Treat Us Like Dogs and We Will Become Wolves

by Carolyn Chute

  Gordon is looking predatorily at Whitney’s one remaining unopened milk.

  “Go ahead and take it, Mr. Kong, sir. I got ’em for you anyway.” Whitney glances long-sufferingly at Bree and Claire.

  Gordon snatches the little carton to himself, hugs it passionately against his ribcage a moment. “Thank you, dear.”

  Something causes Claire to get up quick. Real quick. She is such a short woman, she seems barely taller standing than when she’s sitting.

  A woman and child have appeared. Almost out of thin air. Quietly standing there several feet away in the open space by the lobby. The woman, early forties, with a soft baggy pale pink top and jeans, no jewelry. Just a wristwatch. Black hair in a frizzy topknot. She has the little boy by the hand. His eyes are Asian. Hers are not. Her eyes are odd. They look as though they’ve had acid thrown into them. Worse than the reddening caused by puffing grass. This is something else. Many hours of hard weeping? Her brows are very black and thick and shapely. A small dark mole is noticeable over one side of her mouth. She could have been homely, had this or that feature been more or less. But she is beautiful. And the fact that she has been obviously crying is just another fine raw edge to the lovely whole.

  The boy’s eyes are watchful. He is tiny, not as in tiny baby, but as in tiny gentleman, chin high.

  Claire and this woman now grip each other in a hug and Claire commands, “Sit with us, Catherine.”

  Catherine walks a few paces closer to the tables. She and the boy no longer hold hands. “I’m sorry I wasn’t in the office.” She looks vaguely around the tables, face-to-face-to-face, but not really seeing. The child now leans into her, his very black hair against her pink top, his eyes finding Bree’s deformed face, his eyes widening. Bree doesn’t turn her face away but looks down at her own hands.

  Under the table, Gordon pushes his work boot hard into Bree’s foot, which has only its sock and sandal. She jerks upright, raises her face to look briefly into his eyes. And Gordon is thinking how nice it feels to have Whitney’s foot on one of his feet and his other foot on Bree’s foot, how if the whole human race could do this for one long moment! He remembers a social science class he took at this very college, that short era of his life when he was in college (six months here, one year at the Bangor seminary). They did an exercise called “Star Power,” which involved people placing their right foot on other people’s right foot, to force them to make deals with poker chips. It was a lesson in power, class, and . . . as he saw it, revolution. But it wasn’t like this, this foot-on-foot fondness thing. This! Kind of like monkey love. He doesn’t want to think about revolution now. He looks again into Bree’s face. Her eyes are taking in the art professor, Catherine Court Downey. He presses a little harder on her foot. She is trying to hold back a smile. She refuses to look at him. She does, however, push her foot that is under his boot, closer to him, then she flushes deeply.

  Catherine is whispering close to Claire’s ear, “I need to talk to you alone. Can we?”

  Claire takes Catherine’s hands, whispers, “You bet.” Then turns toward the table. “I’m going to go with Catherine for a few minutes. But first . . . Catherine, please meet my family. This is our Bree.”

  At the moment, both of Bree’s honey-color eyes show, and that nose, flared across the top, the bridge slightly blue-green with veins so close to the surface. Looks like a small cloudy bruise in this sort of light. Her low smoky voice says, “Hi, Catherine.” And she smiles.

  “And this,” Claire goes on, “is Whitney, Penny’s daughter. You met Penny when she came in with me for the auction that time. And Whitney has been around here at USM now for—”

  “Yes,” says Catherine to Whitney. “I’ve seen you many times in the halls. What are you . . . a niece to Claire?” She looks now at Claire. “You said family.”

  Claire stands straighter. “Yes. Family.”

  Whitney, chewing her pita bread sandwich, has given Catherine a little wave and bobbed her head up and down, as to a bee-boppity tune. Now she is looking at Claire, who is saying quickly, “And Lee Lynn is here . . . somewhere . . . women’s room, I guess. You don’t know her. She has a little baby girl . . . a real doll . . . named Hazel. Hazel’s at home.” Claire glances at Gordon, who has perceptibly raised his chin, hearing the thunder of Hazel’s name. Hazel, who is to Gordon present even when not present.

