“I think that’s open to interpretation,” I reply, taking a mouthful of cherry and turning the spoon upside down in my mouth as I raise an eyebrow at him.
Jens crosses his arms. “Excuse me. I didn’t have my Magnus Dictionary of Ridiculous Definitions or I would have known that. In any case, it’s too late. They needed an answer, so I just jumped in with both feet—but I don’t regret it. She’s just the coolest, and I know you’re going to love her … but I know how you can get … so…”
“Wow!” I bark. “Now I’m totally confused. She? Did you get married or something?” I tease. “I know you’re not shacking up with someone. You’re the one who’s always giving me lectures about integrity—”
The look that crosses Jens’s face makes me pause and do a double-take.
“You’ve got to be kidding me.” The words gush from me like so much air rushing from a punctured tire. Pushing my spine ramrod-straight, I teeter on the balls of my feet a moment, then slouch over and lean in close to Jens, hissing in his ear, “You are shacking up!” My arm shoots up and an accusing finger is pointing down the hall toward his bedroom. “Is she in there right now?” Strangely, I’m more curious than mad.
“No,” he snaps instinctively. “Well … yes.”
My head rattles back and forth. “What does that mean?”
“It means of course I’m not shacking up, but, yes … she’s in there, and she’s a dog.”
“Shhh,” I hiss. “She’ll hear you. And that’s just rude, by the way.”
Jens looks at me for a long moment, shaking his head. “Wait here,” he says curtly. “I’ll get her.” Like he has any grounds to be curt.
I could be curt. I could even be terse or abrupt; I’m not the one shacking up in my brother’s house. By the time I think it all the way through he’s across the kitchen and down the hall.
I hear some muffled words—reassuring words? Maybe words like, No, sweetie, you’re pretty. And, No, babycakes, I didn’t say you’re a dog, don’t be ridiculous—and then Jens is back in the hall carrying her purse cradled in his right arm. My eyes aren’t on Jens, though, they’re on the door … waiting … patiently … still waiting.
Nothing. She’s taking her sweet time.
“Magnus,” Jens says as he walks up beside me, “let me introduce you to Ruby. And Ruby,” he says in a cuddly-wuddly voice that’s just revolting, “this is Magnus.”
I’m still waiting …
… and then the purse barks … and my yogurt goes airborne.
“It’s a dog.” I say, pointing at the blond bundle in his arms.
“That’s why you’re with the FBI,” Jens smirks. “You don’t miss a thing.”
CHAPTER FIVE
June 20
I’m wearing uncomfortable shoes.
When I say I’m wearing uncomfortable shoes, I’m not talking figuratively, as in the proverbial “walk a mile in his shoes.” I’m not even using a psycho-figurative version of the proverbial, a version where I’m walking in the shoes of a phony man-tracker or, worse, I’m wearing the shoes of an FBI agent who has a badge but doesn’t normally carry a gun, and who feels more like a pizza delivery guy than a Fed.
While the figurative and the psycho-figurative might be true, when I say I’m wearing uncomfortable shoes I’m really wearing uncomfortable shoes, the tangible, physical, tying-type of shoes: pinching, squeezing, binding, uncomfortable shoes.
A certain blond Yorkie named Ruby peed in my Nikes last night.
It’s true.
She had ten thousand other places to pee both inside and outside the designated peeing areas, yet she chose my Nikes, my new Nikes, the ones that fit so well. So I’m stuck with an old pair of off-brand clogs disguised as tennis shoes. They’re a size too small and the left heel has a hole the size of Jupiter’s storm, and not nearly as pretty.
Jens told me the dog will grow out of it.
She’s just nervous.
But he said the same thing yesterday after Ruby peed on my car keys … which were on the coffee table. See, to me that smells like premeditation. The little rodent didn’t just stumble upon a comfortable shoe that time, she first had to find the car keys, then she had to get her little wiggly body from the couch to the coffee table—no small trick—after which she had to navigate around, through, and over all the myriad obstacles on the coffee table so she could hover precisely over my keys like a B-17 bomber launching an aerial assault.
Do you know what happens to electronic key fobs and chipped keys when they marinate in piddle for nine hours?
I do.
Luckily I had a second key fob hanging next to the door.
Too bad I don’t have a second pair of sneakers.
Now, instead of striding across the asphalt parking lot in front of Hangar 7 with a brisk step-step-step, I’m slouching along with a step-stump-step-stump as the hole in my left heel sucks up every piece of loose gravel or debris in my path.
When I scolded Ruby—this was after I put my foot into a cold wet shoe—she just fell to the floor and looked up at me with bared teeth. Jens tells me that means she’s smiling, but if a lion smiled at me like that I’d be running for the door. I advised Jens that henceforth I’ll be referring to Ruby as the Rodent, or simply Rodent.
He just smirked at me and waved it away. The Rodent smiled some more and I’m pretty sure I heard a low growl, vicious little schemer.
*