“Yes, I hear you.”
“All right?”
“All right,” I say in agreement. The agreement being I am an idiot.
“So where are we headed?” Spider asks, hoisting Ed higher in his arms.
“Halfway down the block,” I say, pointing in the direction of my building. I see someone standing out front smoking a cigarette. It’s Jack.
9
“Mags?” Jack is coming toward us. “What’s up? Where were you?”
“In the park with Mr. Ed,” I say trying to keep my voice steady. “We ran into some problems and Spider here helped us out.”
Jack and Spider nod at each other. If Spider’s hand were free, they’d probably shake, but Spider is still cradling Mr. Ed.
“Here.” I reach out. “I’ll take him now.”
“Maybe you’d better let your friend,” Spider says handing Ed off to Jack. “And I think you should call the police and report this. Okay? I better get going.” Abby is doing a little let’s-get-a-move-on dog dance.
“Thanks, Spider. I don’t know what else to say. I just . . .” I put my arms around his neck. “Thanks.”
“No problem. Take care, now.” Spider nods at Jack again and then heads down the block toward Amsterdam Avenue.
“Maggie, what is going on?” Jack asks.
“I got attacked in the park and Mr. Ed saved me and in the process got the shit kicked out of him.”
“Jesus.”
“Yeah. Jesus.”
We take Mr. Ed to his apartment. I look down the list of emergency numbers next to Sandy’s phone. There is a number for the Westside Animal Hospital. I dial and talk to someone who tells me the location of the twenty-four-hour clinic that will see Mr. Ed. I jot down the address.
“I have to go to the bathroom before we go,” I tell Jack. “And change my pants.”
“Did you get . . . I mean did he?” Jack asks, struck with the possibility. “Oh, Maggie.” He puts his arms around me.
“No, but it was close,” I say, fighting with myself to stay calm. “Can you go ahead with Mr. Ed? I’ll meet you there. I’ll take a cab.”
“No,” Jack says. “I’m not leaving you alone. Go change. Ed is okay for the moment.”
I get to my apartment and turn on the shower. I pull off my clothes and step in. My hands are still bleeding, but the wounds are superficial, and my wrist is throbbing, but I can still move it, so I’m pretty sure it’s just sprained. I grab a bar of soap and scrub and scrub down there where he—I don’t want to finish the thought. I squeeze my eyes shut, trying to erase the image of his hand between my legs. I wish I could stay in the shower and let the water cleanse me of the whole experience, but Mr. Ed is waiting. I dry off quickly and dress and go back to Sandy’s.
“Let’s go,” I say.
“You all right?” Jack is sitting on the couch. Ed is wrapped in a blanket lying next to him.
“Yes. Fine and dandy.” Did I say that? Amazing what stress will make us do.
Jack bundles Ed in his arms and off we go. The clinic is on Tenth Avenue at Fifty-third Street. The veterinarian on duty is a young Asian man with DR. CHANG printed on a name tag. He takes Mr. Ed into an examining room. I’m not sure if I should follow. I think it might be best if Ed has a chance to speak with the doctor one on one.
“You should report this,” Jack says. “You need to talk to the cops.”
“I didn’t even see the guy. He was behind me the whole time and it was dark. I don’t know what I could tell them.”
“It’s an incident. They should at least know it happened. There might be a pattern. The next girl won’t be so lucky.”
“Girl?”
“Woman. I don’t think this is a time to get into semantics, Maggie, and besides maybe it will be a girl and then how will you feel?”
“How is it that I’m suddenly the guilty party? Jesus, Jack, give me a break.”
“Do what you like. Don’t report it. Don’t say a word. Don’t tell the cops a madman is roaming Central Park attacking women. Go home and have another shot of scotch and stare at the wall and maybe it will all disappear.”
“Go, Jack. I don’t want to sit here and listen to you lecture me on my life.”
“Mags, I’m just trying to help. You can’t act like nothing happened.”
