Stray

by Stacey Goldblatt

  “Thanks.”

  “And don’t forget to bring your phone!” she yells as I close the door.

  I grab a sweatshirt from my room, pull my hair from behind my ears, and give myself a once-over in the mirror. I’m hardly Laney Benning. Compared with her, I look like a castaway forced to live without a pair of tweezers or a mascara wand.

  I crane my neck to view Laney and Carver across the street through my bedroom window. They’re waiting for me on the street, in front of her house.

  If I don’t go out there, a love affair between Laney and Carver could blossom. In his wedding reception toast, Carver might say something like “At first, I liked Laney as a friend. But a few days later, we fell in love under a streetlight, waiting for some girl—what was her name? Well, she never showed up.”

  And there I’d be, eyebrows unplucked, at some table, with Mom and my eleven dogs, who would be whining for bites of my chicken cordon bleu.

  Deep breath.

  I fling my backpack over my shoulder so that Mom won’t find it should she happen to be in my room.

  Ready. Set. Go.

  Carver, Laney, and I walk in the street: Carver in the middle, Laney and I on either side of him.

  “It’s so quiet here,” says Carver.

  “Is that a bad thing?” I ask.

  “Why would that be bad?” Laney scrunches her face. It’s body language for “You are an idiotic tree shrew for asking such a stupid question.” Makes me feel like I’m a kid.

  Carver cuts in. “I just meant it’s weird.” I notice him look at me again. I’m keeping score. “I’ve always lived around noise. San Francisco is pretty loud. You can always hear an engine roaring or a plane overhead.” Then he looks at Laney. I’m sure she’s keeping score, too.

  We walk another few blocks to Juniper Street and reach a quaint blue clapboard house with a real estate sign sporting a glamour shot of Laney’s mom, Trina Benning. A smile that big has to be fake. No one on earth is that happy. Laney stops on a patch of grass. “Shhh,” she whispers, “right here.”

  I know where we are headed. Nina went into the house last week; now it’s my turn.

  Laney’s eyes sweep the neighborhood to be sure all is clear, and then she leads us to the illuminated porch. Instead of knocking on the door like a normal, polite person might, Laney reaches down to a little lockbox hanging from the doorknob. After she presses a few buttons, the face of the box comes off, revealing a key.

  With the key she unlocks the door, and we follow her inside. The hardwood floor creaks beneath us with each progressive step. All of a sudden, I realize that I am off my mother’s leash, yet as we get farther into the hollow of the house, I can hear her rattling the collar behind me.

  But I keep walking.

  A dog during play reveals its true nature.

  —Michael Kaplan, The Manifesto of Dog

  The house smells like fresh paint. A single light pours onto a staircase.

  Laney escorts us up the steps. A flash of pink underwear sneaks out from under her insanely short skirt. Carver must see it, too.

  We enter a room barely lit by the stairwell light.

  “Are we trespassing?” I ask. Mom would go into shock if I were caught doing anything that’s punishable with fines and probation.

  “No, my mom’s the real estate agent. I do this all the time,” Laney says, like this is normal. “She keeps the access codes on a clipboard in her home office. Besides, I only go in the empty ones.” What a saint.

  Carver speaks up. “Maybe we should go.” Good boy.

  Laney walks over to the window, pushes it open, then strides to the doors of the closet and slides them to one side. “Give me a lift?” she asks Carver. He creates a stirrup with his hands and hoists Laney up so that she can reach behind the top shelf of the closet.

  The guy’s got integrity, because he doesn’t even so much as peek up Laney’s skirt.

  She dismounts, holding a dark little drawstring bag from which she plucks a tightly rolled cigarette and a lighter.

  When dogs feel fear, they bark. Or sniff. Or their hair rises. The hairs on my arms stand at attention. Would getting caught with this involve jail time?

  Laney pinches the joint, brings it to her lips, and thumbs the lighter until the hissing flame lights the tip. She closes her eyes and inhales so hard that the smoke must travel to her kneecaps. She holds her breath, then her lips part and a thin wisp of smoke slithers out.

  She reaches the joint toward Carver. “Want some?”

