that he has climbed through the door at the top of his palace and is skittering over to me.

  “I know this feels like a setback,” he says. He does that Mo thing where he puts his hands on my cheeks and looks into my eyes. I consider popping him into my mouth and putting an end to all of this.

  “I am destined to be here. Without Etta,” I say.

  “That might be true,” he says. “But remember what I said about focusing on the positive?”

  I don’t want to hear about Mo and his positivity. I shake Mo off and crawl back under the bed. “I need to be alone,” I say. But that pesky hamster follows me under the bed.

  “Life is mysterious,” he says. “We are not always meant to know why things happen the way they happen. Sometimes the information we want is not available to us.”

  “STOP, MO! JUST STOP IT! You don’t have any idea what it’s like to be forced to live somewhere without your family. No one in this house could possibly understand. I live in one house. My sister lives—I DON’T EVEN KNOW WHERE SHE LIVES. It’s not normal for families to be all split up. That’s what I’m saying. And I wish someone would understand what I’m talking about! No one knows how I feel.”

  I look up at Mo. Standing beside him is Clementine. “Have you even been paying attention around here?” she says.

  “What?” I say. “I always pay attention.” What is she talking about? Oh, who cares.

  “INCOMING! THE KID!”

  Oh, Laverne. Sometimes I wish she would just go jump into the San Francisco Bay.

  Georgina is back from Daddy’s.

  She finds me under the bed. Her smile is enormous. Her arms are outstretched. I wish she wouldn’t do this.

  “Elvis, come out, come out. How is your leg? I heard about your adventure. I can’t believe it. You are so brave,” she says. Her eyes sparkle, and I can’t help but approach her.

  I look at Georgina and speak as clearly as I can. “I have a sister,” I say. “Her name is Etta. She’s gray, with white paws. She treads in her sleep and likes pretending to be an X, and I miss her so much. All I want to do is find her and get everything back to normal.”

  Georgina looks into my eyes. Is she listening to me? Can she hear what I’m saying? She lifts me into her arms and gently strokes my withered leg. And that’s when it hits me. Georgina lives in two houses. Clementine—she’s separated from someone, I’m sure of it. Mo, born in a pet store but here now. And me and Etta. We’re all scattered everywhere.

  This life is a rotten mess. And yet, all I want to do is bury myself in Georgina’s warmth. It’s confusing to miss Etta so much but also to want to be here right at this moment.

  Georgina sets me on the foot of her bed and whispers in my ear, “Elvis, I’m so glad you’
re home.”

  Chapter 21

  A couple of weeks go by, and we don’t do a lot of building. Mommy takes me to the vet to make sure my leg is okay. The vet says I am healing just fine and don’t need a new splint. I already knew that. Please.

  Mo spends most afternoons working on projects in his plastic palace. He occasionally skitters over to the bookshelf and taps on that alphabet book. But I’m not really that interested right now. I’ve started to hang out a little bit on the foot of Georgina’s bed. I like how I can see everything in the whole room from here. And Georgina is gone a lot. She has swimming and the library and something that Mommy calls, “back-to-school shopping.”

  “She needs new shoes,” Mo says.

  “I know,” I say. Humans always need new shoes. I’m not stupid.

  When Georgina is in our room, she spends most of her time on her bed staring at a certain page of The Big Book of American Architecture. The very first page, I think. Then she closes the book and stares at the ceiling and then looks at that page again. But she doesn’t read aloud to us. And it makes me wonder what she’s thinking. She doesn’t tell us anything. I don’t know why.

  Then one evening, August 25—it’s a Wednesday—Georgina suddenly stands up and makes an important announcement. One that breathes new life into all of us.

  “We are starting on the World Trade Center today—the Twin Towers,” she says, holding her chin in the air. I think she means business.

  I hear a few plips in Laverne’s bowl and see her two bulging eyes staring through the glass.

  Mo suddenly pops up next to me. All ears.

  “Mommy and Daddy saw the real Twin Towers in person. When they were young. They went on a trip to New York City and saw the World Trade Center. They took a picture there, too. Mommy even thought about becoming an architect back then. But she became a finance person instead. Anyway, none of that matters. The only thing that matters is that New York City is where our family started. The World Trade Center towers are very important to our family.”

  Georgina reminds me of Carly—it’s like she’s telling us a story.

  “I never thought a skyscraper could be that important to a family,” I say to Mo. “It’s not like it was their home.”

  “Sometimes unexpected things feel like home,” he says. I never really thought about that either. But maybe it’s true. Mo crawls up onto my head and stands on my eyebrow whiskers. Such a hamster.

  Georgina is excited. I can tell. She is also serious. She breathes deeply and takes The Big Book of American Architecture and sits on the floor and looks through the pages with focused eyes. Mo and I watch as she stops on the page with the Twin Towers. The tall, skinny buildings that stand side by side. Two identical structures. Then she flips the page, and I see a very interesting skyscraper. It’s got so many sides to it. It’s not a rectangle or a square or even a pyramid. Weird.

  Mo scrambles off my head and over to the book. “That’s the Freedom Tower. It’s part of the new World Trade Center,” he says.

  “There’s a new World Trade Center?”

  “That’s it right there,” Mo says, tapping on a page in the book. “After the Twin Towers fell, they had no choice but to rebuild.”

  “That’s a lot of work,” I say.

  “Yes. They demonstrated resilience and fortitude.”

  “Resilience and fortitude. That’s exactly what I was thinking,” I say. “What does that mean again?”

  “It means you can never give up. When they rebuilt the World Trade Center, a message was sent to the whole world.”

  “What message?”

  “That no matter what, we’re going to keep going.”

  “Oh,” I say.

