by Sheila Agnew
‘Did you girls enjoy the show?’ she asked.
‘It was wonderful, really great,’ gushed Tamara and Kylie in unison and Angela smiled.
‘What about you, honey?’ she asked me.
I nodded truthfully and she smiled, pleased.
‘I saw your poor mother once, sweetheart … dear Alicia. She was on the stage in London. Six years ago or maybe it was seven. She was the most beautiful Rosalind.’
I was shocked to notice that tears came into her eyes. I mean – she saw my mum once in a play. She didn’t know her at all, certainly not enough to cry for her. But I’m used to theatre people being overly dramatic. Tears rolling down her cheeks, Angela leaned down to envelop me in a hug and I felt dizzy and overpowered by the strong smell of her perfume, like incense at Easter mass, a smell that always makes me feel a little afraid. I stiffened. Finn pulled his mom gently away from me.
‘Vamos! Let’s eat, I’m starving,’ he said.
‘Yes, of course, darling,’ Angela answered.
We walked a few blocks to a bistro, dodging around the clusters of tourists gawking at the billboards and the lights in Times Square.
‘I will be on that billboard one day,’ announced Kylie pointing to a giant electronic screen, displaying two actresses standing on a motorbike. Occasionally, Finn glanced behind to make sure Greg, Kylie and me did not get lost in the shuffle.
‘He is so the older brother,’ said Greg, in a resigned tone, slapping a mosquito on his neck.
The bistro had a long narrow bar, smoky mirrors and red leather banquettes around the sides. The maitre d’ embraced Angela and led us to a large booth near the back. Other members of the cast and crew filed in from time to time and sat down at neighbouring booths.
We started with oysters, except for Greg, who has a shellfish allergy, and Kylie, who hates them.
‘I can’t stand the slimy feel and the seawater taste,’ she explained with a shudder.
Angela sat at the edge of the booth so she could nip out for cigarette breaks without everyone having to get up to let her out. She clearly enjoyed being the centre of attention. She was very funny and self-disparaging most of the time and I couldn’t help liking her.
We didn’t have to wait for the newspapers to come out in the morning with reviews of the show because the first show review appeared on a blog eleven minutes after the show ended. During the meal, more and more reviews went online and Daren, the director of the show, read them out in the restaurant and we cheered and clapped because they were all good except for one very sour one, which said that the actress who played the part of Lillian sounded like a raccoon in labour.
‘There always has to be one hater,’ said Finn, rolling his eyes, ‘as if that guy knows what a raccoon in labour sounds like.’
Tamara laughed prettily and reached up and ran her hand quickly through his hair. I didn’t like it.
Chapter 15
August has arrived and with it, the sticky heat that Frank had promised. Scott gave me the money to take Ben to the local grooming salon to get shaved down so he would be more comfortable in the humidity. Ben was prancing along as usual, stopping to sniff and to pee on the trunk of every tree on the sidewalk, especially on the tree trunks that other dogs had already peed on. But when we got to within a few metres of the grooming place, he stopped dead and would not budge, no matter how much I implored him. Eventually, I had to pick him up and carry him in, which caused me to sweat a ton so I looked like I had just stepped out of the shower. Once inside, he seemed resigned to his fate and went off pretty meekly with Meredith, the groomer.
When I picked him up a few hours later, he looked so different, much skinnier, like a shorn newborn black and white lamb, and he wore a bright yellow satin ribbon tied in a loopy bow around his neck. I knew Ben must hate that ribbon. He never wears clothes like so many of the dogs in Manhattan and the ribbon made him look like he was a girl. As soon as we were out of sight, I bent down and unwrapped him. He Evie Brooks is Marooned in Manhattan licked my hand, grateful to have a little dignity restored.
We got back in time to help Scott with the afternoon clinic. The first patient was Bailey, which is obviously a name for a small dog, a miniature poodle or a shih tzu. But, to my surprise, Bailey was a large, beautiful, eight-month old Doberman Pinscher with a friendly face.
