Iphigenia Murphy

by Sara Hosey

  I started to back away, pulling the struggling Angel with one hand and, with my other, grabbing my backpack and shrugging it on one shoulder and then grabbing my sign and the Mets cap with the money in it.

  I looked at Angel’s tail. My face felt tight; my throat felt tight. I turned and started walking.

  “Wait!” She was sounding a bit desperate.

  I turned back to her. “Lady. This is Angel, see. And Angel is all I got. That’s it. Me and Angel. That’s all we got.”

  We stared at each other for a minute. Her sweaty face showed no comprehension for a moment. It was flat, blank as a turned-off TV.

  I turned again to go.

  I started walking away, but I could feel her still behind me, following, but not too close, almost staggering, like there was a string between us that was pulling her along against her will. Meanwhile, I really was pulling Angel, who was being a first-class pain in the neck and wanted to turn back, to go to the lady. I tried to keep moving, but Angel was strong, so I bent over and put my face down near hers. “What, Ang?” I practically begged, her hot breath in my nose. I spoke softly so that the lady wouldn’t hear, but sternly too, because I was getting freaked out. “We don’t know her. Just come on.”

  “Wait!” the lady called again.

  Was Angel her dog? I didn’t know. But at that moment, for me, it didn’t matter.

  I spun to face her. She was real close to getting punched. “You better leave us alone,” I growled.

  Chapter 19

  The jogger stopped walking.

  “Wait. Hold on now. I won’t … fine. She’s yours. I won’t try to take her back.” I nodded like, you got that right, and kept moving, not on any path, just straight back into the trees. Not running, just walking, like the lady was a wild dog or a bear or something and I was afraid that running would only tempt her to chase me. And then I could hear her coming up behind me again anyway, but quickly this time.

  “Just listen for a minute. Please stop.”

  She touched my shoulder and I whipped around. Angel started going crazy, jumping up on the lady.

  “Leave me alone!” I shouted. I yanked Angel, hard, harder than I meant to. She let out a yelp. I wanted to hold her head, apologize and hug her, but I was so angry and scared, I just locked my eyes on the lady. For her part, the lady looked scared, too, like she was finally getting it that she was pursuing a crazy-looking homeless person into the woods.

  “Fine,” she said, holding her hands up like, sorry I touched you or I surrender or whatever. “I’m not gonna try to take her. Don’t cry. Don’t cry, honey.” She lowered her hands slowly and then put one near the side of my arm, like caressing the air above it. I stepped back. I didn’t know why she said that. I wasn’t crying. Was I?

  “Okay,” she still held her hand close to my arm, like, levitating over it. I could feel the warmth on my skin, even though she wasn’t touching me. It reminded me of something, but I couldn’t think what.

  “Just listen for a minute.” She started talking quickly, urgently, like she knew I might just run off and this was her only chance. She kept trying to look in my face now, but I kept looking away. “Please, listen. One minute. She just looks like our old dog is all. And I want to make sure that you and the dog … I mean, you look like you could use a thing or two. Like money. Or food. I just want to make sure the two of you …” She stopped and started again. “That dog just looks like a dog I used to have. You know? You obviously care about her, you know? So, if you saw a dog that looked like your dog, you’d want to make sure she was taken care of, wouldn’t you?”

  I wasn’t sure what this old lady was getting at. I wasn’t gonna give her my dog.

  “See,” she was gaining speed now and talking even faster, “I want to give you what you need so that your dog is taken care of.” She crouched down and I loosened up on Angel’s leash a little, not really thinking about it, just acting the way you do when someone normal wants to pet your dog. Well, Angel started going nuts, licking the lady’s sweaty face.

  “Hey … doggie,” the lady said. I could tell she was holding back from calling her Lola or whatever that stupid name was.

  I just kept standing there, struck dumb, I guess. I didn’t have any more energy to protest.

  “Listen …” She scratched Angel on the ears and the rump and looked up at me and then back down at Angel and then at me again. She would smile and then frown and then smile again. I thought, Jesus, make up your mind already.

