Between Mom and Jo

by Julie Anne Peters

Slowly, deliberately, I shut the door in their faces.

  Kerri

  Savage is dying. Kerri says, “Get your mom on the phone and tell her to meet us at Mesa Vet Clinic. Tell her Sixth and Harlan. It’s the closest one I could find to her office.”

  I don’t move. In my arms I hold Savage’s limp and lifeless body. I stare at the bloody drool dribbling out his mouth and soaking through the towel.

  Kerri sneezes. “Nick, please.” She twists away and blows her nose. “She’ll want to be there at the end.” My brain engages.

  The End.

  Kerri asks, “Where do you keep your cat carrier? In the garage?”

  Carrier? What carrier? Savage never went anywhere, besides the one trip in a duct-taped box from the old house to the new. He’s feral — you can’t catch him. That’s how I knew he was dying. He let me walk right up to him and pick him up. He was on the back stoop, lying on his side, glassy-eyed.

  “I’ll just carry him,” I tell Kerri. I shift the bunched-up towel, and Kerri reaches out like I’m going to drop him. “You call Mom,” I tell her. “I have to call Jo.”

  Kerri acts like she wants to debate this, but the defiance in my voice must change her mind. Good decision. She gets on her cell. One-handed, I flip mine open and punch the speed dial number for Jo.

  My cell phone was Kerri’s idea, so Mom and I could stay in touch. Right. So if there was an emergency at home, I could call Mom. Sure. The only way Mom agreed to let me stay home by myself was if I called to check in every hour on the hour.

  Like that happens.

  A few minutes later we’re speeding down the freeway. Savage lifts his head once and growls. I say, “It’s okay, boy.” I gently stroke him with my index finger.

  “How long have you had him?” Kerri asks.

  Shut up, I think. I hate when she talks to me. We’ve talked enough already today. In my peripheral vision I notice she’s done something different with her hair. It’s blue-black except for the bleached blond streaks in front down her face. She thinks she’s so cool. She’s all pierced. She’s a freak.

  She sneezes again and digs in her bag. She pulls out a snot rag. “Look, I know how hard this is for you.” She blows her nose. “My parents were divorced when I was eight.”

  “So?”

  “So I’ve been there.”

  No, you haven’t, I scream inside. It’s not the same. Is she stupid, or what?

  “My dad abandoned us, basically. Just sort of left us for dead. I remember feeling like it was all my fault.”

  “It probably was,” I say. You’re so weird. I don’t say that.

  Kerri’s looking at me and her eyes are smiling. “Smartass,” she goes.

  I don’t want to joke around with her. She’s not Jo. Savage is dying. “Where’s Taco?” I say.

  Kerri frowns. “What?” She flicks the right turn signal and swerves toward the Harlan Street exit. The traffic is backed up on the off ramp. “Damn,” Kerri says. “This had to happen at rush hour.”

  “Taco,” I repeat. “Takashi. Your son. Remember him?” The one you abandoned?

  She lays on the horn and merges between two SUVs. She’s so hyper it makes me jumpy. “He’s not my son. Dammit! Let me in.” She bolts forward. “He’s Reiko’s, and so, naturally, he’s with her.” Kerri’s eyes dart across at me. She bears down on the accelerator. “He never really liked me. We never, you know, bonded.” Kerri’s cell chirrups. “Would you get that? If it’s your mom, tell her we’re stuck on Harlan. We’re about ten minutes away.”

  I don’t get her phone. I’m not about to dig around in her personal belongings and used snot rags.

  The phone rings and rings. Kerri looks at me. I look away. Eventually, she plunges a hand into her purse and retrieves the cell. The ringing’s stopped by then. She says, “Reiko and I weren’t together all that long. She wasn’t into commitment.” She tosses the cell on the dash and lays on the horn. “Anyway, I thought Takashi was kind of a spoiled brat. Don’t tell him I said that.”

  Like I see him. That kid was a freak too.

  “How’s Savage?” Kerri asks.

  I finger his head, but he doesn’t move. Come on, Savage. Breathe.

  We get to the bottom of the ramp, and Kerri hangs a right. She says, “What happened between your mom and Jo wasn’t anyone’s fault. It happens.”

  Don’t talk to me.

  “You think it’s my fault, don’t you? You blame me.”

  She’s stupid and psychic.

