“Why can’t you do it? What are you going to be busy with that I have to slink about, stalking the swim team?”
“I’ll be taking some informal shots, and,” she says, reaching into the enormous bag she carries everywhere and extracting a giant tube of Pringles, “pumping an informant for info.”
“You’re going to bribe a stoolpigeon with chips?”
“Not bribe, Sloane, never bribe! Boy, you sure are cynical. It’s simply that she is going to dish the dirt, and I am going to gift her with a snack.”
Sienna is what my mother would have called ‘incorrigible”.
“Later, girl friend,” she says.
I catch the faint strains of the spy tune again as she hops downs the stairs and heads towards the exit. I can just make out the brassy red hair of the person waiting for her in the shadows there.
I grab my camera and make my way down to where the swimmers are milling about waiting for races or toweling off after them. The bootylicious girls are only too eager to pose, though they keep wriggling and giggling, and insist on removing their caps and combing their hair before they’ll allow me to shoot their faces. Still, photographing the girls is easy compared to the boys. It’s damned embarrassing to ask the muscled male swimmers to strut their stuff. A couple look as embarrassed as I feel, but most are shameless – volunteering to go full-frontal in the buff while sucking in their stomachs and clenching their muscles to make their six-packs pop. One guy, who has “Eat my bubbles!” written on his back, rolls up his latex swimming cap and stuffs it into his speedo before posing.
After I’ve got head and torso pics of all but one of the male contenders, it’s time for the money shot. I cannot make myself approach Luke directly. I creep about, hiding behind the winners’ podium and the score-keeper’s table trying to get the photographs of Luke, but he is either in constant motion or surrounded by a bevy of smiling girls. I take cover behind a bulky man standing on the paved pool deck and raise my camera. I’m after Luke’s torso. He is some way away and he has a towel slung around his hips so it’s not ideal, but this swim meet will soon be over so I figure I’d better take whatever shot I can get. Also, my feet are getting wet because I’m standing in a puddle of water.
I aim and focus carefully. My finger is just pressing the button when, through the lens of my camera, I see him walking directly towards me. I pull the camera down. This is when I notice that my shelter has waddled off and I’m exposed. There’s no point in hiding the camera – he’s already seen it – so I just stand like a dope in a puddle as a half-naked Luke approaches me by the side of the pool, and am overcome by a horrible sense of déjà vu.
“Are you stalking me?” he says, and I’m relieved that he doesn’t look angry.
“No! Yes. Sort of. I have to get shots of the swim team. Faces and … torsos.” Heat floods my face – I either have scarlet fever, or I’m blushing big time.
“You want a photo of my torso?”
“It was Sienna’s idea – she insisted,” I say quickly. “For her blog.”
“Sure,” he says and when I make no move, asks, “Do you want to do it now?”
“Do it? Now?”
“Take the photo, I mean.” Is it possible that he’s blushing now?
“Oh, right.”
I quickly take a shot of his face. Too quickly – the small onscreen display shows me it’s blurred.
“Sorry.”
I fumble with the settings and take another shot. Then a few more – just to cover my bases for the assignment, of course. Now it’s time for the body shot.
“This okay?” says Luke, striking a pose with his hands on his hip.
“Can you … um,” I wave a hand at his towel, too mortified to say the words.
“Strip?” he asks, raising an eyebrow.
I hide behind the camera while Luke removes the towel. I only hope that the steam inside me comes out my ears, not my mouth – I don’t want to fog up the viewfinder. I take the shots, slowly and carefully, as befits a person respectful of her craft. Below his chest – broad and smooth and tanned – are the lean muscles of his six-pack. Actually, it looks like a ten-pack to me, but I have no time to count now. I’ll have to make an enlargement later and study it at home. Stop it! Focus! I chide my wayward mind. A dark line of hair leads down from his navel to his speedo. Enough.
“Got it, great, thanks,” I say. I wish I had something to fan my burning face.
“No problem.”