I get up and walk across the waiting room and look at the bulletin board that is peppered with pictures of abandoned dogs and cats looking for homes. There is a snapshot of a little black and white dog with spiky ears and a pink tongue dangling out of his mouth. He looks happy. I guess he hadn’t been told yet he was about to be abandoned. I had a feeling I was about to suffer the same fate and it wouldn’t be the first time. I could feel Jack behind me. I could feel him making up his mind to leave, to walk out and abandon me. I wouldn’t blame him. Besides, I had told him to leave, so I don’t know if you can really call that abandonment. I’ve never been good at relationships. I don’t like it when people get too close. I start to feel smothered. I stop making eye contact. I stop talking and I try to stop feeling and that is what I am doing now.
Jack comes up behind me and puts his arm around my shoulders. I feel my body stiffen. I can’t stop it. Jack kisses me on the crown of my head.
“Do you have money for a cab to get home?”
I nod. I can’t respond verbally because there is a big lump in my throat that won’t let the word yes get out, or more importantly, don’t go.
“So long and take care of yourself, Mags.” He leaves. I don’t turn around. I continue to look at the pictures on the board. One calico cat is hunkered down in a corner with her face to the wall. I suspect she, unlike the black and white dog, has been informed of her fate. I wipe my eyes, bite my lip, and sit down to wait for Mr. Ed. The lump in my throat drops to the pit of my stomach and the words I wanted to say before finally slip out. “Don’t go, Jack,” I whisper. “Please, don’t go.”
WE GET HOME about three a.m. Mr. Ed is bruised and hurting, but nothing is broken, and Dr. Chang assured me that Ed would be fine in a few days. He handed me some pain medication to give him and suggested that I go see my own doctor the next day.
I go to my apartment to check on Bixby and then go back to spend the night with Mr. Ed in Sandy’s place. I don’t want to leave the little guy alone.
THE NEXT MORNING around ten the phone rings and wakes us both up. Mr. Ed is sleeping against my right leg. I answer with a groggy, “Hello.”
“Sandy? Is that you?” a man’s voice on the other end asks.
“No, it’s her neighbor. Sandy’s out of town and I’m feeding the dog.”
“Oh, well, I’ll call back. When will she be home?”
“Tuesday afternoon,” I answer, momentarily wondering who in the world this is.
“Thanks, I’ll call back then,” he says and hangs up.
I turn over and stare at the ceiling. Mr. Ed stirs and nuzzles my hand.
“How are you feeling, little fellow?”
He scrunches up along my side and puts his face next to mine and we lay there for quite a while
“Thanks, Ed,” I say. “Thanks for saving my life.”
Ed licks the side of my face and I hug him close.
“SO CAN YOU give us any description at all?” Officer Kelly asks. I’m sitting at his desk in the One-hundredth Precinct. Ed is curled up at my feet. On our morning walk I decide to go by the precinct and then I decide to go in and then I decide to report the incident as long as I’m there. Sometimes I have to trick myself into doing the right thing.
“I didn’t see him. All I can tell you is it was about eleven last night; it was a man; and it happened in the Ramble near the castle. And he was wearing leather gloves. I know because I bit down on his hand.”
“Do you think you broke the skin?”
“No, I’m sure I didn’t. I barely got a hold of the glove. That’s when Mr. Ed found me and started barking and grabbed the guy’s leg or hand or something and he took off with Ed at his heels. Ma
ybe Ed broke the skin somewhere.”
“You’re lucky.”
“I know.”
“Well, fill this out. We didn’t have any other reports last night. Thanks for coming in.” Officer Kelly hands me a clipboard with an incident report on it. I fill in my name and address and number and leave it with the desk clerk. On my way out I notice a bulletin board with pictures of missing children and the FBI’s most wanted list. I guess being abandoned isn’t the worst thing.
When I get back to my apartment there is a message from Dee-Honey. “Just checking in with you, honey, to remind you about the Snow White tomorrow. Early call.” Boy, she must think I never write anything down anymore. For goodness sake, she really is Mother Goose checking on all her goslings, or is it geeselets? There is also a message from Texas Joe.
“Maggie, how are you? Give a call. I, uh, I have something to tell you. I . . . well . . . give me a call.”
