The Patron Saint of Lost Dogs: A Novel
Page 10
When I flew up here, it was not with the appropriate clothing to fend off the extreme cold. Hardly surprising, since a South Carolina winter is practically a Vermont summer, right? Consequently I’m forced to borrow some of Cobb’s clothes, and after all these years, it’s a necessity that still makes me feel awkward. When I needed help with homework, felt sick, or got into trouble, I always went to Mom. Kids gravitate to the parent who will always be there, not the one who says, “Catch me when I’m done,” or “Busy now, Son.” If fatherhood was a class, Cobb’s report card might say his attendance was spotty, always sat at the back, never disruptive but easily distracted. You see he’d let me in from time to time, only not enough. That was the most frustrating part, knowing he had so much more to give. Rightly or wrongly, it made his disinterest feel personal. Enough to notice, enough to hurt.
Frieda at my side, nuzzling into my thigh, I stand at the doorway of what was my parents’ bedroom for the first time in twenty-five years. A hint of lavender hits my nose, the aerosolized remnants of a hand cream my mother used through the dry winter months. I (we) head to a dresser on my father’s side of the bed before my parents started sleeping in separate rooms. There is a series of framed photographs from my childhood set out above the top drawer, and the recollections hit me like flying shrapnel. Mom pushing me on my old swing set, the two of us playing catch with a Wiffle ball in the backyard, and an enlarged candid close-up of her smiling face. I take in Ruth’s cheekbones, her nose, the prominent philtrum, that deep vertical indentation above her top lip, and it’s like looking at my reflection. But where it counts, where it haunts me, we differ. The photo captures Mom’s green eyes with almond flecks. Mine are a forgettable washed-out shade of blue—their shape, the lids, the brows, the lashes, identical to those of the late Bobby Cobb.
There’s one photo I’ve never seen before, me running track at a meet during my freshman year, before I went down south to boarding school. Strange. Mom never used the camera, a Leica M6 Classic that was Cobb’s pride and joy, and I don’t remember him attending a single sporting event during my entire education.
I open the top drawer, and to the right of a neatly folded collection of flannel shirts, there are dozens of envelopes bound by a thick elastic band. I instantly recognize the handwriting—mine. From the time I went to boarding school, Mom and I would exchange weekly letters. It became a ritual, a tradition. Even at veterinary school I couldn’t afford or justify a cell phone, and the phone in my dorm was on the first floor and I lived on the fourth. The guy with the apartment next to the phone hated taking messages, and whenever I called out, there were always other students around, making noise and listening in. Letters proved unhurried, contemplative, and best of all, private. I stopped writing two weeks before finals because Mom insisted I focus on my studies. What would be her last letter to me arrived only a few days before her death.
I close the top drawer, open the one below, and discover Cobb’s collection of sweaters. This stuff is going straight to Goodwill as soon as the house is sold. Settling on a thick white woolen number, I pull it over my head and inhale deep. Mothballs, maybe a hint of a fabric softener. No nasal nostalgia. Perhaps that should tell you something right there. I catch myself in a mirror on the other side of the room. Not good. Naked cheeks and chin still come as a shock, there’s a stubborn cowlick of hair sprouting from the back of my head, and now I look a bit like the Gorton’s Fisherman.
The diner is a fifteen-minute walk from the practice, if that, so rather than drive there in the Silverado and be forced to abandon it in the middle of the road because I can’t reverse into a parking space, I make my apologies to Frieda, finish bundling up, and head out on foot.
Ruth Mills and I made this trek to the diner come rain, sleet, or snow. It became our thing; then again, though it pains me to say it, pretty much all the good stuff growing up was our thing. There was this one time, back when I was seven or eight, that has always stayed with me. At that age Mom and I walked hand in hand, a custom I never questioned until, on this particular Sunday, I spied a couple of classmates off in the distance. For the first time in my little life I felt a twinge of embarrassment being tethered to my mother, a twinge countered by a sense of guilt for wanting to let go. Long before we converged it was Mom who dropped my hand, pulled off her glove, and pretended to bite a painful hangnail. We crossed paths with the two boys, greetings were exchanged, no one giggled, and to my relief, the prospect of ridicule at school was averted. Though it went unsaid, we were careful not to hold hands in public again. I imagine Mom nodded a sad and silent good-bye to the innocence of a son growing up. Thing is, I never got to thank her.
