What a Dog Knows

by Susan Wilson

  “That’s all?”

  “No. That’s what’s on top.”

  “Keep going.”

  Health records come next. Inoculations, colds, a bout with chicken pox. Nothing extraordinary, nothing that would distinguish her from any of the other children there. Ruby remembers having the chicken pox. The itching. The warnings by the exasperated caretakers to not scratch if she didn’t want scarring. The way Sister Clothilde fed her chicken broth and laughed when Ruby asked if that’s how she got the chicken pox in the first place.

  “Maybe you should flip to the back of the file,” Sabine says.

  Ruby doesn’t want to. Doing it this way, piece by piece feels more correct, as if she’s peeling the layers away and at the end she will find the heart of the matter.

  Beneath the medical records Ruby is surprised to find drawings that she had made in the early grades. Imagine the nuns keeping those, keeping them in a file. Crayon drawings illustrating the life she was leading—a big building, a group of small people, a couple of stick figures wearing something that must represent a habit. Scrawled black crayon a little beyond the edges of the garment. Behind that picture, another of the life she had wished to have. A house, two big stick people and two small ones. A towering tree with bright red apples dotting the green. No Westfalia, no carnival rides, no conical tent with a banner. Ruby is unaccountably saddened by the hopefulness of her child self. When did she stop wanting a normal family? When did a Volkswagen become her home?

  “Ruby? You okay?”

  “Fine.” She sets the drawings aside. “Fine.”

  She lays her hands flat on the next of the documents within the folder. She can feel the raised texture of an imprint. She waits, knowing that if she is patient, she might see something, as if this last piece of her history was a tarot card or a palm open to interpretation. Some truth. Some explanation.

  “Open your eyes, Mom. Get the truth the easy way. Read the last document.” Leave it to Sabine to know what Ruby was doing.

  Three sheets of legal paper stapled together are next. There is rust bleeding from the staple, like dried blood. The heading on the first sheet is in both English and French. It is a pro forma intake form. This is the legal document that put her in the care of the Sacred Heart orphanage, giving them custody of a female infant, surrendered on May 3, 1964, date of birth, May 1, 1964. Surrendered by …

  A shaky signature, almost illegible. Ruby stares at it. In the same way her clearest psychic visions reveal a plain fact, a name appears. Estelle Williamson. Surrendered by.

  Can you die of finding out the basic fact of your life? Ruby sits back, pulls the dog into her arms and rocks. She doesn’t know whether to laugh or weep. Breathless is how she feels, nearly out of body. Could this Estelle Williamson be her mother? Is it remotely possible that it would be this simple? She looks closer at the signature line, reaches for her reading glasses. No. Faded but distinct is a printed word beneath the signature: agent. Not parent. Not mother. Surrendering agent.

  The out of body sensation quickly descends into a common garden variety disappointment.

  There is one last piece of documentation in the file. A Baptismal certificate dated May 10, 1964, presumably a week after her surrender.

  Name of Child: Mary.

  Two nuns stood as godmothers and the custodian as godfather. She remembers him. He was always kind to the girls and now she knows why; he was probably godfather to half of them.

  The dog licks her nose, presses her head beneath Ruby’s chin. “I love you,” she thinks. Ruby cuddles the dog, then remembers her daughter still listening in. “Well, it’s a start.”

  “Start to what?”

  “Finding my mother.” Ruby closes the file folder. “I’ve got a name. If I can find this Estelle person, I know that I’m that much closer to finding my mother.”

  “And at least we can now celebrate your real birthday,” Sabine says, and signs off.

  22

  “I have an opportunity for you if you’re interested.” Ruby has bumped into the milliner at the Country Market. “I know it’s short notice, but would you be interested in doing a party?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Do readings at a bridal shower.”

  “Sure. When?”

  “Well, that’s the thing, it’s tomorrow.”

  “Even better. I’ve never heard of a bridal shower on a Thursday before.”

  “It was the only day we could get the restaurant.” The milliner, Rachel Bergen, flutters her fingers. “Besides, it was cheaper on a Thursday than a Saturday. This is a budget event. But we have no entertainment. I mean, we couldn’t get a, you know.” She flutters her fingers again.

