Rachel thinks I close myself off, and she’s right. She also thinks that I don’t care what I look like, that I don’t put more than the most minimal effort into my appearance. But she’s wrong on that score. If she took a minute to investigate the creams and toners and lotions I’ve accumulated, if she saw the amount of money I’ve spent on these products, she’d realize her mistake.
I let my roots grow out and I forget to pluck my brows, and I wear comfortable clothing as opposed to stylish and flirty. Because I haven’t been interested in drawing attention to myself, especially from members of the opposite sex. But I’ve always known, at some point, that would change. Hoped, anyway. Hoped there would come a time when my grief over Charlie would reduce itself to a more manageable emotion, and I would get past my persecution of the entire male population if only to have the companionship and comfort that all human beings crave. To stave off the ever-present loneliness. It hasn’t happened yet, but I still cling to the idea, in the deepest corner of my heart where no one else can see it.
Thus the skin products and nightly regimen.
I don my flannel pajamas and sit down on my bed and turn on the little thirteen-inch TV on my dresser. My bedroom is small enough that I can touch the dresser from the end of my bed, but I don’t mind much. If the room were larger, the TV would be farther away, and I wouldn’t be able to see it.
As I surf through channels, my thoughts settle on Judd. I won’t get my hopes up. But I will allow myself to look forward to our date. For eighteen months, I’ve been living a kind of half life, unable or unwilling to look to the future with optimism. Whether or not the evening goes well, I must change my perspective. I must stop going to the park. I must stop obsessing over Charlie and his wife and children. I need to let go of him, wish him well, accept the fact that he has a new life and let him live it. And I need to live mine.
Perhaps tomorrow will be the beginning of a new chapter for me. A new and exciting adventure.
Perhaps after tomorrow, my nephew will no longer see me as his lonely old aunt who needs a stuffed monkey to keep her company.
Wouldn’t that be nice?
FIFTY-FIVE
SHADOW
I hear my master’s car outside, and my tail thumps against my bed. His footsteps get louder until I can smell him by the front door. I stand up and step off my bed, and my nails make a clack on the floor. I stretch my legs forward, then I shake myself and my collar jingles. The front door opens and I see my master, and my tail wags faster and faster and thumps against the wall. I am happy to see him and also happy that all my humans are home where I can protect them and keep them safe.
The smell on my master is strange and strong and feels funny in my nose. It smells like something I know, something food-smelling and sweet, but I know if I tasted it, it would burn my mouth. The smell makes me sneeze.
My master seems tired, but he makes a small happy face at me and scratches my neck, but not for very long. He says my name and calls me a Good Boy, then walks past me to the stairs.
He looks up to the second floor, where I’m not allowed, stands there for I don’t know how long, but for longer than he scratched my neck. He turns his head like he’s listening, so I listen, too, but all I hear are my sleeping humans.
My master turns back around and makes a frown face, then sniffs his jacket. He can smell that strange smell—not like I can, because dogs’ noses are better than human noses, but I can tell my master doesn’t like that smell. He takes his jacket off and carries it down the hall, then comes back without the jacket. He walks to the food-smelling room, and I follow him so he’ll give me a treat, but he doesn’t. He goes to the sink and washes his hands, then splashes water on his face.
I can still smell the strange smell from the jacket down the hall, but it’s much less, and my master barely smells like it at all now. I want a treat, so I let out a whine and a small bark.
“Quiet, Shadow,” my master says, and I know I’m not supposed to bark when my humans are sleeping, but I really want a treat. I feel a whine in the back of my throat and try to stop it. My master looks at me and smiles, then gets a treat for me and tosses it in the air. I jump up and snap my jaws around it before my paws hit the floor. I hold the treat in my mouth and take it to the bed and start to eat it.
My master goes to the big cold box and opens the door and brings out a bottle. He pulls the top off and drinks from it. I watch him walk slowly to the table and sit down, and I know better than to go to his feet and beg because he doesn’t have anything that I would like.
He drinks from the bottle again, then sets it down. He rests his arms on the table, with his hands up by his face. He rubs his face with his hands, harder than when he pets me, then stares at the kitchen door. I hear him breathe very big and long, and the air whooshes out of him. He makes a happy face, then finishes the liquid from the bottle. He stands up and sets the bottle next to the sink, then walks out of the food-smelling room.
I get up as fast as I can and follow him to the stairs. He looks down at me, then sits on the stairs and gives me a few good scratches and belly rubs, even tickles me until my leg starts moving all by itself, just like it did when my mistress petted me. He tells me Good Boy again, and I see and smell happy on my master.
He tells me, “Good night, Shadow,” and I know this means that I won’t see my humans until the sky is light again. But that’s okay, because I can still hear them and smell them, even from down here. My master goes up the stairs. I watch him until I can’t see him anymore. Then I go to my couch-room bed. I don’t lie down, because a smell just came to my nose. The smell that makes me whine and bark, but I don’t because I don’t want to wake up my humans.
I walk over to the window and sneak my nose through the fabric, then sniff. I look through the glass, but there’s only darkness. I can’t see anything.
But I know the cat is there. I can smell it.
PART FOUR: ANOTHER DAY WITH DR. MEYERS
FIFTY-SIX
MADDIE
I’ve seen the Davenport family twice a week for the past two weeks, and we’ve come to an impasse. Grief counseling can be a long process, and as a therapist, I must be patient. But something about the Davenport family’s plight has captured my imagination and caused me to become nearly obsessed with them. Since getting my PhD and setting up my practice, I’ve always been aware of the dangers of getting too close to a patient or to a specific situation. It colors the therapist’s judgment and devaluates their treatment. But the truth is, I can’t help myself.
Every night over the past two weeks, I have removed the photograph of Jonah Davenport from the file and allowed myself to gaze at it for long moments. I’m not sure exactly why I do this. Perhaps I see in him the child I decided not to have, although his coloring is a little too light to be sprung from my loins, even with Peter’s donation.