  “Look, I don’t know what Jo told you —”

  “She didn’t tell me anything. If you’re going to clean our house again don’t touch my stuff. Don’t use the downstairs bathroom. It’s mine. And next time you do my laundry, leave it in the laundry room. Don’t come in my room — ever.” I adjust Savage on my lap. See if he’ll growl, twitch. BREATHE.

  I expect Kerri to yell at me or cuss me out or something so I can retaliate. Because I hate her. I hate what she did to us.

  She gazes straight ahead. “I’m sorry, Nick,” she says. “I know how much it hurts.”

  I almost throw Savage in her face. She doesn’t know. It’s not the same and she knows it. “You don’t know what hurt is,” I say.

  She looks all crushed. Faker.

  We don’t talk the rest of the way.

  Savage is gone by the time we reach the vet clinic. Mom’s there. She rushes over and takes Savage from my arms. “He’s dead,” I say.

  “Oh, honey . . .” She buries her face in the towel. Kerri puts her arms around Mom and touches her head to Mom’s. “I’m sorry, babe,” she says. Her voice cracks. “I’m so sorry.”

  Faker. Liar.

  Jo isn’t here, out front on the sidewalk, or visible through the glass entryway. I go inside and search around the waiting area. No Jo. I cross to a shelf of brochures and wedge behind the potted plant for privacy. I call her.

  “Nick,” she answers on the first ring. “How is he?”

  “Where are you?” I say. “We’re at the vet’s. Mesa Clinic. You said you knew where it was.”

  “How is he?” Jo repeats. “Is he . . . ?”

  “Dead.”

  “Oh, Nicky.” She exhales audible pain. “Nick.”

  Now the tears I’ve been holding back start to gush. I sink into the nearest chair and curl into a knot. “Where are you?” I say again.

  “I’m home,” Jo answers. Now she’s crying too. “How’s your mom?”

  “Why aren’t you here?” I whimper. “I want you here.” I clutch the phone tighter to my ear.

  “I know. I know. I just . . . I can’t. Not yet. I’m sorry, Nick. I can’t be where she is. How is she? Erin? Your mom, how’s she taking it?”

  I rubberneck around the plant. Mom and Kerri are near the reception desk, nodding at a woman in green scrubs who’s got a stethoscope around her neck. Tears stream down Mom’s cheeks. Kerri stands back. I was right; her eyes are dry. She’s cold. I don’t know why I’m bawling. Savage never really liked me or Jo that much; he was Mom’s cat.

  No, that’s not true. He was our cat. Mine and Mom’s and Jo’s. We loved him. We all did.

  I bury my head in my knees while Jo says stuff like, “He’s in heaven now. He’s happy now.”

  “Nick?” Kerri looms at the side of my chair. “We’re going.” She lowers herself to the armrest and adds, “Are you okay?” Her hand weights down my head.

  I stand up fast. “I have to go,” I tell Jo. “I’ll call you later.” I flip my cell shut.

  Swiping my eyes on my arm, I brush by Kerri and head off to find Mom. She’s outside at the curb. Empty-handed.

  “Where’s Savage?” I say.

  Mom engulfs me in a hug. She’s crying so hard I almost lose it again.

  “Where is he?”

  Mom inhales a stuttered breath. “He’s gone, honey.”

  “I know that. Where is he?” I slip out of her arms.

  She glances over my shoulder to the door, where Kerri is emerging from the
clinic. Also empty-handed.

  “Where. Is. Savage?” I speak the words distinctly so they can’t be misunderstood. So Mom can’t ignore me.

  She looks to Kerri. Kerri answers, “The vet clinic takes care of everything. They dispose of animal bodies.”

  “No!” I shout. “That’s not how we do it.” My stomach clenches. “Tell her, Mom.”

  Mom says . . . nothing.

  “Mom!” I yell right in her face. “We have to bury Savage. We saved a place, remember?” Next to Lucky 2 and my Kuhli loach. Alongside all my fish. A place of honor and respect.

  Mom runs a hand down the length of my arm.

  I jerk away. “Go get him,” I order Kerri.

  “Nick, I —”

  “Get. Him.”

  Kerri casts Mom this helpless what-do-I-do? look. Mom touches my shoulder. “We can’t,” she says. “It’s illegal. There’s a new law that animal bodies have to be disposed of by a licensed removal company. People aren’t supposed to bury their pets anymore. I’m sorry, honey.”