Amanda is Bailey’s ‘Mommy’. She is about thirty years old. Her long, dark-brown hair was scraped tightly back from her face into a ponytail secured by a yellow elastic band. From the second we met, she talked in a hoarse, nasal voice, without pausing to breathe, about all the dogs she has ever had or known, which is a lot because she is a professional dog trainer and walker. She said she walks about fifteen dogs a day, five at a time. She also gives puppy training and obedience classes. I thought I recognised her. I remember seeing her in the Park with five dogs, all different sizes, on little leashes connected to a big leash. I noticed that she talked to them constantly, mainly about her difficult love life.
I helped Amanda lift Bailey up onto the examining table. She was still talking. She was sure that Bailey was going to be a champion in the show ring. I started to get the impression that when it came to dogs, Amanda was a bit of a know-it-all.
‘Bailey’s just got a bit of bleeding from his toe nails. I must have nicked one when I was cutting them yesterday, which isn’t like me at all. I’m always so careful.’
Scott began to examine Bailey while Amanda regaled me with stories about the long line of Dobermans she had owned since she was a little girl, one of which had won ‘Best in Breed’ at the Westminster Dog Show in 1996.
‘Wow!’ I said, courteously, although I’ve never been overly impressed with dog show titles. Ben wouldn’t be allowed to enter. Under dog show rules, you are not permitted to show neutered dogs and Ben was neutered when he was six months old because Scott thought that was the healthiest option for a dog living in New York City. And, the dog shows only allow one hundred percent pedigree dogs to take part and Ben is a half-breed. That is so snobbish and unfair. Many of the nicest and friendliest dogs that come into the clinic are mixed breeds, mainly adopted from shelters.
‘We need to get some blood work done, just a few tests,’ Scott told Amanda gently.
Amanda grimaced.
‘Scottie,’ she said loudly and he winced. ‘I can’t afford to pay for totally unnecessary tests. It’s just a little nail problem. It was my fault. These things happen.’
Scott was firm.
‘I think it is more serious than that. We need to do the blood tests. You can pay over time in small instalments.’
Amanda still looked doubtful but she acquiesced.
‘Ok,’ she mumbled and she kept up a stream of chatter to Bailey as Scott drew the blood.
I overheard Scott calling Amanda a few days later with the results. Bailey had von Willebrand disease, a blood disorder, which I gathered could be pretty serious. Scott told Amanda that it was similar to haemophilia in humans.
‘It can’t be cured, Amanda,’ said Scott, ‘but it can be managed. Bailey should be able to have a reasonably normal life. It’s important that you avoid playing rough with him as even light injuries can cause problems.’
I couldn’t hear Amanda’s side of the conversation, but I felt sorry that her dreams of stardom at Westminster with Bailey had been shattered.
Not long after lunch, when I was cleaning out Sam’s new tank, Janet telephoned to announce that she has a wonderful, new boyfriend, Brendan.
‘He’s a sound engineer,’ she said, a little breathlessly. ‘We met on the set of a new TV show filmed in Westport, a documentary about a family from Dublin who moved there to run a goat farm and open up a cheese and yoghurt shop. Remember – I told you all about it in my emails.’
‘Oh yeah,’ I said, privately thinking that the pilot had not sounded riveting.
‘I have never been on a set with so many problems in my life,’ she chattered. ‘The director had a bad pint of Guinness or somethi
ng because he ended up in hospital with a mysterious stomach ailment, and half the cheese turned out to be mouldy and we had to substitute fake cheese.’
She paused for breath.
‘Anyway, about Brendan and me – we are thinking that I will move in with him, to his house in Bray.’
‘That sounds a little fast,’ I ventured.
But Janet wrongly jumped to the conclusion that I was thinking about myself.
‘Love, there will be loads of space for you,’ she emphasised. ‘Brendan’s house has four bedrooms and he has a back garden. He can’t wait to meet you. He has heard all about you. It will be great craic the three of us living together. You are going to adore him. He’s an expert at cooking spicy shrimp pad thai and he does brilliant, dead-on Monty Python impressions.’
‘It was Mum that liked Monty Python, not me,’ I said, absentmindedly, and then I immediately regretted sounding so bratty.
