It did not, however, have an extra chair, so Janet had to hunch over me while she showed me what she wanted me to do. I was so busy paying attention and taking notes that I barely had time to think about Nick D’Angelo. If I were lucky, I wouldn’t run into him again.
. . .
“Well, how was it?” my mother asked. She had just come through the door and still had her keys and her briefcase in her hand. “They didn’t make you work with dogs, did they?” She sounded even more worried than I had felt getting out of my father’s car that morning.
I shook my head. “It was just like they told me on the phone,” I said. “I’m working on a computer.”
The worry vanished from my mother’s eyes, which are a stunning shade of aquamarine. I always thought it was unfair that I hadn’t inherited her coloring. My eyes are the same lead gray as my father’s.
I told my mother that I would be entering names and addresses into a database, although Kathy might need me to do odd jobs every now and then.
“Did your father pick you up like he promised, or did you end up having to take the bus?” she asked later, over dinner. My father had spent nearly twenty years as a police officer and since retiring from the force had built an enormously successful business. But my mother always talked about him as if he were an overgrown teenager who couldn’t be trusted to do his chores. Probably because he had missed more than a few birthday and anniversary celebrations. To be fair, that was usually because of work.
“Dad was right on time,” I said.
“Did he say anything about me?”
“No.”
My mother studied me for a moment. “You haven’t told him about Ted, have you, Robyn?”
Ted Gold was the man my mother had been seeing for nearly five months. She seemed to like him a lot. I didn’t blame her. He was nice. In fact, I liked him a lot too, which was why, this time, I had resisted the urge to mention him to my father the way I’d mentioned other men my mother had gone out with. It was also why, this time, I could react to her question with sincere indignation.
“Of course I haven’t,” I said.“A promise is a promise.” My mother was fanatical about keeping her personal life private from my father—for good reason. “I don’t think he even suspects that you’re seeing someone.” Why would he? He usually relies on me to volunteer that type of information.
“Well, if he asks, don’t say a word. I don’t want him harassing Ted the way he harassed Anthony, Patrick, and Chris.”
Anthony, Patrick, and Chris are other men my mother has been out with. My father didn’t actually harass them so much as he’d chatted with them. And in all fairness, that had been during the first year that he and my mother were separated (but still technically married). Right after the separation, my mother had gone through an intense period of dating that had only lasted a few months. I think she wanted to purge my father from her system. That period had coincided with my father being in complete denial about the separation, which is why, I think, he’d behaved the way he had. He’d grilled me for information about who my mother was seeing, and I had happily supplied it (I think I was in denial too). And then he’d had little talks with the men in my mother’s life.
The men involved learned that my father is a big guy, in great shape (for someone his age), with a forceful personality. They learned that he was an ex-cop with a lot of friends on the police force. They also learned that he was in private security now. My father told them that they would probably be surprised at how much information one person can find out about another person if he knows where to look. He told them that the main thing he’s learned by being in the security business is that everybody, but everybody, has something that they’d prefer to keep secret from the rest of the world. My father’s personality, along with his access to a wealth of information, had alienated the affections of Anthony, a professor of English literature (a pretentious bore, if you ask me); Patrick, a tax accountant (a plain, old-fashioned bore); and Chris, a dental surgeon (drills, large needles, and pain).
I’ve changed a lot since then, even if my father hasn’t. I’ve figured out that my parents probably aren’t going to get back together. I understand that my mother likes Ted now. I know she deserves to be happy. And I know better than to tell my father anything.
“My lips are sealed,” I told my mother. But I didn’t add that just because I wasn’t going to say anything to my father, it didn’t mean that he was never going to find out. She already knew that.
My mother relaxed. “So,” she said, “are the people at the animal shelter nice?”
. . .
“Can you meet me tomorrow after I get off work?” Billy said when he called after supper.
“Why?” I said. “What are you protesting now?”
Not only was Billy a dedicated animal rights activist, but he was spending the summer working at a social justice camp that got kids involved in all kinds of causes, from protecting the environment to fighting against child labor.
“Nothing,” Billy said. “I swear. I still feel bad about what happened.” I already knew that. He had called me twice over the weekend to apologize. “I want to make it up to you. I want to take you out to dinner and a movie.”
A couple of “I’m sorry” phone calls I could understand. But dinner and a movie? That didn’t sound like Billy.
“You’ve been talking to Morgan, haven’t you?” I said. Morgan had been disappointed when I told her that I couldn’t join her at her cottage as planned. She’d become furious when she found out the reason why: “Because of one of Billy’s save-the-world protests? What about saving my summer?” Morgan’s focus, unlike Billy’s, was on her own species—and on one member of it in particular.
“I just want to do something nice for you, you know, because if it wasn’t for me . . . ”
“She yelled at you, didn’t she, Billy?”
“Yeah,” Billy said with a sigh. “She sort of said I ruined her summer—and yours.”
“Sort of?”
“You know Morgan.”
I did. She expressed her feelings freely. She dispensed advice even more freely.
“It’s okay, Billy. You didn’t ruin my summer, and I’m not mad at you.”
