Around the Bend

by Shirley Jump

  They grinned at me. I gave them a watery, please-don’t-rob-us-and-leave-us-to-die-here smile back.

  Somehow, given the circumstances lately, I had a feeling my luck wouldn’t be that good.

  seven

  It turned out Norm, the scrawny guy, knew how to change a tire and pop off a wheel cover, but lacked the strength to get the lug nuts off, so he had his girlfriend stand on the tire iron. Apparently neither one of them cared that she was six months pregnant—something Norm proudly told me as his girlfriend lifted up her Penn State sweatshirt and displayed a big round belly with an outie that seemed a lot like a tongue sticking out at us.

  “Are you sure she should be standing on that?” I asked Norm. I had finished cleaning the seat with the wet wipes, given Harvey the evil eye, then swiped the whole thing down again with the remaining napkins. What I wouldn’t have given for a little Lysol.

  He shrugged. “Rita’s cool with it. Aren’t ya, baby?”

  She beamed at him and gave the metal rod a little bounce. “Absolutely. I do it all the time in the garage where Norm used to work.”

  “Where are you guys headed?” Susan asked after the kid—the closer I looked the more I realized Norm couldn’t be a day over seventeen—finished jacking up, replacing, then jacking down.

  “Dollywood,” his girlfriend answered for him. “Norm’s a country singer. A real good one, too. We’re headed there for this season’s American Idol tryouts. Norm’s gonna be a star.”

  Her smile for him was so filled with adoration and hope that I didn’t have the heart to mention Norm’s chances of breaking onto the Billboard Top 100 were about nil. Particularly since he looked more like Charles Manson’s younger brother than Clint Black’s replacement.

  “You’re all set,” Norm said. He swiped his greasy palms across his jeans, then stared at me expectantly.

  “Uh…How much do you want?” I said, reaching for my purse, keeping it hidden behind the open door in case Norm and Rita got any ideas.

  “Nothin’,” Rita popped in. “’Cept maybe a ride. Susan says you guys are going to Tennessee, too.”

  I shot Susan a glare, but she ignored me. “We really can’t—”

  “Get on in,” Susan said, ignoring me. “We could definitely use the company.”

  Which meant she wasn’t having much more fun than I was. I said a quick prayer that neither one of them was a homicidal maniac, then slipped in behind the wheel. I did owe Norm, after all.

  I pulled out onto the highway, easing into traffic, giving the tire a test before getting back up to full speed. Behind me, Harvey settled in between the two new passengers, sitting up and panting something that looked oddly like a smile.

  “Oh, my God!” Rita shrieked.

  “What? What?” I whipped my head around, trying to ease across two lanes, back to the side of the road. Was she in labor? Had the wheel slipped off? Had Norm forgotten to reattach the lug nuts?

  “It’s that dog, baby,” she said, smacking Norm on the arm, making his faux leather jacket crinkle. “The one from Letterman.”

  Norm leaned around to look at Harvey head-on. “Holy crap, it is. Harry the Dog.”

  “Not Harry, silly. Harvey the Wonder Dog.”

  At that, Harvey let out a yip of agreement. He sat up and begged, then did a twirl of a dance around the leather. I thanked God that he didn’t get too excited. I only had so many wet wipes.

  “You own Harvey?” Norm asked, clearly impressed. I could have been Dolly Parton for all the awe I saw reflected in my rearview mirror. “That’s, like, cool, dude.”

  “I only sort of own him.” I concentrated on getting the car back on the road, without being creamed by a passing double semi.

  “Oh, Penny, don’t be so modest,” Susan said. “She’s Harvey’s mommy.”

  Only because you dumped him on me, I thought but didn’t say. “We’re both his owners,” I said, giving Susan a friendly you’re-stuck-with-me-in-this-one smile.

  “Dude, this dog is, like, famous.” Norm let out a low whistle. “No wonder you’re driving an M.B.”

  “M.B.?” I said.

  “Mercedes-Benz, dude. A rich chick’s car.”

  I wasn’t rich, nor was I a chick, but I let it go. The green sign on my right promised the Tennessee state line was only another forty miles away. Pigeon Forge was another thirty from there. Soon, Norm and Rita would be gone, off to pursue fame and fortune at Dollywood.

