Too Good to Be True

So, in honor of my country, I spent another hour hearing about Dave’s quest for a trophy wife, his five children by three women, the amazing AARP discount he got on his La-Z-Boy recliner and which type of catheter worked best for him.

“Well, I should get going,” I said the moment I felt my duty to America had been served. “Uh, Dave, you have some very nice qualities, but I really am looking for someone closer to my own age.”

“You sure you wouldn’t like to go out again?” he asked, his good eye glued to my boobs as his fake eye pointed in a more northerly direction. “I find you very attractive. And you said you liked ballroom dancing, so I bet you’re quite…flexible.”

I suppressed a shudder. “Goodbye, Dave.”

Julian’s class was sounding better and better.

“NO DADDY YET,” I said to Angus upon my arrival back home. He didn’t seem to care. “Because I’m all that you need, right?” I asked him. He barked once in affirmation, then began leaping at the back door to go out. “Yes, my darling. Sit…Sit. Stop jumping. Come on, boy, you’re wrecking my skirt. Sit.” He didn’t. “Okay, you can go out anyway. But next time, you’re sitting. Got it?” Out he raced toward the back fence.

I had one message. “Grace, Jim Emerson here,” said my father’s voice.

“Better known as ‘Daddy,’” I said to the machine, rolling my eyes with a smile.

The message continued. “I dropped by this evening but you were out. Your windows need replacing. I’m taking care of it. Think of it as a birthday present. Your birthday was last month, wasn’t it? Anyway, it’s done. See you at Bull Run.” The machine beeped.

I had to smile at my father’s generosity. Truthfully, I made enough to pay my bills, but as a teacher, I didn’t make nearly as much as the other folks in my family. Natalie probably made three times what I made, and it was only her first year in the working world. Margaret earned enough to buy a small country. Dad’s family “came from money,” as Mémé liked to remind us, and he made a very comfortable salary on top of that. It made him feel paternal, paying for home repairs to be done. Ideally, he’d have liked to do it himself, but he tended to injure himself around power tools, a fact he learned only after getting nineteen stitches from what he still called a “rogue” radial saw.

Returning to the living room, I sat on my couch and looked around. Maybe it was time to repaint a room, something I tended to do when down in the dumps. But no. After almost a year and a half of nonstop renovations, the house was pretty perfect. The living-room walls were a pale lavender with gleaming white trim and a Tiffany lamp in one corner. I’d bought the curved-back Victorian sofa at an auction and had it reupholstered in shades of green, blue and lavender. The dining room was pale green, centered around a walnut Mission-style table. The house wanted for nothing, except new windows. I probably needed another project. I almost envied Callahan O’ Shea next door, starting from scratch.

Yarp! Yarp! Yarpyarpyarp! “Okay, what now, Angus?” I muttered, hauling myself off the couch. Opening the slider in the kitchen, I saw no sign of my furry white baby, who was usually easy to spot. Yarp! Yarp! I moved to the dining-room windows for a different view.

There he was. Crap. In a move he was bred for, Angus had tunneled under the fence and stood now in the yard next door, barking at someone. Three guesses as to whom. Callahan O’ Shea was sitting on his stairless front porch, staring at my dog, who yapped from the yard, leaping and snapping, trying to bite the man’s legs. With a sigh, I headed out the front door.

“Angus! Angus! Come, sweetie!” Not surprisingly, my dog failed to obey. Grumbling at my dog, I walked across my front yard to 36 Maple. The last thing I needed was another confrontation with the ex-con next door, but with Angus snapping and snarling at him, I didn’t have much choice. “Sorry,” I called. “He’s afraid of men.”

Callahan hopped off the porch, cut me a cynical glance. “Yes. Terrified.” At those words, Angus launched himself onto Callahan’s work boot, sinking his teeth into the leather and growling adorably. Hrrrrr. Hrrrrr. Callahan shook his foot, which detached Angus momentarily, only to have my little dog spring upon the shoe with renewed vigor.

“Angus, no! You’re being very naughty. Sorry, Mr. O’ Shea.”

Callahan O’ Shea said nothing. I bent over, grabbed my wriggling little pet by the collar and tugged, but he didn’t let go of the boot. Please, Angus, listen. “Come on, Angus,” I ground out. “Time to go inside. Bedtime. Cookie time.” I tugged again, but Angus’s bottom teeth were crooked and adorable, and I didn’t want to dislodge any.

However, I was hunched over, my head about level with Mr. O’ Shea’s groin, and you know, I was starting to feel a bit warm. “Angus, release. Release, boy.”

Angus wagged his tail and shook his head, the laces of the work boot clenched in his crooked little teeth. Hrrrrr.

Hrrrrr. “I’m sorry,” I said. “He’s not usually so—” I straightened up and bang! The top of my head cracked into something hard. Callahan O’ Shea’s chin. His teeth snapped together with an audible clack, his head jerked back. “Jesus, woman!” he exclaimed, rubbing his chin.

“Oh, God! I’m so sorry!” I exclaimed. The top of my head stung from the impact.

With a glare, he reached down and grabbed Angus by the scruff of his neck, lifted him—there was a small snap as the laces were tugged out of Angus’s mouth—and handed him to me.

“You’re not supposed to lift him like that,” I said, petting Angus’s poor neck as my dog nibbled my chin.

“He’s not supposed to bite me, either,” Callahan said, not smiling.