  “I don’t have anything on me now. I don’t have pockets.” She looked down at herself and kind of laughed like not having pockets was the most ridiculous thing in the world. She kept on playing with Angel’s ears and kissed her on the head. “But I could run home real fast and come back. We don’t live too far from here.”

  She must have been able to tell from my face that this was not going to fly.

  “Well, is there a place I can find you later? Or better yet, leave you something? Just twenty bucks or something? You know, just so … it looks like maybe you might … your sign said …” She took a breath and tried again. “What do you need?”

  Another question I’d never been asked before. It must have been the day for it.

  I just stood there, feeling awkward, looking down at her. My stomach was grumbling. We’d been rationing pretty carefully the last few days.

  “Sure, we could use twenty bucks,” I said, as nonchalantly as I could. My voice was higher than usual, tinny and weird in my ears.

  Angel jumped up, put her paws on the women’s shoulders, knocking her off balance and to the ground. The lady rolled on her back and Angel nuzzled her and licked her face. Dogs go crazy for that, when you get down on the ground with them. “She’s just real friendly,” I grumbled, still in my weird voice. “You know, to everyone ’n all.”

  “She’s a nice dog.” I thought maybe she was the one who was gonna start crying now. I couldn’t handle that.

  She sat up and hugged Angel, who kept shoving her snout in the lady’s face and neck and armpit, trying to get even more scratches.

  The lady looked up at me, kind and serious. “Where can I leave you the money?”

  I glanced around. We were off the main path, but not so far that she would get lost if she tried to come back. “You can leave it here, under this rock here.” I took a half step away and nudged a convenient and big rock with my foot. Angel, who was acting totally bonkers, stopped bugging the lady for a minute, to playfully snap at the foot I used to kick the rock. Then she leapt back to the lady. A real joyful jump. I felt my mouth start to pull up at the corners, even though I didn’t like it one bit. Angel was just so cute sometimes.

  “Great! Great—I’m gonna go home right now. I’ll be back in just a little bit.” She was smiling like crazy.

  “That’s fine,” I said, pulling Angel back and away from her. The lady stood up and started brushing leaves off her body. There was one leaf hanging awkwardly out of her hair; I wanted to reach out and pluck it, but I just stared, watching it flop around.

  Angel jumped up, lunging and nipping at the air and trying to get me to play. “Angel! Down girl,” I said, working to keep the pressure on her leash steady, wishing she would cut it out. I looked at the lady. She was still all smiles. Just standing there, watching us, smiling. I picked up my backpack and the sign, which I had dropped at some point—of course, Angel was all about knocking my head with her nose—and then we turned to go.

  “Okay, then,” she said.

  “Okay,” I said over my shoulder.

  “Okay,” the lady repeated. “Bye, Angel.”

  Angel kept turning around, trying to go back, but I didn’t.

  “Wait! What’s your name?”

  I didn’t stop. “Brenda,” I yelled, not looking back.

  “Okay, Brenda! Okay,” she added weakly, “I’m Ann.”

 
“Don’t worry, Ang,” I murmured to Angel, putting my forehead to hers once we were out of sight. “Don’t worry, girl. Don’t worry about that crazy lady.”

  But Angel didn’t seem worried at all. She licked me right on the mouth. I held her mouth closed and kissed her on the top of her snout and we got moving again.

  I had absolutely no idea how to feel. Worried, but maybe a little excited too. Sad that that lady might actually be Angel’s owner, but angry too. I even forgot about the money.

  I just wanted to talk it over with Corinne.

  Chapter 20

  I removed Angel’s leash as soon as we were a little deeper in the woods. I really only put her leash on for appearances, around people, so they didn’t get afraid of her and so they’d know she was mine. Although so much for that last part. The leash didn’t keep that jogger away. As we trudged and crashed toward the bridge to meet Corinne, I thought about how crazy and happy and weird that lady had acted. Ann.