He wraps the towel around his hips again. We stare at each other for a long moment, then look away at the same time as the pack of swimmers passes us. Senior girls, 50m fly.
“Do you miss it?” he asks.
“Yeah,” I nod. “I miss a lot of things.”
“I found out what a splenectomy is – I searched it on the internet. Why did you have to have your spleen removed?”
“Only about half of it, they were able to save the rest.”
“Why?” he repeats.
“It ruptured. In the accident.”
I can’t believe we’re talking about this. That I said the A-word. He places a warm hand on my arm above my elbow, and my heart stutters. But then he moves me gently to the side and I see it’s to allow some people to pass by. My arm feels cold, kind of exposed, when he removes his hand.
“It sounds rough,” he says.
“It’s not too bad.”
“Is that why you take all the pills and vitamins, and why you’re obsessed with germs?”
“Yeah. Your spleen is like the home of the immune system. When it’s removed, you’re more susceptible to infections and complications. So you have to be careful.”
“And a titanium pin in your knee.”
“I’m a real Frankenstein’s monster.”
“And a severed femoral artery.”
“It could’ve have been worse,” I say and immediately want to kick myself. Of course it could have been worse – who knows that better than Andrew Naughton’s brother? But Luke doesn’t take the opportunity to twist the knife.
“Yeah,” he merely says, “but it’s a little more than ‘only a few cuts and bruises’. Look, I’m sorry I gave you such a hard time. I was a real –”
“Don’t worry about it, really. There’s nothing you need to apologize for. It’s no more than I deserve.”
“But you –”
“So,” I interrupt, changing the subject. “I did some digging on you too – fair is fair. If you read my private records, I should get to read your private goals.”
“Oh yes?” Am I imagining it, or does he look concerned? “How did you do that?”
“Google. I entered the search string: ‘What are Luke Naughton’s short and medium-term goals’.”
“Of course. Any results?”
“Only 38,977,” I boast. “Do you know that you’re the karaoke king of Kansas, a hockey player for the Pittsburgh Penguins, and the author of a book entitled Turkey Farming for Pleasure and Profit? Ooh, and you’re wanted in three states for public indecency.”
He throws back his head and laughs. It’s that joyous carefree laugh I saw when he was holding the puppy. If I had a tail, I’d be wagging it now.
“Funny,” he says. He reaches out a finger and touches the tip of my nose. “Funny one,” he says again and, still grinning, he strolls away to the starting blocks.
That night, in the quietness before sleep, I realize a whole day has gone by without my thinking of my mom. Guilt sits on my chest, heavy as a marble gravestone. “The length of your pain is not a measure of the depth of your love” – I repeat Eileen’s words over and over to myself. But I still feel like a bad daughter, and the tears are as much for my guilt as my grief.
26
Blissed out
Sienna and I are walking past the lockers after school ends for the day, comparing homework woes, when Luke falls into step alongside me.
“Hi,” he says.
“Hi,” I respond. Brilliantly.
“I’m neede
d somewhere else – urgently,” says Sienna, and she melts away to join a group of friends.
“So,” says Luke.
“So,” say I.
“Are you mocking me?”
“Would I dare?”
“So … I was thinking.”
I want to prompt him for more, but my brain reminds me that I had the cafeteria special for lunch today – vegetarian lasagna – and I’m overcome with the worry that there is spinach on my teeth and garlic on my breath. I keep my mouth closed.
“About what you said about fair’s fair.”
“Yeah?” The word slips out as I turn my face to look at him. I close my mouth again.
“I did read your entire medical record – you could say I know you from the inside out,” he says, with a quick grin.
“More about the ‘fair’s fair’ part, please,” I say.
“Well, I wondered if you wanted to see me busy achieving one of my goals?”
“Yes, I’d like that.” Am I hallucinating? Is this actually happening?
“I’ll pick you up at your place – 4p.m. okay?”
“Today?”
“Sure – is that a problem?”