“I still want to take you out, Robyn. Please?”
I know Billy as well as I know Morgan. Morgan had made him feel worse than he already did, and he would go right on feeling terrible until I let him do what Morgan wanted.
“Okay,” I said. “Dinner and a movie sounds nice. Where do you want to go?”
“There’s a vegan restaurant a couple of blocks from the camp. I can meet you there, if that’s okay, and we can walk to the theater from there.”
I told him that sounded great.
My job: help the shelter’s fund-raising committee by entering names and addresses into a database. Sitting next to my computer was a cardboard box filled with photocopies of checks, lists of participants at events such as the shelter’s annual dog-walk-a-thon, and clip-out coupons from the shelter’s newsletter or its calendar—which, by the way, featured cute and cuddly dogs, not fierce-looking dogs like Orion and the two pit bulls I had met the previous day. The mound of paper would have had my very organized mother delivering lectures on the perils of disorganization.
I pulled the first coupon out of the box, read the name and address written on it, checked both against a website Janet had showed me, and made a couple of corrections on the original piece of paper. Then I entered the information into the database. Even though I understood why all this checking was important—“Would you make a donation to an organization that couldn’t even be bothered to spell your name correctly or get your address right?” Janet had said—I couldn’t help thinking that a few days of this would have me begging the powers-that-be to open the schools early.
From where I sat, I had a good view of the shelter’s two main wings, the heat-seared lawn between them, and the parking lot beyond. Every now and again I glanced out the window and saw shel
ter staff members taking the shortcut across the lawn from one wing to the other. By mid-morning, the volunteer dog walkers were outside with their charges. They were mostly retired people, according to Kathy. One of them in particular caught my eye—a thin old man with snow-white hair. He was working with a dog that looked an awful lot like Orion. I looked more closely. It was Orion—I was sure of it. Good luck, I thought, turning back to my computer. I checked and entered a few more names and addresses into the database, and then I glanced out the window again.
The old man had taken Orion into a fenced-in area of the yard. I watched them. The man didn’t seem the least bit nervous. Nor did Orion seem the least bit fierce. He was sitting, but his ears stood at attention. He seemed utterly focused on the man, who was standing beside him, facing him. The man curled his hand into a fist, as if he were hiding something in it. He held the hand in front of Orion’s nose for a moment. Then, slowly, the man pivoted around so that he was facing in the same direction as Orion. He squatted down and lowered his hand from Orion’s nose, past his chest, and down to the ground. Orion remained sitting—which I found astonishing—and lowered his head to follow the old man’s fist. The man swept his fist along the ground farther away from Orion. The dog slid forward to get closer to it until finally he was lying down. I saw the old man smile. He brought his hand to Orion’s mouth and opened it. Orion gobbled something out of it. The man clapped his hands, and Orion stood up. Then the man got him to sit. He ran through the whole sequence with Orion again. He was training the dog, I realized. He seemed pretty good at it too, which made me wonder if he were really a staff member, not a volunteer.
“Not again,” I heard someone exclaim. Kathy bustled past my door. She did not look happy. When I turned to the window, I saw her marching across the lawn toward the old man and the big dog. Her expression was serious as she talked to the man. The old man shook his head. Kathy said something else. The old man didn’t look any happier than Kathy, but he finally nodded. The next thing I knew, he was leading Orion back to the animal wing. What was that all about? I wondered.
. . .
The shelter was air-conditioned, for which I was grateful. August was turning out to be even hotter than July had been. Not only had the grass withered from green to brown, but the leaves were curling on the few trees on the property. It hadn’t rained for weeks. But as hot as it was, I couldn’t stand staying indoors all day. I like to breathe real air, not climate-controlled air, as often as possible. There was a picnic table at one side of the yard, shaded by a large umbrella. At lunchtime I peeked out at it and saw that it was empty. I collected my sandwich and juice from the staff fridge and headed for the table.
By the time I got there, someone else had claimed a space. The old man who had been working with Orion was sitting at one end of the table. There was a thermos in front of him. I hesitated. Did I really want to spend my lunch break talking to an old guy I didn’t know? I glanced around but didn’t see any other shady spots. The man noticed me and smiled.
“Don’t tell me one of you people has decided to brave the elements,” he said. He waved me over. “Come on. I don’t bite.” He laughed—animal shelter humor, I guess—and stood up when I reached the table. He reminded me of my grandfather—my father’s father, who was in a nursing home in New York State. Grandpa Hunter always leaped to his feet when a “lady” approached, just like this man was doing. If the bench hadn’t been attached to the table, he probably would have pulled it out for me, just like Grandpa Hunter.
“Mort Schuster,” the old man said, catching one of my hands in a grip of iron and pumping it.
“Robyn Hunter,” I said, sitting on the bench opposite him.
“Pleased to meet you, Robyn,” Mr. Schuster said. He sat down again, unscrewed the lid of his thermos, and poured something into a cup.
“Hot tea?” I said.
Mr. Schuster grinned. “A hot beverage actually cools you down on a day like this,” he said.“Of course, it doesn’t work the other way around.” He peered across the table at me while he sipped his tea. “You look pretty young to be working here full-time. Summer job?” he said.