  We got there quickly and no Corinne yet, so I settled down with Angel, pouring her a bowl of water and going over in my head what had happened.

  I couldn’t find anything truly suspicious about what the lady had said or about her offer, but I was jumpy and feeling weird about it anyway. Like, maybe she might come back with the cops. It could be that she wanted the dog, or maybe she was just a busybody, one of those radical animal lovers or something, determined to get Angel into a shelter, and me too, for that matter.

  It occurred to me I was mostly nervous because I hadn’t interacted with any adults in a while. Corinne was kind of an adult, but not really. The fact was I didn’t know if I could trust that old lady. I wanted to, though. And it wasn’t even about the money. It was almost like … finally. Finally, somebody noticed. It was embarrassing to admit that to myself. But it was a relief, that feeling of finally.

  Maybe Angel did look like her dog. Or maybe she really was hers. But what kind of dog owner had she been anyway if her dog had wound up alone in the park? Angel was messed up when we found each other. She was skinny and scared and just messed up. That lady didn’t deserve to have a dog if she couldn’t keep track of her.

  “Ang!” I would call when she got a little too far away and she would come bounding, that’s just the right word, bounding, back to me, jumping over downed trees and wagging that ridiculous tail. Whatever. She’s my dog now, I thought.

  I was starting to get worried when we finally heard Corinne’s whistle and Angel, who had settled down at last and was lying at my feet, jumped up and bolted through the woods toward Corinne. Corinne was kind of jogging and stumbling, and when I saw her face I could tell that something was wrong.

  I rose and rushed toward her. I grabbed her arm. “What is it? What’s wrong?”

  “He saw me.”

  “What happened?”

  “I don’t know,” she said. We stood looking at each other and her face was transformed with fear. My friend Corinne was usually smiling, or looking bemused, or at least calm. Now, her jaw was tight, there were lines on her forehead.

  “He must’ve seen me walking. Like, I didn’t notice anything. I went and bought the books.” She lifted a plastic bag at her side and tossed it over toward where I had my stuff piled near the base of the bridge. “I don’t know, he was definitely looking for me. Someone must’ve seen me … or I don’t know what. I left the library and then I went to the gas station—I knew I shouldn’t have gone to that place—and I was buying cigarettes and stuff and then he was right there, like, literally breathing on me and he grabbed my neck.”

  “Oh my god, Corinne.”

  She brought her fingertips to her throat where he had left red marks. I imagined him, that ugly man, digging his fingers into my friend’s neck. The muscles of my jaw clenched.

  “Iffy, I don’t know what I’m gonna do,” she choked.

  “Tell me everything.” In the pause I guided her toward the big rock we usually sat on, handed her the bottle of water. She took a long drink and then looked around, as though she didn’t know where she was.

  “I don’t know,” she repeated. She took out a cigarette and lit it with trembling fingers. “The guy at the counter—in the gas station—he was like, ‘Hey, hey now kids,’ and Henry was like, ‘We’re just playing around,’ and he steered me out of the store. By my neck. I thought he was gonna kill me right there. Oh god, Iffy, he knows I’m in the park. He said it. He said, ‘So, you’re living in the park?’ He laughed, like he knew it but couldn’t believe it. He said, ‘You smell like shit.’ And he called me a … all sorts of things.” Corinne began to cry. It had started with just big, plump tears rolling down her pink cheeks, but then her eyes turned into slits and her mouth turned down and she sobbed. “He said he would get me. The things he said, Iffy … It was … just … He said,” she gasped out, but softly, quietly, as though she was speaking not to me. Angel, who was lying at her feet, looked up at her and I swear to god that dog looked concerned too, like she was asking, What’s wrong, Corinne?

  “So, how did you get away?”

