What Looks Like Crazy (10 page)

“I love you, Katie,” he said. “I'll quit the fire department. I'll go to work for Uncle Bump.”

I rose slightly, guided Jay to my heat, and lowered my body. My head fell back as he filled me exquisitely. Our sighs mingled and hovered in the air, and Jay cupped my hips tightly, digging his nails deep in my flesh until I cried out. I rode him hard and the heat rose in my belly, hotter and hotter until…

A clap of thunder woke me, and I sat bolt upright in the bed. It was dark. I felt the pillow beside me and was not surprised to find myself alone. Just another dream, one of many I'd had since leaving Jay.

They always left me sad, but I preferred them to some of the other dreams I had. The bad ones. Those dreams consisted of tall burning buildings. Skyscrapers that loomed so high, they poked through the clouds. And like an idiot, I always found myself climbing the stairs to the top, even though I knew I was headed for disaster. I hated those dreams, but they'd been with me for more than twenty years.

I reached to turn on the lamp beside my bed, but nothing happened. Obviously I'd lost power. I opened the drawer of my night table and pulled out a flashlight. I shone it on my battery-powered alarm clock. Five a.m.

I got out of bed and looked out the window. Lightning flashed, followed closely by more thunder. The rain fell in sheets, and I was thankful I'd brought Mike the stray inside. I imagined him huddled and trembling from the noise of the storm.

Still holding my flashlight, I carefully picked my way downstairs. I opened the door to the laundry room and found Mike standing there, his brown eyes pleading. “What is it, boy?”

He grunted. I knelt on the floor, and my hand brushed something small and warm. It wiggled. I gave a shudder of horror, thinking I had a mouse in my laundry room. Even worse, I'd touched it! I had an attack of heebie-jeebies and came to my feet so fast that I made myself dizzy. Quickly, I shined the light on the floor. Holy hell, it was a puppy! Nearby, there were three more just like it.

“You're not a Mike,” I said. “You're a girl! And you forgot to mention you were pregnant!”

Despite her straining, she licked my foot. I bent over and stroked her head. “I hope you know what you're doing, because I'm clueless.”

I hurried to the kitchen and dialed Mona. She answered sleepily. “There's a dog in my laundry room having puppies,” I blurted, “and I don't know what to do.”

“Huh? When did you get a dog?”

I gave Mona a brief summary of how I'd ended up with a stray. “I should probably put the puppies on a towel or something, but I'm scared to pick them up. Plus my power is out.”

“Let me wake Mrs. Perez,” Mona said. “I'll call you back.”

I felt relieved as I hung up. Mrs. Perez was Mona's housekeeper and the most capable woman I knew. I'd seen her get a red wine stain out of Mona's white carpet.

The phone rang ten minutes later. “Mrs. Perez will be there as soon as she can,” Mona said, “but it'll take longer in this weather. She said you don't need to do anything; the mama dog will know what to do. Oh, and try to stay out of the dog's way so you don't make her nervous. I'll be over after I shower.”

I hated that Mrs. Perez had to drive in bad weather, but I feared there would be a glitch in one of the puppy births, and I wouldn't know how to help. “Could you please grab a can of dog food on the way over?” I asked Mona. “All I have is tuna fish.”

I hung up and made my way to the laundry room door, but didn't go in. I aimed the flashlight at Mike. She was busy licking the puppy she'd just expelled. “You're doing great,” I said, thinking I should prod her on. I gave her a thumbs-up. Then, I paced the kitchen and waited.

Mrs. Perez arrived
an hour later carrying a box, a heating pad, a stack of newspapers, and a couple of towels. The storm had blown over, and power had been restored. Mike had delivered yet another puppy. I'd managed to take a quick shower and put on minimal makeup, but I was still in my bathrobe.

“Who painted your front door?” Mrs. Perez asked as she looked in on Mike, who seemed to be resting, her puppies still scattered about.

I gave a mental sigh. Obviously Bitsy had not taken my warning seriously. “My neighbor doesn't like me,” I said.

