Earnest

by Kristin von Kreisler

  Hardly likely. “I see,” Jeff said.

  “If the study finds a problem, you’ll have to come up with another parking plan. We also want a traffic count.”

  Are you joking? Our traffic engineer will fall asleep waiting for passing cars. “Given the location, do you think the count is necessary?”

  “If I didn’t think so, I wouldn’t ask.”

  Grabowski’s demands irritated Jeff, itches he couldn’t scratch. He thought, Go ahead, Grabowski. Jerk us around. It’s part of my job.

  Jeff glanced at Anna’s photo on his desk. He’d let her jerk him around about Earnest, but that was about to end. This morning he’d left her the voice mail he’d thought about all week. He’d told her that at eight tonight he was going to sit at her door till she let him in, and, once and for all, they’d end their misunderstanding. “I love you,” he’d said.

  Jeff told Grabowski, “I’ll get back to you with the traffic study. Six weeks?”

  “I’d say more like three. A month, tops.”

  You say, “Jump,” and I ask, “How high?” “We’ll do our best.”

  Jeff was hanging up the phone when his assistant, Kimberly, set a certified letter next to his phone. From Horowitz, Mason, and Drudge, Attorneys-at-Law. It wasn’t Mrs. Blackmore’s firm, but maybe she’d changed lawyers.

  Expecting a complication from Mrs. Blackmore, who was an expert in making Jeff ’s job harder than it needed to be, he opened the letter. Expensive stationery typical of lawyers. The smell of ink. Letterhead in bold black print that bristled ego.

  As Jeff read, his gaze became intense enough to slice the paper. He couldn’t be reading right. He started again. Each of Sheldon Horowitz’s words could have been a bullet Jeff was biting—and he was cracking teeth: “Harassment.” “Stalking.” “Over the line.” “No contact.” “With Anna or Earnest.”

  No contact with Earnest! Some lawyer dared tell Jeff he couldn’t see his own dog? Who the hell did Sheldon Horowitz think he was? What lies had Anna told him?

  Jeff turned Anna’s photo around to face the wall. Suddenly, it sickened him to look at her. All week he’d thought of her with tenderness, and he’d just left his loving message, which he’d regret to his dying day. Never would he have believed she’d sic a lawyer on him. And the preposterous claims! Harassment? Stalking? Where had she come up with those? She’d gone beyond the realm of decency into the land of ambush.

  Reeling from shock, Jeff buried his face in his hands. He’d been a fool to trust Anna. To love her, he’d been out of his mind. He was embarrassed to have been so stupid. And to think he’d wanted to marry her!

  He may have been wrong to leave that damned message, but, come hell or high water, he was going to get Earnest back. Slowly, Jeff ’s shock expanded like combustible gas. It seeped into his mind, filled its darkest corners, and blazed into fury.

  As his face turned fiery red, Jeff muttered, “This is war.”

  From the sideline, Jeff clapped his hands and shouted, “Go, go, go!” His tyke soccer team of five-year-olds, the Mini Kickers, ran around the field, their skinny chests heaving under small green jerseys. From brightly colored camping chairs along the sidelines, mothers and fathers yelled, “Control the ball, Duncan!” “Behind you. Look, Joey!” “Kick it! Kick it!” Alan Biggs, an attorney and Jeff ’s co-coach, who was even taller than he was, encouraged from the other side of the field.

  Usually, Earnest, as team mascot, watched from the touchline. However, for the fourth Saturday in a row, he hadn’t come to Heron Harbor Park. “Not feeling well” to explain his absence no longer cut it. His missed games were more reason for Jeff to be angry.

  Both teams ran to the center of the field and clumped together. Jeff and Alan’s boys were trying to get the ball and score with only forty seconds left in the game. They were behind, but another goal would win it. Jeff yelled, “Come on! You can do it! Let’s go!”

  Alan’s son, Bobby, broke away from the others. He had the ball! He kicked it with the power of his entire forty-five pounds—but in the wrong direction, toward his own team’s goal.

  “Stop! Stop!” Alan shouted.

  “Go back!” Jeff yelled, and pointed to the field’s other end.

  The Mini Kickers’ parents wailed, “Turn around! Wrong way!” Pandemonium reigned.