  Ruby takes a stab at Rachel’s meaning. “A male stripper? Kind of an odd choice at a bridal shower.”

  Rachel nods. “This is kind of a combined shower and bachelorette party.”

  “Sign me up.”

  Birthday parties, bridal showers, baby showers, retirement parties have all been a part of Ruby’s job description over the years. When she was raising Sabine, these were her bread and butter. It’s been a few years. Ruby’s preference for being on the road has mostly precluded such events. Having been in Harmony Farms far longer than she had anticipated, and being a fixture at the Makers Faire, has allowed her to become something of a town presence. People know her. Like Rachel here, now asking for a favor. Ruby asks how many readings she might be asked to do. Rachel really has no idea, so Ruby offers her terms, guaranteeing that she’ll walk away from this Thursday-night party with nothing less than $250 and possibly more. Chipping away at the Hitchhiker’s price tag.

  Ruby plugs the yellow extension cord into the Westie’s outlet, puts away her few groceries. Bull is out in the backyard tossing a tennis ball for the yellow Lab. Bull is a pretty good pitcher, and in a wave of insight, Ruby sees him as he might have been many years ago. Trim, clean, athletic. As quickly as the vision came, it dissipated, leaving the real Bull in her sight line—shaggy, stained, and puffing a little with the effort of lobbing the tennis ball.

  The Hitchhiker has gone out to join in the game. Her banner tail is waving and she yips in excitement. Imagine being that enthusiastic about a tennis ball, and one that is pretty gnarly with dog spit. Bull leans over, out of breath. The dogs, sensing that the human participant in the game is done, play a little “catch me if you can” by themselves.

  “I bought lemonade. Want some?”

  “Wouldn’t mind.” Bull pulls himself upright and joins Ruby, who’s dragged over two sagging lawn chairs from Bull’s collection.

  “You know that you should give up the cancer sticks, right? You want to be around for that dog, don’t you?”

  Bull shoots Ruby a look that says this isn’t a new suggestion. “I gave up drinking.”

  “That’s good. So giving up smoking should be easy.”

  “They don’t arrest you if you smoke too much.”

  “Fair enough.” Ruby hands Bull a glass of lemonade. They both look up as Polly’s animal control truck pulls into the yard.

  “You speakin’ to her yet?”

  “I was never not speaking to her, Bull, she was just doing what she’s paid to do.” Ruby pushes herself out of the lawn chair. “Besides, it’s going to work out.” This gig tomorrow night will push Ruby over the thousand mark. With no word yet from Mrs. Cross as to when to really expect the arrival of her son, Ruby is almost complacent about the fact that she can pull together much of the second thousand with another few days of busking around town. There are just enough tourists that she has a good supply of potential customers. And, God bless her, the Hitchhiker is the best shill of them all, attracting anyone who has left a dog behind while traveling. That, plus the steady stream of “pet parents” wanting Fido’s psyche read.

  “Greetings all.” Polly grabs another lawn chair. Ruby hands her a glass. Bull pours the lemonade. The three of them sit quietly for a few moments, content to simply be sitting down and enjoying the lemona
de. The weather today is sultry; August has arrived.

  “You know who that bridal shower is for?” Polly plunges in as if they had been talking about it.

  “Rachel Bergen signed me up. I figure it’s a friend of hers.”

  “Her cousin, well, her cousin’s daughter. A little bit of a rush job, if you know what I mean.”

  “Do people even care about that anymore?”

  Polly waves a dismissive hand. “Apparently some people still do.”

  Buck left her alone in the RV. Ruby dragged herself back into the shower and scrubbed herself until the water ran out. She put on clean underwear. Jeans and a T-shirt. The bloodied nightgown she left in a heap on the floor. Knees to chest, Ruby waited in the dark. It was midnight before she heard Madame Celestine open the door to the trailer.

  “What’s this, then?” Madame Celestine flipped on the lamp and looks surprised to see Ruby sitting there. “Why up so late?” It was such a maternal thing to say that Ruby’s breath catches in her throat and the tears begin to run.

  “Buck…” Ruby found that she had no words to describe this thing that had happened to her.

  “What about him? Is he all right?”

  “He hurt me.”

