Night Kill (10 page)

“What are you doing?” he asked with characteristic charm as I emerged from the bin.

“I forgot something.” My jacket was the smelliest thing in the bin, which was saying something. I fumbled in the pockets for the jar and dumped the jacket back in.

Hap came over and took a look, possibly hoping to distract Wallace from his critique. “Reptile stuff?”

“Yeah, from Rick’s locker.”

Wallace followed him. He reached for the jar and I reluctantly handed it over. He dumped the contents onto his palm. “Zoo property. Ask the Education Outreach people if they can use this stuff.” He carefully returned everything to the jar.

“Sure thing.” I took the jar back and stuck it into the pocket of my current jacket.

Wallace scowled. “You staying out of trouble?”

“No worries. Calvin barely lets me go to the bathroom without supervision.”

“Good strategy.” He went back to inspecting lettuce, muttering that it was slimy and a rip-off.

“Going to lunch?” I asked Hap, and he was glad to escape with me.

Hap’s reliable friendship bolstered my courage. I’d tended to avoid my coworkers since the Raj accident and my abrupt transfer to Birds.

We joined Denny, Arnie, and Linda huddled at a covered table in front of the café, denying the reality of fall chill. A few yards away, two education volunteers were clamping a temporary four-panel bat display to a signpost. Panels about the benefits of bats would be Finley Zoo’s only nod to Halloween. Prizes for the best costumes had come to an abrupt end the year before when a man in a realistic gorilla costume strolled around the Primate building. The monkeys and gibbons had gone nuts, screaming and threatening—we heard them all over the zoo. Kip Harrison, the primate keeper, had come running, but too late. The two female mandrills had truly lost their minds and taken advantage of the riot to attack the big male. Sky, twice their size, was a bully who had it coming, but Violet and Carmine were the ones that ended up in the hospital. Kip Harrison and Dr. Dawson had ensured that costumes were banned forevermore.

Denny was chowing down what looked like walnut hulls and grass clippings as I settled in with my tuna melt and fries, Hap with two corn dogs and an orange soda. I took one bite out of my sandwich and realized that fish were falling out of the edible category for me. Too much smelt and herring in my life already.

Linda put aside her crossword puzzle and said hi. Denny began expounding to Hap on the high probability that the British royal family was the successful result of a longevity experiment involving nanobots, whatever those are. “Only one of them has died of natural causes in over fifty years,” he summed up, and segued into the reasons Princess Diana was assassinated, something to do with land mines and Muslims. The diversity of Denny’s conspiracy theories was a marvel.

I wondered if I should toss the tuna melt and go buy a hamburger. I’d never survive the afternoon’s disasters without food.

“How’s Benita’s rattlesnake doing?” Denny asked Hap.

Linda looked amazed. “Benita has a rattlesnake?” she asked. “In the house?”

“Uh-uh,” Hap said around a mouthful of corn dog. “In the garage. I can’t have it near the parrots. She inherited it when her mother died.”

“Did her mother, by any chance, die of snakebite?” Linda asked.

“Oh, no. She and her boyfriend took his crotch-rocket to the coast and he laid the bike down on a curve on Highway 53, on the way to Neahkahnie Beach. Probably a deer or something in the road. Took them both out. Great way to go. That was about a year ago. Then Benita had to keep the snake.”

“Naturally.”

“And that mouth thing it had?” I asked, remembering. “Some kind of fungus Rick was helping her with?” That had been weeks ago. We’d visited their place for him to examine the snake.

“She used hydrogen peroxide and cotton swabs like he told her to. It cleared right up. Eating great.”

Arnie spoke up, derailing me from starting to obsess about Rick. “Hey, Iris. How’s it going at Birds? Silent Cal treating you right?”

“He hasn’t kicked my butt out of his area yet.”

“He’s mighty particular,” Arnie said.

Arnie probably found most people he worked with to be mighty particular.

No one brought up tiger attacks or sudden changes in assignments. I breathed a silent thanks to Benita and her venomous family heirloom.

Linda peered at the name sewn onto my jacket. “Why are you wearing my spare jacket?” she asked.

“Because yours was the only clean one that fit me.”

“My pleasure, I’m sure.”

“I messed up mine and didn’t have a spare. I’ll bring it back clean tomorrow. You don’t mind, do you?” It came to me that I’d taken her jacket instead of, say, Arnie’s as a way of reasserting our friendship.

