Earnest (8 page)

C
HAPTER
12

“E
arnest!” In the condo's entry, Jeff sank to his knees and hugged him.

Wriggling with happiness, Earnest nuzzled Jeff despite the evil plastic cone, which would have vexed Saint Monica, the patron saint of patience. At last home from the clinic, Earnest squeaked and wagged his tail as if he thought it could lift him into flight. He unambiguously declared,
I'm thrilled to see you! I love you! We're finally all together again!

Jeff said, “We were worried about you, Earnest.”

We.
Without thinking, Jeff had used the word. For three days he and Anna had not been a “we”—they'd split into an “I” and an “I.”

Jeff looked around the living room. “Is Anna here?” he asked Earnest. Jeff got to his feet. “Anna?”

No answer.

He found her stirring Earnest's evening yogurt into his extra-nutritious kibble, whose expense took a firm financial commitment. When Jeff reached the kitchen doorway, she did not look up.

“So, how you doing?” he asked cheerfully despite the scrunch at the edges of her eyes. He'd seen it before, when she fought back tears. He wanted to hold and comfort her.

But as she kept stirring, the scrunch hardened, and the tears' unexpressed sadness seemed to give way to irritation that was written all over her face. She pressed her lips together in a tight, straight line.

Jeff reminded himself not to let her ill feelings spoil his intent of going along with her wants and needs. For now, she was in the driver's seat, and he was glad to run behind Vincent and cough in the exhaust.
Sometimes you have to sacrifice in the present to achieve a future goal,
he thought. No matter how mad she got, he would not veer from his plan to wait out her huff and welcome her back.

“I'm fine,” she finally said. “Have you come for the rest of your stuff?”

“That was my plan, but I wish you'd dissuade me.”

“Not likely.” Anna unfastened Earnest's cone and set it on the counter. She placed his supper on the floor.

As he began to inhale his food—he didn't chew, he vacuumed—Jeff pointed out, “Smoke didn't ruin his appetite.”

Anna let the words roll by her. She stared out the window at fir trees, gray-black in the gathering dusk.

Jeff took the hint. “Okay, so I'll start packing.”

He went to the bedroom and piled clothes on his and Anna's bed. From the garage's storage locker, he hauled back two suitcases and five Bekins moving boxes, which he assembled with tape. Slowly, he packed—underwear, towels, sheets, his pillow, some architecture books, and two Stephen King novels he hadn't gotten around to reading yet. He rummaged through the bathroom for extra razor blades and shampoo. From the kitchen, where Anna was studying her tea as if her entire future hinged on how long her chamomile bag might float, he got a frying pan, sauce pan, cereal bowl, mug, spatula, knife and fork and spoon, and two glasses. He took a beer and a package of cheese from the refrigerator and put them in a paper bag.

As Jeff packed, Earnest, wearing his cone again, hobbled behind him from room to room. He tilted his head, the better to observe what disappeared into each box. Though he'd seen Jeff pack a suitcase for out-of-town business trips, he'd never seen him load items into large cardboard cubes. Their novelty clearly pricked his concern.
What are you doing?
asked his suspicious glances. Earnest's worried eyes wrestled Jeff 's resolve to the ground.

Guilt over what he was about to do to his dog pained him—guilt he didn't deserve. The last thing he wanted or intended was to upset Earnest, and now his routine would be disrupted, and he wouldn't understand Anna and Jeff 's separation even for a short time. Jeff didn't know how to convey to him that Anna wanted it this way, that
he
wished he didn't have to leave.

He supposed he could make up for Earnest's disruption with ferry rides, or trips to the office, where his colleagues would fawn over him. Jeff could set him by the goal line at Saturday morning practices of the tyke soccer team Jeff coached. Earnest loved little kids. He would be happy. Jeff hoped.

He carried the boxes and his drafting stool and table to his rental truck. He took his two paintings off the wall. (They'd never look right with Mr. Ripley's hot pink, but at least they'd add a civilized touch.) Jeff went back for the clock radio but decided that he could wake up by his cell phone and Anna needed the morning alarm. From the dresser's top, he took a photo of Earnest leaning against Anna's leg while she was browning hamburger.

Finally, as Anna remained in the study, ignoring Jeff, he went to the kitchen pantry. He lifted the cover of Earnest's kibble vat and poured scoopfuls into a plastic bag. He took five cans of Earnest's gourmet chicken and a bag of Cheetos, for which Earnest would gladly give a year of his life. Jeff removed Earnest's leash from the hook by the back door.

“Let's go, Bud,” he called.

As Earnest padded over to him, Anna rose from her chair. She looked angrier than a threatened mother grizzly, her claws unsheathed. “What are you doing?” she growled.

“Earnest is coming with me.”

“He is
not.
”

“Of course he is.”

“Earnest is staying here.With
me
.”

“That's ridiculous. He's my dog. I adopted him at Second Chance. I filled out the form and paid the fee.”

