teacher on
a step stool, painting a downspout while her husband stood there talking to her, drinking a beer. Another can of beer sat
on the stoop, next to the open paint. Everything pointed to its being the teacher’s.
It isn’t that I don’t know they’re regular people with regular lives; it’s that I find it confusing to think of them that
way. A case in point is the time when I was a second grader and went to my friend’s house for lunch and her mother was in
bed with the mailman.
Me and Dee Jurgenmeyer, walking into her mom’s room to ask what there was to eat, and there was the whole confusingscene: the messy-haired divorced mother in a pale blue nightgown, sleeping in the middle of the day, the mailman’s familiar
face with strangely red lips like a woman’s, and the mailbag itself, hanging on the bedroom door. For a long time afterward
I would suddenly think, Dee’s mother takes a nap with the mailman, and I’d feel strange about it. And yet a mailman would
get tired too, just like anyone else. Maybe more tired, with the bag.
We trade off carrying the box. Felicia is starting to cry a little. We have no idea how we ended up dragging these cats down
with us—they were perfectly happy in their garage when we met them. Now one is dying and the other two are frantic. Everything
we go near gets ruined. Somewhere there’s a boy with a damaged hand and a mother possibly riding a motorcycle to Arkansas,
a bowlegged baby teetering on a top step. Before putting Blacky Strout in the box, Felicia had taken a long time saying good-bye
to him.
She’s crying pretty hard now, which somehow makes me feel better.
“Don’t cry,” I say kindly, lugging the box. Inside, the kittens are sliding around.
She is silent for a while, walking along. “I’m not,” she says finally.
The house is low and composed, with green shutters, all dark except for a faint light way back in the vicinity of the kitchen.
On the porch is a basket of trailing ivy, a white wicker chair with a cushion, and an antique crank-type doorbell. We creep
up and set the box on the porch floor, untie Ruffles from his T-shirt, close the flaps loosely, and tiptoe away. Along theedge of the yard, in the black shadows, Felicia stops so abruptly that I run into her.
“What if they’re on vacation or something?” she whispers.
Vacation! While we’re pondering this, there’s a thump and the cardboard box starts moving. A paw pokes through the flaps,
thrusting around in the air; then a head squirms through alongside it and Ruffles is out, scrambling across the porch, up
and over the railing, into the night.
Gone.
“Shite!” Felicia hisses.
She shoves me forward and I dart across the lawn and up the steps. On the dim porch, I can barely tell the remaining kittens
inside the box apart, which one is dying and which one is running for sheriff. From this view, Monroe Park looks exotic and
sinister, with its moonlit teachers’ houses and overgrown bushes. There’s a narrow garage next door, made of crumbling brick,
with ivy framing a small, dirty window. From here I can see that the side door is ajar, and that’s where I direct Felicia.
Over there, over there. She run-walks across the lawn and shimmies inside.
Freckles doesn’t seem to be breathing. I put one finger under his chin, and his head seems limp. But then he lifts it toward
me without opening his eyes, and I lean into the box and kiss him. As he settles himself deeper into the towel, I give Strout
one last pet and close the flaps. I ring the doorbell and sprint, down the steps and across the lawn.
The garage is junky but it smells good, like gasoline. I squeeze through the door and grope my way over a fallen bicycle to
the dirty window, just as the porch light goes on and Trent comes out, wearing a pair of striped pajama bottoms and nothing
else. He looks down at the box and thentoward the street, shielding his eyes from the light. Lisa
a step stool, painting a downspout while her husband stood there talking to her, drinking a beer. Another can of beer sat
on the stoop, next to the open paint. Everything pointed to its being the teacher’s.
It isn’t that I don’t know they’re regular people with regular lives; it’s that I find it confusing to think of them that
way. A case in point is the time when I was a second grader and went to my friend’s house for lunch and her mother was in
bed with the mailman.
Me and Dee Jurgenmeyer, walking into her mom’s room to ask what there was to eat, and there was the whole confusingscene: the messy-haired divorced mother in a pale blue nightgown, sleeping in the middle of the day, the mailman’s familiar
face with strangely red lips like a woman’s, and the mailbag itself, hanging on the bedroom door. For a long time afterward
I would suddenly think, Dee’s mother takes a nap with the mailman, and I’d feel strange about it. And yet a mailman would
get tired too, just like anyone else. Maybe more tired, with the bag.
We trade off carrying the box. Felicia is starting to cry a little. We have no idea how we ended up dragging these cats down
with us—they were perfectly happy in their garage when we met them. Now one is dying and the other two are frantic. Everything
we go near gets ruined. Somewhere there’s a boy with a damaged hand and a mother possibly riding a motorcycle to Arkansas,
a bowlegged baby teetering on a top step. Before putting Blacky Strout in the box, Felicia had taken a long time saying good-bye
to him.
She’s crying pretty hard now, which somehow makes me feel better.
“Don’t cry,” I say kindly, lugging the box. Inside, the kittens are sliding around.
She is silent for a while, walking along. “I’m not,” she says finally.
The house is low and composed, with green shutters, all dark except for a faint light way back in the vicinity of the kitchen.
On the porch is a basket of trailing ivy, a white wicker chair with a cushion, and an antique crank-type doorbell. We creep
up and set the box on the porch floor, untie Ruffles from his T-shirt, close the flaps loosely, and tiptoe away. Along theedge of the yard, in the black shadows, Felicia stops so abruptly that I run into her.
“What if they’re on vacation or something?” she whispers.
Vacation! While we’re pondering this, there’s a thump and the cardboard box starts moving. A paw pokes through the flaps,
thrusting around in the air; then a head squirms through alongside it and Ruffles is out, scrambling across the porch, up
and over the railing, into the night.
Gone.
“Shite!” Felicia hisses.
She shoves me forward and I dart across the lawn and up the steps. On the dim porch, I can barely tell the remaining kittens
inside the box apart, which one is dying and which one is running for sheriff. From this view, Monroe Park looks exotic and
sinister, with its moonlit teachers’ houses and overgrown bushes. There’s a narrow garage next door, made of crumbling brick,
with ivy framing a small, dirty window. From here I can see that the side door is ajar, and that’s where I direct Felicia.
Over there, over there. She run-walks across the lawn and shimmies inside.
Freckles doesn’t seem to be breathing. I put one finger under his chin, and his head seems limp. But then he lifts it toward
me without opening his eyes, and I lean into the box and kiss him. As he settles himself deeper into the towel, I give Strout
one last pet and close the flaps. I ring the doorbell and sprint, down the steps and across the lawn.
The garage is junky but it smells good, like gasoline. I squeeze through the door and grope my way over a fallen bicycle to
the dirty window, just as the porch light goes on and Trent comes out, wearing a pair of striped pajama bottoms and nothing
else. He looks down at the box and thentoward the street, shielding his eyes from the light. Lisa
Similar Books