  Bobby kept kicking the ball toward the wrong goal. Clearly, he did not realize his mistake. He must have seen glory ahead, and he was determined to reach it. He closed in on the crossbar, took careful aim, and with one last triumphant effort, he sent the ball into the Mini Kickers’ net and scored for the opposing team.

  Bobby jumped up and down and waved his arms in victory, but slowly it seemed to register on him that he was the only person cheering. He looked at his father, then Jeff, then his teammates’ sullen faces, and Bobby’s grin slumped in confusion. As a sun of understanding rose in his vulnerable brain, his lips rounded to a small O of horror. He seemed to shrink, then crumble into small, embarrassed pieces.

  Jeff ached with sympathy for him. When the referee blew his whistle to end the game, Jeff hurried down the field to assure Bobby that we all make mistakes, nobody gets it right every time in life, lapses of judgment happen every day. As Jeff himself had just learned by going along to get along with Anna and telling her he loved her in his damned voice mail message. He’d headed for the wrong goal and run the wrong way. His mistake had been far worse than Bobby’s.

  After Alan’s wife took Bobby home and everyone had left, Jeff and Alan leaned back in their camp chairs with Cokes for a postmortem about the game and a last shot at sun before the autumn rains.

  “I’ll give Bobby a pep talk when I get home.” When Alan set the heel of his size-fourteen running shoe on his chair’s seat, his long, thin leg looked like a collapsible yardstick.

  “I was proud the other kids didn’t make Bobby feel bad. Maybe all our talk about good sportsmanship is paying off,” Jeff said.

  “I wish Earnest had been here. He’d have made Bobby feel better.”

  “Yeah . . . well.” Jeff flicked sweat off his Coke can. “I think I need your help to get Earnest back.”

  “Where is he?”

  “Anna’s holding him hostage.” Jeff let out a long and angry breath. He explained the whole miserable business, starting with his move from the condo and ending with Sheldon Horowitz’s letter.

  Alan’s nervous laugh surprised Jeff. “What’s so funny?”

  “Horowitz. Anna’s not messing around. He’s a hard-nosed bastard. People call him ‘Mad Dog,’” Alan said.

  “Great.” Jeff ’s fury heated up a few degrees. “He accused me of stalking. Can you believe that?”

  “He’s setting up a paper trail. He’s warned you. He’ll be waiting to see if you do something stupid.”

  Jeff shook his head. “But Earnest is mine. I want him.”

  “If it means a legal fight?”

  “What choice do I have? Anna’s brought in Mad Dog.” Jeff spat out the name through contemptuous lips.

  Alan fixed Jeff with his intelligent eyes. “You’d better think carefully. Litigation costs you.”

  “I have deeper pockets than Anna does.”

  “There’s also a big price to pay in time and energy,” Alan said. “You’d be asking for more sleepless nights than you can imagine. If you think you’re angry now, wait till Mad Dog goes after you.”

  “It’ll be worth it when I get Earnest back.”

  “But you might not. That’s the thing. Mad Dog’s a diabolical genius at finding creative ways to screw people.”

  Dismayed, Jeff looked at the harbor. On the beach, a heron was scratching fleas, and a golden retriever scared ducks into flight. The water was rough. Small white caps bobbed in the waves.

  “So Anna has a maniac to represent her. What am I supposed to do?” Jeff asked.

  “I’d go to mediation. You and Anna could meet with a neutral third party who’d help you figure out what to do with Earnest. It’d be a lot c
heaper than a trial.” Alan rolled his Coke can between his palms.

  “Anna and I could never compromise about Earnest,” Jeff said.

  “You’d be surprised. When push comes to shove, people usually work out their differences.”

  “What if we don’t?”

  “You declare an impasse. And you have the pleasure of watching Mad Dog grind you up and spit you out in court.”

  Perish the blasted thought. Jeff took his last swallow of Coke and crushed the can in his fist. Maybe mediation was the wrong goal. He could end up as vulnerable as Bobby Biggs, running in the wrong direction. But what choice did Jeff have?

  “I don’t know.” He wiped his hand over his face, covered his mouth.

  “You don’t have much to lose.”

  “Can you set it up? Go with me?” Jeff asked.

  “If you want. The trick is to get Anna there,” Alan said.

  “She won’t talk with me. You’d have to track her down.” Jeff watched the golden chase another duck.

