The Dog That Whispered (9 page)

“Isn't Emily nice?”

Wilson shrugged.

“Well, she is. And she's a widow. With children, Wilson. You know what that means.”

Wilson shut his eyes for a second and considered what to say in response. He quickly decided not to say anything at all.

“She has children, Wilson. Young children. Younger. Youngish. I could be a grandmother. Isn't she nice?”

Wilson scowled in her direction.

“I am sure she is a lovely person, Mother.”

Gretna nodded firmly.

“And Thurman promised me, Wilson. And Thurman would not lie about grandchildren.”

Wilson looked at his mother, then at Thurman, who was joyously dog-paddling in the water, then at Emily, who indeed was attractive and pleasant, and then back to his mother, finally making the connections that she had been implying, and then trying to determine if they were both sliding into the same memory abyss at the same dizzying rate of descent.

At that moment, in the afternoon, on a warm spring day, he was pretty sure that they were.

H
AZEL HAD
two more official days of her much-longer-than-customary-at-this-office vacation, and only a few more things to attend to…before she had to come to some sort of decision…about what to do…now that everything had changed. Everything in her life was now different. Changed. The old had gone and the new, the “now,” wasn't here just yet, but it certainly was about to arrive.

Hazel hoped she would be ready for it.

Her mother's house had been broom-swept, and then some, in accordance with the Realtor's request, and the windows had been professionally cleaned by a van's worth of workers, each carrying a bucket, a rag, and a squeegee—perhaps clean for the first time in decades. Her mother's eyesight at the end had been failing, so a smudgy window was the least of her worries.

A landscape crew had come in and spruced up the small lawn, trimming shrubs and edging around trees and beds. They had planted two new shrubs by the end of the walk and placed flowers into two large terra-cotta pots on either side of the front stoop. Hazel had had the front door repainted.

The house appeared as nice as Hazel could recall ever seeing it. But it was empty, and her steps echoed as she made one more pass through.

I could have painted a few of the rooms…

The Realtor had waved off her offer.

“This paint is okay. A little faded, and that's not bad. People will repaint anyhow. Everyone wants to make a fresh start when they move in.”

There were no tasks remaining in her mother's soon-to-be former house, nothing left for Hazel to do, so she locked the front door and drove to the cemetery. Cemeteries are quiet places, maybe more so on Thursdays, she thought.

Unless there's an active funeral taking place
.

She drove to where her mother's grave was located, stopped the car, and walked slowly over the grass to the recently set headstone.

She stared down at the marker.

She read and re-read the Bible verse.

Maybe those plans God had were for me
, she thought.

Then she looked up, cleared her throat, and narrowed her eyes.

“I don't get it, Mother. This money could have been yours. And it was almost lost. I didn't know it was there. You could have told me.”

Hazel folded her hands and prayed, one of her standard prayers, for peace and wisdom and for God to be merciful to her mother.

She looked up into the clouds.

“She did the best she could, God. She tried her best. And she was a good person. I told her about you. I did. Like I was supposed to. She listened. She nodded at the right times. She said she understood. She did. She said she understood. That means she believed, right? I suppose she could have just been humoring me, but God, this is all I have to hang on to. Those few nods. A smile. I thought she understood.”

Hazel could feel a tear forming. The first tear always came from her right eye.

“I don't know if that's enough for you, God. But it is all I have. If you're merciful, she's there with you now. She really did do the best she could.”

She looked down at the stone.

“And Mother, you could have told me about the stocks,” she said aloud. “You could have least hinted at it. Now, all of a sudden, I'm rich.”

She took a deep breath.

Over the crest of the hill to the west, she caught the reflection off the windshield of a hearse as it slowly made its way into the cemetery. Only a single car followed.

She looked back down at the headstone.

“So what do I do? Really, Mom, what do I do now?”

Wilson and Thurman stood on the front step as Emily and Gretna drove away. Wilson offered a half-wave and Thurman barked—twice.

Wilson sighed loudly and Thurman looked up at him, a puzzled look on the dog's face.

“It's hard, Thurman, that's all. I don't know what she wants me to do. I don't know what I want to do.”

Thurman appeared to nod in agreement, then he shook his head, his ears making flapping noises as he did so. Then he growled up at Wilson.

Hungry
.

Wilson stared back at the dog.

“You know, I am simply projecting all this talking onto you, right? You know that, right? You know you can't talk. I know you can't talk. Let's be honest here, Thurman.”

Thurman smiled and nodded again, or looked like he nodded. Then he growled again.

Hungry
.