  Quickly, again, leaving no room for questions, Claire continues. “We also have Chris and C.C. with us, but they’re on slave duty over at the mailing room. And Michelle is around, too.” She hugs Catherine to her side, as they are both facing the tables. “And this, guys, is Catherine Downey, who I’ve told you so much about. Her work is amazing. I want you all to see it sometime. She is about to transform the Art Department into the dazzling apex of civilization,” which is supposed to allow Catherine a cynical laugh due to the funding cuts, but she doesn’t, just looks another degree dispassionate and distanced. “And I love her,” Claire adds, smooching Catherine’s cheek while Catherine stands like a soldier, eyes like blind eyes. Beautiful eyes. Brown eyes. Beautiful brown blind. “And this is Robert.” Claire aims a finger down at the boy’s dark head.

  “Hi, Robert!” everyone at the table sings out.

  “You forgot the gorilla,” Whitney says around another squishy bite of her tabbouleh and pita sandwich.

  Claire has not forgotten. She has just been stalling, disliking the sharp thuds of her heart that have always come whenever she imagined the day Catherine and Gordon would meet each other, the ugly electricity, the opposite poles of the political, social, and class planet upon which these two creatures exist. Claire chortles. “Whit-neee . . . in public, pretend to . . .” She almost says pretend to honor your father, but, missing a few beats, fills out the sentence, “to honor your elders.” She then dramatically throws out a hand to give Gordon his fitting introduction. “My ex!”

  Gordon stands up, always more of him than people expect. Taller than everyone. And right now, no belly at all, and small-hipped, his summer look. And slopy thick shoulders like . . . like . . . well, like King Kong. Dark green work shirt, a little frayed. Jeans. His one pair that fit tight. He, unlike the others, has not dressed “pretty” for Portland. And there, as ever, the belt buckle, copper, the sun’s face, the gaze that seems older and weirder than mythology itself, older than all the human story, yes, and all faith, back to a time when the only fire, the only light, the only epiphanies were in the sky and art was brand new. His eyes lock with Catherine Court Downey’s bloodshot ones for an impolitely long time. Her eyes, equally impolite, return his gaze. The distractedness and passionlessness of her eyes are gone.

  Claire squints a little off to one side, thinking, Hmmm, I should have known.

  And Catherine says, “David?”

  Claire says, “No, Gordon.” Claire suspects David means David Koresh. Waco. Koresh being another head of a teeny nation within the nation called America.

  Claire has witnessed Catherine’s crackling super contempt for these ways of the world, and so she, Claire, now winces.

  Claire also suspects that Catherine has figured out the whole thing about Gordon from all the hints Claire has dropped lately like anvils during their summertime phone chats. Too many to count. And if Catherine is anything, she’s a gossip, especially if it involves “big bad men.” Oh, boy. But whether this speaking the name David was Catherine’s weary confusion or a sly dig, Claire doesn’t know. Claire looks hard at her friend’s lovely profile. The overhead cafeteria lights and bright rectangles of afternoon glare from the tall windows across the room slide over Claire’s glasses as Gordon takes Catherine’s left hand in his right hand, nothing like a handshake, more like a chivalrous man helps a lady from a carriage. He doesn’t say anything. He just does not let go of that hand, then opens his other hand over the dark hair of her child and Robert is looking square into the face of the copper sun, bewitched. And Gordon looks down at this little kid like he wants to own this kid . . . to shelter him . .
. to absorb him, and Catherine murmurs, finally, “Yes, Gordon. I’m sorry. Yes . . . Gordon. Of course. I’m sorry.”

  Gordon fondles one of the boy’s ears while still keeping Catherine’s hand in his other hand. The boy doesn’t fight off the ear fondling, and he still doesn’t look up at Gordon’s face, just continues to look at the belt buckle but with one eye squinted now in that silly way of four- and five-year-olds when they exaggerate disbelief.

  Across the room, by the open lounge, Gordon sees a man staring at him. When Gordon stares back, the man doesn’t look away.

  Gordon lets Catherine’s hand go. He scooches and says quietly, “Robert.” He places both hands on the front center of his belt to undo it, jerks the belt from its loops and, with a twist, the sun is freed. He says, “A boy just about your age made this. He’d be honored if he knew you liked it. You like it?”

  Robert holds out his hand. He wears no smile or signs of gratefulness, but he now has a deathly grip on the sun.

  Catherine says, “Robert. Where are your manners?”