  “I’ll give it a try,” Alan said. “No guarantees.”

  CHAPTER 21

  Anna was putting together a Weep-No-More bouquet of sunflowers for Edna Cartwright, whose husband, a freighter captain, had died of a heart attack on the way to Singapore. Edna’s neighbors had gone together to order the flowers, and Anna wanted them to cheer her. She stroked the yellow petals and whispered, “Go out into the world and do your job.”

  As she fluffed a matching bow around the Weep-No-More’s vase, the phone rang.

  “Can I order some flowers?” The man’s voice was as rich as butterscotch. If he were a late-night radio host, women would fantasize about him.

  “I take phone orders if you have a credit card,” Anna said.

  “Do you deliver?”

  “At the end of the day.”

  “Great. I want you to take some flowers to my wife.”

  “Any special occasion?”

  “It’s for a secret anniversary.”

  “Oh . . .” Secret! Anna’s imagination leapt to its feet. The flowers could mark the day he and his wife robbed their first bank, or divorced their former spouses and ran away together. If the latter, Anna could deliver the Humdinger or another of her specialties, the Floral Smooch. Anna also made an arrangement called the Golden Glow, of orange gerberas, gold cushion mums, and red daisies. That would work.

  “What flowers would your wife like?” she asked.

  “I’m not sure.”

  Anna searched her mental catalog. He’d make it easier if he told her what the secret was—but, then, maybe she didn’t want to know. “Do you want roses? Lilies? I could do a mix.”

  “I’ll leave it up to you.”

  Yikes.

  Anna took the man’s credit-card number and home address. He told her that his card should say, “Remember, Sweetheart?” He added, “Don’t forget the question mark.”

  Later, Anna was still trying to decide what bouquet best fit a question mark, when Joy showed up in pink skinny jeans and a black lace top. “Where’s Earnest?” she asked.

  “At the library. Today’s his day to encourage kids to read aloud,” Anna said.

  “Right. I forgot.” Joy settled on the stool next to the counter and rested her hands on her knees. “Slow day. All I’ve sold are a few motley birthday cards. I’m trying not to get freaky about my poverty.”

  “You’ll sell some gifts tomorrow.” Anna brushed ribbon trimmings into a pile on her counter. “I need some help. A man just ordered his wife flowers for a secret anniversary. I can’t decide what to put together.”

  “What’s the secret?”

  “He didn’t say. I was thinking the day they eloped.”

  “Way too tame. It’s got to be more delicious. Sex has to be in there somewhere.” Joy held out her hand, palm down, and examined her coral-pink polished nails. “At the very least it’s the first time they made love. Maybe in some weird place like a hot air balloon or on a McDonald’s bathroom floor.”

  The wheels of Anna’s mind began to turn. “In a Macy’s fitting room. Under the bed. On a golf course. In an aerial tram.”

  “You got it. Now what about flowers?” Joy asked.

  “Some dark, exotic ones. Black calla lilies. Queen of the Night tulips.”

  “Queen of the Night would fit right in for sure,” Joy said.

  Anna rested her fists akimbo and shook her head. “The problem is my inventory’s low. I don’t have any dark, exotic flowers.”

  “Make the Humdinger. If you gave that wife a dandelion and crabgrass bouquet, she’d be thrilled because her husband remembered the secret. The Twit never remembered anything. Including that I was his wife.”

  Anna threw the cuttings from Mrs. Cartwright’s sunflowers into a plastic garbage can and wiped her hands on her blue apron. When she glanced out the bay windows, she saw a man hammering a sign into the front yard. His beard looked like the fur of a cadaverous alley cat.

  “Joy, look.” Anna went to the window between Constance and Edgar, who’d lately perked up.

  Joy crossed the room and peered out. “Boy, would Lauren ever like to get her scissors on that ghastly beard. A whole family of hamsters must be nesting in it.”

  “The sign can’t be for politics. There’s no election,” Anna said.

  By the time she and Joy stepped outside, the man had put his hammer into his backpack and started down the street. The sign he’d left behind was plastic-coated poster board stapled to two stakes. Across the top was printed, NOTICE OF APPLICATIONS FOR DEMOLITION AND BUILDING PERMITS. Naomi Blackmore was listed as the applicant/owner, and Randy Grabowski as the head planner. The proposal was described: “Remove current residence and construct a commercial building.”