Wilson stared for a moment, as if waiting for some spark of clarity, or understanding. None occurred. So he shrugged and entered his house, Thurman a step or two behind, his nails clackering on the wooden floor. Wilson measured out a generous serving of kibbles, poured it into Thurman's dish, and made a second cup of coffee as Thurman nibbled, with great canine daintiness, at his evening meal.

Wilson sighed again and Thurman interrupted his eating to walk over to him and gently butt his head against his thigh. Without growling, without saying anything, he stared up at Wilson.

Wilson reached down and patted at the dog's head. Thurman smiled and returned to his dinner.

After a few minutes, Thurman had finished eating. He sat down, facing Wilson.

Hungry
.

Wilson shook his head.

“No. We do this every night, Thurman. I even called Dr. Stansing about this.”

Not vet
, Thurman whisper-growled, almost under his breath, muttering in a dog growl, dismissing Dr. Stansing, but doing so politely.

“I know he's not a vet. But he has dogs. And he's a doctor. He should know. He said a cup and a quarter, maybe a cup and a half, is all a dog your size needs.”

Bunkum
.

Wilson smiled. The two of them had gone through the very same thing before, holding the same discussion, at least a few times a week.

Wilson decided that Thurman might be intelligent, but he had a problem with short-term memory.

Or perhaps he just liked to repeat things, like a toddler relishing the hundredth time a storybook is read to them.
Safety and security in repetition
. Wilson recalled that truth from a psychology class he took decades ago.

Thurman looked back at his bowl and snorted, as if finally realizing that it was not going to be refilled. Then he looked back at Wilson and smiled.

Then he growled.

“What?”

He growled again.

“Emily? Is that what you're trying to say? Emily?”

Thurman grinned and stood and walked to Wilson, raising up and placing his front paws on his thigh.

Pretty
.

Wilson shrugged.

“I suppose. But young. Much younger than me.”

Thurman tilted his head as if what Wilson said made no sense.

He growled again.

Pretty
.

Then he bounced back to the floor and trotted over to the back door.

Wilson sighed.

“You want to go for a real walk?”

Thurman bounded up and ran to the front door, nails machine-gunning on the floor.

“I could use some time to think,” Wilson said.

Walk
, Thurman growled happily.
Walk. Walkies-walkies-walkies-walkies
.

Emily insisted on walking Gretna back upstairs to her apartment.

“I can manage,” Gretna objected. “Really. I'll be fine.”

Emily smiled her best long-suffering smile. “I know. But I would feel so much better if I see you get home safe.”

Gretna shrugged in submission.

“I guess taking care of your mother-in-law is hard, isn't it?” Gretna said. “This is what it's like, isn't it?”

Emily's smile did not evaporate, not really, but it did wither.

“It is. But I don't mind.”

She pressed the elevator button and it clicked as it lit up.

Gretna let the obvious lie go unchecked. At least Gretna thought it was a lie.

Maybe she doesn't mind. Maybe she's okay with it. After all, there are people who want to be podiatrists and urologists. Go figure. Or dentists
.

Gretna fumbled with the key, then held it close to her eyes, checking to see which side had the ridges.

“I can do that,” Emily said, gently reaching for and taking the keys, inserting each into its lock before finally opening the door.

“There you go,” she said as she handed Gretna back her keys.

Gretna stepped inside, then quickly turned back.

“You believe in God, don't you?” she asked, peering a little at Emily's face, watching her expression.

Emily hesitated only a few heartbeats.

“I do.”

Gretna leaned closer.

“Which one?”

It was obvious that Emily wanted to laugh, and her smile broadened, but she quickly drew herself to a serious look again.

“The only one.”

Gretna remained questioning.

“Not just the Jewish one?”

Emily's mother-in-law was Jewish and had mentioned once, when she had an episode of clarity, that Emily, who was “such a good daughter-in-law,” had been born in Israel.

Emily reached out and took Gretna's hand in hers.

“They are actually the same God, Gretna. But I believe in the God of the New Testament.”

Gretna looked down at her hand.

“That's the same one as me, right?” Gretna asked. “The real one, right?”

“It is.”

Gretna nodded.

“Good.”

Emily's smile had a wistful, almost sorrowful tilt to it.

“Though there were times…after my husband…when it was hard. It's still hard. But I believe. I do.”

Gretna pulled Emily closer.

“Then I can tell you this: I think Thurman talks to God. Or maybe it is vice versa. I can't tell for sure.”

Emily's surprise was more than obvious.

“He does?”

“He does. And he told me today that you're not supposed to be worried anymore. That it will all work out.”

“He did?”

Gretna's nod was firm and decisive.