  Or maybe just ride the rides and leave with their ticket stubs and some disappointment.

  “So, like, what kinda tricks can you make him do? Can you get him to do that thing where he opens a can? Man, if he could pop open a brewski, he’d be a damned handy dog.” Norm thought a second. “Though, it might be better if he could open the fridge and the brewski. Save me from getting off the couch.”

  I didn’t say anything about his obvious underage status and the fact that he was already sofa surfing and drinking beer. Not to mention the example he’d be setting for his future child.

  “So, what can you get him to do?” Norm asked again.

  “Hello,” I said, annoyed and frustrated with my passengers, “I’m not really his—”

  I caught sight of Harvey in the rearview mirror. He was standing on his back paws again, waving the two others at me.

  “Cool. He waves.”

  I’d said hello, the dog had started to wave. Coincidence or was Harvey listening to me? I opted for the first one.

  “He’s such a cutie,” Rita said. “Do you know how old he is?”

  “How old are you, Harvey?” I asked, half joking, figuring the dog would ignore me and go back to his crumb hunt. Instead, Harvey began pawing at the seat, almost tapping on it. Once, twice, three times…eight times total. “Eight,” I said, not sure I’d just seen the dog count, but maybe…

  I mean, he was called Harvey the Wonder Dog. Wouldn’t he at least be able to tell how old he was? Dave had mentioned a few tricks in the journal, but overall he’d been pretty vague, mentioning things like Harvey’s A Routine and his C Routine, whatever those meant. Either way, it didn’t matter to me. Soon enough, Harvey—and his routines—would be Vinny’s problem.

  “Oh, my God!” Rita shrieked a second time.

  “Don’t tell me that dog peed again.” My wet wipe supply was running low, along with my patience.

  “Uh…no.” In the rearview mirror I saw Norm’s eyes grow wide as Rita began to curse and yell, grabbing at his hand. He held hers tight, their joined knuckles turning white, along with every feature in Norm’s face. “We gotta go to the hospital. I think Rita’s having the baby.”

  At that she let out another scream and smacked him with her other hand. “Will you quit talking and just get this thing out of me?” She whipped her head around, glaring at Norm. “This is all your fault, you—”

  Another scream, a third smack-down for the situation. Norm took it all, no complaint, but the color was a shade off in his face. “Dude, we gotta go faster.”

  “You said she was only six months pregnant.” I swerved again, into the exit lane, narrowly avoiding a FedEx truck. My gaze darted to the roadside, praying for a little blue sign with an H.

  Norm shrugged, cool as a cucumber. “What do I know? I failed math three times.”

  eight

  Pandemonium.

  That word pretty much summed up the entire day. In Whitfield, we found a hospital, thank God, and brought in Norm and a nonstop screaming Rita. By the time we got there, she was full out thrashing and clutching at Norm and begging for drugs. I started calculating the chances she’d give birth on my backseat.

  Not even Johnson & Johnson had enough wet wipes to cover that kind of mess. And I doubted Harvey’s skills extended to midwifery.

  In the end, the leather was saved, the tire held and Rita turned out to be having a hell of a bad case of Braxton Hicks. The hospital kept her overnight for observation.

  “You can’t be hitchhiking with her,” I told Norm in the hall, feelin
g like the housemom for Dropout U. Susan was inside Rita’s room, the two of them laughing and giggling, as if this had just been one more adventure.

  Norm lifted one shoulder, then dropped it. “I gotta get my chance at Hollywood, dude. Rita’ll be cool.”

  “Do you want your future son or daughter born on the highway? You need to get her home. Think of the baby, not yourself.”

  “Dude, it’s American Idol. It’s like the biggest show on TV. If I go home now, I may never get my shot.” Norm toed at the floor, streaking black rubber across the pristine vinyl. “Besides, we ain’t got no place to go home to. Rita’s dad kinda blames me for her…condition.”

  “Well, you did get her pregnant.”

  “Yeah, but I, like, love her and everything.” He looked back at the room. His gaze softened and in it, I did see love, or at least I thought I did. I wasn’t sure anymore if I could read a man’s expression and know what he was really thinking. “I was gonna get a job, get us a place to crash, but Rita, she really wanted me to do this singing thing. She says I got charisma.”