“He's mine,” Anna seethed. “How could you be so callous? If you take him away, you'll upset him more than the fire did.”

“You think my
leaving
won't upset him?”

“Earnest needs his home.”

Earnest clearly heard his name being tossed back and forth because he moved his cone from Anna to Jeff, the better to read their faces and smell their smells, which shouted
Danger! Trouble! Bad news!
He narrowed his eyes to screen out the emotions that flew around the kitchen. As he crouched down and flattened back his ears, his face went dark, like blowing out a candle.

Jeff stopped himself from saying more. In this situation no one would win, especially not Earnest. Right now what mattered most was keeping him secure. Jeff told himself,
Traipse lightly on the eggshells
.
Don't get Anna's dander up any more than it is
.
Go along to get along
. But he'd never imagined that going along would mean leaving behind his dog.

“Fine. You keep him,” Jeff said gently. For Earnest's sake, Jeff kept his voice calm, hardly what he felt. He hung the leash on its hook, replaced the cans on the pantry shelf, and poured the kibble into the plastic bin.

“Bye, Buddy.” Jeff squatted down and hugged him as he had when he'd arrived, but, for both of them, the joy seemed to have drained out of the gesture. Jeff patted Earnest's side and got a hollow, empty sound. Earnest seemed stiff, tense. He might have been holding back feelings he didn't understand.

Collateral damage
.
To my best friend. Damn.
If Jeff let himself, he could be as mad at Anna as she was at him.

But he wouldn't let himself. Back to his plan. He smiled at Anna, who seemed to have launched a new career in glowering. “See you, Honey.” He headed toward the door with Earnest at his heels.

“Wait a minute,” she said.

He stopped, turned around.
Please, say you don't want me to leave. Please, let's go back as we were.
“What's the matter?”

She held out her hand, flat, palm up. “I can't live here if I could come home and find you in the living room. I need the key.”

What the hell?
This was Jeff 's condo as much as hers. He'd signed the lease with her. He'd paid most of the deposit and sometimes her half of the rent. Besides, giving her the key was too final. Being Mr. Nice Guy was getting old. Fast.

But then he thought,
Humor her. Let her keep the damned key for a few weeks. What difference does it make?

As he worked the key off the chain she'd given him for Christmas, its four-leaf clover dangled upside down and seemed to spill out Jeff's luck. He dropped the key onto Anna's palm, patted Earnest, and said a pleasant good-bye. Without looking back, Jeff walked out the door.

C
HAPTER
13

E
arnest limped to the bedroom and sniffed Jeff 's side of the bed. He examined Jeff's empty half of the closet and plodded into the living room. He stopped at the love seat, where Jeff and Anna often cuddled under a quilt and watched TV, and he circled the wingback chair, where Jeff read his nightly
Seattle Tribune
. After searching for Jeff 's drafting table in the study, Earnest checked Jeff 's place at the kitchen table.

Then Earnest started his restless patrol again. He would not stop pacing. His whimpers let Anna know his feelings:
Where is Jeff ? I am upset and confused.

As Anna watched him, her heart melted. It wasn't fair for Jeff to tarnish Earnest's shining spirit. Jeff could ruin
her
life, but Earnest's? And just so Jeff could chase ambition? His professional success was not worth a louse's toenail of the anguish he was causing their dear, sweet dog.

Earnest came to Anna. From deep inside his cone, he looked up at her with undeniable torment that asked again,
Where is he? What did you do with him?

“Sweetie, I haven't done anything with Jeff. He's moved out.” There was nothing else to say. She couldn't gloss over the truth when Earnest could decipher nuances of behavior and read minds.

Anna wanted to point out that Jeff had been a jerk, but she stopped herself. After a breakup, parents weren't supposed to disparage each other to their children, and surely that rule also applied to sensitive dogs.

All she could think to do was to distract Earnest. From a ceramic cookie jar, she picked out one of the vile cow's hooves that Jeff bought for him in spite of Anna's guaranteed recoil. To her, there was something gruesome about his gnawing on a hoof, but, to him, it was the golden key that unlocked Nirvana's door. Barely touching the hoof, she set it on the kitchen floor. She expected Earnest to be ebullient. He'd chomp it with abandon and forget that Jeff was gone.

To aid the chomping, she removed Earnest's cone. He glanced at the hoof, then up at her so the whites under his eyes looked like dejected supine crescent moons.
I'm on to you. You can't bribe me,
said his pressed-back ears.

Earnest picked up the hoof in his teeth, escorted it to the study, and dropped it where Jeff 's drafting table had been. As Earnest walked away, he offered his unambiguous view of Anna's method of distraction:
Phooey on your hoof
.
I don't want it. I want Jeff
.

Earnest limped to Jeff 's wingback chair and curled up in his cannelloni bean position next to where Jeff normally placed his feet. Earnest could not have made plainer where he stood on the matter of Jeff 's absence:
It is terrible. Unacceptable. Cruel.
Earnest closed his eyes and retreated to a dark and tangled mental forest.