“It will all work out, he says. For me. For you. And for Wilson.”

Emily's face bore…well, not a laughing-at-you look, but one of tenderness and understanding. It was apparent that she had faced the same manner of statements from her mother-in-law on more than one occasion.

“I'm glad, Gretna. That makes me feel good.”

Gretna squeezed Emily's hand.

“Good. We believe in God. And I believe in Thurman. And that settles it.”

Gretna's door latched with a metallic finality.

And Emily walked back toward the elevator, smiling and shaking her head just a little, obviously exhibiting equal measures of pity and amusement and skepticism, if not downright disbelief.

H
AZEL WOKE
UP
an hour earlier than normal—for a workday, that is. For nearly the past month, while on her first extended vacation in years, the time needed to handle all the details after her mother's death, she had lived without the tyranny of the alarm clock, and she had enjoyed that freedom immensely. This morning her early awakening provided extra time and allowed her to have two additional cups of coffee as she glanced at the newspaper—“glanced” was the operative word, since none of the stories seemed to make any sense to her today.

The jumble of thoughts and emotions kept her from thinking clearly, or focusing on the news from the Middle East.

She dressed carefully, wearing one of her more sedate outfits—dark pants and a dark blouse with a matching jacket. It was old and loose and comfortable. She did not want to think about her outfit, at least not today. Instead of catching the bus, she chose to drive her car to the office.

Parking was a bit of a problem, and expensive if one had to park in one of the area's parking garages every workday. But for once, Hazel did not factor into this week's budget the dollars spent on parking.

She arrived ten minutes before her usual ten minutes early and went to her desk and just sat behind it, waiting for the rest of the staff to arrive, waiting without looking around or adjusting her computer screen or cleaning out the break room.

Today, she just sat.

On the one bookcase in her office was a framed picture of her mother, a picture Hazel had taken several years ago. Her mother was seated in her backyard, sunlight illuminating her smile.

Hazel had never realized, or perhaps never saw it, but her mother's smile was somehow incomplete, a half-smile, as if she was happy, but knew that she could have been happier, as if there was something holding her back from truly being lost in happiness. Or that her life wasn't totally complete. Something appeared to be missing.

You can tell a lot from a smile. Or a half-smile, I guess.

Perhaps that was just what Hazel saw in the picture this morning as she sat and waited.

Mr. Shupp, the owner, was a stickler for promptness. His office looked out on the main entrance to the agency, and anyone who came in late would get a baleful glare from the owner. If one's tardiness became commonplace, like several times in a single week, the lateness marked that employee as a “short-termer” who might well be replaced at the next opportunity.

Hazel was never late. And on those few occasions when cars broke down or bus drivers went on strike, she notified Mr. Shupp immediately, always offering to make up the lost time after 5 p.m.

He always accepted her offer to work a full eight hours regardless of the starting time.

Hazel smiled.

I should have strolled in ten minutes late this morning. Just to see what would happen
.

Too early for pretending to be late, she gave Mr. Shupp ten minutes to get his coffee or whatever it was he did in the morning, then she stood up, tugged her jacket into place, took a deep breath, and marched slowly, with even steps, toward his office.

“Mr. Shupp?”

The older man, wearing a tailored three-piece suit, the kind of suit that no one, other than undertakers, perhaps, wore anymore, looked up. He was not smiling. He seldom smiled.

“You're back. Good. What?”

He was a man of few words as well.

“Mr. Shupp, I am leaving the agency.”

Mr. Shupp looked at her the way a dog looks at complex machinery—with little to no comprehension.

“What?”

Hazel was afraid that her resignation would be difficult. She had never quit anything before, other than her job as a waitress in college, but that was decades ago, and she remembered it as being difficult as well.

Hazel did not like to disappoint anyone.

“I am resigning. I wrote out a resignation letter,” she said as she looked down at her empty hands, “but I must have left it in my office.”

“What?”

“Resigning, sir. Quitting.”

The color in Mr. Shupp's face went from a cold pallor to a somewhat more crimson hue.

“Why? What? Resigning? You've been here forever…Ms. Jamison. This seems like a most rash decision. Jobs don't grow on trees, you know.”

His features grew sharper, his angular jaw growing more angular as he thrust it out at her decision.

“You're not going to another insurance agency, are you? Not the Gibson Group, are you? That might be problematic, you know. Noncompete clauses and the like. You did sign one of those, right? You all did, right?”

Hazel closed her eyes for a moment, then opened them and smiled.

“I might have, Mr. Shupp. But I'm quitting…and not going anywhere. Workwise, that is. At least for a while.”

That surprised the old man more than anything else that morning.

