Walking the Dog (27 page)

“I'll never be safe,” Midge grunted.

PHYLLIS

Phyllis Gelb greeted me with a hug. I almost threw up in her embrace. We met in a private room in the warden's quarters. She sat down in a folding chair and patted another one for me to join her. The puppy was lying asleep next to her in an iron crate. I could hardly see what it looked like. Phyllis Gelb, however, was obese, and wore an alligator T-shirt and khaki capri pants. She was fair skinned with blondish hair and in her forties. I didn't want to be unfair, because it was clear that she loved dogs and wanted all of life to be perfect. She just talked a lot. She talked so much. She talked as if she knew the definitive answers for everything from household tips to why guns were not necessarily bad if you locked them up. I knew all about dog breeding and training philosophies and her family history and theories about the president before she remembered to ask my name.

“Carleen, believe me, I'm psychic in matters like these, and I can tell you have real dog sense. Dog people
know
dog people, and you
are
a dog person. I'm going to be giving you a pamphlet the association put together. It tells you everything from what your puppy should eat, to the correct toys, to the voices you use to talk to him, to the training techniques, to when he should poop. Please read it thoroughly and not like
we're just some weird cult who lives for animals. We've been training dogs for the blind for over seventeen years. Hasn't always worked out perfect, but we have an 87 percent success rate and that's because people like you pay attention and are devoted. This is the first time we're trying out at a prison like this, Carleen. Dogs can't read your records. They only know your heart.”

Phyllis then bent over to pull the sleeping puppy out of his crate. He opened his eyes and wagged his tail and went back to sleep on her lap.

“Long trips tire 'em out till they're trained otherwise. We've got dogs now that travel with businessmen all over the world. In private jets even. Seventeen-hour flights. You wouldn't believe.” I was trying to get a look at the puppy, but all I could see was a mound of reddish-brown curls and big feet.

“The standard dogs for guiding and protecting tend to be Labs, golden retrievers, and German shepherds. This one here's a hybrid. Don't know what in the hell he is. We found him in a litter of retrievers, but he was clearly stuck in there by somebody because he has no resemblance to those who would be his brothers and sisters. I just hate dishonest breeders, don't you? Also, he's not typical because we think he's going to be larger than most. We're starting a program with strays to see if they respond as well to puppy trainings as the ones bred for the task. So you're new. He's new. The experiment is new. New. New. New. I believe change and experimenting is all there is in this world.” Phyllis Gelb shifted in her seat again. But the puppy stayed out cold.

She paused and appeared to be sad for a brief moment. She tried not to glance at my somewhat sickly thinness.

“You strong enough for this, Carleen Kepper?”

“Yes, ma'am,” I said.

“Then take him. Just pick him up and look in his eyes.”

So I carefully took the curly, dead-to-the-world, gangly creature off her lap. My hands felt big and calloused. He awoke immediately, and I held him out in front of me so I could get a good view of his face.

All I remember are his brown eyes. They were the first eyes I'd ever seen in my life that instantly, without thought, trusted me. With no knowledge of the past. No fear of the future. And I experienced a loosening inside myself that I'd never felt before. It was as if a breeze blew through me. There was no instinctive pulling back, like a child used to being beaten. I leaned forward a little bit at a time until he put his head on my shoulder and snored.

BAT MITZVAH TALK: ANOTHER LETTER TO BATYA SHULAMIT

Dear Batya Shulamit,

              
I know more now about your chosen name. Please forgive me for parroting back stupid details when you are a vessel of biblical facts and subtleties. I simply had an urge to tell you why I find the name so fascinating and perhaps inspiring for me. Batya wouldn't worship any idols, which I personally find an admirable trait. It seems to me that an idol can often be given unearned power and will allow its source to abuse people. I don't like the word “idol” because it promotes a kind of easy stardom—like that show American Idol, which seems to me to be a lot of yodeling, crying, and creating hysterical pseudostars before anyone's even proven that they're a pseudosuperstar. I just really don't like the word “idol.” It sounds like the word that means doing nothing. Revving, but in place.

