Connections (25 page)

Eileen entered her Social Security and pension deposits in the ledger book in the column marked INTEREST. Even though she had changed the title in the top margin from NAME OF STOCK to MONTHLY INCOME, it bothered her that the form was still not correct. She was premature in entering September’s credits, but she had the book out to record some dividends, so she got a little ahead of herself. Anyway, it wasn’t as if she couldn’t count on the checks being sent to the bank on time, and if the United States government or the New York City Board of Education went bankrupt and couldn’t pay her, whiting out the figures and correcting the total would be the least of her problems.

She went back through the pages and tallied up August. In pencil. All the dividends were in, but she’d still have another grocery bill, possibly something at the hardware store, so she couldn’t finish all her expenses or balance them against her income. But she knew what the final amount would be, almost to the dollar. And it was ten thousand dollars less than it used to be. Eileen’s sigh was broken by a groan. How long did it take to save ten thousand dollars when you didn’t have anything extra to save? Which is why she couldn’t understand how Rosa Bassetti was off buying cameras and developing pictures. Eileen was sure she had no extra income. And probably no savings to speak of. If she was living on Social Security, how could she risk spending that kind of money? Eileen might be able to cut a little more off her food, but that would only come to pennies, nickels. It took a lot of nickels to make ten thousand dollars. She had to face it; she’d never be able to make it up, and she should just stop thinking about it. Because whenever she did think about it, she got a pain in her heart. If Rosa ever knew how much money Eileen really had, she’d probably yell at her for living the way she did. Like Patsy McQuinlan always did. Or she’d laugh.
Well, it takes all kinds
, Eileen lectured herself,
and if she wants to live from hand-to-mouth, that’s her problem!

She pushed her book away and fanned herself with her bank statement. She took a long pull of iced tea, enjoying the shock as it cooled the inside of her chest. Mr. McGee lumbered through the kitchen door and sat next to her chair, panting. “You hot too?” She stroked his head. “I know, but we can’t put the air conditioner on ’til after five. Understand?” His tongue drooped sideways. His soulful eyes seemed to follow Eileen’s words as they left her mouth. “It’s just too expensive during the day when all the offices have theirs on. See?” She turned sideways at the table and fanned his face hard. “Better? Poor Fibber.”

Looking at him now, old, lethargic from the heat, his breathing straining his lungs, Eileen remembered how easily she had given up the ten thousand dollars when she thought Fibber McGee’s life was at stake. And she remembered how much she loved that dog. She glanced at the clock over the stove and suddenly pushed herself back from the table. “The heck with it. C’mon. Or as Rosa would say, ‘Who else but yourself should you treat good?’” She tried to mimic the Italian accent as she went into the bedroom, but it came out more of an Irish brogue. Once Fibber was inside with her, Eileen closed the door. She pushed in the LOW COOL button and as the motor spun to life, she lifted him onto the bed.

“In just a second it will be cool.” She hugged him. “And just think,” she gloated as she defended her extravagance out loud, “it will mean that much less money for Charlene!”

The last of the water swirled around the recess, slowed to a thin stream, and gurgled down the drain in the floor, leaving a few opaque bubbles of ammonia on the stainless steel rim. The scrawny figure walked on the sides of his feet, close to the edge of the concrete, to avoid the puddles, winding the hose in large circles around his arm as he went. He stood by the entrance and inspected the long room and the open doors to its fourteen rooms, eight on one side, six on the other. He put the hose down, took the rag hanging out of his back pocket, sprayed some Fantastik on it, and scrubbed the smudge on the wall next to the light switch.

He stepped into the hallway, hung the hose in a closet, opened the double-louvered doors concealing a built-in sink, and filled the bucket. He went to the next room, which he had cleaned earlier, and double-checked the typewritten instructions Scotch-taped to the little table just inside to make sure he hadn’t overlooked any details. It was quiet. The four were either drugged, still under anesthesia, or just too weak to cry. An occasional twitch of a leg or flutter of an eyelid was the only sign of life. Besides the level of liquid receding in the intravenous tubes. He reread the list to make sure he had given them the proper medication, prying their teeth open and pushing the pills back to their throats, forcing them to swallow in reflex.

He peeked back into the larger room to see if the floor had dried. He replaced all the bowls he had washed, carried his bucket from cubicle to cubicle. Everything was immaculate, ready for the day, ready for the boarders to return from their outing. He touched his chin to see if the pimple he detected under his skin this morning had grown.

The triage nurse in the Emergency Room at Metropolitan Hospital looked in her desk for a treat to give the four-year-old whose broken leg was being set in the trauma room. She pulled the drawer out farther and looked in the back. The REPORT OF A DOG BITE that she had thrown in there the night before slid forward. She took it out, along with an aging yellow lollipop that had melted onto its cellophane wrapper.

