At the Edge of the Haight

by Katherine Seligman

  “So, you knew who that explorer was?” I said. Ash had some college. He knew things.

  “I could come up with it, if there wasn’t so much else going on here.” He pointed to his head. “But you have to try to make them happy. You could, Mad. Let’s go get Root.”

  “She didn’t seem happy,” said Fleet.

  We headed for the bus stop, but Fleet wanted to stay with Tiny. It was easier to have a rat on the street than a dog. The rat could eat anything out of the trash. He could sleep in Fleet’s sleeve. She never had to worry that he’d be stolen or beaten. Or taken to Animal Control. The cops took away Root, but they had let her keep Tiny, who was crawling through her hands, one to the other.

  The wind picked up so we stood up in the doorway of the bar on the corner that served punch in pineapple-shaped bowls. A group of people inside sat around a little table with long straws, like insects. The manager came out and asked us not to block the door, even though it was barely noon and the place was almost empty. At night people filed out regularly, went around the corner to pee on a wall and went back in. No one hassled them.

  We jumped on the bus through the back entrance. The driver glanced at us, but let it go. What did he care? We weren’t going to bother anyone. People parted to let us through, like they didn’t want to be near us or stand in our way either. We sat in the way back and Ash rested his skateboard across both our laps.

  “Next stop, dog jail,” he said.

  “But what am I going to do if we get him? I’m not sure I can come back here after what happened to that kid in the park.”

  “You should wait before you get all worked up,” he said.

  How could I wait? My whole life had flipped in one day. All I wanted was to get Root and figure out where to sleep that night. It seemed like every time I set myself up somewhere, everything changed. One place to another, nothing stuck. The bus jolted us when it stopped and started, and swayed in between. I thought I might throw up.

  “Jesus,” shouted a man in front of us as his cup flipped out of his hand and onto the floor, where it rolled down the aisle spewing coffee.

  “Thanks. Thanks a lot,” said a woman in a tight black skirt, wearing ear buds and looking at her cell phone that was suddenly flecked with coffee.

  “I’m sorry,” said the man. He scavenged in his backpack for something to clean up the mess and dropped a newspaper on the pool of coffee.

  The woman leaped out of her seat. “You’re going to have to pay my cleaning bill and take care of my phone if it’s damaged,” she said.

  “Calm down,” he said. “It was just caramel latte. Not battery acid.”

  “Easy for you to say since you don’t have to show up at work this way. You’re not even supposed to bring food on the bus,” she said. “See the sign up there?”

  “I told you I’d take care of it,” he said. “I’ll give you my contact information. You don’t have to act like a bitch.”

  He stood up to fish in his backpack again, which is when the real trouble began. She was so close that he bumped her with his elbow and she stumbled backward, grabbing onto a railing. The rest of us watched, like it was a show on TV.

  “Stop the bus,” the woman yelled, and pulled the emergency cord along the window. “I’ve been assaulted.”

  The bus jolted to a stop, which sent everyone standing into the next person. The bus driver got up, squared his shoulders and headed toward the back, which was slick with coffee. I could hear his shoes getting sticky with it. Ash and I looked at each other. It was one of those times when we didn’t have to talk. We bolted for the back door and off the bus. There was no sense getting mixed up in that scream fest.

  “What a total be-otch,” said Ash. “It’s not like he was all after her or anything.” He laughed, throwing his head back. But I was annoyed.

  “He was the bitch,” I said. “He acted like she was nuts for complaining.”

  “Complaining? More like making it into a crime scene.”

  I could feel myself growing angrier with every step. I walked like I was marching.

  Ash could take his skateboard and go back to the Haight. I’d pick up Root alone and figure out where to take him. Who needed that?

  “You are a cave man,” I yelled at him. “Actually, that’s too good for you.”

  He looked at me and I figured he would turn around and go the other direction, skateboard slung over this shoulder. Instead he started laughing again and then he pounded his chest.

  “Cave man go with cave woman to get dog,” he said and he couldn’t stop laughing.