  Illegal? How can it be illegal to keep your family together?

  I panic. I can’t help but wonder what’s going to happen to Savage. Will they just throw him in a Dumpster and bag him with the trash? Will they crush him, or incinerate his body? They’ll shovel his ashes out of an oven, then what?

  “This is your fault.” I point at Kerri. My finger shakes. “If we didn’t bring him here he could’ve died at home and we could’ve buried him. No one would’ve known. That’s how we do it.”

  Kerri throws up her hands. “Yeah, it’s all my fault. Everything is my fault.” Her eyes swell and she storms past us to her car.

  Faker.

  Unexpectedly, Mom spins me around to face her. “What a horrible thing to say. Go apologize.” She shoves me toward Kerri.

  I stumble off the curb and fall to my knees. Mom is racing for Kerri, so I scrabble to my feet and dust off my pants, my hands. Then I turn and march toward Mom’s car. Never, I think. I’ll never forgive her.

  Jo

  I bounce up onto the truck seat and slam the door. “We’ve got to stop meeting like this,” Jo says. L-3 slobbers all over my face. “Does Erin know you’re here?”

  It’s Erin now. Never Mom.

  “I called her.” I don’t add, She was in a deposition or something and couldn’t come to the phone. I didn’t leave a message. Hey, I checked in. I’m the dutiful son.

  Jo steers out of the Conoco parking lot, and we rattle away. It sounds like the muffler is loose, or the exhaust pipe. Beatrice is rusty and decrepit. Filthy too, like Jo’s been four-wheeling her — without me. She says, “You’re sneaking out, aren’t you?”

  I don’t answer. I hug L-3. I love this dog. This mental mutt. We can’t have any pets now because Kerri is allergic. Yeah, well, what about me? I’m allergic to her.

  All I have are my fish. And L-3. I like my fish, but you can’t cuddle fish at night. You can’t confide in them how much you wish you could be six again. Or eight. How you miss playing Fetch the Football with your three-legged dog, or building snow forts with your mom, or scheming to get your other mom with an artillery of snowballs when she comes home from school.

  “What’s going on in that scary brain of yours?” Jo reaches over and clamps a claw over my skull. She twists my head on my neck so I’m facing her.

  “You don’t want to know,” I say.

  “Actually, I do.”

  I shrug. “Nothing. Everything. I hate it there. I hate her.”

  Jo’s eyes go black. “Has she moved in?”

  I shift my thinking. Kerri wasn’t the one I meant. “No.”

  Jo doesn’t admonish me anymore about hating people. She hates Kerri; I know she does. Some people deserve it. Jo releases my head.

  “I gotta go see a guy about a job, then I thought we’d head up to Bear Lake.”

  I already know the answer, but I ask anyway, “Did you get fired from FedEx?”

  Jo huffs. “No I didn’t get fired. And thank you for your confidence in my stability and reliability. I got laid off. There’s a difference.”

  I look at Jo. Really see her. She’s thinner than usual. Harder around the edges. Strands of gray filter through her hair. She doesn’t wear makeup and her skin looks blotchy. She still has her dragon tattoo, but the colors are fading, the scales and wings bleeding into her skin. She must sense me studying her because her shoulder twitches, then her right eye, then she screws up her face like the Hunchback. I laugh. I’m going to cook Jo dinner for a week and put it in her freezer. She needs to eat better, healthier. She needs more variety than pizza and hamburgers.

  We cruise the warehouse district downtown along factory row. We stop in front of a cinderblock building. There’s steam rising from metal grates and a smokestack emitting smelly soot. I don’t like it here. It’s ghetto. Jo says, “I’ll only be a minute. You guys hold down the fort.”

  I curl an arm around L-3’s neck. Jo hops out and hustles toward the building, her hands jamming into her pockets. My nose puckers and my stomach churns.

  L-3 gets restless and clambers to the back of the cab, behind our seats. He roots out a squeaky dog toy. There’s so much crap back there — fast-food cartons and dirty laundry and gum wrappers, rags and empty quarts of oil. I dig through the rubble and retrieve a sock. A red crew. I sniff it. Clean. She must’ve run a load of wash to the Laundromat and forgotten to take it upstairs. I wad the sock and shove it into the front pocket of my baggy shorts. If she ever sorts socks, she might wonder why she’s missing so many. Chances are that won’t happen soon. Anyway, I need them for my collection.