He’s getting married. I know it. That’s what he wants to tell me. He’s going to marry the dentist. Damn, I think, damn, damn, damn. I take Mr. Ed back to his apartment so he won’t have to see me get all weepy and ugly, which I have a feeling I’m going to do.
I wait an hour before I call Joe back. I drink two beers and listen to Sam Cooke sing “You Send Me” about a half-dozen times. Once, after we had spent a couple of weeks together, Joe called me from Texas and sang that song into my answering machine. I saved the message and played it when I was feeling blue and then my phone broke and the message was lost, so I bought a cassette of Sam Cooke’s Greatest Hits.
“Hey, Joe, what’s up?” I ask as nonchalantly as I can when he answers.
“Well, I just wanted you to know . . .” he falters.
I decide to help the poor guy out.
“You wanted me to know that you’re getting married. Am I right?”
“Boy, you know me.”
“Like the back of my hand.” I say. “So, wow, is it the dentist?”
“Yeah.”
“I thought that was over.”
“It was, but then we decided that we really should give it a shot.”
“Sure, why not? So when is the happy day?”
“Well, actually . . .” Joe sounds sheepish. “Today.”
“What? And you waited until now to tell me. Why didn’t you tell me the last time you called? I mean . . .” I can’t finish.
“I’m sorry. I’m real sorry. Every time I started to tell you I chickened out. It hasn’t been easy.”
“I know,” I say, and then we are both quiet. I can hear Joe breathing and I know he can hear me, and for a few moments we just breathe together.
“Look, I’m happy for you,” I say finally. “I really am. Best wishes, I guess.”
“Thanks. I love you,” Joe says.
“I love you too.”
“So you’re okay?” Joe asks.
“I’m fine,” I say and then my voice breaks.
“What’s wrong?” Joe asks.
“Nothing, it’s just that . . .”
“Tell me, I got time, tell me.”
“It’s your wedding day. And I’m happy for you.”
“Thanks. I’ll call you soon.”
“Sure. We’ll talk. Bye, Joe.” And we hang up. The clock over the kitchen sink ticks off the minutes. Bixby catnaps on the sofa. I sit and stare at the wall, remembering every sweet thing I can about my Texas Joe. He slept on his left side and snored only when he had a cold, was a good lover, made an excellent peach pie, and could sing harmony to all the Beatles’ early tunes. But the sweetest thing I would always remember about Joe was the night Goodie died. The whole family was there: Charles, Goodie’s and Joe’s parents, all the siblings, two nephews, and myself. Goodie had requested not to be put on life support. He had been in a coma for twenty-four hours and his breathing began to fail. Joe walked into the living room where we were keeping vigil and announced that it was time. He went over to his mother, took her hand, and led her into the room. Goodie’s breath was labored. Joe’s mother got very agitated and started to cry.
“Please, we have to do something, give him oxygen, I can’t just let him go,” she sobbed. She had been so strong, but momentarily her strength deserted her. Joe gently took her by the shoulders.
“Goodie needs you to help him, Mom. Remember how you used to read from the Bible when you put us to sleep. Do you think you could read to Goodie now?”
“He always liked the Twenty-third Psalm,” she said. “It was his favorite.” Charles handed her the Bible from the bookshelf next to the bed.
“The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want,” she began from memory, her voice now steady with purpose. The rest of us gathered around the bed and gently placed our hands on Goodie’s frail and struggling body. Charles sat against the headboard with Goodie’s head in his lap, and Joe stood behind his mother, his hands still on her shoulders, giving her the courage to bear the unbearable grief.
“Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil: for thou art with me.” Her voice intoned as Goodwin Albert DePugh, her precious firstborn son, surrendered his final breath.
Then, later, Joe was the one who called the coroner and the ambulance service. He was the one who reached out and gently closed Goodie’s half-opened eyes and held Charles and comforted his father. He was the one who was there for us all. “But you’re not here for me now, Joe,” I say out loud. “You’re not here for me now and I need you, I need somebody. How come you get someone and I don’t?” But I know the answer to that question. I push away from people when I should try to pull closer. It’s a reflex. Like not knowing your left from your right and always turning the wrong way.
