Charles Grant - The Pet

“Why what?”

“Why you don’t love me anymore.”

“Oh, for god’s sake.” His shirt was off, and he dug for his pajamas folded under the pillow.

“No, really, I know. You think Harry and I are having an affair. That’s why you’re so hard on him. That’s why you make an ass of yourself when you talk to him like you did tonight.”

“You’re full of it,” he said unconvincingly. He put on his top, stood, and unfastened his belt, zipper, and let his trousers fall. “I figure you have better taste than that.”

She turned away to the basin, running hot water and steaming the light-ringed mirror. “You don’t have to pretend, Norman. I know. I know.”

Except for her panties she was naked. Her breasts were still small and firm, her stomach reasonably flat for a woman who’d had two children and didn’t exercise, and her legs were so long they seemed to go on forever. He watched as she leaned forward to squeeze toothpaste onto her toothbrush; he watched while she examined herself in the mirror, turning slightly left and right. He watched, and he was saddened, because she didn’t do a thing for him.

It’s a bitch , he thought; god, life is a bitch.

He wriggled under the covers, rubbed his eyes to relieve them of an abrupt burning itch, and looked at her again. “Are you?” he asked at last. “With Harry, I mean.”

“You bastard,” she said, and slammed the door.

The overcoat wasn’t going to be enough, but Tanker had nothing else to use as a blanket. The leaves covered most of him, and the brush kept away most of the wind, but it still wasn’t enough.

What he needed to relax was one of them whores. Like the one up in Yonkers. Tits breaking out of her sweater, teenage ass as tight as her jeans. When he yanked her into the alley and clubbed her with a fist so she wouldn’t scream, he had known once again he wouldn’t be dying without getting a piece. Her eyes had crossed when he dropped her on the ground, and she’d spat blood at him when he slapped her again; but she was warm, no doubt about it. She was warm right up until the moment he had opened her throat with his knife, and had finished the job with his nails grown especially long.

She had been warm, and now he was cold, and he decided that the next one would have to be one of them whores.

He shivered, huddled deeper under the coat and the leaves, and closed his eyes, sighed, and waited for sleep.

Waiting an hour later, eyes wide and watching.

It was the park.

The moon was up there, still guarding him, still whispering him his orders, but there was something else, something in the park that was waiting just for him. He tried scoffing at it, but the feeling wouldn’t go away; he tried banishing it with a determined shake of his head, but it wouldn’t go away.

It was out there, somewhere, and if it hadn’t been for the moon, he knew he’d be dead.

Tomorrow, he promised himself, crossing his heart and pointing at his eye; tomorrow he would have a whore, and then get the hell out.

And if the moon didn’t show, he’d kill somewhere else.

The door was open just enough to let a bar of light from the hallway drop across the brown shag rug, climb the side of the bed, and pin him to the mattress. Don lay on top of the covers, head on the pillow, hands clasped on his stomach, and checked to be sure his friends were still with him.

Above the headboard was a poster of a panther lying in a jungle clearing and licking its paw while it stared at the camera; on the wall opposite, flanking the door, were posters of elephants charging with trunks up through the brush, their ears fanned wide and their tusks sharply pointed and an unnatural white. Elsewhere around the large room were pictures and prints of leopards and cheetahs running, eagles stooping, pumas stalking, a cobra from the back to show the eyes on its hood. On the chest of drawers was a fake stuffed bobcat with fangs bared; on the low dresser was a miniature stuffed lion; in the blank spaces on the three unfinished bookcases were plaster and plastic figurines he had made and painted himself, claws and teeth and talons and eyes. And above the desk set perpendicular to the room’s only window was a tall poster framed behind reflectionless glass — a dirt road bordered by a dark screen of immense poplars that lay shadows on the ground, shadows in the air, deepened the twilight sky, and made the stars seem brighter; and down the road, just coming over the horizon, was a galloping black horse, its hooves striking sparks from hidden stones, breath steaming from its nostrils, eyes narrowed, and ears laid back. It had neither rider nor reins, and it was evident that should it ever reach the foreground, it would be the largest horse the viewer had ever seen.

His friends.

His pets.

After examining them a second time, he rolled over and buried his face in the crook of his arm.

His parents refused to allow real animals in the house, at least since Sam had died and they had given the kid’s parakeet to an aunt in Pennsylvania. Because of the memories; and it didn’t seem to make a difference that Don had loved the dumb bird too.

When he pressed for a replacement — any kind, he wasn’t fussy — his mother claimed a severe allergy to cats, and his father told him reasonably there wasn’t anyone around the place long enough anymore to take adequate care of a dog. Fish were boring, birds and turtles carried all manner of exotic and incurable diseases, and hamsters and gerbils were too dumb to do anything but sleep and eat.

He had long ago decided he didn’t mind; if his parents weren’t exactly thrilled about what he wanted to do with his life, why should he fuss over the absence of some pets?

Because, he told himself; just because.

And suddenly it was summer again, the sun was up, and he was down in the living room, bursting with excitement. Both his folks were there, summoned from their chores in the yard and waiting anxiously. He could tell by the look on his mother’s face that she expected him to say he was quitting school to get married, by the look on his father’s that he’d gotten some girl pregnant.

“I know what I’m going to study at college,” he had said in a voice that squeaked with apprehension, and he bolstered his nerves by taking his father’s chair without thinking.

“Good,” Norman had said with a smile. “I hope you’ll get so rich I can quit and you can support me in a manner to which I would love to become accustomed.”

He had laughed because he couldn’t think of anything else to do, and his mother had hit Norm’s arm lightly.

“What is it, dear,” she’d asked.

“I’m going to be a doctor.”

“Well, son of a bitch,” his father had said, his smile stretching to a proud grin.

“Oh, my god, Donald,” Joyce had whispered, her eyes suddenly glistening.

“Sure,” he said, relieved the worst part was over and there was no scene to endure. “I like animals, they like me, and I like learning about them and taking care of them. So I might as well get paid for doing what I like, right? So I’m gonna be a veterinarian.”

The silence had almost bludgeoned him to the carpet, and it wasn’t until several seconds had passed that he realized they had misunderstood him, that they had thought at that moment he had meant he was going to be an M.D.

Joyce’s smile had gone strained, but she still professed joy that he was finally decided; his father had taken him outside after a while and told him, for at least the hundred-millionth time, that he was the first member of the Boyd family to get a college education, and Donald would be the second. He said he hoped with all his heart the boy knew what he was doing.

“Being a teacher, and now a principal,” Norman had said, “is something I’m not ashamed to be proud of, son. Being a vet, though, that’s not … well, it’s not really anything at all, when you think about it. I mean, helping cats instead of babies isn’t exactly my idea of medicine.”