  “Well, the guy from the gas station came out again and he said he had called the cops and that we had to get out of there and Henry was all like, ‘That’s fine, I’m just leaving now and you’re free to go Corinne,’ and he kind of threw me, by like my neck. He was doing that weird smile. He said I was pathetic, that I had to come back because I had nowhere else to go. He said that I could die in the park. But then he said I should come back, he wanted me to. But then he just got in his car and left, you know? And I was so scared. I just started running. I just ran back to the park. But what if he followed me? What if he comes looking for me? How long before he comes looking for me, Iffy?”

  “He won’t be able to find us,” I assured her.

  “But if he does,” she sobbed, “then he’ll hurt you too. And Angel. I don’t want him to hurt you two.”

  “He won’t hurt us, Corinne.”

  “Iffy.”

  “We won’t let him.”

  “He killed Prince. Or, I don’t know. He said Princie was ‘gone.’ I don’t even know what that means.”

  I didn’t say anything. But I was thinking. I was thinking about my stepbrother. I was thinking about how, before I left, I got a knife one night. My stepbrother was asleep in his room, drunk and high, and I knew I could kill him. I knew I was capable of sticking that knife into his chest, more than once if necessary, until he died.

  I didn’t do it. I knew that if I killed him I would go to prison, that even if I ran they would look for me for real and they would find me. So, I didn’t do it.

  But I knew I could.

  “Corinne,” I said so calmly and seriously, I knew I meant it, “we’ll kill him first.”

  Chapter 21

  After she’d calmed down, I told Corinne about the guns.

  “You ever shoot a gun, Iffy?” She was impassive, unimpressed.

  “No,” I confessed, deflating a bit.

  “You know how?”

  “Sure,” I shrugged. “Don’t you just pull the trigger?”

  “Well, sort of. It’s not really as easy as it looks.”

  “You’ve shot a gun?”

  She nodded. “But not at anyone. I’m telling you Iffy,” she sighed. “It’s not that easy.”

  “Well, it might not be a bad thing to have anyway,” I said. I gnawed on the side of my thumb, thinking.

  Corinne worked her way through the cigarettes, and me and Angel sat there, quiet, just keeping her company. She was thinking, every so often mumbling to herself. Sometimes she put her hand up to her head like she was gonna run her fingers through her hair and then her fingers would get caught in what was becoming a knotted and smelly mess. Then she’d scratch at her scalp and run her hand over her face and look at me and look at Angel and get real still. Then the whole routine would start all over again.

  She got up an
d started pacing. “You know, when I first met him, that was it. Like, I looked into his eyes and it was love at first sight.”

  I had heard this story already. I didn’t want to hear it again.

  I must’ve been frowning, because she added, “No, for real. I went with my friend Karen to the Limelight. I was totally trashed at the bar and he was across from me, leaning against a wall and we made eye contact and that was that. I went back to his place that night and, like, I basically never went home again,” she exhaled through her nose and smiled a little, but then the smile faded and she rubbed her hand over her eyes. “That’s not true. I left him a couple of times. But after that first night, I didn’t even bother going back to my mom’s to pick up my stuff. I just moved right in with him.”

  “He’s not a good guy, Corinne,” I said softly, digging at the dirt under the leaves with the tip of my sneaker. A worm wriggled helplessly. I covered it with leaves again and started digging in a new spot. I thought, vaguely, that we could always eat worms. If it came to that.

  It wouldn’t come to that.

  Would it?

  “I know. I know. But god, I love him so much. I mean, loved him so much. I think that’s the problem, you know. I’ve always loved him too much.”

  “I don’t think that’s the problem, Corinne.”

  “No, but it is. Like, he never loved me as much as I loved him. Or at least that’s how I always felt. And then I’d act stupid, you know? You don’t know, Iffy. I would get so jealous. You know? Like kind of crazy sometimes. We were once at this party and …” She stopped, reconsidered. “I mean,” she began again, looking at me, “so, like, to be honest I guess I kind of used to do a lot of drugs. Pills, whatever. And he really helped me to stop with all that, you know? But before, sometimes I would just do stupid stuff. And then we’d fight … and Iffy, I can be really mean if I want to, you know?”