  He had something, that was for sure, because Rita saw the sun and the moon in his face. And whenever they were alone, I’d noticed he reflected that solar system right back at her.

  I dug in my purse and pulled out the cash I’d withdrawn that morning. It was only a few hundred dollars, but I hoped it would be enough for the two of them to get back to their homes and some sanity. “Take this,” I said, handing it to Norm. “Go home, find a place, a job, some baby furniture. Promise me you’ll marry her. And keep it to one wife.”

  Norm’s eyes grew wide. “That’s, like, a lot of money. I only changed your tire.”

  “Be good to her. Talk to her and be smart about your decisions.” I left off the rest of the lecture that had been stewing in the back of my mind. Who was I, the Clueless Wife, to tell Norm and Rita what to do?

  “Thanks. You’re, like, a chick with heart,” Norm said, closing his hand over mine, then releasing it to give me what I thought was a peace sign. “Keep it posi, dude. And good luck with Harvey.”

  “Yeah, thanks.” I probably needed the luck more than Norm, who seemed oddly grounded and cool about the direction his life had taken. I grabbed Susan and we left, stopping by the hospital ATM on the way.

  “I saw what you did,” Susan said.

  “I didn’t want them holding up a minimart to pay for a crib.”

  Susan laughed, then wrapped her arms around me in a hug.

  I cleared my throat and pulled back. “We have to get Harvey to the dog show before he eats my dashboard.”

  Susan kept up her usual chatter during the hour and a half it took us to reach Pigeon Forge and then the Grand Resort Hotel and Convention Center that was hosting the Dog-Gone-Good Show. She talked mainly about Norm and Rita, about their baby, about Norm’s singing voice and how his audition would go. I tried to respond but barely got more than a word or two in.

  When Susan’s motor was started, there was no stopping it. I was actually relieved to park the car at the hotel and enter a whole new kind of crazy.

  Harvey bounded out of the car the second I opened my door, ran through the lobby, past the bellhop’s attempt to grab him and straight into the Dog-Gone-Good registration fray. “Harvey!”

  He ignored me and kept on going, weaving his little body in and out among the other dog owners and their pooches. He nearly missed being sideswiped by a Labradoodle, darted under a Great Dane as if it was a bridge, and skidded to a stop before the skirted table, leaping up onto the white surface and wiggling his way toward the third man on the right.

  Around me, I heard people calling out Harvey’s name, telling each other the Wonder Dog was here, laughing at his break for freedom. People pointed, smiled, waved at the terrier.

  Harvey, apparently, was a regular celebrity on the dog-show circuit.

  “Harvey!” I screamed, mortified. Stupid dog, why couldn’t he obey? Wasn’t that what he was trained to do? And where the heck was a Beggin’ Strip when I really needed one?

  “Harvey!” the man cried, wrapping his arms around the dog and submitting to the terrier’s wild tongue introduction. “Where you been, buddy?”

  I made my way through the crowds, reached forward and snapped Harvey’s leash onto his collar. “I’m sorry. He got away from me.”

  The man grinned. “Once Harvey gets an idea in his head, he goes after it. The only time you can get him to behave is on the stage.”

  I studied the man in front of me. Not a bad-looking man at that. Dark hair with a dusting of gray, tall, reasonably well built. Green eyes that were just a shade above gray. No one I’d ever met before, but that didn’t surprise me. Dave had clearly kept this entire side of his life a secret. “How do you know Harvey? Are you his trainer?”

  “I’m his agent.”

  A woman slipped into the line beside me, carrying a white poodle whose froufrou hairstyle had been jazzed up with hot-pink bows. She was cooing to the dog, telling it everything would be just fine. Cee-Cee, the dog, quivered in the woman’s arms, as though she was about to pee. I stepped a little to the left, keeping my Rockports out of Cee-Cee’s aim.

  “Harvey has an agent?” I said.

  The man chuckled. “Hell, ninety percent of the dogs here do. And those that don’t are looking to chomp on to the first one who shows an interest.”

  “Dave never—” Dave hadn’t mentioned an agent in the journal for Harvey, but I didn’t want to tell this guy that. Maybe they’d been on the outs? Maybe Dave hadn’t seen it as an important detail?