  Celestine glanced at the heap of nightgown on the floor. “I’m sure it was an accident.”

  In the single women’s trailer, romance novels were passed around from girl to girl. Ruby had read her fair share, and it was with that vocabulary that she finally spat out what Buck had done. “He forced himself on me. He penetrated me.”

  “He would not. You must have done something to make him think it was all right. He’s rough around the edges, but he’s a good boy. I didn’t raise him to hurt women.”

  “He’s rough, all right. Look.” Ruby grabbed the nightgown off the floor, twisted it until the blood stain on the back appeared. “Tell me he didn’t hurt me.”

  “You got your period. That’s all that is. Rinse it in cold water.”

  “There is no more water. I used it up trying to get clean.”

  The sense of power that had coursed through Ruby’s body in confronting Buck in the moments after his assault returned in that moment. It was as if she was transforming from youth to crone, limbs stretching, heart beating. Anger fueling her metamorphoses from child to adult.

  Celestine abruptly turned around, wobbling a tiny bit, and Ruby realized that she was half drunk. Ruby sniffed the air and caught the scent of booze. “We’ll discuss this in the morning. Good night.” She grabbed the handrail and hoisted herself into her bedroom. The metal door clicked shut.

  Ruby shook her head. No, we won’t, she thought. No, we won’t. Ignoring the breaking of her heart, Ruby stuffed her schoolbag with her belongings. She had been so happy with Madame Celestine, letting herself believe that the woman was a mother figure, someone to admire. Someone who would care for her. This new version of herself realizes that the old woman owes her. Owes her for letting her monster of a son back into the trailer. For taking his side over this girl who would love her like a daughter. Ruby’s conscience was clear as she opened the drawer with the day’s take. She’s owed it. She stuffed the bills into her pocket. As Ruby moved toward the door, she spotted something else. The beautiful hand-painted teapot. She’s going to need it to start the next chapter in her life. As carefully as if it were an infant, Ruby liberated the box containing the teapot and slipped it into her bag. Opened the door and took off.

  In the years to come, that teapot would help her support the child who was both penalty and prize.

  Even as she goes through the motions of daily life, Ruby is dwelling on the inconclusive nature of what she has found out. Inconclusive because she doesn’t know the why of her abandonment. Had it become too much for her mother to keep her? Had her mother wanted a fresh start? Had she been coerced into giving her up? The custodial papers offer little more than Ruby’s intake into the orphanage. Every possible scenario spins in her imagination as Ruby grooms the dog, purchases loose tea for the bridal shower readings, showers, brushes her teeth, and looks herself in the eye in the mirror and wills herself to understand. To see.

  She lines up the facts. Rearranges them. There is no dot-to-dot solution. She’s even dealt herself a hand of tarot to see if, armed with this information, she can discern the truth.

  Ruby wakes up Thursday morning with the dog standing on her chest, nose to nose, her round brown eyes fixed on making Ruby open hers. Barely awake, Ruby is defenseless against the dog’s thoughts. The Hitchhiker is growing impatient with Ruby’s distractedness. Ruby feels the touch of grass and the taste of a rubber ball. She isn’t quite saying: “Play.” It’s more she’s thinking that Ruby needs to stop chewing on the hard bone of her new knowledge. “It doesn’t taste good,” thinks the dog. “Give.”

  “You’re right,” says Ruby. It doesn’t taste good. It tastes like the ashes of disappointment. “I wasn’t expecting anything, and yet, with all this information, I can’t get it out of my head that my mother gave me away. I worked so hard to keep Sabine. Is that because I had some latent memory of the moment my mother handed me over?” She hugs the dog to her, breathes in the doggy scent of her. “And here I am struggling to keep you.”

  “Thank you. I love you. I want always to be with you.”

  “Then let’s go earn some money.”

  Ruby has two clients with dogs today. She won’t need a teapot or a set of tarot cards unless the owners suddenly decide to get their own fortunes read. The first is a pit bull type dog, a rescue. The second, the owner proudly mentions, is a rare breed, a Mexican Xoloitzcuintli. He spells it out and then gives Ruby a quick tutorial on pronunciation: Sho-lo-itz-QUEENT-ly. Sho lo for short. Both dogs are exhibiting depression.