She licked the sticky lemon flavor off her finger and hurried to meet a heart-attack victim. After that, it was a whirlwind of attending to patients, prying information out of new arrivals, and calling for specialists. When she came back to her desk, she collapsed in her chair for a two-minute break. She slipped off her left shoe to massage the throbbing callous, stretched her arms, and rotated her shoulders. Then, energy renewed, she resumed the midnight-to-eight.

Toward the end of her shift, she called her husband at his all-night gas station in Brooklyn to tell him what time she’d be ready to come home and started cleaning up for the replacement team. As she sat at her desk to freshen her makeup, she noticed the lollipop and realized she had never had time to give it to the little girl, who was probably fast asleep in her own bed by now. She stuck it back in the drawer. She saw the card with the report of a dog bite and knew she might get into trouble for not mailing it on time. She considered just dumping it. What good would it do the Bureau of Animal Affairs anyway, when the victim didn’t even have an address. That’s why they’d had to admit him, just to watch him in case of rabies. She flipped the card over. It was postpaid by the Department of Health. She could just drop it in a mailbox, when she passed one. She put it in her bag and waited in the doorway, hoping the day nurse would be on time. She could always blame the delay on the post office. They deserved it.

Honda waited on the worn welcome mat, a spasm of shakes and shudders spraying water and hair in the hallway. As soon as Louise came back with the old bath towel, he offered his front paw, his ears flat back as if admitting some guilt. “It’s okay; it’s not your fault it rained.” She rubbed him vigorously. “But did you have to jump into the puddle?” When she was finished with all four feet, she massaged his body dry and twisted the towel into a terry-cloth rope. The air cracked as she slashed it toward him. She screamed in fright as she let him chase her through the apartment and eventually grab the end of the rope. They both grunted and growled during a fierce tug-of-war and then tumbled to the floor so the victor could administer his customary licks of consolation to the loser. That was the best part of the game.

Louise relaxed flat on her back, with Honda’s head resting on her shoulder, one front paw across her chest. Warmth and affection spread through her. She wondered if the bonding between a mother and a newborn baby on her breast could be any stronger. “You’re my guy, aren’tcha?” She kissed the silver triangle between his eyes and held him tighter to her. She relished the feeling and worried that she would never be able to share it with another human being. Even Ken, although each time she was with him, she felt closer to experiencing it—abandon with someone. The ultimate freedom. Like she felt with her dog. For a minute, she wanted to shrug off the intimacy that she was ashamed must hint of perversion.

Honda’s brows were lost in his thick fur but the shaggy ridge shirred in concentration as his eyes tried to follow Louise’s mood, able to distinguish every nuance of her expression. “Don’t worry,” she reassured him, “there’s no way you’re going to be boarded. Not for Labor Day, not next Christmas, not even for the apocalypse. Uh-uh.” She had told Ken she would consider it. Well, she just had. She could never enjoy the weekend, worrying about Honda being in a cage. Not that he would be mistreated. But her soul lurched at the thought of Honda crying for her, wondering why he was being punished. You couldn’t explain to a dog that it was only for a few days. That she couldn’t bring him to a stranger’s house and even though Ken’s parents might love animals, she couldn’t ask them. She couldn’t explain to Honda that he’d be better off in a kennel than at home all alone.

Look how he was now, at the end of a long day. She knew that he knew what time it was. No matter what anybody said, he knew. And he waited at the door so he could hear her coming in downstairs. Unable to contain himself. Then anxiously watching her change into a pair of jeans, eager to go. Not only because his bladder was probably bursting, but because his heart was bursting with the joy of being with her, the anticipation of coming home from their walk and spending time together with her. No, she just couldn’t put him in a kennel.

The fleeting possibility that Ken would give her a hard time about it tugged in her chest. That he would make her choose between them. But as soon as the thought took form, it evaporated. That was one of the endearing things about Ken. He respected her feelings, no matter what they were. Respected them and accepted them. Something that nobody had ever done before. Or to be honest, maybe it was because she had never let anyone know what her feelings were before. No, it was going to be all right. At least she hoped it was, because if there was any doubt, if Louise were ever forced to make a decision, she knew who she’d give up.
God knows, I’ve done it before.

“You’re my guy,” she said out loud and clutched Honda, “my main squeeze.”

🙧

Chris Barrett could hardly bear the excitement stirring in his gut. He knew, after the first page, that this was going to be
it
. Now, more than a third into the story, he was sure of it. He got up to mix himself a scotch and soda. He set a coaster on the cocktail table for his drink, lit a cigarette, and stretched out on the couch, inhaling the first deep drag. He reached behind to turn the lamp higher, as the rain had brought dusk early. That, of course, was the test—not reading at the desk. The fact that Jason’s files were all over it didn’t have anything to do with it. Work-reading was done at the desk, pleasure-reading on the couch.