  Robert says, “Thanks.” His voice is really high, cartoonish. But not cute. Suddenly shrugging over him is the eminence of great age, old age, vulnerable understandingness.

  “Thank you, Mr. St. Onge,” Catherine further coaches the boy.

  “It’s not a gift. It’s a trade. When he comes to the Settlement for a visit sometime, he can make me another one. Or whatever sort of thing he thinks would become me.”

  Gordon stands from his squat, buckleless belt drooping from one hand, sees that the man by the lounge has been joined by another man, who also looks across the room at Gordon. A small sick feeling touches Gordon’s stomach. Not paranoia exactly. But the way he has started to dislike that his family roams so freely. All this public, all this hungry hard-assed public, their eyes more like groping hands than eyes. Would he be willing to keep his family in a prison of protection? It has crossed his mind. Yeah, it has crossed his mind.

  And now Michelle, the Settlement’s second oldest girl, and three young strangers (two girls and a boy) breathlessly arrive, too late for a meal but in time to nibble on everybody’s yet-to-be-eaten desserts.

  After a few good-to-meetcha’s between the Settlement group and Catherine, and a man-to-man squeeze to Robert’s right bicep by Gordon, and after Claire and Catherine and Robert walk away, Whitney says, “There’s a guy over there with nose trouble.”

  Now Lee Lynn is back from the ladies’ room and her funny tiny Chicago-accented voice, almost as tiny a voice as Robert’s, adds something melodic to the conversation at these tables, and her wondrous orange dress is the passive-aggressive focal point of the whole room.

  The cashier closes the glass doors to the serving area. A nearby juice vending machine begins to hum.

  And now the staring man is crossing the cafeteria, his eyes on Gordon. He is a medium-build medium-height man in a sport jacket, thin hair, shaved face, professorial glasses. Jeans. Sneakers. Gym bag. He puts out a hand. “Gordon St. Onge?”

  Gordon says, “Yep,” puts out his hand.

  “Good,” says the man, his eyes glittering all over Gordon’s face. He doesn’t give his own name and Gordon doesn’t ask. The guy says, “Very good. Very good.” His eyes laser into Gordon. “Well . . . you give it hell, okay?” And then he turns, eyes grazing with wild appreciation over the faces of those at the table, and walks away.

  Lee Lynn stares after him.

  Whitney is balling up her napkin. She snorts. “One of Gordon’s fans.”

  Across the campus ten minutes later.

  Catherine stands with her back and shoulders to the door as if to keep out a formidable army. Also the door is locked.

  Claire has gone to stand by the window but keeps her eyes on her friend.

  In one corner, the boy stands beside a tall rangy silver-gray wood sculpture depicting not a recognizable life form, but a mood or emotion, like nervousness or enthusiasm.

  On the way over to this building, Claire had been thinking once again how she has never laid eyes on this child before although she has been friends with Catherine for a few years. Even stayed overnight three times in that Stevens Avenue home. The husband, Phan, she has met. But Robert was at a “friend’s house” or on a trip with “my sister who has tourism-a-holism” Catherine had said with a roll of the eyes. But also Robert gets lots of day care. And au pairs. And camp. A busy boy.

  Catherine often mentions Robert. “He’s a good kid.” Or all that trouble about finding his shoe size. And something about his birthday, moving her schedule around for his party, which was “a fabulous party for a fabulous little guy.”

  Sometimes Claire had the creeped-out feeling that the boy did not exist, was like art, created, rendered fleshlessly but solidly as genius tends to do.

  Now Catherine levels her burned-looking eyes on Claire’s face. “A counselor is like a lawyer looking for accident victims, like a fungus on a dead tree, like a fly on shit.”

  Claire says, “I thought you were seeing a psychiatrist.”

  Catherine nods. “All of the above. Two of each.”

  “There’s a counselor . . . one you mentioned . . . you said he was a friend.”

  Catherine looks past Claire. “Yes.”

  “And your regular doctor in Portland?”

  “Yes.”

  “Somebody is giving you a lot of pills, aren’t they?”

  Catherine nods once. Gravely. “Because I’m crazy and might hurt people.”

  Claire laughs.

  Catherine steps away from the door. “I love you.”

  Claire laughs. “You’re just saying that because my advice is free.”

  Catherine laughs.

  Claire squints one eye. “I have an idea.”