“Goodie? Are you here somewhere?” I ask between sobs. “Did you hear? Joe is getting married. Isn’t that dandy? You said we were made for each other. You said we were perfect for each other. Why can’t you wave your magic wand now? Why, Goodie, why?”
I stumble into the kitchen and get a beer. I swig it down.
“Here’s to you, Joe,” I say. “Here’s to you and little wifey.” Snot drains down my throat along with the beer. I open another and chug it. I get down on my knees and bury my head in my arms. I want to disappear. I want to not feel anything.
“Goodie, dammit, where are you?”
There is no answer.
“Miss Goodie-Two-Shoes, I need you.”
But there is nothing. Just the damn clock over the sink tick-tick-ticking off the minutes. I close my eyes. The room spins and I’m out.
I wake up at three a.m. in the middle of the kitchen floor. My back is in spasm and my mouth is so dry I can’t swallow. I stand up but my left leg is so profoundly asleep there is no feeling in it and I fall against the counter. Shit! I get to the bathroom and splash water on my face. I use the toilet and limp to my bed. By a miracle I remember I have a show in the morning, so I manage to set the alarm before I pass out.
10
Dee-Honey, as usual, is driving. She is weaving in and out of traffic, making a beeline for the Fairfield Junior Civic Center where we are scheduled for a Snow White performance. My stomach flip-flops as the van zooms along on the Major Deegan Expressway. We stop at a Dunkin’ Donuts a few blocks away. I order a large coffee and two Bavarian crème donuts. I wish I had a beer to settle my stomach and a shot of scotch to ease the pain, but a megasugar hit will have to do.
Helen Sanders is standing next to me, shaking her head. “You kill me, the way you eat.”
“Well, Helen, I’m lucky. I don’t have to squeeze into that wood nymph costume the way you do.”
“Coffee and a low-fat blueberry muffin,” Helen barks at the counter girl. “And be sure to put skim milk in the coffee.”
“You are so disciplined, Helen, I don’t know how you do it,” I say, biting into my Bavarian crème. The sugar plops to my stomach and immediately jumps onto the express lane spreading happy glucose molecules as it goes.
“I hate you, Mags.”
“I know,
Helen.”
We get back in the car and head to the civic center. My left hip hurts like crazy from where I fell against the kitchen counter, and my spine feels like a pretzel from sleeping on the kitchen floor last night.
Right before the show starts I bum a cigarette from Frank. I lean out the fire exit and take a few puffs. It’s so hard to smoke anywhere now it’s almost not worth it, but almost is the operable word because I‘m still not humiliated enough actually to kick the habit, especially now when all my underpinnings seem to be coming unpinned.
I hear Frank call, “Places, please,” and I stamp out the cigarette and head to the stage left wing, ready for my entrance. Helen has the first scene as Snow White’s dying mother. She’s very moving and does a lovely job with the ballad. She declares the baby’s name to be Snow White because her skin is as white as snow and her hair as black as ebony. (However, today Snow White is a blonde, as I forgot the black gel I usually put in my hair to darken it.) Then Helen dies as the huntsman reaches for baby Snow White.
In the next scene I skip onstage and sing my little Snow White happy song. Then Dee-Honey sweeps onstage as the evil stepmother, or as Frank calls her (never to her face of course), “Herself, the Ancient Evil.” We do our scene and then I scrub the stage while Ron, the handsome play prince, arrives. My hip starts to throb as I scuttle around the stage on hands and knees. And then my stomach does a few more flip-flops.
“Is that Snow White?” I hear a girl whisper in the front row. I glare out at her.
Don’t you dare, I think, don’t you dare say a word. The girl looks at me and I look at her and then smile my adorable ingénue smile and she smiles back. She can’t resist. I’m a star, dammit, and nobody, not even a spoiled rotten six-year-old, can resist star power. I finish the scene and exit stage left. I head for the dressing room for another cigarette while the Ancient Evil and the huntsman plan my demise. Helen is in the dressing room struggling out of her wood nymph costume.
“Maggie, could you help me? I think the zipper is stuck.” With a good bit of tugging and yanking and grunting I get Helen unzipped and out of the leotard. She collapses into a chair.
Dorothy on the Rocks Page 10