Sabrina stood on the fanned-out pages he had been turning face down on the floor as he finished them. The hell with electronic submissions and squinting at a screen. Chris always had the manuscripts printed out. And he favored the loose sheets over ones that came in some fancy spiral fasteners or glued bindings that were so heavy to hold. “Uh-uh, little girl, careful.” Chris picked her up with one hand and moved the box with the rest of the pages from his stomach to make room for her. “Careful, careful, that’s our fortune there.” He took a long sip of his drink and blotted his hand, wet from the frosty glass, on Sabrina’s belly.

“So whaddya think? We’re going to be rich and famous, you lucky dog you.” Chris scratched the spot under her neck that she loved, the one Jason always said gave her a canine orgasm. “After all these years, reading all that crap—I must’ve read a thousand novels—I finally have a best-seller. Yup, and we’re going to be able to write our own ticket from now on. Because I discovered it.” His explanation to the Yorkie became a singsong tale. “Would you believe…I selected this old bond-paper box out of the mountain of other old bond-paper boxes and manila envelopes? They don’t even get read anymore, just returned with a form letter saying we don’t accept unsolicited manuscripts. It’s our lucky day, girl. Can you imagine? I just felt like thumbing through anything, just for something to do instead of watching TV. That’s fate. Maybe we’ll get a big enough bonus, with the small advance I’m going to offer, to quit. That’s right, quit. Say ‘screw you’ and walk out.”

Chris thought of all the encouragement he had given to Jason to start his own business, to open the store, and take the risk, when deep down Chris had always been afraid to do that himself. If he could build up just a little more of a nest egg, he would do it. Become a literary agent, like he’d wanted to for the past twenty years. The luster that had attracted the young Christopher Barrett, just out of college, to the prestigious world of publishing had long ago tarnished. Words like scholarly, erudite, letters, intellectual, and classics had been replaced with terms like mass-market, paperbacks, promotions, author tours, packaging, acquisitions, marketing, floor bids. And most recently, digital. Old, respected publishing houses were being swallowed up by communications conglomerates, and authors who couldn’t write an English sentence were getting advances the size of movie-star salaries. The intellectual quest had gotten lost somewhere in the drudgery. The literary aura had faded. And so had Christopher Barrett’s dreams.

But now, discovering a new talent, a real writer, immersing himself in the eloquently told story, Chris’s youthful enthusiasm came back. “Know what?” he said softly to Sabrina. “We could get a little house in the country. We’d keep the apartment for as long as Jason had the store. Just the three of us. Wouldn’t you like that?”

Chris made another drink and curled up to finish the manuscript, with Sabrina fast asleep in the crook of his left arm. His old passion for books swelled in his brain; his eagerness to celebrate it with Jason throbbed in his groin.

🙧

Lenny unpacked his duffel bag. He put his dirty laundry in the hamper, his shirts on top of Jessica’s dress on the vanity shelf, where she would automatically sort Chinese laundry and dry cleaners, and his toiletries in the medicine chest. He didn’t feel like talking to anyone so when the phone rang, he let the answering machine pick it up.

He recognized Dr. Kravitz’s voice before she left her name. Lenny unpacked his clean underwear while he listened to her breathless message. “Great,” he said out loud and then clamped his hand over his mouth, as if she could hear him. “Great,” he repeated in a whisper, patting the boxer shorts as he put them on top of the neat pile in his drawer.

🙧

Almost all of the files were now in the database. Certainly there were enough for Laurie to finally demonstrate the new procedure. Early this morning, she had entered all the names scheduled in the appointment book for the day and had given Dr. Pomalee a printout for each patient, an entire medical history on a single sheet. Only one history was not available—a German Shepherd who had not been in for two years—and she put his folder on the bottom. By November, she expected to have the previous two years’ records input. She was very pleased with the doctor’s reaction…his astonishment was still glowing on her cheeks. Right after Labor Day, she was going to get a temp in so Stacy could sit with her all day and learn the system. Then she’d be able to do the same thing at the terminal on her desk, automatically printing a bill at the end of an office visit.

Her watch, which she kept fifteen minutes fast, showed five thirty. Storage cabinets blocked the view, so she couldn’t see out, but she could hear the rain hitting the window panes and thrumming the air conditioner. Time to call it a day, if you counted coming in at eight and gobbling lunch at her desk “a day.” Which reminded her that there was still some of lunch left. Laurie retrieved the plastic container from the refrigerator and held it open so Megabyte could lick the remnants. “What? You don’t like homemade tuna salad? Okay with me if you’d rather have cat food than the real thing! Crazy cat.” She left the container on the floor in case the cat changed her mind. Before she went home, she’d go downstairs for a can of food. There was no point getting drenched. She might as well stay until the rain let up. Besides, she’d been so busy lately that she hadn’t had time to work on her own project.

She folded back her spiral notebook cover, turning the pages to find where she had left off. The keys on her computer clicked slowly at first, and then she increased her speed as her fingers found the rhythm and the melody of rain.