Блейз Клемент - Cat Sitter On A Hot Tin Roof

I knocked on Tom’s door, then used my key to go in. Billy Elliot bounded to meet me in the foyer, and we kissed hello as if we hadn’t just left each other a few hours before. Tom was working on taxes or something at his kitchen table, so I hollered hello to him and took Billy Elliot out to the elevator and downstairs.

Billy Elliot needs to run hard laps around the parking lot for at least fifteen minutes, and then it takes him another ten minutes to find the right bushes to pee on, the right patch of grass to make a deposit. By the time I’ve collected it in one of my poop bags, and he’s made one final streak around the parking lot, we’ve spent a good thirty minutes outside. When we got back upstairs, Tom was still working and didn’t come out to chat like he usually does. I stuck my head in the kitchen to say hello and saw a strained face and bloodshot eyes.

I said, “You okay?”

He waved his hand dismissively. “I’m fine. Stayed up too late.”

I could tell he didn’t want to talk, so I told him goodbye, gave Billy Elliot another smooch, and left them. But I was suspicious about Tom’s explanation. I would have bet good money that Frannie was the problem, not late hours. I hoped they worked it out, because he had been happier since Frannie came into his life. As much as I didn’t think she was good enough for him, I didn’t want him to lose her.

By the time I worked my way to Mazie’s house, it was nearing five o’clock. I parked in the driveway behind Pete’s car and rang the doorbell. Mazie was close beside Pete when he answered the door, and they both looked anxious.

Pete said, “Mazie has been searching all the rooms for Jeffrey. She’s whimpering too, like she thinks she’s lost him.”

That’s exactly what Mazie probably thought, that somehow she had lost her boy. That would be bad enough for any companion dog, but for a service dog it would be even worse. Her job was to stay close to Jeffrey, so she would think she had failed in her duty.

I said, “Pete, have you ever brushed a golden retriever?”

His brow furrowed like Mazie’s. “Excuse me?”

“Let’s take Mazie to the lanai and I’ll demonstrate.”

Nothing in the world is as calming as brushing a dog, and dogs like it too. Even though I don’t usually groom pets during an afternoon visit, this day wasn’t an ordinary day for Mazie.

I led her to the lanai, and Pete followed with two mugs of hot coffee. He put one on the table for me, and said, “Jeffrey’s awfully young to have to fight for his life.”

I didn’t answer him. I didn’t want to talk about what was happening to Jeffrey. It hit too close to home, made me remember too vividly how small and fragile Christy had looked in death.

Pete fell silent and watched me pull an undercoat rake through Mazie’s hair.

Nature gave golden retrievers double coats to keep them warm in winter. That’s an asset up north, but in Florida it’s like wearing thermal underwear in August, so they shed it. You have to keep it raked out or it’ll be all over the house.

Mazie looked over her shoulder at me and smiled, not because she was glad she wouldn’t be carpeting the house with dog hair, but because getting rid of it made her feel cooler and lighter.

Pete watched closely and didn’t speak until I’d finished with the undercoat rake and got out my boar-bristle brush.

I said, “You finish off with the brush to fluff her topcoat and make it shine.”

He said, “I’ll call you the minute I hear something about Jeffrey.”

Over Mazie’s head, I met his knowing eyes. I guess I hadn’t fooled anybody. Certainly not Pete, and probably not Mazie. They both knew I was afraid for Jeffrey. I wished I weren’t, but I knew only too well that there are times when the worst happens, and there’s not a damn thing anybody can do to stop it.

Mazie was calmer once she was brushed, but when I snapped the leash onto her collar and led her outside she didn’t happily swish her tail. I wondered if she had lost trust in me since I had taken her away while Jeffrey and his parents left. More than likely, she was simply confused and unhappy because her people had left her and strangers had taken their place and she didn’t know why.

We took a long walk, following a meandering sidewalk past houses almost invisible behind palms, oaks, and thick shrubbery, all the way to the far side of the lagoon. Occasionally through the hibiscus hedge screening the jogging path on the other side of the street, I saw a dark shape running on the track. Mazie and I didn’t run until we made a U-turn and retraced our walk. Then, as if by tacit agreement, we both broke into an easy trot that gradually turned into a hard run. By the time we got to Mazie’s driveway, we were flying.

A car rolled up behind us in the street, and a voice yelled, “Hey!”

It was Laura Halston, waving to us from a red Jaguar convertible. In big dark sunglasses that hid her eyebrows, and a blue Dallas Cowboys cap pulled low over her hair. I wouldn’t have recognized her if I’d seen her on the street.

She nodded to grocery bags piled in the backseat. “Had to go stock up on essentials. Coffee, wine, Pepperidge Farm cookies.”

“No ice cream?”

“Well, hell, sure. Ice cream’s a given.”

Then she turned her attention to Mazie, who was looking up at her with anxious eyes. “Oh, sweet Mazie, don’t worry about Jeffrey. He’ll come home all better.”

To me, she said, “I know about Jeffrey’s surgery. Poor little guy.”

Relieved that I didn’t have to keep it a secret, I said, “Pete Madeira will be staying in the house with Mazie. He’s a clown, so if you see him wearing a red nose, don’t be alarmed. He also plays saxophone, so if you hear music, that’ll be Pete playing for Mazie.”

She said, “I dated a saxophone player once. Sweet guy. Great kisser.”

We chatted for a few minutes more about nothing, the way women do when they like each other and don’t much care what they’re talking about. I didn’t divulge any more information about Mazie’s family, and she seemed to understand that I wouldn’t, that I was a professional, and that it would be unprofessional to talk about my employers.

I hadn’t had a close woman friend since high school, when Maureen Rhinegold and I used to go to Turtle Beach and sit behind a sand dune and try to get high smoking marijuana. We were abject failures at it—we mostly just coughed and gagged—but we kept at it until my brother caught us and told me he would kick my butt clear to Cuba if I ever smoked weed again. We had drifted apart after Maureen married a rich man and I became a deputy married to a deputy. Talking to Laura stirred up a nostalgic wish for the kind of closeness I’d had with Maureen. There had been an easy trust in that closeness that I missed.

Laura must have wanted to prolong the chat too, because she said, “Say, do you have time for a glass of wine?”

I felt a bubble of excitement, as if one of the girls at the popular table in the high school cafeteria had invited me to sit with her. Trying not to sound like a lonely soul grateful for an invitation, I said a glass of wine sounded fine, and that I would take Mazie home and be at her house in a flash.

She said, “I’ll be in the kitchen, so just come in through the garage door.”

Every time I met the woman, I liked her even more. Except for being gorgeous, she seemed refreshingly uncomplicated. Straight-forward, friendly, generous, and a pet lover. How could I not like her?

Back in Mazie’s house, Pete was puttering around in the kitchen.

“Hal called while you were gone. He said the surgery is scheduled for tomorrow morning at seven. Gillis will spend the night in the hospital with Jeffrey, and then she and Hal will take turns sleeping in a recliner by his bed. He left his cell phone number and their hotel number in case we need to get in touch. He said he would call after it’s over.”