‘He sounds really nice,’ I added quickly.
That made her happy.
‘He is,’ she gushed. ‘He doesn’t have a hair on his head, but he’s gorgeous. He’s completely different to anyone I have ever gone out with before.’
‘That can only be good,’ I answered. ‘I like him already.’
Janet giggled.
‘Not long now, darling, you’ll be back home in just under five weeks.’
Why didn’t that make me feel excited? Maybe I was coming down with something, like heatstroke.
‘Gotta run, miss you loads. Tell David I was asking for him and tell Brendan I look forward to meeting him, bye!’ I said, and hung up.
Chapter 16
It has become our ritual to have breakfast on Friday mornings at Pier 72, a diner on the corner of West 72nd Street and West End Avenue. It’s a real old-fashioned New York City diner with doughnuts under glass and egg-stained menus and an ancient, grumpy waitress, Velda, who barks at the customers and at the Ecuadorean busboys. They ignore her.
Scott always orders the same thing, two eggs over easy with an English muffin on the side. I alternate between pancakes and a Belgian waffle, which Scott refers to as ‘syrup with a side of pancakes or waffles’.
‘How can you eat that corn syrup?’ he wondered.
‘Very easily,’ I responded, liberally drowning my pancakes.
He turned his attention to Joanna, who had joined us this morning. She also ordered what she always orders, Greek yoghurt with honey and fruit with a side of bacon and toast.
Joanna seemed distracted and fidgety.
‘What’s up?’ Scott asked her.
‘Do you know the charity group I volunteer with?’ she asked.
‘Yes, the children’s literacy project – helping the kids in the projects in the Bronx learn to read.’
She nodded.
‘I got railroaded into giving a talk to some of the high school kids next month about what my job is like – What it Takes To Be A Vet. I don’t have a clue what to say. I would rather do fifty consecutive surgeries spaying cats, and with a cheap red wine hangover, than do this presentation.’
Scott grinned.
‘Say that.’
‘What?’
‘There is your opening line. Just be yourself and be honest. Walk them through it.’
Joanna looked dubious.
Scott warmed to this theme.
‘Tell them some of your funny stories about some of the incidents with the animals and the clients.’
‘Like the time Herman, the white bulldog with the farting problem, kept doing nasty silent ones, and Eliot, the cute Asian guy who came in with Charley, his pet iguana, thought it was coming from you,’ I interjected helpfully.
‘You can talk about how, a lot of times, the patient we are really treating is the owner, not the pet,’ added Scott. ‘Tell them why you became a vet. Tell them that becoming a vet involves a lifetime of studying, hard work, late nights and lousy pay, but it’s never dull and the patients make up for all the headaches.’
‘Ok,’ said Joanna. ‘I’m starting to feel inspired.’
‘Why don’t you take Ben with you?’ I suggested.
Joanna took off her glasses and cleaned them as she thought about that one.
‘I could use Ben as a hypothetical patient, do a practical demonstration,’ she said.
I felt a pang of guilt for volunteering Ben. He wasn’t going to like this at all, but he had a tolerant nature. I resolved to make it up to him by putting some of Joanna’s bacon in my napkin to treat him later.
‘I could come with you for moral support,’ Scott suggested.
Joanna waved him away.
‘That’s ok, Stefan already volunteered,’ she said airily.
‘The kids will really be able to relate to Stefan,’ said Scott innocently.
‘Maybe I should ask Leela instead – I’m sure taking time off work to interact with underprivileged kids would be right up her street,’ replied Joanna, even more innocently.
‘Why did you become a vet, Joanna?’ I asked.
She smiled her wide, beautiful, Anne with an ‘e’ smile.
‘You know the kid at school who is always finding and bringing home birds with broken wings to try to heal them, that kind of thing. Well, I was that kid. I always wanted to be a vet. I can’t remember a time when I didn’t want to be a vet.’
She began scribbling some notes of ideas for the presentation on the paper napkins.
‘How long have I worked for you now, Scott?’ she asked.