  “I can’t believe it,” Anna fumed.

  “This makes it official. Those putrid worms,” Joy said.

  “I feel sick.”

  “It’s no surprise. We already knew Jeff filed for Mrs. Scroogemore’s permits.”

  “This sign’s a finger in our eye.” Anna could practically hear bulldozers flattening Grammy’s house. She could smell dust and see wood scraps, glass shards, and brick rubble overflowing Dumpsters. “It’s not fair.”

  “Hey! I just bought us some kettle corn.” Lauren hurried down the sidewalk, wearing animal-print harem pants and her Salvation Army Eileen Fisher sweater. As she got closer, she stared at Anna’s and Joy’s faces. “Who died?”

  “Look.” Anna pointed at the sign as if it housed flesh-eating bacteria. “It’s Jeff.” As Lauren quickly read the sign, Anna added, “I’m not sure what we should do.”

  Lauren put a soothing arm around Anna’s shoulders. “We’ll think of something. We’ll fight.”

  “But how?” Anna asked.

  “Bring on the tar and feathers,” Joy suggested.

  “We’ll find a way, Anna. Don’t worry. We must have months before they’d come after the house,” Lauren said.

  “That sign can’t hurt us. It’s just words,” Joy said.

  “Yes, but we have to stop Jeff,” Anna said.

  “Here. Have some comfort food.” Lauren held out her bag of corn.

  Anna popped a kernel into her mouth. “I want to rip down that sign and burn it.”

  “That wouldn’t accomplish anything,” Lauren said.

  “It would show how mad I am,” Anna said.

  “We have to keep calm and strategize,” Lauren said.

  “And never give up.” Joy grabbed a lusty handful of corn and spilled kernels on the sidewalk.

  Anna narrowed her eyes and said, “This is a fight to the finish.”

  CHAPTER 22

  The office of the mediator, Lincoln Purcell, occupied the first floor of a white historic house, which looked like Mrs. Blackmore’s minus the turret and plus five fluted columns, thick as telephone poles. His assistant escorted Jeff and Alan to a mahogany-paneled library. Though French doors looked out to a rose garden, the room was dark. At a trestle table in the center of
the room, Jeff studied the floor-to-ceiling shelves of leather-bound books, their spines as stiff as his was.

  Alan looked through notes on a yellow legal pad while Jeff listened to ticks of a grandfather clock. Anxious for the damned mediation to begin, he thrummed his fingers on the table—until he heard Anna’s voice, then toenails clicking on oak.

  “Earnest is here!” Jeff jumped to his feet to rush into the hall.

  Alan grabbed Jeff ’s sport coat sleeve and pulled him back into his chair.

  “I want to see my dog. It’s been six weeks,” Jeff protested.

  “Shhhh,” Alan warned.

  Too late.

  Earnest barked, quick staccato barks, every one of which ended in an exclamation point. I heard Jeff! He’s here! He’s here! Earnest’s nails skidded on the hardwood as he charged the library door. It’s me! Let me in! I want to see Jeff!

  Again Jeff got up, and Alan yanked him down. “Don’t go out there. You and Anna will fight. You can see Earnest later. Now’s not the time.”

  Jeff heard a gladiatorial shuffle of paws and feet and knew that Anna was tugging Earnest’s collar and trying to lead him down the hall. Resisting, he cried and fought his way back to the door. He whimpered and sniffed at the crack underneath as if he couldn’t get enough of Jeff’s smell.

  As Jeff ground his teeth, he shook hands with agony. It crowned every other awful feeling he’d had since moving from the condo. His best friend on earth was out there, and he’d doubtless concluded that Jeff didn’t care enough to open the door. Hurting Earnest’s feelings like that was torture.

  “Come on, Earnest. Heel!” Anna sounded exasperated.

  The more exasperation for her, the better, Jeff thought.

  Suddenly, Earnest let out a small but urgent shriek. Someone might have hit him or stepped on his paw.

  Alan grabbed Jeff ’s sleeve before he could leap up again. “Mad Dog must be out there,” Alan said barely loud enough for Jeff to hear over Earnest’s protests.

  “If he so much as touches my dog . . .” Jeff said.

  “You’ve got to go with the flow today. Zen. One minute at a time. Let this play out,” Alan said.