Near the center of town, hidden behind another snowbank monolith, adjacent to the gas pumps, is a pay phone, and standing in front of the phone, under the yellow streetlights, are two figures I recognize, the incomparable Mrs. Silverman and her husky, Kai.
Mrs. Silverman is being swallowed by plumes of her own dragon breath, and on her head she wears a hand-knitted blue pom-pom hat pulled down over her ears. It’s Kai who has my attention, though. He’s sitting by Mrs. Silverman’s side. Still. Not scratching. Of course this could just be the soothing, numbing effect of the bitter cold or, more likely, that dose of steroids Lewis insisted I give him. Even so, I catch myself hoping it’s his change of diet beginning to kick in.
“It’s going to be a while,” says Ethel Silverman, cupping a big black mitten across the mouthpiece as she sees me heading her way, staring with wide-eyed curiosity, refusing to continue her conversation.
“It’s okay,” I say, “I don’t need it.” I smile and point across the street toward the diner.
Mrs. Silverman slips in another quarter, still looking as though I might be about to mug her for her change. As I cross the street, from nowhere, a snowplow rattles by, spraying me with frosty slurry. I have time to notice the driver’s smile and dust myself off thinking, what’s wrong with this town?
You know that moment in every good cowboy movie, when our hero wanders into the busy saloon and, in an instant, conversation stops and heads turn and focus on the new stranger in town. Well, as soon as I open the door to the diner this is exactly what happens to me. Either I’ve already been labeled as the discredited son of Robert Cobb or cast as the no-good drifter, here to cause trouble. As I hesitate, looking for a sign to tell me whether or not I should seat myself or wait to be seated, I realize that one particular set of eyes is boring a hole straight through to the back of my head. I try not to meet them, but the uniform makes me take notice. I am face-to-face with a police officer. I’ve never been good at remembering people’s names, but for better or for worse, I have a gift for remembering faces. And right now, I know I’m face-to-face with the bully who taunted me during my school days in Vermont.
I look away. The diner is packed and steamy, the air moist with the grease of fried fat. The cop has obviously been paying attention to The Godfather and The Sopranos. He is seated in a booth with a clear view of everyone who comes in through the front door. As I step into the spotlight of intense and silent scrutiny I feel the familiar tingle at the back of my head and scratch away.
The place is just as I remember it: single room, a little bigger than a railway lunch car, mosaic linoleum, gingham curtains, Formica counters, stools, and a bar on one side of the room, series of two-and four-man booths on the other. The booths have wooden seats, no cushions, uncomfortable like church pews. My mom used to tell me this was to make you eat fast and move on so they could turn over the tables. Two short-order cooks man the grills, and I spy one waitress, way down at the other end of the restaurant. I want her to see me and bail me out, but she seems intent on writing down an order. All I can do is smile and hope the locals understand I come in peace, hurrying over to the only empty booth available, the one directly behind the police officer. I make a point of saying “good evening” to him as I walk past. He follows me with his eyes but makes no reply. I take off my coat, hang it up on the dull brass coa
t hanger at my booth, and shuffle across the seat to rest my elbows on the red-checkered tablecloth.
Though the cop has his back to me, I can see that his proportions are unchanged from his persecution days as a scary senior, when I was a fearful freshman. Same defensive end shoulders and ropey triangular neck muscles that tether an oversize head. But time has taken its toll. Tight curly black locks have been replaced by a bullet head with a reflective glare that resembles one of those tacky garden orbs. The bully has become a slave to vanity. Nothing can disguise the dark shadow of pattern baldness he is probably shaving twice a day.