‘Three years, four months, one week,’ he answered immediately.
‘And in all that time, I’ve never asked you what made you become a vet,’ she said, with a question mark in her tone.
‘You don’t want to hear my boring becoming-a-vet story,’ he said, draining the last of his orange juice.
‘Yes, we do,’ I replied.
He shrugged.
‘Dr Lucas,’ he said.
‘Dr Lucas,’ he repeated, more to himself than to us.
Joanna and I waited.
Scott sighed.
‘I had a golden lab when I was a teenager. Try not to snigger openly, but her name was Goldie. She followed me everywhere. She was such a loyal dog and an incredible jumper. You should have seen how far she could jump from a pier into the water. She loved swimming; she was half dog, half dolphin. When I was sixteen, soon after I got my driving license, a group of us drove across the country to Montana on a camping trip. Just a bunch of privileged Connecticut kids goofing around in the wilderness. One night when we were pretending to be men, drinking beers around the campfire that took us about half a day to get started …’ and he laughed.
‘Go on,’ said Joanna.
‘I realised Goldie was missing, so we divided into two groups and set off to find her. Poor Goldie, she had got her leg caught in a steel trap left by a poacher. When I found her, she was all matted with blood and, despite her tremendous pain, when I knelt beside her, she just gave a little whimper and licked my hand.’
He paused for a minute, remembering.
‘We cut straight through that steel trap and I ran with her in my arms back to the car and set off looking for a vet. You have to remember this was late at night in the middle of nowhere. I stopped at the nearest gas station for directions. The woman there looked at me as if I was crazy to be out of my mind over just a dog. But she said, “Try old Lucas in the next town over,” and she gave me directions.’
‘I arrived at a dilapidated, clapboard cabin, all peeling paint with a rusted car in the front and heaps of junk all over the lawn. I ran up the steps to his porch and kept my finger on that bell until I heard someone yelling, “Alright, alright, no need to wake up the dead. I’m coming,” and this old man opened the door.’
‘He looked in bad shape, more like a homeless drug addict than a vet. He had a vest on that could have been white once, with gaping holes and some kind of dark pants held up by braces. His hair was long and grey and matted and he had a grey beard with bits of barbeque he
had for dinner stuck in it. He smelt of stale beer and something else, maybe urine.’
‘He took one look at Goldie and me and said, “Bring her in, son,” and I followed him through into the back room where he saw the animals. I’ve never seen a poorer practice. He didn’t have any modern equipment at all, just a few bits and pieces that looked like they had been around since the Civil War and an ancient examining table, which had only three legs. “Put your leg there,” he grunted. And I shoved my leg against the table to keep it up.’
‘All night long, he worked on Goldie while I held up the table. He didn’t say much. He just concentrated. When dawn finally came, he straightened up and he said, “We’ve done what we can, it’s in God’s hands now.” I asked him about paying him, explaining I just had a credit card my parents had given me, and he laughed so hard that I thought his wobbly looking front teeth were going to fall out. “No credit cards here, son, what have you got in cash?” So I emptied my pockets and I had seven dollars and twenty-three cents. “That will do,” he said and he put the money in his pocket and shuffled out of the room.’
‘That’s an incredible story,’ said Joanna. ‘So old Lucas cured Goldie and that inspired you to become a vet.’
Scott shook his head.
‘No, Goldie died later that day, peacefully in my arms, and I buried her there in Montana. But I have never been able to forget the way Dr Lucas tried with what he had, which was little more than his own pair of hands. If it were not for him, I would probably have been a business major at college and right at this very moment I would be on a yacht, surrounded by a bevy of Victoria’s Secret models.’
Joanna smiled and she put her hand on top of Scott’s and I put my hand on top of hers.
‘What have we got here, The Three Musketeers?’ asked Velda, with a sniff, tearing out the bill and dropping it down on our table.
‘Absolutely,’ said Scott, winking at her, ‘do you want to be d’Artagnan?’
‘I’ve no time for your shenanigans, Dr Brooks, I have work to do,’ and she shuffled off, but not before giving him a second free refill of coffee.