  He takes it from her and inhales a deep drag, his face caving into contortion. Then he passes it to me.

  I hold it between my fingers like some specimen I’ve just pulled out of a petri dish. My turn.

  The stub feels soggy. A head of ash forms, waiting for me to flick it. I don’t know how to fake this. Or even if I should fake it.

  I pass it right back to Carver. And as if we’re playing a nightmare game of hot potato, he won’t take it.

  “You don’t want any?” he asks, baffled.

  I shake my head.

  Laney tweaks it from me and takes another hit, then holds it out to Carver while her lungs absorb the smoke.

  “No, thanks,” he says.

  She exhales the smoke toward the ceiling. “You can’t get high off one toke,” she says, sucking in more.

  Carver looks at me like he’s trying to figure me out.

  And I look back, doing the same.

  A dog’s health reflects its owner’s nurturing or lack thereof.

  —Michael Kaplan, The Manifesto of Dog

  During the walk home, I try to gain a significant lead on Carver and Laney, but Carver is close behind me, trying to catch up. “Wait!” he yells.

  A montage of confusion wraps around me, keeping me from slowing down. I see Mom waggling her finger at me, Dad clicking his clicker to make me heel, Kirby shaking his head in disappointment, Carver asking me to steal more campfire. And I didn’t even do anything wrong. Except maybe trespass. And lie to my mother.

  What is the matter with me?

  We turn onto our street and getting home becomes urgent. I practically do a series of high jumps to get to my front door, and stumble through the wall of dogs who await me there.

  Grandma is on her baking stool in the kitchen, plopping softened pats of butter into a bowl. Her eyes scrunch up when she sees me. “Vhat is vrong?”

  I’m about eight feet away from her and somehow she manages to read me. Mom can be an inch away, wearing eyeglasses, and not have a clue.

  “Nothing. Nothing’s wrong,” I say.

  “Something is vrong.” And with the vigor of an electric mixer, Grandma twirls her wooden spoon, transforming flour, sugar, and egg into creamy cake batter. Normally, I’d eagerly swipe a finger along the rim of the bowl. But not tonight.

  The dogs totter upstairs with me to Mom’s room, where she is splayed on her bed, holding an issue of National Geographic. I keep a safe distance from her, worried that I reek of secondhand smoke. “I’m home.”

  Mom looks at the clock on her nightstand. “It’s only eight-thirty. You had till nine.” She must be surprised, because when she gives me an inch, I usually take it. Mom puts her magazine on her lap.

  Oh, no, please don’t let her pat the mattress for me to come and sit down next to her. “You left your keys in the door earlier. I shouldn’t have to remind you that you need to be more responsible. For God’s sake, you’re sixteen.” She sighs in frustration. “I put them on your dresser.”

  I had to screw up something. My mouth comes to the rescue with a yawn.

  “Love you,” she says as I leave the room. She clicks off her bedside lamp.

  “Me too.” I doubt she hears me, because after lights-out, she is the kind of person who fades into dead sleep when her head hits the pillow.

  The dogs go into my room, but I stop outside Mom’s door and press my back against the wall.

  I’m her—the girl in the made-for-television drama. The one wh
o dodges the doobie, the one all the adults of the world applaud because she “just said no.” Oprah will call me to be on her show featuring Teens Who Don’t (a panel of probably five people my age). My peers in the audience and watching from home will flip me the finger.

  Southpaw pokes her head out my bedroom door, curious about why I’m not in there yet. She dodders over to me. I slide down the wall, get on all fours, and crawl into my room with her, petting Fu-Fu for good measure. I climb onto my bed, tug the covers over me, and create a cave.

  Scores of people my age are probably congregating near a bong or popping little pink pills into their bodies right now. This whole pot thing should be no big deal. One could do something a lot worse, like leave her keys dangling in the front doorknob.

  Southpaw jumps onto my bed. I tuck her under the covers with me and scratch the coarse hair on her back. Her thumping leg tells me she’s grateful.

  I reach into my backpack, fumbling for the phone.

  Nina answers on the first ring.

  “I have to talk to you.”