  Or maybe the guy was making the entire thing up.

  “Matt Shay,” he said, thrusting out his hand. I recognized the name from Dave’s cell directory. Success.

  “Penny Reynolds,” I replied, shaking with him. He had a firm grip, the kind that said he was comfortable in his own skin, in the jeans and button-down shirt he wore.

  “Are you related to Dave?”

  “I’m his wife.”

  I had to give the man credit, he didn’t blink an eye. Didn’t betray his surprise at all. “Penny. That’s right, he’s mentioned you.”

  I didn’t want to call his bluff. I didn’t want to make him admit that he’d never heard of me before. That the woman Dave had called his wife had been Annie or Susan or worse…someone else. “Nice to meet you.”

  “Vinny told me Dave had…passed away,” Matt said, drawing Harvey closer to his chest and absently fingering the dog’s ears. “I’m really sorry.”

  The crowd pressed in against me, people shouting out their dog’s FAQs, their addresses, phone numbers, screaming names like “Sir Hightower Golden Fancy” and “Lady’s Lost Slipper Deluxe.”

  I nodded, swallowing back the lump in my throat. “It was pretty sudden.”

  “What happened?” Then he put up a hand. “No, no. You don’t have to talk about it.”

  Good. Because I had no intention of telling this stranger, the dog’s agent, for God’s sake, that my husband had been found dead after screwing his second wife. A wife who was finally bringing up the rear, after a prolonged trip to “the little girls’ room.”

  “Penny! There you are. You won’t believe it. They have dog biscuits in the ladies’ room. In the little—” Susan cupped her hand over her mouth “—candy machine, if you know what—” She stopped talking when she noticed Matt. “Hello. I’m Susan Reynolds.”

  “Matt Shay,” he said, shaking with her, too. “You must be Dave’s sister.”

  Susan laughed. “Oh, no. I’m his wife.”

  Matt’s mouth dropped open. I wanted to die right there, sink into a hole in the floor and take Susan with me.

  Susan and I hadn’t thought to discuss this. All those hours in the car and the whole “what do we say when people ask?” question had never come up. I guess I’d just assumed Susan would let me be the wife and she’d play Dave’s friend.

  Susan covered her mouth as if she’d just realized what she’d said. “Well, Dave was a busy guy
,” she said, with one of those little laughs of hers.

  Cee-Cee’s owner turned around and stared at us. She elbowed the woman behind her. “Lucy, did you hear that? They’re one of them polygamy families,” she whispered, in decibels they could hear in space. “Bunch of perverts.”

  “This was a bad idea,” I said, taking Harvey out of Matt’s arms, with a protest from the dog, and wheeling around. I hadn’t thought about how we’d answer these questions, how I would deal with what people would think. I’d been intent on getting here, ridding myself of the dog and determining how far I’d have to split Dave’s assets. My plan lacked…a plan.

  Ignoring the stares and whispers, I wove my way quickly through the crowd, my eyes fixed firmly on the four red letters of Exit.

  Go home. Go back to normalcy. Pretend all of this never happened.

  “Penny!”

  I ignored Matt’s voice and plunged forward, through a crowd of collies, their owners looking as poufy as the dogs themselves. A weird part of my mind, the part that had completely disassociated from this entire surreal experience, wondered if they’d be called a crowd. Or a litter. Or a bark, or some other weird thing. Tears rose to my eyes—when had I become this weepy creature? I never cried—and I stumbled into a group of poodles, the leather straps wrapping around my legs and tangling my steps.

  “Penny,” Matt said, reaching for me across the over-groomed white dogs. “What’s wrong?”

  I stepped back, out of the leashes, and kept backing up until I hit the solidity of a column. “Come on, Matt. Tell me you aren’t that clueless.”

  “Actually, I am.” He grinned. “It’s part of my DNA, or so my ex-wife told me.”

  I couldn’t help but laugh, the kind of relieved laugh you let out when you’ve narrowly missed creaming the neighbor’s bushes because a chipmunk ran in front of the car. I sobered when I caught a glimpse of Susan stuck on the other side of the dog pool, waving at me like a mariner lost at sea. “I think it’s pretty obvious. I’m Dave’s wife and so is she.”