  I stared him down, not willing to give up this easily, even to the person who knew me better than just about anyone else, at least in this city.

  “Come on, Mad,” he said. “Let’s get Root before the stupid place closes for the day.”

  The lobby of the animal shelter was lined with pictures of dogs and cats—a fat orange tabby, a small dog that looked like it was smiling through broken bottom teeth, a beagle in a banana costume—each one with a story about where it was found, and the words underneath, Adopt Available. All of them had been found somewhere. I thought about the cast of faces on the cop station walls, none of them found.

  The room smelled like wet fur and herbal shampoo. A woman with glasses on a string around her neck sat at a wooden desk reading a magazine. She didn’t look up when we walked in even though a buzzer sounded. Ash pulled me in front of him.

  “Yes?” she said, smiling and closing the magazine, something called bark. That gave me courage. She was working in a place that took care of lost animals and spent her time reading about dogs.

  “I’m looking for my dog. The cops at Park Station said he would be here.”

  “What’s your name? You have some ID?” she asked.

  I turned around to Ash. “I don’t have any ID,” I said. “What are we supposed to do now? Do you have anything?”

  “Police citation, anything will do,” said the woman.

  I pulled the wrinkled citation out of my pocket and handed it to her. She smoothed it, then started tapping at her computer.

  “He’s around the corner because we were full up,” she said. “He’s staying at the adoption center, but if you sign for him and wait a few minutes, a volunteer will take you over to get him. You’re Madlynne Donaldo?”

  “Yes,” I said. Then added, “Ma’am.”

  “You don’t need to Ma’am me,” she said. “We are all here for the same reason. It doesn’t matter if you live in a fancy house in Pacific Heights or you live on a street.” She handed me back the citation. “You’ve got to have the right resources to care for your dog.”

  “We do okay,” I said.

  “Well, I can see they treated him for fleas and they cleaned him up,” she said. “He was hungry. He ate two bowls.”

  I wanted to tell her he would always eat two bowls, even after he’d already had two before that, but I kept quiet. A girl came in and led us to the adoption center. She wore skinny black jeans but managed to wedge a phone into her back pocket. It moved back and forth as we passed through a few long corridors with glass doors along the walls. We could see dogs in big cages behind each of them. That must have been the jail portion. The girl pushed a switch on the wall and a door opened into a whole other part of the building. This one was wide open like a mall, but instead of stores there were big rooms with furniture and rugs. All around, there were dogs, collapsed on a bed or sofa, or curled on a throw rug. A Great Dane lay draped on one bed, one ear up and the other down, even though it looked asleep. Next door a fluffy black puppy playing with a stuffed giraffe stopped and looked hopefully at me. And then I saw Root, standing at attention, his nose pressed against the glass. He knew we were there and he was waiting. I put my hand on the other side of the glass.

  “He’s got it pretty good in there,” said the girl, reaching to open the door. “But I guess he’s not into TV. Some of the dogs watch it all day.”

  The flat screen in his room was tuned to
a nature show, a lion relaxing in the sun, watching a herd of antlered animals in the distance. The bed was covered with a zebra pattern blanket. In the corner were stainless steel bowls for food and water. The girl watched me look around and told me about how when the adoption center first opened it offered to let homeless people come stay with the animals, just to keep them company.

  “To get the dogs used to people and give people a place to sleep,” she said. “But the homeless groups said it was insulting, it wasn’t a real solution, and refused to sign on with the program. Go figure. I can hardly afford my rent. I’d stay here in a minute.”

  “I’d be down,” said Ash. “Tell your boss.”

  “I will, but I’m no one here,” said the girl. “I just fill in when I’m not overloaded at school. I’m getting a degree in public affairs, which I’ll finish next year if I can ever get my classes. It is taking forever. Or maybe I’ll try to get into vet school.”

  Root jumped up and put his paws up on my waist, trying to lick me. He was whining like I’d been away for a month. I hugged him and put my nose on his head.