  “Shoot, sugar. You okay?”

  “I went for a walk with Carver and Laney. She took us to that house. You know, the one you went into last week.”

  “Yep. So what happened?”

  “They smoked pot.”

  “Did you freak?” Nina asks after a thoughtful pause.

  “Kind of”

  “Do you remember that I’ve had my share of it?”

  “Yeah, but you said it made you paranoid.”

  “It did, but not everyone gets the same kind of high. So did you say something to them?”

  “No, but I ran away from them when we were walking home.”

  “Why?”

  “I don’t know. I was uncomfortable. I guess seeing Carver do it sort of surprised me.”

  “So you really like this guy?” Nina says with a coy lilt in her voice.

  “I do. I admit it. But what if he’s some pothead?”

  “Then maybe you’ll end up not liking him. He probably does it once in a while, like me. You don’t think I’m a pothead, do you?”

  “No,” I answer.

  “You want to know what I think?”

  “I called you, didn’t I?”

  “You’re careful about stuff, and that’s fine. And I totally love that you are still friends with me even though I’m not as careful as you. But I do think you, Natalie, are scared shitless.”

  I feel stung. “Scared of what?”

  “Look, I know you think for yourself. I’ve heard enough arguments between you and Kirby to know that. But ever since I’ve known you, you’ve been making up little lies to avoid the wrath of your mom.”

  “If I didn’t, I’d have no social life,” I say defensively.

  Nina is kind enough to ignore the pinched tone of my voice. “Right, and that’s fine, too. But, and please don’t get pissed off at me for saying this, okay? You wanted my opinion.”

  “Say it.”

  “You don’t stand up to her. Not like you should go ape shit or anything, but if you don’t start speaking up for yourself, you’re going to lie yourself into someone you’re not. You can’t see everything through your mom’s eyes.”

  “So what should I do, ask my mom for permission to trespass and date a guy who dabbles in pot?”

  “No, I’m not saying that. I just think that sometimes you confuse what your mom thinks with what you think. What does your gut tell you about Carver?”

  I think for a minute. “There’s this thing I’ve never felt before. I spent last week making up great excuses not to like him. But he’s nice, different. I feel a connection with him or something.”

  “Is that your final answer?” Nina asks.

  “Yes,” I say.

  “Sleep on that, okay?”

  “Thanks, Nina.”

  “I loves you.”

  “Loves you, too.” I smile and flip my phone closed.

  I took Mom into that house with me tonight and ran home with my tail between my legs. Nina’s right. I’m not sure where Mom’s opinions end and mine begin.

  But I might be ready to find out.

  Dogs competing for pack dominance must be separated.

  —Michael Kaplan, The Manifesto of Dog

  Tuesday morning, after Mr. Klinefelter gives us a lecture about the Louisiana Purchase Treaty of 1803, he asks us to spend forty-five minutes in our cooperative groups looking closely at the treaty and assessing how the acquisition of 828,000 square miles of land, purchased at less than four cents an acre, added to Thomas Jefferson’s “Empire of Liberty.”

  Allison yawns when Richard asks her to contribute her opinion. Laney looks directly at me and says, “It sounds like Thomas Jefferson manipulated Napoleon for the land.” Laney is defending Napoleon. It is also a direct stab at me, I assume, because she glares at me even after she says it. Yeah, me and big bad Thomas Jefferson. Sheesh.

  Walking to work after school is becoming its own minidrama. I travel from the roots of America’s history to the modern-day scene of life in a dog clinic, both nervous and thrilled about seeing Carver.

  Vernon is behind the reception desk when I get there. “Hey, little lady. What’s going on?”

  “Nothing much. School.” I go behind the desk and drop my backpack onto the floor. “I swear my history book weighs as much as a Saint Bernard.”

  “Does it drool, too?” Vernon asks.

  I laugh. “Luckily, no.”

  “Your mom’s in the back room spaying Tinkerbell. Carver’s back there, too,” he says.