Also, I am very intrigued by the version of the story that says the angel Gabriel slew all Batya's handmaidens because they wouldn't retrieve Moses's basket and, in place of them, by magic, he made her arm and hand grow so she could reach into the water herself. The image of a long, reaching arm is so beautiful to me. I think of a swan, or
blue heron. I can even see the Loch Ness Monster rising out of the lake, not as a hideous creature, but as a glowing white hand with a tiny basket made from brush and twigs. What an arm!

And finally, among many other variations I like, I find that papyrus, which surrounded Batya and Moses, can be made into paper. So appropriate considering your ambitions to be a writer.

I further admire Batya because she was rebellious, but I will say no more on the subject.

I hope you remain and shall always be well.

        
Carleen Kepper née Ester Rosenthal

I showed the letter to Elisheva. “I can't cry, I can't cry. I'm gonna drip. God, I cry so easily and I wear too much makeup. It's so stupid.” She dabbed expertly around her eyes. We were sitting in the Leroy Street dog run right off the river.

“Will you give it to her?”

“Give it to her? I'll shove it down the little brat's throat. I'm telling you, puberty—she's worse than some child soldier in the Congo . . . No, no, I didn't mean that. Really, I didn't mean it. I'm not racist. Well, maybe unconsciously—but not overtly. No, I just mean she's turning into a viper, a vampire. She's still Miss Goody-Goody most of the time, but so full of herself—so judgmental. Do you know she got sent home from school for refusing to change into her gym clothes in front of the other girls? Refused. Told me they'd make fun of her. Because she has a belly.”

“Does she?” I asked.

“She's still got some remnants of the little girl, and that part of her hasn't smoothed out yet.”

“Good thing she doesn't have to eat what they served us in prison: Meat. Cheese. Salisbury steak. Thick mystery stews. Jello pudding pies. Mac and cheese.

Elisheva eyed me competitively for a minute. “You're pretty fit,” she muttered.

“Manual labor—the best workout,” I mumbled.

“Anyway, Batya was in hysterics and Anna, who is cool, Danish, gorgeous, and about as psychologically adept as Judge Judy, called me. Leonard was beside himself because, you know, any hint of anger or distress and Batya goes straight to the shrink on the Upper East Side lest she become . . . ,” Elisheva stuck her tongue out at me, “‘a psychotic.' Leonard's very quiet lately. Softer. Not so many lectures on the environment and self-serving stories about playgrounds in Cambodia. He also used to make her laugh, but he's not as funny as usual. Maybe business is bad. That's freaking her out, too, I think.”

“What did you say to her?” I asked quickly.

“I tried to find a comforting passage in the Song of Songs about sexy, fleshy women, but she wouldn't have any of it. I told her that all her friends were too worried about their bodies to notice her. And, finally, I just said, ‘Stop being such a Jewish princess,' and
that
got to her.”

“I'm glad she's on the right moral path. Concerned with the future of mankind.”

“You're not,” Elisheva said with a laugh.

APARTMENT HUNTING

I'd spent every day for two months trying to find an apartment. Something strange was going on. I'd find a modest studio in the Lower East Side, put down a deposit, and the landlord said he'd check my references. The next week I'd get my deposit back and a firm
no
. This happened over ten times. I called Joe Kasakowski and asked him if he'd changed his opinion about me. He said he'd given the okay to anyone who called.

“Clayton's giving you an A+, too, Ms. Kepper, so I don't know what's going on. I'll make some calls.”

I gave him the number of some of the landlords who had recently rejected me and in ten minutes he had the answer.

“It's your so-called employers. They're saying that you won't be working there after next week, so they can't guarantee you'll have a job. Did you fuck up?”

“I swear no, Joe. They said I was their best walker.”

“Go talk to them and get back to me. It's time for a visit anyway. 'Specially if you're getting canned.”

Neither Hubb nor Lucinda would look me in the eye. Lucinda looked jazzed on some speed. Hubb swished papers around on the desk as if he was working, but he wasn't.

“What the fuck?” I said.

“Watch your language,” Lucinda said. “Show some respect. You always act as if you own the place.”