 

When the phone rang, a small, sad, sorry piece of Anna wished the caller might be Jeff. Because of Earnest, she was torn. Part of her felt like a huffy begrudger, who wanted Jeff banished from her life. But another part felt like a wounded lamb, who wished Jeff would come home and reassure Earnest so he'd be himself again and they could go back to being a family.

However, Anna mentally grabbed herself by the scruff of her neck and told herself that the wounded lamb had to go. She would serve it on a platter with asparagus for Easter dinner before she would think again of getting together with Jeff. Wanting him home was out of the question.

Anna picked up the kitchen phone.

“Boy, have I got good news for you.” Joy laughed the low and lusty laugh of her villain Murdon when he'd snatched Penelope away from the Cornwall pub. Lately, Joy had gone back to writing, much to the relief of Anna and Lauren. When Joy was working on her novel, she sometimes acted like her characters.

“I could use some good news.” Anna sat at the table and twirled a fork between her thumb and index finger.

“Divine justice comes to Mrs. Scroogemore! Tee-hee! Lightning strikes the old bat!” Joy said. “I hinted that she was negligent about the wiring and we might sue her if she didn't let us stay in the house for a third of the rent. She agreed as long as we'd move out quickly if she gives notice.”

“What about rewiring?”

“She said she can't afford repairs. Can you believe that?!” Another Murdon chortle. “She said there's a separate electrical panel in the garage that some tenant put in for his shop. If we buy those long orange extension cords at the hardware store, we can get electricity from the garage into the house.”

“Would that work? Is it safe?”

“Lauren called her electrician cousin. He said the setup would be weird, but okay for now,” Joy said. “The buzzard woman said she'd have her lawyer write up some paper for us to sign. She refuses to be responsible for our safety.”

“Typical.” Anna rested her elbow on the table. “At least now we have some time before we'd have to move out.”

“Exactly. Mission accomplished, except I want her to suffer. I want cannibals to get a crack at her. I want them to broil her in her St. John's suit.”

“Oh, well,” Anna said.

“You don't sound very happy. I thought you'd be ecstatic.”

“Jeff just moved out. He tried to take Earnest. At least he backed off.”

“Uh-oh. Red flag. I read in
New Divorce Magazine
that couples fight for custody of pets,” Joy said. “Maybe he's playing nice before he goes to a lawyer.”

“You think he'd actually
do
that?” Anna sat up straight.

“You never know. You should line up Mad Dog Horowitz. He's the lawyer who freed me from the Twit,” Joy said. “Here, I'll give you the number.”

As Anna wrote it down, conflict bit into her again, but this time in a new way. Now instead of the huffy begrudger versus the wounded lamb, she was of two minds about Earnest. He needed to live in his familiar home and come to work with her as usual. He needed Anna.

But if she were truly honest, he also needed Jeff.

Anna was the gentle one, Earnest's devoted caretaker, who fussed over him, wiped his muddy paws, knew all his friends, fed him, walked him, and bathed and brushed him. In thunderstorms she soothed him, and on hot days she carried water in Vincent to quench Earnest's thirst. She broiled him chicken breasts when he was sick and baked him peanut butter pupcakes every year on his “gotcha day,” when she and Jeff had adopted him.

Jeff, on the other hand, was Earnest's playmate, his mentor of manly pursuits, such as body surfing, fetching a Frisbee, romping through wetlands, and balancing in a canoe. Jeff played rough games with Earnest, the favorite being tug with Monty, who started life as a plump toy rabbit but became a pink fleece scrap.

Outside in a deck chair, Jeff held out Monty, tantalizing, teasing. Earnest bit into his hind feet while Jeff grabbed his ears, and back and forth, man versus dog, they went. Earnest growled tenacious playful growls. With all his mighty eighty pounds, he yanked Jeff from his chair. Jeff jerked back and hauled Earnest by his teeth across the grass. Finally, Jeff let loose so Earnest won. He pranced around the yard with Monty in a victory lap.

Countless times, Anna had pushed Monty's stuffing back into his fleece suit and sewn him up. Though the rabbit was only a piece of fabric now, Earnest still adored him.
He also adores Jeff,
Anna thought.
The tie between them is as strong as steel.
It wouldn't be fair for her to break it, but it wouldn't be fair for Jeff to have Earnest, either.What was she supposed to do? King Solomon couldn't slice through Earnest and give half of him to her and half to Jeff.

She told Joy good-bye and fished out what was left of Monty from Earnest's toy basket. She would entice him into a few tugs, even if they wouldn't measure up to his mano-a-dientes bouts with Jeff. When she went to the living room, however, Earnest's closed eyes put her on notice:
Do not disturb.
Anna turned around and set Monty back in the basket with Earnest's balls, Frisbees, Kongs, and Nylabones—his macho toys from Jeff.