“No, no problem.”
He looks me up and down from head to toe, frowns at my dress and low-heeled sandals.
“Wear your oldest clothes. And sneakers,” he says and then disappears into the throng of students heading out.
Sienna materializes back into the spot next to me and demands a word-for-word action-replay of the last two minutes.
“Old clothes,” she muses. “Old clothes?”
I nod.
“Not a date then,” she concludes.
“I hardly think Luke Naughton wants to ask me out on a date,” I say.
“Oh, I don’t know. He can’t seem to stay away from you.”
“He’s probably going to drag me out into the woods somewhere, chop off my head and fingertips, and bury the remains in the damp earth,” I say, remembering this morning’s newspaper article.
By a quarter to four, I’m dressed in faded and fraying jeans, an old but warm sweatshirt and purple canvas sneakers, ready for either my outing or my ending. My aunt drops by to check on me and it’s all I can do to get her out of my apartment by the top of the hour.
“My partner on a school project is coming by to collect me,” I say. “We have to go take more pictures of pollution.”
I grab my camera and wave it around as evidence.
“You’re going out dressed like that?”
Aunt Beryl never looks this casual – even when the triplets have flung food and toys and each other at her.
“We’re going to some mucky places,” I explain.
“Just be sure that you and she don’t go to any sketchy or dangerous places, Sloane – safety first!”
“Safety first!” I chime, steering her towards the door. “Give a hug – or three – to Devon and Keagan and Teagan.”
The buzzer sounds from downstairs just as I close the door behind her. I press the button on the intercom and tell him I’ll be there in a minute. I grab my jacket, bag and camera and fly down the stairs.
Luke drives an old-fashioned, sky-blue VW beetle with silver trim. He folds his long limbs into the low seat, and with a roar of the loud engine, we set off.
“This is one cool car,” I say.
He eyes me as if to check whether I’m being sarcastic or not.
“Really, I love it,” I say.
It’s true – something about it makes me want to smile. I feel like I’m in a toy car as I peep out of the windscreen, and twiddle the old-fashioned knobs and dials on the blue metal dashboard. The radio still works – though it’s stuck on a golden-oldies station – the wipers wipe and there’s an image of a fox on a castle in the center of the steering wheel.
“Want to press the horn?” he asks as we pull up to a set of lights.
“How did you know?”
I lean over and toot a tune. This prompts some discourteous hand signals from the driver in the car in front of us, and we both laugh. I’d do anything to keep him laughing.
“Where are we going?” I ask.
“You’ll see.”
We bounce along down the road to the sound of the sixties and, too soon, we pull into the parking lot alongside a long, low building. The sign outside reads: West Lake Animal Sanctuary.
“You volunteer at an animal shelter? That’s your community service goal?” I guess.
“I do.”
I should have guessed – the way he plays with puppies and saves spiders.
“You’re okay with dogs and cats? Not afraid?” he asks.
I make a dismissive noise to indicate that I have no fears of our furry friends. Then I’m struck by a thought.
“But if there are pet rats and mice – you can have them all to yourself.”
“Don’t like rodents?”
“They have no bladder control. They dribble wherever they run on their creepy little paws.”
“That’s actually a myth put out by pest control services,” says Luke. “But they do pee a lot, and some like to mark their territory.”
“I’ll stick to Fido and Whiskers,” I insist.
The animal shelter has a front office where everyone greets Luke by name and they give me a friendly welcome when he introduces me. Then, armed with rubber gloves, buckets, liquid soap and scrubbing brushes, we head out back to where the animals are housed. The day is cool, winter will be here in a month, but at least the sun is shining.
“We’re cleaning cages today,” says Luke. I have a feeling, from the way he checks to see how I react, that this is some kind of test.