  In the corner now, Robert is standing with a superhero posture, chest out, arms at his sides, eyes straight down, trying to see how the sun-face belt buckle looks, clasped loosely there to the stretchy waistband of his sporty shorts.

  Tonight, Secret Agent Jane begins her career in earnest. (Jane speaks.)

  I am in my bed at Gordie’s house.

  It’s him. Gordie. I hear him coming up the stairs. Yes, it’s him. None of them other ones, Bev or Barbara or Bonnie Loo or Claire, make that many squeaks and eeeeeks.

  He knocks soft and I say, “Come in,” in a sad way.

  And he does. He is never mad that I leave the light on all night, even though he says wasting “juice” is killing the world. And he sits on the bed, really squashes the bed down, and he feels my hair and my ear. We don’t talk. We both just look into each other’s eyes in a sad-feeling way. Although he might not see into MY eyes because of my secret agent glasses with pink heart shapes that Ricardo gave me to be a spy. Mum says they give special powers of vision. I see Gordie’s whitish old sad eyes very well.

  He is wearing a very wicked-wrinkled black T-shirt washed by the mothers.

  Gordie tells me we can go visit Mum again real soon. I say, “It’s about time.” Jail is far away but Gordie never says it is wasting up all his gas, which is what he says if you say the word: McDonald’s. Or Burger King.

  Before Gordie goes back to the stairs, he reaches down into a pocket in his pants and it’s a small black notebook, very small and flat.

  “What’s that?” I ask.

  “A spy book,” he says and gives it to me. He says, “It’s just something I found around and thought you might like.”

  “Thanks,” I say.

  His giant face comes down and his mouth smells like Cheerios although you don’t see too many Cheerios here and he squashes a kiss on my head, the side of my head by my ear. “I love you,” he says. And he squashes a long, long hug around me and I wait limpishly inside his arms. When he drops his arms, I kinda laugh and I bend close to him and kiss one of his big round arms which is the pop-out muscle part.

  After he is gone, I open the little book. Ah-ha! What a coincidence!!! This is exactly what I need.

  Secret Agent Jane begins col
lecting evidence.

  My secret notebook is too full already. I do the reports in pictures. Much faster. Babies lay around in laps or on the grass wagging their legs. Stuff pours from their noses. And pee and poop are like storms.

  Big people are all the white kind like Mum but not pretty. Some say they are Indians. Big deal. Nobody even tries to look famous. This evidence is just for Mum to see. Only Mum. Mum says she is “Headquarters.” I am her agent. Very secret of course.

  Now here is a page of me standing in the middle of all the eating mouths, men with hats, no eyes, food on the floor. That’s when Gordie makes me go up there to visit instead of staying in his quiet house. But big problem at Gordie’s house. Emptiness. See my sad face. Here’s one with me answering Gordie’s phone. Hello is coming out of my lips and see my cute top with straps. Here’s Gordie’s evil cat. He scratched Bonnie Loo’s tall small boy. Here is Gordie’s red chimney. Here is a sponge in Gordie’s sink. Here is Gordie’s ratty desk. Here is Gordie’s empty refrigerator.

  Here is Claire and Bonnie Loo telling a secret while I hide behind one of their goopy trucks. With these pink heart-shaped glasses I can hear every word. They say Cherish, my Scottie dog is not at a farm like Mum keeps telling me. Nope. Cops killed Cherish by leaving her alone in the hot car with WINDOWS UP!

  See this page ripped out. Once it was my picture of cops but I squashed it under my shoe.

  Cherish was not some junk, not some old snot rag. She was a dog. Get it!

  Another day. Secret Agent Jane further explains special powers of vision.

  My spy book is loaded now. Here’s a picture of Gordie eating all the cupcakes, none for me.

  Another day, now midnight. And Bree, witch of duty.

  St. Onge farmhouse. Stacks of mail arranged on one desk and in a cardboard box on the floor. Phone messages six inches thick, tightly mashed down over the message spike. Gordon in a rush but ever so tired. He has come straight from the sawmills, his truck parked up on the grass close to the door outside. He snatches the phone off the hook, leaves it on the floor, knowing that the dial tone will turn to the high-tech robot’s voice that tries to sound like a professional woman, “Hang up and dial again. Hang up and dial again. Hang up and dial again,” and then the high-tech head-splitter. Impossible to ignore.