“You want good manners?” I was weirded out. “And I can't find a place to live?”

“Sorry 'bout that,” Hubb said, “but we're terminating you.”

“But why?” I asked. “I haven't broken one rule. I've brought in over three-fourths of your new clients. I thought we even liked each other.” I could see that they'd both fallen off whatever rickety wagon they'd been riding. I had to watch it because they were in a dark high.

“We was talking,” Lucinda said, “and we figured out that you was planning a coup.” She pronounced it
coop
.

“You're gonna try to worm your way in with some of your ex-con friends and take over our business. We're all criminals, Carleen. We know how you think. But me and Lucinda, we made something here. You're a jackal,” Hubb explained.

“I've been completely loyal,” I said. “I didn't have any plans like that at all.”

I suddenly realized it was ridiculous to have a rational conversation. They were heavily back into their drugs and booze, the perfect cocktail for paranoia. I saw the future. Their business was going to fry, and they'd end up in their separate jails. There were so many reasons I had to get out of there, I didn't say goodbye.

Instead of sinking into despair, I went into a fury. I got wired. The first person I called was Elisheva. She met me later that day, and we sat near the fountain at Washington Square Park.

“I'm waiting for the day when we can meet inside and stop playing
Mission: Impossible
,” she said cheerfully. But she noticed I was jumpy. And I was smoking a cigarette, which I rarely did anymore. I was grateful to her for not becoming afraid of me.

“Look,” I said. “I know you're in over your head, but could you help me start a business?”

“I'm all about business,” Elisheva said excitedly.

I told her the story of what had transpired.

“Those bastards!” she yelled. “Let's get right on our phones and call every single one of your clients, tell them exactly what's been going down, and you'll just start your own agency.”

“No, we can't do that,” I said. “I can't be associated with any drugs or junkies. Not even if I'm out. Me and anything negative and illegal brings up associations, you know? One person talks to one cop. One word gets out, and I'll be the one to go down.”

“Then what do we do?”

“You be my business partner. You'll call the clients who like me best in your cultivated, college-tone voice and tell them I've decided to branch out and try to start my own business. We'll buy a cheap cell phone and we'll give them the number. You'll be sure to say that, of course, they probably want to stay with Hubb and Lucinda, but if they know of anyone new looking for walkers, Carleen is available, as she has always been, to provide all services. If they ask why she's not working at Pet-Pals anymore, you just say that I want to try and make it on my own. Let them make the decision. Don't coax or hint.”

Elisheva's hands were dancing with excitement as she took notes, wrote little scripts for herself, and copied down my twenty-five or so names and numbers.

She looked at me, a wide grin showing perfect orthodontist teeth.

“What're we calling it?” Her enthusiasm wasn't helping my anxiety. I was already worried about involving her.

“You name it. But don't make it Jewish,” I said.

“I know you'll melt and die if we put your name in it, so let's just call it We Love Dogs.”

“Yeah,” I said mildly. But Elisheva was hesitant.

“Your daughter objected to the ‘love.' Batya said, ‘Stop
using
that
.
That
has been overused, trivialized, and made absolutely improbable. It takes years and years to achieve the truly holy status of that word. And Hallmark and
Grey's Anatomy
and
Sesame Street
have all blasphemed it!'”

“Wow.”

“She's been a little intense lately.”

“I personally have little feeling about the word,” I said. I was nervous and desperate. “We Love Dogs.”

“Yes!” she said, and shot her fist into the air.

“Elisheva, calm down. Let's get the clients first.”

“I'm on it,” she said, and was tapping away on her phone as I left her at the fountain.

My young partner was a rabbinic dynamo. By the end of the week I had fifteen of my original clients and three new ones. Soon, five more of my old clients had come over to me. I was still living at the halfway house, and the counselors kept reminding me that there were women getting out of Clayton and Bedford and Reed that needed beds more than me. But I was still a middle-aged ex-con with no steady work I could guarantee. I absolutely refused to use my fortune or reveal anything about it. It would change the delicate balance I was beginning to find.