Just Life

by Neil Abramson

  “We so don’t care,” one of the other soldiers said. “Get off him.”

  Kendall struggled to obey, his arms lifted uselessly in the air and the rifles aimed at his skull. Kendall saw Andy step forward and quickly waved him away. A crowd began to gather around them and the Guard urged it back. In the commotion Louis retreated unharmed from the perimeter and Andy was able to scoop him up.

  One of the soldiers noticed. “Sit tight, kid,” he ordered. Andy reluctantly complied.

  Owens staggered to his feet, pulled his handgun from its holster, and pointed it at Kendall’s head. The crowd gasped almost as one, but Kendall didn’t even blink. “Get that gun out of my face,” Kendall snarled. “Or I will shove it up your ass.”

  McGreary arrived panting. “What the hell is going on?” he yelled. “I’m away for one goddamn minute! Stand down, soldiers, and secure those weapons. And move this crowd back.”

  The soldiers with the M4s surrounding Kendall immediately complied with McGreary’s order and lowered their rifles. Owens, however, seemed to be thinking it over.

  “I said stand down, Owens, you big idiot,” McGreary hissed. “You can comply with that order or finish your tour in cuffs. Your choice.”

  Owens finally holstered his weapon. “Sir, yes sir,” he said through clenched teeth. “He attacked me,” he added, and then turned to Kendall. “Asswipe!”

  “Enough!” McGreary yelled.

  Owens walked off, rubbing the back of his head. The other soldiers tried to keep the crowd moving.

  Kendall stepped up to McGreary. “That jerk pointed his firearm at me on a public street, Lieutenant. He shouldn’t have a gun.”

  “I have this situation now, Sergeant,” McGreary said wearily.

  “Well, I don’t want him on my street. Get him off it or I will.”

  “Look, here’s the deal,” McGreary said. “You could drive a large truck between where you’re now standing and the end of your jurisdiction. You’ve assaulted a member of the New York National Guard in the performance of his lawful duties.”

  “Lawful duties? He was about to club a puppy on a pedestrian-filled New York City street for no reason other than—”

  “Other than he was following his orders.”

  “What the hell are you talking about? Killing puppies? You got orders to do that?”

  “This isn’t some game we’re playing here, Kendall,” McGreary snapped. He glanced at the crowd and dropped his voice. “We have orders to secure the perimeter with force. No dog crosses out of the quarantine area. Period. No exceptions. You want to know what that really means? Talk to your commanding officer or someone with clearance.”

  “But…” Kendall sputtered.

  McGreary’s demeanor softened. “I know you’re doing your job, Jim. Guess what? Me too. I didn’t ask for this assignment and God knows I don’t want it. But I don’t get to choose my wars or where I fight them. Let’s just get through this.”

  “War? There’s no war.”

  McGreary turned to Andy. “Is that the canine in question?”

  Andy didn’t answer.

  “That’s him,” the Guard nearest Andy volunteered.

  “Did he actually cross the perimeter at any point, Private Bryce?” McGreary asked.

  The Guard shrugged. “Don’t think so.”

  “It’s not brain surgery, Bryce. Those barricades are the perimeter, did the dog cross it or not?”

  “There was a lot going on, Loot,” Bryce responded.

  “He didn’t cross it,” Kendall said.

  “Give me the dog, son,” McGreary ordered.

  Andy shook his head. “This can’t end that way.”

  “Come on, kid,” McGreary said. “Don’t make a scene. Just give him to me.”

  “What are you going to do with him?” Kendall asked.

  “Turn him over to the lab coats. Those are my instructions.”

  The crowd was getting sticky again, some slowing down while others stopped altogether.

  Sid reached the perimeter sucking wind. “What’s happening,” he gasped.

  “Everything’s OK,” Kendall said. He knew he needed an exit strategy that would protect the dog and that McGreary could accept. “We’re just going to take him to Dr. Lewis to make sure he’s OK.” He turned to McGreary, hoping the lieutenant understood that bad things happened in crowds and this was neither the time nor the place for an aggressive move.

