I generally avoid Target for shopping excursions. I don’t like the place. Not because they don’t carry everything in the world a person might need—they do. But it’s all those moms, pushing their carts with two, three, four kids clinging to them or sitting in the cart, or scurrying through the aisles. They unknowingly taunt me. They remind me of my inadequacies. Occasionally, I’ll see a mother completely snap, berating her kids for their behavior, rolling her eyes, painting on a long-suffering expression as though she would give anything to be relieved of her burden. I want to shout at her. I want to tell her to appreciate what she has, to count her blessings, to thank her lucky stars for that burden.
Mostly, I shop at Vons. Much more eclectic patrons. But this morning, I’m going to brave Target. Their prices on hair dye are much better.
The elevator descends toward the parking garage. It opens on the floor below mine, and the doors open, revealing Judd standing on the threshold. Surprise renders me speechless. Judd sees me and smiles, and I quickly smile back. His hair is still damp from a recent shower, and his eyes twinkle.
“Well, good morning!” he says brightly. “What a lovely surprise. You weren’t coming down to cancel our date, were you?”
I shake my head. “No, I’m on my way out. To Target. I’m making pies for Easter, and I need some ingredients.” I don’t mention the dye. Hopefully, tonight he won’t notice that my hair is a different shade than it was this morning. Charlie never noticed my hair when I had it done. Rachel complains that Sam doesn’t notice hers, either. That would be one male trait I wouldn’t mind Judd having.
He steps onto the elevator, bringing with him the scent of soap and a subtle masculine cologne. His proximity makes me almost dizzy, and I tell myself to calm down.
“I’m heading to the store myself,” he says. “Thought I might get a few nibbles for this evening.” The elevator continues its course. “Anything you don’t eat?”
“I’m pretty easy to please,” I tell him, then groan inwardly at my choice of phrase. “I mean, I’m not a vegan or a vegetarian or paleo or Atkins. I eat pretty much everything.”
“Wonderful,” he says and winks. “I’m not too keen on all those restrictions. Makes something that’s supposed to be pleasurable too damn complicated.”
“I agree.”
“I thought prosciutto, cheese, maybe some olives. To go with the wine?”
“Sounds lovely.”
The doors slide open at ground level. Judd walks me to my car.
“I made lasagna. I mean, I made one for my sister, and I made an extra one to freeze. I could bring it, but that might be too . . . much . . . with everything else?”
He smiles down at me, and I force myself to meet his eyes, which is one of the most difficult things I’ve done in recent times. My cheeks flame, but I don’t look away.
“Why don’t you save it,” he says. “For next time.”
I nod and get into my car. He closes the door for me, like the gentleman he is, then mouths the words See you tonight.
I exit the garage with a smile on my face. If I could get through that encounter, Target is going to be a piece of cake.
SIXTY-SEVEN
SHADOW
All my humans are awake, and they all seem excited. If they had tails, they’d be wagging them. There is a hum of energy in the house that only I can hear and feel, and my nose sniffs the smell of happy.
My nose also smells the smell of dirt on Little Male, and he is the tail-waggingest of all of my humans.
I can also smell the cat. I can’t see it. I go to the window, then back to my bed, then to the food-smelling room, then back to the window. But I don’t see the cat. But I know it’s somewhere out there.
Little Female is on the couch watching the big screen on the wall. Little Male runs from the food-smelling room and goes up the stairs. I hear my master and mistress laughing in the food-smelling room. They smell like something else. They smell like clean, but under that, a very human musky scent that doesn’t wash off. I smell that on them sometimes, mostly when there’s darkness outside and all my humans are upstairs. Their laughing makes me happy.
The big screen on the wall goes dark, and Little Female jumps off the couch and goes fast into the food-smelling room. Then she comes out holding my mistress’s small screen, not the very small one and not the medium one that she makes tapping sounds on. Little Female is smiling and that makes me happy, too. She goes up the stairs just as Little Male comes down. She stops and says something to him, but I don’t understand the words. But what she says makes him happy. Then she goes up to the place I’m not allowed, and he comes down and goes out the front door.
I trot to the window so I can see where my little human has gone. I hope he hasn’t gone too far, because then I can’t protect him.
But I see him on the grass outside the window. He has that thing on him, a human toy that’s full of smells from other humans, and Little Male talks to the toy and smiles. Then Little Male goes to the big long green thing that isn’t a tree and isn’t a plant but goes all the way to the sidewalk. I watch Little Male. He has happy face. His toy has happy face, too, but even I know that the toy isn’t real like a dog.
My nose catches the scent of the cat, and I look across the wide black strip to the sidewalk on the other side. At first, I don’t see anything, but then there is movement and my eyes that see near and far focus on the movement and the movement is the cat.
My tail wags, but not a happy wag. It almost hurts me. And the whine starts deep inside my throat and comes out as a bark, loud in my own ears. No humans hear me. If they did, they might tell me, “Quiet, Shadow,” but my master and mistress are still in the food-smelling room, talking and laughing, and Little Female is upstairs and Little Male is outside and can’t hear me through the window. I bark again, then whine, then put my paw on the glass.
The cat is looking at me from where it sits. I don’t know how cats see, if they can see like dogs, but it definitely knows I’m here. Maybe it can smell me. It swishes its tail, then stretches its mouth open, like I do when I’m tired or just waking up. Then it meows. And I can hear it even through the window, even from inside my house, and the sound makes my ears flat. It’s the worst sound I’ve ever heard, and I want it to stop. But the cat keeps going. Meow meow meow.
The cat and its meow is like an itch I can’t reach with my paws, and it’s making me upset. Then it starts to move toward me, slowly. It stops at the grass in front of my house. And meows again.
I have to stop that sound.
SIXTY-EIGHT
JONAH
“Marco, look! A monarch! Isn’t it so pretty?”
The hedge is the best place for looking for bugs. I don’t know what kind of plant it is, but it’s got big bright-pink flowers on it, and the bees and butterflies like to get the pollen from the big yellow stamens in the middle of them. My teacher, Mrs. Hartnett, said that stamen was a very big word for a kindergartner to know, but I told her that I only know it ’cause of the insects who gather the pollen. Mrs. Hartnett is a girl, but she likes hearing about bugs. Maybe ’cause we’re just talking about them, not looking at real ones.