She seemed relaxed, our uncomfortable discussion about whether she’d let Raj out on me forgiven if not forgotten. “No problem. I’ll take it out in trade when I need dry socks. I know where you hide your stash. Hey, Wallace wants to get ready to put the clouded leopards together, probably in a week or so. Losa spent most of yesterday lying in full view outside. She’s settling in. Dr. Dawson wants a twenty-four hour watch on them for the first month. Wallace says it has to be volunteer time, no pay.”

“I can do Wednesdays or Thursdays. Those are going to be my weekend, but I’m not sure when Wallace will switch me over. I’ll get back to you in a couple of days.” The luxury of real weekends off would end after my two weeks of training. Saturday and Sunday were Calvin’s days off and therefore not mine.

Linda’s offer of a legitimate reason to hang out in Felines again sounded wonderful, catching up with the cats and returning to a place where I wasn’t incompetent.

Hap and Denny argued about hybrid cars and whether global warming was really happening while Linda and I talked through the whole feline string. Somehow I ate the tuna melt without noticing. She and Spice were having a good time with lessons. She could get the lioness to open her mouth reliably and hold it open for a few seconds. I urged her to start training the other cats and to continue the enrichment activities: big bones, catnip, various scents such as perfume and spices, all to add some variety and sensory stimulation. She wanted to try hiding food in the exhibit for the lions to search for.

“Watch out they don’t fight,” I warned.

“I’ll keep an eye on it.” The patience in her voice reminded me that I wasn’t the cat keeper anymore. She left and Denny followed, leaving me wondering if my longing for my old job was pathetically obvious. The comfort of talking about cats oozed away.

“It’s freezing. Why don’t you guys eat where it’s warm?” Jackie, the administration secretary, pulled out Linda’s chair and yanked her black coat closed. Hap and Arnie shrugged. Jackie was in her forties, divorced and living alone, a tense, bony woman with jet black hair and a nasal voice. Long red fingernails clutched a cigarette. She blew the smoke out of the corner of her mouth, an ineffective concession to purists. Often Jackie was fun, her gossip and cynical wit brightening dull days. Other days her drama addiction was repellent, more like picking at a carcass.

“It’s a miracle Raj didn’t do you like those lions did Rick,” she said. “I hear you’re on Birds, thank god, where you can’t get yourself killed.”

A chill breeze cruised through the hole this left in the table’s conversation.

If I insisted that someone let Raj out, would anyone believe me?

“Paper said Rick was really smashed when the lions got him,” she added, since this topic was going nowhere. “You guys go out drinking after the party?” She eyed me sidelong, waiting for my answer.

“No. I don’t know how or when or where he got drunk.” I finished off the fries, eager to flee. “But I would like to know what happened that night.” I looked at her, then at Hap and Arnie. “Any idea why he was up here? Or how it happened?”

They shook their heads.

“It was an accident,” Hap said, gruff and certain. “Happens to everyone—your number comes up.” He shrugged acceptance of the unpredictable.

Arnie nodded. Jackie looked resigned to a disappointing reality.

“Accident? Rick wasn’t stupid and incompetent, even drunk.” The conviction in my voice surprised me.

Arnie and Hap gave me identical startled looks. Jackie cocked her head at me, her bright eyes evaluating.

“You guys can’t really believe Rick would die like that.” My voice was getting shrill. “You knew him.”

“Police said it was an accident,” Jackie insisted. “Everybody knew he was drinking a lot.”

Everybody knew because I’d mentioned it to Jackie weeks ago.

“It’s been real hard on you,” Hap said cautiously.

Arnie looked confused.

The dust was settling: Rick died because he was incompetent. I was incompetent and a nut case. Dismayed, I tossed my garbage into the can and left without another word.

Chapter Nine

Sleeping in on my day off didn’t work out. Bad dreams sent me to the kitchen table at seven o’clock Saturday morning. I took stock over a second cup of coffee. It was a gray, cold day, with rain likely. The house was not great. Dirty dishes in the sink, a thin layer of dog hair on the floor, mail piled on the table like molted feathers. Rick had been the one who knew how to keep the bathroom functional. I was showering in a couple inches of water already, not the ankle-deep swamp it was before Rick, but getting there. The toilet was picking up an attitude also.