“Right.” I glanced down at my dog, kissed his head. “Sorry about your, um…chin.”

“Of all the injuries you’ve given me so far, this one hurt the least.”

“Oh. That’s good, then.” My face actually hurt from blushing. “So. Are you going to live here, or is this an investment or what?”

He paused, obviously wondering whether I was worth the effort of an answer. “I’m flipping it.”

“Oh,” I answered, relieved. Angus spotted a leaf blowing across my lawn and convulsed to be put down. After a second’s hesitation, I complied, relieved when he ran off to give chase. “Well. Good luck with the house. It’s very cute.”

“Thank you.”

“Good night.”

“’ Night.”

I took a few steps toward my house, then stopped. “By the way,” I added, turning back to my neighbor, “I did Google you and saw that you’re an embezzler.”

Callahan O’ Shea said nothing.

“I have to say, I’m a little disappointed. Hannibal Lecter, at least he’s interesting.”

Callahan smiled at that, an abrupt, wicked smile that crinkled his eyes and lightened his face, and something twisted hard and hot in my stomach and seemed to surge toward my burly neighbor. That smile promised all kinds of wickedness, all sorts of heat, and I found that I was breathing rather heavily through my mouth.

And then I heard the noise, and so did Callahan O’ Shea. A little pattering noise. We both looked down. Angus was back, leg lifted, peeing on the boot he’d tried to eat a few moments before.

Callahan O’ Shea’s smile was gone. He raised his eyes to me. “I don’t know which one of you is worse,” he said, then turned and headed for his house.

CHAPTER EIGHT

THIRTEEN MONTHS, TWO WEEKS and four days after Andrew called off our wedding, I thought I was doing fairly well.

The summer after had been pretty rough without the daily presence of my students, but I threw myself into the house and became a gardener. When I was antsy, I tramped through the state forest behind my house, following the Farmington River miles upriver and down, getting chewed on by mosquitoes and scratched by branches, Angus leaping along beside me on his festive leash, pink tongue lapping the river, white fur spattered with mud.

I spent Fourth of July weekend at Gettysburg—the real Gettysburg, in Pennsylvania—with several thousand other reenactors, forgetting the ache in my chest for a few days in the thrill of battle. When I got back, Julian put me to work at Jitterbug’s, teaching basic ballroom. Mom and Dad invited me over often, but, fearful of upsetting me, they were painfully polite to each other, and it was so tense and freakish that I found myself wishing they’d just be normal and fight. Margaret and I drove up the coast of Maine so far north that the sun didn’t set till almost 10:00 p.m. We spent a few quiet days walking the shore, watching the lobster boats bob on their moorings and not talking about Andrew.

Thank God I had the house. Floors to sand, trim to paint, tag sales to attend so I could fill my little wedding cake of a home with sweet, thoughtful things that weren’t associated with Andrew. A collection of St. Nicholas statues that I’d line up on the fireplace mantel come Christmas. Two brass doorknobs carved with Public School, City of New York. I made curtains. I painted walls. I installed light fixtures. I even went on a date or two. Well, I went on one date. That was enough to show me that I didn’t want to get involved with anyone just yet.

School started, and I’d never loved my kids more. They may have had their little foibles, the overindulgences and the horrible speech patterns laden with like and totally and whatever, but they were so fascinating, so full of potential and the future. I lost myself in school, as I always did, watching among the resigned for the spark in one or two, the glow that told me someone connected with the past the way I had when I was a kid, that someone could feel how much history mattered to the present.

Christmas came and went, New Year’s, too. On Valentine’s Day, Julian came over armed with violent movies, Thai food and ice cream, and we laughed till our stomachs ached, both of us pretending to ignore the fact that this should’ve been my first anniversary and that Julian hadn’t been on a date in eight years.

And my heart mended. It did. Time did its work, and Andrew faded to a dull ache that I mostly only thought about when I was lying alone in bed. Was I over him? I told myself I was.

Then, a few weeks before Kitty the Hair Cutting Cousin’s wedding, Natalie and I went out for dinner. I had never told her the real reason Andrew and I had broken up. In fact, Andrew had never even said those words aloud. He didn’t have to.

Natalie picked the place. She was working at Pelli Clarke Pelli in New Haven, one of the top architectural firms in the country. She’d had to work late and suggested the Omni Hotel, which boasted a restaurant with a nice view and good drinks.

When I met her there, I was a little shocked at her transformation. Somewhere along the line, my little sister had gone from beautiful to stunning. Each time I’d seen her in grad school or at home, she’d been dressed in jeans or sweats, typical student clothing, and her long, straight, blond hair was all one length. Then, she looked like a classic American girl next door, wholesome and lovely. But when she started working for real, she invested in some clothes and a stylish haircut, started wearing a little makeup, and wow. She looked like a modern day Grace Kelly.

“Hi, Bumppo!” I said, hugging her proudly. “You look gorgeous!”

“So do you,” she returned generously. “Every time I see you, I think I’d sell my soul for that hair.”

“This hair is the devil’s hair. Don’t be silly,” I said, but I was pleased. Only Natalie could be sincere about that, the sweet angel.

I ordered my standard, generic G&T, not being a really sophisticated drinker. Nat ordered a dirty martini. “What kind of vodka would you like?” the waiter asked.

“Belvedere if you’ve got it,” she answered with a smile.