  Jo’s door flies open and she blows in. Lucky wraps his paws around her neck from the rear, but Jo pushes him away.

  I don’t like the look on her face. “Didn’t you get it?” I ask.

  She glares. “Thank you again for your belief and faith in me.”

  I click my tongue. “What happened?”

  The fire in her eyes extinguishes. “What would you think of me hacking slaughter for a living?”

  I frown. “What’s that?”

  She smiles grimly. “Meatpacking.”

  It triggers the recognizable stench in the air. One time I left hamburger to thaw in the oven so Lucky 2 wouldn’t snitch it off the counter. A week went by before I remembered it was in there. We couldn’t figure out what smelled so bad. Mom screamed when she found it. The meat was rancid and rotten and there were maggots crawling all over it.

  I shudder at the memory.

  Jo cranks over the ignition. “What the hell. It pays the rent.”

  “Is that the only job you can find?” I ask.

  “Well, Donald Trump was looking for an apprentice, but apparently he wasn’t impressed by my extensive resume. I doubt he even got to page eight, where I lie about graduating from high school.”

  She runs a red light, and we whack a speed bump. “It’s the only job I can find that isn’t union. I hate unions. And I need a full-time night shift.”

  “Why?”

  Her eyes cut to me. “For Einstein, you’re pretty slow on the uptake.”

  Oh. She’s keeping her days free. For me.

  Mom comes tearing out the front door as I’m slogging up the block. “Where have you been?” she screeches.

  I stop dead. This is why I asked Jo to drop me at the corner. Mom looks like a pit bull in heat. She comes at me like she’s rabid, foaming at the mouth. As strong as my instinct is to flee, I stand my ground. She clenches my shoulders and shakes me. “Where have you been?” Her fury is palpable. “I have the cops out looking for you.”

  “Huh?” What time is it? I wonder. The sun’s going down and the streetlights are flickering on. If my arms weren’t pinned to my sides, I’d check my watch. Jo and L-3 and I were having such a blast I guess we lost track of time. Bear Lake’s a long drive.

  “Where were you?” Mom jostles me again.

  “Quit it.” I push away from her. Kerri exits the front door, punchin
g numbers on her cell.

  “Nick!” Mom screams in my face. “Answer me.”

  “What? I was with Jo.”

  Mom’s eyes raze the landscape and ignite a grass fire. She snaps her head around and seethes at Kerri, “He was with Jo.” She scorches me again. “I thought I forbid you to see her.”

  “You did not.” My skin swells.

  We have an intense stare down. “You never did,” I say. You better not.

  Kerri calls, “I let the police know he’s home. I left a message.” She winces at me like, deep shit, boy.

  Mom’s still clenching my arms and it’s starting to cut off the circulation. I twist out of her grasp. She says, “Where did you go? Why didn’t you answer your phone?”

  My phone. Where is my phone? I dig in my pocket and feel only Jo’s sock. My head spins around. I must’ve left my phone in Beatrice. I guess I forgot to check messages when we got done fishing. Then after, I forced Jo to stop for groceries so I could cook for her tomorrow.

  “You’re not going to see her anymore. You’re not to talk to her or have any contact whatsoever.” Mom sticks out her hand. “Give me your cell. I can’t believe she had the gall to come here and pick you up.”

  My mind is reeling. “She didn’t. She doesn’t. I mean, I go to her.” What does she mean, I can’t see her? She can’t do this. Forbid me to see Jo?

  Mom stiffens her palm. “Give it to me.”

  My eyes scatter, my brain. “I don’t have it. Jo does.”

  Mom drops her arm. I don’t know who she’s talking to when she goes, “Now she’s stealing from me. That phone doesn’t belong to her. If she starts running up charges —”

  “She won’t. I forgot it, okay? I’ll get it back. God.”

  Mom lets off a puff of steam, then stomps back toward the house.

  “You can’t do this,” I say at her back. Then louder, “You can’t do this!”

  Mom whirls. “Oh yes, I can. I’ll get a restraining order if I have to, but she’s not coming anywhere near you again.”

  Kerri says calmly, “Erin, you don’t mean that . . .”

  Fear and rage fuel my feet and I charge at Mom, fists clenched. I bear down on her, flailing at her. She staggers forward and almost falls. Kerri catches her.