  “She’s a vet?” McGreary asked.

  Kendall nodded. “She’s just a few blocks away, within the perimeter.”

  “Please,” Sid added. “Let us take him.”

  McGreary looked like he was doing some calculations in his head. “OK. Makes sense to me,” he said. “Bryce, you go with them to make sure the dog is OK and report back.” McGreary moved Kendall two steps farther away and spoke in a whisper. “I’m giving you this one because you say the dog didn’t cross over. I’m trusting you. Don’t prove me wrong.”

  “I won’t,” Kendall said.

  “And please, for both our sakes, stay away from Owens until I can get him transferred out of here.”

  15

  In the relative quiet of Sam’s exam room, Sid held Louis on his lap while Sam completed her examination. Sid’s hands trembled so badly that she took them in her own. “It’s OK now,” Sam told him, trying to convince herself of the same thing.

  A tear rolled down Sid’s cheek and he wiped it away with a meaty paw. “I was so scared. I thought that was going to be it. Thank God for Jim and Andy. I was so stupid leaving Louis tied to the bench with all this going on.”

  “Louis is fine.” Sam rubbed the dog’s ears as if that would prove the truth of her statement.

  “But for how long? You didn’t see the look on their faces. There’s something else going on here.”

  Her father’s words about the inevitability of a QCK campaign echoed in Sam’s ears. “Let’s not panic yet,” she said.

  “I just don’t want to sit around waiting for the day they decide to start knocking on doors. But there’s no place to go either. I feel so helpless.” Sid rose from the chair holding Louis to his chest. “What would you do if they ever came for Nick or your other dogs?”

  Sam allowed herself to think about the reality behind the question. Could it really happen here? In vet school one of her professors had made her class memorize a quote from William Ralph Inge: “We have enslaved the rest of the animal creation, and have treated our distant cousins in fur and feathers so badly that beyond doubt, if they were able to formulate a religion, they would depict the Devil in human form.”

  She fought against Inge’s image of damnation every day, and it really was a fight because complacency was so much easier. How many others were prepared to fight? Certainly not her father. Why would she expect the governor or the mayor to be any different?

  And what if they did come through that door?

  Sam wore the answer to Sid’s question on her face.

  “Just promise me that you’ll take Louis with you,” Sid said.

  “If it ever comes to that then Louis will be right beside me, Nick, and all the others.”

  She realized it was a silly thing to say even before the words came out of her mouth. As if she really could save these dogs when she didn’t even have the first idea of the cause or the epidemiology of the virus. As if she was going to take on the governor and the Guard with her volunteers and little stethoscope. As if she even mattered.

  “I want you to keep Louis here with you,” Sid said.

  “But Sid—”

  “You can say he’s under your care.”

  “I don’t think they’re gonna give a damn what I say.”

  “Please. Perhaps it will buy him some time when the knock comes.”

  Because Sam knew she had no better answer for him, she nodded. She escorted Sid to reception and left him with a hug and a kiss, after which he looked a bit better.

  Back in her office, Sam stared at a favorite photo of her
mother, taken during a rare mother-daughter weekend a year before her death. They had been hiking in the snowy Vermont woods. Her mom looked youthful, confident, and fit, so vivid.

  “I could really use some advice, Mom.”

  “Trust yourself,” her mom would always say. But now it was too easy for Sam to see where her own decisions had taken her. Charlie? Gone. Shelter? Gone. Sanctuary? Gone. Dad? Gone. Mom?

  Gone.

  “I’m not smart enough to figure this out,” Sam told the photo.

  Nick nudged the door open, lay down at her feet, and broke her spiral of self-doubt. “Why are you so tired?” Sam knelt and carefully examined Nick’s eyes. She had a fleeting horrible thought, but then shoved it out of her mind. It’s not possible, she decided; the universe just isn’t that cruel.

  She buzzed Greg on the intercom. “Did Nick’s blood work get faxed over?”

  “Yep.”