  Because the Hitchhiker’s thoughts have been so pronounced this morning, Ruby is a bit surprised that she isn’t getting any thoughts at all from the pittie. Unlike her human clients, Ruby doesn’t want to fake it with the canines. They are sitting in the living room of the owner’s split-level house. The dog has been willing enough to let Ruby put hands on him, but all she feels is a cloud of silence. The dog does seem sad, his stubby ears cocked backward as if he wishes to hide.

  The owner, a young guy with a man-bun and a full sleeve of crimson and green tattoos, waits patiently for Ruby’s diagnosis. Like any good doctor, she begins to gently question the fellow. “Any changes recently in your life?”

  “Same old same old. Work, workout, go out.”

  “Is he alone here a lot?”

  The guy shrugs. “Maybe. I guess so.”

  “How long have you had him?”

  “Well, let’s see. A year, maybe a little more. My ex and I…”

  As soon as he says that, Ruby gets a quick pulse of thought from the dog. “Wait. You said ‘your ex.’”

  “I did.”

  “How long ago, if I can ask, did you split?”

  “You think that had something to do with his mood?”

  “I do. Was he close to her? Does he see her?”

  “Him.”

  “Him. Is there any kind of contact between them?”

  “No. Philip bailed and went out to Seattle.”

  Ruby rests her cheek against the dog’s head, waits. There it is. A fine mist of grief. And a scintilla of anxiety.

  “He’s afraid you’ll let him go too.”

  The client rubs his face. “Is that what he thinks? That I let Philip go?”

  “I could be interpreting it a little broadly, but in Max’s view, you didn’t tell Philip to stay. Like you should have given the command: stay.”

  “What do I do?”

  “Short of finding another boyfriend, try to give this guy a lot more attention. Take him with you more often. Play with him.”

  The young man kneels beside the dog and wraps his arms around him. “Max, I’ll never let you go.” He looks up at Ruby. “Do you think he understands what I’m saying?”

  “Not by words, my friend, by actions.”

&nbs
p; The second dog, the Xolo, whose name is Maggie, is a marked example of beauty is in the eye of the beholder: skinny, hairless, and a mottled black and gray. But the dog has a sweet nature and seems eager to meet Ruby halfway in her quest to figure out what’s bothering her. Gingerly, Ruby places her hands on the dog, finding that the bare skin is baby soft. The dog snuffles at Ruby’s face. “What are these dogs meant to do?”

  “Guards, companions.”

  “And why did you choose such an unusual dog?”

  “I always wanted a cool dog.” The owner is a balding middle-aged man, very typical of the men she’s seen around this upwardly mobile town. A little podgy, nice shoes. Likes status symbols like the Lexus in the driveway and the Rolex on his wrist.

  Ruby strokes the dog’s naked body. It feels like a bald scalp. The dog looks into Ruby’s eyes and she sees that she isn’t sad, she’s bored out of her mind. “She’s pretty intelligent, would you say?”

  “Yes. She was housebroken pretty easily, and her trainer thinks that she could do obedience.”

  “So, you didn’t train her yourself?”

  “Oh, I don’t have time for that.”

  Except for the Turcott’s unhappy Great Dane Ruby hasn’t yet suggested re-homing a dog, but she is tempted in this case. “Do you have a family? Or anyone who takes her for walks?”

  The owner shakes his head. “I see what you’re getting at.”

  “Dogs aren’t accessories.”

  “Is that what you think I’m using her for?” His face is growing flushed, not an attractive look.

  Ruby backs down a bit. No sense pissing off a client. “She’s a sentient being who is telling me that she very much wants to be a bigger part of your life.” Ruby thinks about the Hitchhiker and how enormous her role has become in her own life. Which brings the threat of losing her to mind. She closes off that part of her brain. Ruby’s job right now is to make this unusual-looking dog happier.

  “How do I do that? Make her happier?” He sounds sincere and Ruby relaxes a bit.

  “Look, you’ve taken the first step, recognizing that she isn’t happy. You called me. That’s a big deal, the fact that you noticed her mood. Now talk to her, take her with you for rides to the gas station. What kind of games does she like to play? Tug, chase the ball?”