“Point me in the right direction and tell me what to do,” I say enthusiastically, but I’m checking him out, too. I don’t know whether he brought me here to spend time with me or to sentence me into hard labor for my crimes. I guess the latter might be the more likely scenario when he hands me a purple plastic spade and some paper bags, and sets me on poop-scooping duty in the cat cages. The cats eye me disdainfully as I clean their litter trays, holding my breath against the gag-worthy smells.
By contrast, complete pandemonium breaks out when Luke walks down the lane that runs between the rows of cages. Dogs bark, hounds bay, puppies whine hysterically and they all hurl themselves in friendly welcome at the wire. Even the cats deign to amble up to the front of the cages so he can give them a welcoming tickle.
It’s heartbreaking – and not just because I wish his fingers were touching me. There are dozens of animals, all rescued or abandoned, locked into simple cages with a shelter at the back and a small square of concrete at the front. The animals look fairly healthy, but some of the older ones have obviously had a hard life. A couple of the dogs limp, one has only three legs, and there’s a mean-looking marmalade-colored cat with only one eye and half an ear missing. A small pot-bellied pig, by the name of Christmas, and several rabbits snuffle about in the last cage of this row.
Suddenly Luke is at the door to the cage where I’m busy.
“I’m sorry – I forgot about your immunity thing. You probably shouldn’t be near cat litter.”
“It’s fine,” I say, waving my hands in their bright yellow rubber gloves. “Anyway, this is the last one.”
“Here,” says Luke, when I’ve dumped the revolting contents of the cat litter trays into a large bin labeled “Poop”. He tucks the nozzle end of a hosepipe into my hands – I’ve been promoted!
“You can spray the floors of the dog cages. Try to angle it so that the water and mess runs into those gullies along the side of the cages, rather than into the shelters at the back of them, where their bedding is.”
“Shouldn’t we get them out first?”
“Nah, the ones that don’t like it will hide out at the back, but some of them will enjoy the shower.”
They do – some dogs stand right under the spray and a few try to bite the stream of water, barking madly and running around in circles. By now
I’m sweating in my jacket, so I enjoy the fine cool mist spraying off the water which the breeze blows my way. Meanwhile Luke carries an old dog out of his cage and walks over to a deep stainless steel sink. He lowers the dog gently into the warm water and lathers him up with the foamy soap.
“Can’t he walk?” I call over the sound of the hose and the hounds.
“He can, but he’s stiff with arthritis, aren’t you old man? And he loves baths.”
The dog does seem to be wearing a contented smile under his grey muzzle.
“Are all these dogs and cats waiting for adoption?”
“Yeah, they have to be sterilized before they can be adopted, though. It’s the shelter’s policy that no pet goes out and has more unwanted babies. And money is tight, so they don’t get to save as many lives as they could. There’s a shortage of space, and food costs plenty, so they can’t afford to keep an animal for longer than six months.”
“What happens to those that don’t get adopted in time?” I ask, although I can guess.
He winces.
“They have to euthanize them. It breaks my heart. But there’s no real option otherwise. Some of them are rescued from inhumane owners and conditions – they can’t go back. And if they run feral on the streets, that’s no good either. They work really hard here to find good homes – advertise in the paper and on their website. Tyrone Carter – from our L.O. class? – he set up their website for them, and helps them run it.”
“I’m impressed – with the both of you.”
“It’s little enough. I just wish we could do more. I want to study veterinary science, so this means a lot to me.”
I’m ashamed. I have had my head stuck so deeply up my own ass for so long it’s a disgrace. My scar pales into insignificance beside this magnitude of need, and my past losses are less pressing when set against the immediate demands of the here-and-now. I need to start thinking about the future, about doing something worthwhile or meaningful. I can still make my mother proud – I believe that.
“Can I help?”
“Can you hold onto Moses for me while I fetch a towel? I’ll want to get him out as soon as I’ve rinsed this shampoo off him. Don’t let go or he’ll try to jump out.”
“Sure,” I say, turning off the hose and walking over to keep the mutt steady in the sink. “But I meant can I help in some way with the shelter – in general, I mean?”
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