  I take the needed precautions: I scrub my hands, then grab a face mask and loop the straps over my ears. Mom and Carver, also masked, hover over Tinkerbell in the surgery room. She’s a fluffy white Maltese who is anesthetized, sprawled on her back, and gently strapped to a little dog gurney. Mom’s gloved hands are about to make an incision into Tinkerbell’s shaved belly but stop when she sees me.

  “I’m here,” I say behind my mask.

  Carver and I exchange stifled hellos.

  “How was school?” Mom’s hands are still positioned for surgery.

  “Fine. Just wanted to let you know I was here.”

  “Grandma needs a ride to the Elks’ lodge tonight. You’ll need to pick her up by six o’clock.”

  “Sure.” She seems to be in a good mood. “Can I go to Quimby’s while I wait?” I’m trying to flex some courage and exercise my right to musical enrichment.

  “No, I’m not comfortable with you driving around by yourself.” Thanks to network television’s Everyday Dangers for that segment on the hazards of teens driving alone at night.

  I push it a little more. “But it’s only a few blocks away.”

  Carver cuts in from behind his mask. “I’ve been wanting to go there. I hear they have an amazing collection of vinyl.” I wonder who told him that.

  Mom relaxes her arms for a minute to think. Tinkerbell’s bubble-gum pink tongue peeks out from her slightly tapered muzzle.

  Please, Mom, I mouth underneath my mask. Please.

  “Okay, Carver. Why don’t you go along with Natalie?” Yip! If my mom knew what Carver was doing last night, she’d probably wrap him up in postal tape and send him back to San Francisco.

  “As long as it’s okay with Natalie,” Carver says.

  “It’s fine,” I say.

  I try to act like Tinkerbell, sort of laid-back and going with the flow, as one would be if she were sedated and about to have her girl parts removed. I don’t want Mom to catch on to the fact that she’s just granted me my ultimate wish for the day. Now that I think about it, I realize that she probably would have let me go to the beach with him the other night, too, because he’s Boy Wonder in her eyes. She had her “boundaries” talk with me, and because Carver looks so good on paper, he’s sort of duped her.

  I should have figured that an SAT-top-one-percenter could do no wrong in Mom’s eyes.

  “We’ll need to leave here at five-fifty,” I say, bull-hornin
g that I, too, am capable of being responsible.

  Mom starts the incision on Tinkerbell’s bare stomach. I detect a grin behind Carver’s mask before he is pulled into the intrigue of dog surgery. I walk away carrying the souvenir of Carver’s hidden smile.

  At five-thirty, Nigel St. Paul, a healthy Chow Chow with a mane of auburn hair, and his elderly owner, Mrs. St. Paul, are waiting in the reception area for Mom to finish with a patient. Nigel is panting and slobbering a pool of drool onto the floor. His black tongue extends and retracts like a scroll of rubber that won’t stay rolled. His curled tail wobbles side to side when the front door opens. All of us turn our heads.

  Laney and Maryann walk into the office with their short skirts and matching wrist purses. Twins. They reel back when they see the waterfall pouring from Nigel’s mouth.

  “I don’t have Bogart,” I say curtly.

  “I know.” Maryann is chewing a huge wad of gum. “Your friend had him. Again. We got him back today.” Kirby’s mom must have made him return Bogart.

  Laney places her little purse on the counter of the reception desk. Because her shirt isn’t long enough, her belly button peeks out like a little cyclops eye. “Is Carver here?”

  “Just a minute,” I reply in a professional tone. I’m interested in knowing what she wants with Carver. I get up and go into the back to find him. He’s mopping up a dog kennel.

  I stay back at the mouth of the kennel run. “Carver?”

  “Yeah?” He stops mopping and wipes his forehead with the back of his bandaged-finger hand.

  “Laney’s here to see you.” I say this as if she’s a client, but I know she’d never have enough character to own a dog, or, for that matter, a cat.

  “Hey, can we talk about last night?” he asks. My shoulders relax. Laney’s waiting for him, and he wants to talk to me.

  “Yeah,” I say, but I can hear Mom calling.

  “Natalie?” She comes in behind me. “The phone was ringing. You missed the call.”

  “Sorry. I was getting Carver.” I walk toward the front with Mom and Carver trailing behind.