Hazel turned her head, just for a moment, and stared out at the beige walls of the office, and the beige fabric on the walls of the cubicles, and the beige-tinted fluorescent lights overhead, and the beige window blinds, and the beige carpet.

My mother never left Portland, not really, but said she wanted someday to travel the world. And now I can do what she wanted to do. And maybe look for some truth out there. Isn't that what they said on the TV show,
The X-Files
? “The truth is out there”?

“Not work? That's insane, Ms. Jamison. That's for millionaires and people who win the lottery. You didn't win the lottery, did you?”

Hazel shook her head. “I've never played the lottery, Mr. Shupp.”

“Then are you sure you're feeling all right? It's not because of one of those female problems, is it?”

Hazel laughed to herself, mostly at the agency owner's inelegance with a phrase, or his ineptitude.

“No, Mr. Shupp. I feel fine. But I'm leaving. I have made up my mind.”

Mr. Shupp stood, trying to look more august and somber than he typically did.

“You know that you have to work two more weeks. In order to get your last paycheck, that is indeed what you have to do. Otherwise, you will not get any vacation pay due you.”

He was no longer smiling, and he let his non-smile curve into a semi-frown, semi-sneer. Hazel had expected as much.

“Fine,” she replied, and she walked back to her office, took the photograph of her mother off the bookcase, slipped it into her purse, looked around the rather spartan interior of her small office, her home for the last several decades. She knew, right then, without a shadow of a doubt, that she could never return to this place again. Not with the world waiting for her. She touched her desk with a fingertip, then walked out, and walked past the desk of Henry Karch, who offered her a hopeful, almost leering smile, and kept walking, through the front lobby, and out the front door, and into the sunshine, smiling broadly now, feeling suddenly free, if not freer than she had ever felt in her entire life.

Gretna sat in the large, open foyer of the senior apartment complex and watched two old women, each holding a magnifying glass, working on a massive jigsaw puzzle—a picture of a seaside village, probably in New England somewhere. The picture included a large swath of blue sky and blue water.

The puzzle had remained half-completed for the past several weeks. Gretna scowled as she watched. That same puzzle had been put together several times over the course of her residency—put together, admired in its totality for up to a week, then returned to its box, and brought back out after most everyone forgot that they had once put it together.

“Like Sisyphus,” Gretna mumbled to herself. “But he remembered how useless his task was. No one here remembers.”

She sat in one of the upholstered chairs, feeling the afternoon sun on her face. Her apartment only caught the morning sun.

“The afternoon sun is better,” she said, self-narrating again, and closed her eyes, just for a few seconds. “Just to rest them for a bit.”

A moment later, a wheelchair wheezed closer. Gretna could hear the familiar squeak of the wheels.

She opened her eyes.

“Lucille,” she said loudly, knowing Lucille's hearing was not very acute.

“But then no one here can hear worth beans,” she said quietly, again self-narrating. “Lucille,” she said with more volume, “I was with your daughter-in-law yesterday. A lovely person.”

Lucille, a small frail woman, appeared to brighten.

“Emily? Yes. Yes. She told me. Thurman. That's the dog, right? She said she met Thurman. She liked him, she said. A good dog, she said.”

Gretna leaned closer.

“She did. Thurman is a good dog.”

Lucille looked over Gretna's shoulder as if remembering a time long ago when perhaps some dog was in her life and when things were good and memories were still being made and remembered.

“Emily is a very nice person,” Gretna said.

Lucille nodded.

“She is so good.”

Then Lucille's face grew somber. Her eyes reflected pain.

“Emily is married to my son, isn't she?”

Gretna was not sure where Lucille was at that moment, but she decided to stay positive.

“Yes, yes, she is.”

Then Lucille sniffed.

“He's dead. Isn't he? My son. He died.”

Gretna reached over and took Lucille's hand.

“I believe he is gone, Lucille. You told me that before.”

Nodding, Lucille replied, “Yes. It was the war. Not in the war. After. He came home. It was after. Something was wrong. After the war, that's when it happened. Even I could tell something wasn't right. Poor Emily.”

Gretna was at a loss for words, unsure if offering comfort was the right response, or if simply listening would offer some small amount of solace.

“I don't remember what happened. But he doesn't come here anymore. I have his picture. He was handsome. Did you see it? The picture.”

Gretna had not, but she said that she did.

“Poor Emily. Maybe God will help. Do you think God would help?”

Gretna leaned closer and hugged the woman.

“I'm sure he will, Lucille. I am sure he will. Have you asked him?”

Lucille looked at Gretna for a long time.

“About what?”