  “Any problems?”

  “And I’m just keeping that information from you?”

  “Just checking. Don’t be mean. My inner child is suffering enough today.”

  “His blood was perfect like all the rest.”

  That was a profound relief. “Well, you sure as shit tired him out today.”

  “I do have that effect on men.”

  “Can you take him back to my apartment? I want to give him a break.”

  “That I can do.”

  Nick was fine. Of course he was. She knew that. But she also knew that she had lied to Tom. She did do the what-if thing—so often, in fact, that she was surprised she got any sleep at all.

  What if Nick wasn’t fine?

  What if Sam had been a member of one of those families with a dog that needed to leave the quarantine?

  What if soldiers started to knock on doors because people panicked?

  What if another dog challenged the perimeter?

  Sam knew that she could try to wait it out, play the odds, and see if someone would attempt to do something to her or the creatures she cared about. Or she could try to do something now.

  Trust yourself.

  With a final glance at her mother’s photo, Sam fished the business card out of her pocket. She dialed his number and paced until he picked up.

  “Walden,” he said.

  Sam explained her plan.

  “I don’t know about this,” he said finally. “You have no idea the crap that’s going on. The situation is deteriorating and the governor isn’t helping. Now there’ve been multiple reports of a pack of strays in the park exhibiting suspicious behavior.”

  “You guys do know the park pack thing is all an urban myth, right?” Sam said.

  “It’s impossible to tell what’s real and what’s just mass hysteria at this point. Maybe there is a pack of strays. We know there have been rabid raccoons in the park. Perhaps the strays could be infected.”

  “But none of those raccoons have ever transmitted to dogs. There’s some species transmission barrier going on there.”

  “Maybe the barrier is broken now for some reason. I don’t know. I’m waiting for people to start showing up at Bellevue claiming they’ve got puppies growing inside them.”

  “You said you wanted an ally. I’m giving you a way to avoid trouble at the perimeter and a more aggressive response from others. But for this to work, I need the mayor’s commitment that the dogs who come in will be safe. No visits from your lab brigade. I will draw bloods and turn them over to your folks; the dogs here are under my care. Otherwise people won’t trust this. And I want your commitment, Tom, that I can believe her.”

  “Am I talking into a microphone again?”

  “No. I now know about something better.”

  “What?”

  “Your broken watch.”

  “I should’ve never told you about that… What if a dog shows signs?”

  “You’ll be the first to know.”

  “You’ll need to give those animals up. No fight.”

  “I know and I will.”

  “So you’re saying I’m supposed to trust you?”

  “Think of it as a two-way street.”

  “But you don’t have a broken watch,” Tom said.

  “You visited the shelter, Tom. You know I’m surrounded by them.”

  “OK, I’ll speak to the mayor. But this isn’t a halfway thing, Sam. Old Yeller didn’t exactly have a happy ending. You can’t just change your mind once the shit hits the fan. Even if it gets painful.”

  “I know. Don’t worry about me. I can do painful.”

  16

  The approach of another evening found Gabriel again in his sanctuary. This time, however, the room did not feel so dark, the ornamentation was not as overwhelming, and the wooden crucifix did not seem so high above his head. He didn’t even pay attention to the broken window.

  Gabriel sat cross-legged before the chancel with Eliot on one side of him and Molly on the other. The first few interactions between cat and dog had been less than successful. When Molly initially saw the dog, she glared at Gabriel as if he were an unfaithful husband bringing his mistress to Thanksgiving. Eliot, for his part, could not have been more excited. He must have known a friendly cat in the past because he barreled into Molly, oblivious to her claws and temperament. Molly whacked him on the nose a few times, even drawing a bit of blood, but Eliot was undeterred in his affection. Gabriel would have felt bad for the dog, but the mutt seemed to be having such a good time.

  This was now the second hour and Eliot was beginning to wear Molly down. The cat allowed him to get within six inches before hissing and turning around to show the dog her rear end. Gabriel thought of the song one of his younger congregants sang—“Talk to my butt ’cause my hand’s too busy and my face ain’t got nothing to say”—and laughed.