  “He thinks he’s a biped,” said the girl. “He’s a sweet guy. Better than most of my boyfriends.” Then she looked over at Ash. “Sorry,” she said.

  “He’s not my boyfriend,” I said. “Actually, neither of them is.”

  The girl laughed. “Come on back here if you ever want to volunteer. It’s a good way to build a résumé and you’d get to spend time with all the dogs and take them on walks.”

  She clipped a leash on Root’s collar and handed the other end to me. He pranced like a puppy back to the lobby and pulled to get back outside. Now that we had him, we’d have to walk back to the park. No bus driver was going to let us on with Root, even though he looked cleaner than we did.

  We threaded through the downtown business area, past people waiting in line for the bus and rushing into crosswalks in a hurry to get home. The fog was blowing in and it was starting to get cold. The tall buildings blocked what was left of the sun and set up a wind tunnel that whipped my hair around my head. A steel crane turned in the wind on the top of a building across the street. I walked faster, hoping it wasn’t going to flip over. Ash crossed his arms across his chest to keep in the warmth. But Root seemed to get friskier, sniffing in all directions. His tongue lolled out to one side.

  “Be right back,” said Ash, when we reached the Tenderloin, a corner of downtown where we started not to stand out so much. The streets were lined with worn-out hotels, liquor stores, smoke shops, and diners. I’d been there a few times, mostly to a church that served free dinners. People were already sitting outside, waiting in a line that went around the block. A lady in a puffy coat sat with two little girls, one of them on her lap playing with a doll. The other one was next to her, trying to draw in the dust on the pavement. I smiled at her when we passed, but she didn’t look at me. The lady probably told her not to talk to strangers. That’s what my mom would have done.

  I kept walking. Three older guys sat next to a planter passing a bottle of vodka. One of them, a dried bloody knot on his forehead, waved and held it out to me. I raised my hand and shook my head. Down the block a guy in a leopard print dress and a stiff wig combed into a flip was sprawled on the sidewalk. Where was Ash? If I’d known he was going to disappear I could have waited for dinner at the church, with that lady and her kids. I passed a red neon peep show sign blinking in the window. xxx special girls. Maybe Ash had gone to take a leak in one of the bathrooms that looked like storage sheds. They gave us tokens at the shelter, but then warned us about using them. People got robbed in there. Or they fell asleep. And if you stayed in too long, a water spigot opened on the ceiling and sprayed you.

  I hurried, keeping my eyes down. “Don’t talk to strangers,” I said to Root. A few blocks later Ash showed up back at my side, holding out a green apple for me. “Did some shopping,” he said, crunching into his own. “And this is for Root.” He offered a small hard roll to Root, who snapped it from his fingers and started chewing. We stopped until he swallowed it and had licked the crumbs off the sidewalk.

  “Don’t lift stuff,” I said to Ash. “We don’t need to get busted again. I don’t.”

  “What makes you think I lifted those?” he said. “Okay, so I liberated a few things. Like you should be talking. The jerk at that market on Eddy charges twice what he should anyway. Next person who pays makes up for it. It’s a cosmic game, with no one keeping score.”

  I finished my apple and fed the core to Root. We were going to miss dinner at the shelter and it was too late to check in for the night. I’d be relieved to have Ash in the park or wherever we ended up. Root was a good watchdog when he needed to be, but after everything that had happened, I didn’t want to be alone.

  I held onto Ash’s arm and Root pulled us along. It was dark when we reached Haight Street and I was hungry in a way that made me want to punch someone. “Here comes dinner,” said Ash, watching a middle-aged couple walking toward us, holding two square pizza boxes. We stopped right as they walked by and tried to make eye contact. That was always the first thing you had to do. They were holding hands, which they dropped apart when they got to us. The woman walked all the way to one side and the guy on the other.

  “Excuse me,” said Ash. “Want to help us out with some doggie bags? We even got a real dog here.”

  They clasped hands again after they passed, but neither one slowed down. “Can’t we walk down the street without getting harassed?” said the guy, turning to look back at us.