“Can I get you something to drink?” I look up to see my waitress standing over me, and I jump, rocking back in my booth seat.
“Um … oh, yes … what was that?”
It’s her eyes—one a perfect blue, the other a perfect brown. Not partial but complete heterochromia. Fascinating. The condition can be either genetic or acquired. It’s extremely rare in people, though, interestingly, nearly 8 percent of water buff aloes have some form of heterochromia.
She wipes down the table and pours ice water into a glass, setting it down next to the collection of condiments and ketchup. “Just so you know, we don’t serve alcohol on the premises but we are BYOB.”
Complete heterochromia is all about how much melanin pigment you either have or lack in your iris.
“You okay?”
She’s speaking to me.
“Yes … sorry … that’s okay, I’m on call.” I make it sound as though this is all she needs to know and I can’t tell whether she’s confused or convinced I’m a troublemaker. I press on. “Any chance of getting a coffee?”
“Of course,” she says, looking relieved, “give me a few minutes and I’ll make a fresh pot. Here’s the menu while you’re waiting, and our blue plate specials are on the board.”
She points toward a large whiteboard next to where the cooks are busy grilling and flipping. “Be right back.” She flashes me a smile, and I like the way she pauses long enough for me to register its sincerity before rushing off.
I watch her go, accosted by another patron at another table before she gets very far. She’s attractive, probably in her mid thirties, with thick auburn hair twisted into a braid running an impressive length down her back. She seems to be working the tables alone, and she doesn’t wear a name tag. I guess when you’re serving the same bunch of regulars every night everybody knows your name.
“Hey, Chief.” A stooped old man with a cotton-candy gray beard, on his way out of the diner, has dropped in on the police officer. “When you goin’ to get round to having another word with that limey, Greer? Goddamn dog of his was at it again, barking his head off first thing this mornin’. Worse than any cockerel.”
“Look, Sam,” said the officer, his voice silky smooth and surprisingly calm, “I spoke to Mr. Greer a couple of days ago. He says he’s sorry, but he’s a heavy sleeper.”
“Drunk is what he is,” says Sam, twisting his corrugated cardboard face, seething at this Mr. Greer’s audacity. “The damn dog wants someone to get him some breakfast and all his master ever does is sleep until noon.”
“Chief” sighs, leans back, and spreads his hands wide, palms up. “What more can I do? Give him a wake-up call? Insist he get Toby debarked?”
Sam edges away from the table with a huff.
“Might not be a bad idea,” he says, pulling a pipe out of the breast pocket of his plaid lumberjack shirt and rooting around in his painter’s pants for the pouch of tobacco. “Then again, rat bait might not be such a bad idea, either.” And with that Sam shuffles toward the front door, shaking his head the whole way.
I check out the slightly sticky laminated card that serves as a menu. It’s standard diner fare—burgers, club sandwiches, all-day breakfast, the only form of seafood being the ubiquitous clam chowda and tuna melt.
“Here’s your coffee,” says a voice in my right ear. The waitress places the steaming mug before me. “Cream?”
“Thanks.”
She pours. “Have you decided?”
The acquired form of complete heterochromia can be secondary to trauma, inflammation, and tumors.
Notebook and pencil in hand, she’s ready to take my order. Or maybe my gaping fish mouth distracts her.
“No, sorry, what was the special?” From where I sit I’m having a hard time reading what’s on the whiteboard.
“Let me see.” She looks up at the ceiling for a few seconds. “On Tuesday night, chef offers slices of hardy hand-crafted, grass-fed beef, seasoned with savory vegetables and spices, served over garlic-infused and pureed Yukon Golds, with a sauce of delicately thickened pan juices.” She regards me, poised to write, maintaining an air of seriousness and patient anticipation. She really is very pretty. I can feel my eyebrows knitting, my cheeks inexplicably flushing as I try to work out what she said.
“Did you just describe mashed potatoes, meat loaf, and gravy?”
She shrugs, conceding a hint of a smile.