  “I haven’t heard that sound in this room for quite some time, Gabe.” Channa stood next to him.

  “What can I say? You were right after all. As usual.”

  Channa reached down and rubbed Eliot’s head. “I wish you could see the world as he does,” she said.

  “And what would I see?”

  “You would see the entirety of his were. To know things even though he can’t recall precisely how or when he had learned them. No memory as you conceptualize it.”

  “You mean instinct.”

  “No.” Channa shook her head. “I mean grace. He knows that what he smells can be trusted more than what he sees and what he hears. He knows that people lie through their appearance and their speech—a bright child with beautiful clothes, blue eyes, blond curls, and a sweet voice can deliver a mean kick or offer spiked water, while an old man whose only possessions are his half-rotted teeth and an impossibly worn shirt can offer warmth and comfort. He knows to walk away if the child smells wrong, no matter what the child looks like or says. If the man smells kind, then his filth and grime are illusory and the gibberish he speaks is no more dangerous than the thunder the dog often hears over his head on August evenings. That type of knowing is not instinct. It comes from his connection to the Divine.”

  “And is there a message for me in that?”

  “Memory and knowing are so different. Give up on memory, Gabriel. You will not have it. But you will still have knowing.”

  “Will I still know divisiveness? Will I continue to know hurtfulness and malevolence? Will those persist as the gifts of my own connection to the Divine?”

  “Yes,” Channa said, her voice low with regret.

  “Then you can tell Him to keep his damn knowing.”

  “Gabriel?”

  A hand pulled at him. “Gabriel? Are you all right?” The priest knew this was not Channa’s voice. “Gabe?”

  Sid stood beside him. “Of course I’m all right,” Gabriel snapped, and glanced around. Molly was long gone, but Eliot was now asleep in his lap. How long had it been this time, the priest wondered.

  Sid’s face dropped into his view. “No, you’re not. You were just sitting there. Staring off. I’ve been calling your n
ame.”

  “What are you doing here, anyway?”

  “What? A Jew can’t go into a church?”

  “You know what I mean.”

  “You need to see a doctor, Gabe.”

  “Don’t change the subject.”

  “What subject is more important than your health?”

  “I can think of a few. Besides, I’ve been to a doctor. Several, in fact. The church has a marvelous medical plan.”

  “And?”

  “And I smoked cigarettes and drank Scotch every day for forty years. I’m in perfect health for a hundred-and-twenty-year-old.” Gabriel moved Eliot off his legs (the dog didn’t even stir), and rose from the floor.

  “Let me help you at least.”

  Gabriel ignored the plea. “Are you going to tell me why you’re really here or not?”

  “I came to tell you about what happened with Louis and to see your new dog.”

  “Andy told me about Louis. Tying him to a bench? Not your brightest move, Sid.”

  “Thank you for your comforting words, Father.” Sid closely examined the priest’s face. “You have no idea how bad you actually look.”

  “I wasn’t really asking for your opinion.”

  “Maybe you should. You know, even a blind pig finds an acorn once in a while.”

  “Meaning?”

  “I know I can’t hold a candle to Channa when it comes to being insightful, but sometimes relief comes simply from knowing there’s an interested ear—regardless of what the head attached to the ear actually understands. She valued your friendship and I really would like to honor that, but you just keep on pushing me away.”

  “And what if I have? I’m old. I don’t want to make friends anymore.”

  “Are you so sure there is nothing left to be learned?” Sid put out his hand. “Whatever else you’ve got going on, just allow me the privilege of being your friend.”

  Gabriel thought of Eliot. There was more to learn. But he was so weary. “I don’t think I still know how to do that—if ever I did.”

  Sid pushed his hand out farther. “You do know. I saw it between you and Channa… when I wasn’t blinded by my jealousy.”

  “You? Were jealous of me?” Gabriel grinned like a high school boy who learns for the first time that a girl thinks he’s cute.