  “Sorry, Mom and Dad. What did I do?” Ash yelled after them. “I promise I’ll take a shower if you let me come home. I’ll clean my room.”

  Then he tapped the back pocket of his jeans. “Hey,” he said, “I forgot we have money.” He clawed out the folded up twenty we’d gotten for Root, then put it back quickly when we got to the pizza place and saw some guys set up outside. They usually hung out in a park that was halfway downtown, but they’d tagged their name on the sidewalk, ES EF, just in case you forgot they were here. You couldn’t get by them without paying somehow.

  One of them held an open pizza box on his lap and the others were gathered around him. A brown and white speckled dog growled at Root as we got close. He had a choke chain around his neck so I wasn’t worried, but Root moved closer to me.

  “Bastard, down!” said the guy with the box and tightened his hold on the dog. It was about Root’s size but looked like pure pit. “Down,” he yelled and slapped the dog hard across the neck. It kept growling, but rolled on its back, paws up. “Bastard,” he said, and put his face down near the dog’s ear. “You listen when I tell you something.” We inched past and Ash went inside to order our own pie. I stood with my back turned, pretending I didn’t notice them. On the way out, warm box in his arms, Ash stopped, and the group surrounded him. One of them had a shaved head and tattoo that looked like a ring of thorns around his neck. Another had a chain belt, with small hanging links tucked into his front and back pockets. He wore a black knit cap and an olive-green jacket, like he was a military officer. Ash opened the box and handed the military guy half the pie, folded the lid shut and started moving down the street. That was what it cost. They took whatever they wanted, half of anything we had, and then they let us alone. Root pulled to keep up with Ash.

  “Fucking ES EF,” said Ash, sliding down onto the ground, starting into a slice of pizza. I was taking a bite when they showed up next to us.

  “That’s how you share?” said the one who’d already grabbed half our pie.

  Ash looked up, his mouth too stuffed to talk. I could feel Root’s body going tense and his growl growing louder. The guy kicked the empty pizza box so hard that it flipped up into the air and landed in the street. He wheeled around and slammed his foot into Ash’s gut. I could hear the air rush out of Ash’s body as he doubled up. He reached down toward his feet, like a boot knife was going to solve our problems. The guy with the thorn tattoo laughed as they took off down the st
reet.

  Ash was gasping, but already up on his feet. I put an arm around his waist and he shrugged me away, embarrassed. We waited to make sure they weren’t circling back and then walked toward the park. We passed two guys in headlamps going through trash cans at the corner, picking out cans and bottles they could recycle. One jumped out of the way as a skateboarder flew by. A few people were tucked in doorways, in any position a body could fit. No one wanted to crash like that. After it got dark, people came and picked you over. They took your pack, your shoes, your coat if you were too out of it to notice. You woke up and everything was gone. It wasn’t that where we stayed was so great, but at least it was ours. You have to choose, Ash said. We made peace with ES EF, we knew the rules, we paid, so they left us alone most of the time.

  chapter 7

  Hope was all but swallowed by her lumped-up sleeping bag, snuggled against a twisted trunk at the top of 40 Hill, where we stayed. Ash had staked it out, strung up empty beer bottles on the biggest tree, along every branch he could reach. On windy days, they clanked and jangled. You could hear them down at the lake, but you couldn’t see us. We’d worn a trail on the flattened leaves, through the bushes and up to the center of a small windblown circle of trees. All of them listed to one side, blown by the constant wind off the ocean, like they’d been groping for something and then stopped before they got it. We slept below, in the spongy mattress of leaves and dirt. I took down the sleeping bag that I’d hung on a branch, along with a coat I’d found at the shelter. Hope had slung a plastic bag of her things nearby. I didn’t want to know what was in there. She hoarded. I kept bugging her not to tie food up in our trees, to put it in a cart we’d parked down the hill so the raccoons wouldn’t bother us. They would do anything for food, climb into a backpack at night, even with Root there. He would sit up, growl, and then lie back down. He knew his own food was buried in a plastic tub, safe.