  Georgina studies her book, and I can tell that she’s making a plan. I’m glad, I guess. But right now, I’m just so tired. I don’t even bother to jump down and crawl under the bed. I just stay up there with Georgina, tuck my paws under my head, and close my eyes.

  I don’t think about anything at all.

  Chapter 22

  I’m half asleep. Dream-thinking about those towers. And those people who rebuilt there. I hear a splash and open my eyes.

  “INCOMING! MOMMY!”

  I jump out of my fur. Lavern’s warnings are helpful—and also startling.

  Mommy walks into the room and stands with her hands on her hips. Then she pets her hair tail. “What are you all up to?” she says.

  “Mommy, we’re starting on the World Trade Center today. The Twin Towers.”

  “That’s wonderful, Georgina. Do you want to invite a friend over to help you? I hate to see you spending your last bit of summer vacation in your room all by yourself.”

  “But I’m not by myself!” Georgina stands and spreads her arms out toward me and Mo, like she’s presenting us to Mommy for the first time ever. “I have lots of help.”

  “I think Mrs. Lin’s daughter likes LEGOs, too. We could invite her over.”

  “Mom! This is my project. It’s special to me. I don’t want help from Mrs. Lin’s daughter.”

  “Of course it’s special, Georgina. But a little human interaction every now and then can’t be that bad.”

  “I have human interaction. With you! And I’d have more if Daddy still lived here.”

  At this moment, I feel like someone opened the window and let in the shivering San Francisco fog.

  Georgina turns and marches over to her LEGOs and dumps out a bin of gray ones. Clementine tries to get Mommy’s attention by circling her legs and yowling.

  “Georgina, don’t get upset. Come on, now,” Mommy says, all droopy like one of those Basset Hounds.

  Georgina turns to face Mommy. Her eyes are damp. This makes me nervous. “Everything is ruined,” she says. “Daddy’s gone. We’re not going to New York City, and I can’t even find that photo album.” Georgina’s negativity is just like Rupert’s.

  I headbutt Georgina on the ankle. I want her to calm down. I want her to sit and work quietly on our skyscrapers. But that’s not what she does.

  “There’s a picture, Mommy,” she says. “Of you and Daddy in front of the Twin Towers. From your trip to New York all those years ago. You’ve told me the story a million times. You and Daddy went to New York City that summer to sing with your choir at Carnegie Hall. It was the summer right after you graduated from high school. It’s in that photo album. You used to call it the album of your love. You were standing in front of the Twin Towers. Only a few weeks before they fell. Don’t you remember?”

  “Of course I remember,” Mommy says.

  “Well, I need that picture! Where is that photo album?” Georgina’s face is red. Her nostrils flare, and she shakes. I’ve never seen her this way.

  “Is this about 9/11, Georgina? It’s upsetting to all of us, especially since we’re coming to the anniversary. People are talking about it.” Mommy crinkles up like she’s in pain.

  “Yes!” Georgina cries. “And I need that picture.”

  Georgina paces around the room like a lost chihuahua, and Mommy follows her, trying to get her to calm down.

  “Georgina, I wish you would tell me what this is all about,” Mommy says. She reaches out, but Georgina is having none of it. She stomps out into the hallway and opens the closet.

  I watch from the bedroom door as she pulls out boxes and crates and plastic containers, tossing papers and clothing and old toys everywhere. A doll with painted lips and a broken arm lands right next to me. Mommy picks it up and holds it tightly to her chest, squeezing it to death—just like she did to me when she first held me on the Fourth of July. Is she crying?

  “I’m sorry, Georgina. I don’t know where the album is.”

  “The Twin Towers are gone forever, and you don’t even care about that picture.”

  “Of course I care, Georgina. We have other pictures. Surely we can find one for you,” Mommy says.

  Georgina runs past me and back into her room. She picks up the Big Book of American Architecture and holds it in front of
her. “I need that picture. I’m going to build the Twin Towers, and that picture goes with it, like this one of us in Chicago goes with the Sears Tower.” She points to her shelf. “And that picture goes with the Transamerica Pyramid, the place you used to eat lunch with Daddy when you both worked in San Francisco. Daddy used to go to your office and meet you for lunch. He told me about that. He said you would sit right there next to the Transamerica Pyramid and eat dim sum from Chinatown.”

  Mommy looks like she will collapse at any moment. She doesn’t even grab her tail of hair. “Oh, Georgina,” she says.

  Georgina swings the book around and throws her head back and squeezes her eyes closed. “Why did you even buy me this book? And why did you write that in my book? Why?”

  “What?” Mommy says.

  “You wrote it in my book,” Georgina says.

  I am confused by this and don’t know what they are talking about.

  Georgina opens the book to the first page, the one she kept staring at before, and reads aloud. “‘For Georgina, Build a world of your own choosing.’ That doesn’t make any sense!” she says, through gasps and chokes. “How am I supposed to do that?”

  Georgina drops the book on the floor and falls to her bed, burying her face into her pillows, sobbing.

  The one thing I do know is that I can’t take it anymore. I jump up onto the bed and give Georgina a soft headbutt. She doesn’t reach for me. I lick her arm and nuzzle her shoulder. Even Clementine jumps up there, shocked and staring. Mommy tries to sit on the bed next to Georgina, but Georgina won’t look at her. They are both sniffling, and I can see Mommy’s hand reach out to stroke Georgina’s hair. But she pulls it back and finds Clementine instead.

  “Georgina,” she says softly, so softly that I perk my ears and listen hard. “Sometimes things happen that are out of our control, and it’s okay to be upset. But there are some things we can choose. We can choose how we react when things change. We can choose what to do next. Life is still good, Georgina, even when it feels unbearable.”