“Sounds good.” Before I can ask her name, the Chief twists around in his seat and calls, “Hey, Amy, get another slice while you’re up?”
Amy nods as she scribbles and backs away. She’s back a couple of minutes later, and when she slides a second piece of pie across the table toward the Chief he appears to catch her by the wrist because she startles as he leans in closer. “Think about it,” he says, trying to whisper, but he raises his voice to repeat himself when Amy pulls away. “It’s just dinner. It’s two old friends catching up. Simple as that. Nothing heavy.”
“Really, Matt,” she says, her words dripping with sarcasm. “Nothing cute, nothing fancy? You’ll play it straight down the line?”
Strange turn of phrase I think. Where have I heard that before? I try to focus on a bottle of ketchup and its fascinating list of ingredients as I listen in.
“First of all, we were never ‘friends.’ ” Amy pulls out the quotation fingers, though based on the daggers she’s sending the Chief’s way they are totally unnecessary. “And second of all, you’re not exactly known among the eligible and not-so-eligible ladies in town for ‘nothing heavy.’ ”
Second time around I thought the quotation fingers packed quite a punch.
Chief Matt is positively squirming in his seat, angling forward, patting down the air between them for Amy to lower her voice as he shakes his head and tries to whisper, “With respect, that’s a goddamn lie and you know it.”
This time Amy leans in, flicks a stray strand of hair behind her ear, and places her lips close to his ear. “With considerably less respect, no, it isn’t.”
And with that she takes a step back and points a finger at me. “Your dinner’s coming right up.” And then she heads toward the counter to place my order.
I watch her flit across the room. I’m mesmerized, like I spotted a woodland fairy. What’s wrong with me? I don’t have time for this, so why do I have the inclination? The fact that Chief Matt is enamored of Amy should be reason enough for me to keep my distance. He won’t remember me—how many bullies remain haunted by their victims?—but, if I were to mention the R-rated movie Scarface (something he boasted watching while my friends and I were still watching the likes of Bambi) and the fact that, in school, every time he pitched a dodgeball into my face, he would scream, “Say hello to my little friend,” there’s a chance I might jolt his memory. Best not go there.
I pull out my worn copy of Field & Stream, flick through the first few pages, and remember my cell phone. For the record, I am not, and never will be, addicted to inane telecommunication. I don’t have a contact list. I proudly possess a phone regarded as stupid and not smart. You won’t find me logging on to Facebook, trying to convince so-called friends that I am leading a better life than they are, and I am not one of the masses that whips out a phone as soon as the airplane touches down because somewhere in the world someone needs to know I have landed safely. I’m simply checking to see that I’ve still got bars in case I get paged.
Amy appears, steaming plate in hand. “One meat loaf with mashed potatoes and gravy.”
“Thank you.” Ordinarily I would leave it at that, but I discover my mind and mouth slyly adding, “Nothing cute, nothing fancy this time?” It’s the weird phrase she used earlier. I remembered. It’s a quote from a Dirty Harry movie.
She considers me, not sure whether I’m toying with her, and we both notice how Chief Matt’s fork has stopped midway to his mouth. He’s obviously listening. Amy concedes a laugh and a little shake of her head. “Enjoy your meal.”
I watch her go, as does Chief Matt, and for a dreamy second or two, I recognize the fact that I too might be interested in getting to know the feisty Ms. Amy. The unexpected buzz in my pants takes me by surprise. It takes a second to realize it’s actually the vibrating pager in my pocket going off .
I read the digital display, fumble for my cell phone, and dial the number. I should ask for a doggie bag, get back to the clinic, and at least have access to some textbooks, given the high probability of being asked about something I have either forgotten or know nothing about. I need not have worried.
“Who’s this?” says a female voice I instantly recognize.
“Good evening, Mrs. Silverman, this is Dr. Mills.”
“What are you doin’ calling me?”
“You called me, or should I say, you paged me.”
“See, I wanted to leave a message on the machine for Doris.”