“Something like that,” I said. “What about you? I saw you with one of the dogs this morning. Do you work here?”
“I certainly do,” he said. “Five days a week for the past six years. But I don’t get paid for it. I’m a volunteer.”
“You must really like animals,” I said, impressed. “Do you have a dog of your own?”
He shook his head. “I’m between animals, as they say. Jinx passed away a couple of months ago. He was eighteen years old.” He shook his head. “I should be lucky enough to live that long.”
I had to do some quick math in my head to work out that eighteen dog years was the equivalent of 85 years. I wasn’t sure that I would ever want to be that old.
“I’ve always had a dog,” Mr. Schuster said. “Always liked their company. It got to be even more important after I retired and my wife died.”
“I’m sorry,” I murmured.
He smiled at me. “I’m thinking of adopting,” he said. “There are plenty of fine animals here that haven’t had it so good. That dog I was working with this morning, he’s like a big unruly kid, always seeing what he can get away with. But there’s a good chance he can be broken of his bad habits.” He glanced back at the building, in the general direction of Kathy’s office. “He needs a lot more work, though,” he said. “It takes six to eight weeks to break a dog of undesirable behavior, and three to four weeks to lock in a new behavior. But who knows? Maybe he’ll be the one for me—if they get sensible around here and let someone with experience work with him.” I had the feeling he was referring to his conversation with Kathy this morning. But it was really none of my business, so I didn’t ask. Mr. Schuster peered more closely at me.
“Don’t tell me, let me guess—you’re not a dog person,” he said. “Cats more to your liking?”
“Actually, I’m allergic to cats.” After five minutes of direct exposure to a cat, I start to sneeze. After ten minutes, my eyes begin to water. After fifteen minutes, they turn red and itch so badly that I feel like scratching them out of my head.
Mr. Schuster opened his mouth to speak but was stopped by a whoop of laughter. I looked around and saw a gang of boys swarming out of the parking lot and onto the lawn. At first it looked as if they were headed our way. Then one of them pointed in our direction and the whole group ground to a halt. They conferred for a few moments before changing direction. One of them—Nick—glanced back over his shoulder at me. He was frowning. I watched them disappear inside the building.
“Good riddance,” Mr. Schuster said.
“Who are they?” I said.
“In my day we called them juvenile delinquents.” I looked from his bitter face to the door through which Nick and his friends had just disappeared.
“They can’t be that bad if they’re volunteering here,” I said.
“Volunteering?” Mr. Schuster said, his contempt deepening. “They aren’t volunteering. They’re here because they have to be here.” He shook his head. “Young offenders, that’s what they call them these days. Future convicts is what they really mean.”
I thought about Nick and what I already knew about him.
“Kids like that don’t know the first thing about volunteering,” Mr. Schuster said. “You have to be capable of thinking about someone besides yourself. The only thing those kids think about is themselves. They’re always looking for a way to get something for nothing. That’s what got them in trouble in the first place.” His anger stunned me. “I’m sorry,” he said, reading my expression. “I know I’m ranting. I just can’t help myself. Kids like those really get me going. If I were in charge, I wouldn’t let those violent criminals within a mile of this place.”
“Violent?” I said.
“Every single one of those young fellows has been in trouble with the law,” Mr. Schuster said. “And I don’t mean jaywalking or stealing
a pack of gum from the corner store. I mean serious trouble. The reason they’re here is that they’ve been charged with at least one violent crime. And now some weak-kneed do-gooder has decided that working with animals is just the cure for their violent tendencies.” He snorted.
“Violent crime?” I said.“What kind of violent crime?”
“We’re not allowed to know that,” Mr. Schuster said. “Those young fellows could go out and kill someone, and we wouldn’t be allowed to know. They’re protected by the law.”
I know from my mother, who sometimes works with young offenders, that it’s illegal to report their names in the media. Mr. Schuster swallowed the last of his tea and screwed the top back onto his thermos. He snapped the lid onto the plastic container that had held his lunch. “Well, work doesn’t do itself,” he said as he stood up. “It was very nice to meet you, Robyn.”
Before I could ask him how working with dogs could cure Nick—or anyone else, for that matter—of violent tendencies, he was striding away from the picnic table. For an old guy, he sure moved fast.
. . .
I had to transfer buses twice to get all the way from the animal shelter to the vegan restaurant near where Billy worked. Billy was waiting for me outside. He’s tall and thin and knows more about animals than anyone I’ve ever met. He’s planning to be a wildlife biologist.
“You really didn’t have to do this,” I told him again as we sat down.
“I hope you’ll like this place, Robyn.”
“If you like it, I know I will,” I said.
In fact, the menu looked great. It was amazing how creative vegans could be in coming up with dishes that came 100 from the plant world—no meat, no cheese, no eggs, nothing that came from animals.
We ordered and Billy started to tell me about a project he was working on with some of the camp kids. They’d drawn up a petition to ask the city for permission to paint a mural on a pedestrian walkway that was covered in graffiti.
Last Chance Page 3