It would be foolhardy to let Marcie or my mother see me slipping in the housekeeping arena. I didn’t need my best friend and parents to decide I required intervention.

Another slug of caffeine failed to generate the energy I needed to tackle the list. Going back to bed was enticing, but I didn’t have the verve even for that. A week of working as hard as I could while sleeping poorly left me feeling like an old caribou exhausted by migration, mosquitoes, and parasites. The wolf pack should be showing up soon.

Instead, the domesticated wolves came in from the backyard. Winnie stuck her nose in my hand and shoved. Range nudged my thigh, lips bulging with his tennis ball. There’d be no peace sitting in the kitchen.

I wiped dog snot off my hand and onto my jeans, put on a jacket and grabbed a couple of plastic bags for poop-scooping. The dogs bounced around in a frenzy, seriously worried that I would change my mind. They bounded into the back of the Toyota, I snapped on the short leashes attached to the truck bed that kept them from falling out, and off we went.

In ten minutes or so, we left the freeway and wound down a curving, tree-lined road into Leverich Park. It has the usual signs and rules, among them clear prohibitions against letting dogs run loose. So call me an outlaw. It was raining, 7:20 in the morning, nobody but another outlaw was likely to be there, and a walk on a leash is a pathetic form of exercise for a healthy dog. I unclipped Winnie and Range and they leaped ecstatically from the truck and galloped off into the drizzle.

I carried leashes in case the canine paddy wagon showed up. Winnie’s chain was heavy in my pocket since she would chew through a $15 nylon leash in seconds. Range would never do such a thing, maybe because his retriever ancestors were bred for soft mouths.

The dogs dashed across the creek, spray flying, and went in a big circle through the meadow and off to the trees, fading in and out in the uneven mist. Winnie was lithe and graceful, her flexible back arching as she poured on the speed and skidded through the turns. Range thundered along powerfully, not as fast, but cutting corners and catching up now and then. Few sights are prettier than your own dogs romping with all their hearts.

Rick used to throw a Frisbee at the park for the dogs. I hadn’t thought to bring one. He would flick it in a high arc over the lawn, then sprint after it. Range loved the competition and never tired of winning. Two perfect male bodies playing, all vitality and grace…

After an hour, other people began to show up and it was time to go. Happy dogs with long tongues and short breath hopped back into the truck. I dried them off with an old towel, and we went home.

The house was still looking neglected, much as though someone really depressed lived there. I set the radio to aggressive rock, vacuumed the floor and sofa, and gave myself a handful of chocolate covered peanuts. Changed the sheets. Emptied the wastebaskets. Cleaned the iguana cage while Bessie tried to bite me. More candy. Washed the dishes.

Hostile rock had grown tedious, so I put on a couple of Rick’s blues CDs.

My blues CDs.

Plumbing seemed the next easiest place to start. The instructions on an old can of chemical drain cleaner were terrifying. A manual plunger seemed low-tech, but far more benign. I gingerly poked at the toilet’s maw, then got into it, sucking and shoving to Sonny Boy Williamson. “Flush when I say flush,” I warned it. “Or it’s poison for you.” It eventually did so with civilized vigor; I chalked one more up to progress, and dug a wad of hair out of the shower drain for good measure.

I thought about the next challenge over a second cup of coffee and a few more chocolate peanuts, for the protein. The dogs came in from the backyard, tracking mud on the clean rug. They got doggy cookies for clearing squirrels out.

The way your smile just beams

The way you sing off key

The way you haunt my dreams

No, no they can’t take that away from me.

What had I been thinking to put that album on? It was only another song, no reason to cry. It wasn’t going to derail me. I made a fuss over the dogs and wiped off their feet with a rag, not listening.

Money was next on the list. The zoo had turned over Rick’s last paycheck and eight days of vacation pay. Paying off his credit card bills would take most of that. I hadn’t had a housemate until Rick moved in, except for Denny, who didn’t count because he spent all his money on fancy comic books and fixing his van. Rick had saved me from confronting the fact that I really couldn’t swing the rent alone over the long haul. I would need to find a roomer.

Truck payments were another problem. Rick had been a salesperson’s dream, ready to reach out and grab the good stuff, fearless about debt. The truck ran well and it looked great, but it was a Dodge Dakota with all the fixin’s: a CD player, big tires, fancy stripes, and big, fancy payments. No way could I afford it. My old Toyota was paid off and it ran fine.