Mrs. Perez immediately prepared the box, putting the heating pad beneath the towels and covering it all with newspaper. “You'll want to keep the area warm for the puppies,” she said. I followed her inside the laundry room, where she placed the box in a corner to avoid drafts. I plugged in the heating pad as she petted Mike, then carefully placed the puppies in the box.

Mike didn't look concerned that Mrs. Perez was handling her newborns. She walked to her water bowl and began lapping greedily before heading to the back door. I let her out, and she was quick to do her business and come right back.

“I don't know if she's finished having her litter, so we should stay out of her way,” Mrs. Perez said as Mike climbed in the box and began sniffing and nuzzling her new family as though wanting to make sure each was healthy and perfectly formed. We went back into the kitchen, and I poured Mrs. Perez a cup of coffee.

“You'll need to change the newspapers when they get soiled,” she said. “The mama must be fed several times a day so she'll have plenty of milk for her babies.”

“How do you know all of this?” I asked anxiously.

“It's not rocket science,” Mrs. Perez said. “Dogs have puppies all the time.”

By the time Mona arrived with a bag containing several kinds of dog food, Mike was nursing her brood and dozing. “I love what you've done with your front door,” Mona said.

“Does the name Bitsy Stout mean anything to you?” I said dully.

“Have you heard anything more from her henchman?” she asked.

I told her about the late-night phone call.

Mrs. Perez called me to the laundry room. “You're going to have to keep an eye on the runt of the litter and make sure he nurses like the others,” she said, showing me how to guide the tiniest of the puppies to a nipple.

“I can come home during lunch,” I said, “but other than that, I have appointments all day.”

“I'll stay with them this morning and look in on them from time to time over the next few days,” she offered. “You have cable TV, right?”

 

I tried not
to think about what I was going to do with a female dog and five puppies, as I greeted my first appointment of the day, a husband and wife who had decided to separate and were using me as a mediator. My first impulse had been to convince them to try to salvage their marriage, but their decision to divorce was a done deal.

To their credit, they were trying very hard to keep things amicable for the sake of their two children, whom I was also seeing separately. Although everybody seemed to be handling the situation well, it was still sad to witness the dissolution of a family.

Jay's family had not made me feel less loved after I'd left their son. Jay's father had worked at the same fire station and on the same shift as my dad. He had been there the night my father had not made it out of a burning building. While Jay's parents and siblings were disappointed over the split, they seemed to understand.

George Moss showed up at ten a.m. He did not look happy, but at least he wasn't shoving vials in my face and threatening to blow up my office. I took that as a good sign, but I was cool to him as I invited him to sit down on my sofa.

“I know you're mad at me,” George said, “but I was upset last time, on account of my wife leaving me.”

I was silent.

“I'm sorry I did what I did,” he said. He wiped his hand across his face. “I just have all this crap going on in my life. It's not fair.”

I had to force myself not to overreact. If only he knew what was going on in
my
life. “What makes you think other people don't have crap going on?” I said. This was not the first time I'd asked him that question.

“See how you are?” he accused. “My life is in the shit house, and you're scolding me!”

“You know what, George?” I said. “I did you a favor by not having you arrested.”

He glared at me. “I thought you were supposed to be my compassionate friend.”

I didn't want to be George's friend. I realized I didn't even like George. I was tired of his drama and hysterics. I didn't blame his wife for leaving him. Bad enough she had to put up with that bony chest.

“Having a bad day does not give you the right to yell at or bully people,” I said. “It's nobody's fault but yours that you choose to blow everything out of proportion.”

“You're out of line, Doc,” he said stiffly.

“I can't help you, Mr. Moss.”

He sat up straighter on the sofa. “What the hell do you mean you can't help me? That's your job.”

“I'll be glad to refer you to another therapist if you like, but that's the best I can do.”

His face reddened and his eyes bulged. He was on the verge of God only knew what. I waited for him to whip out his vial.

“Then I demand that you give me all my money back,” he shouted.

“We don't give refunds.”

“We'll just see about that!”

There was a tap on the door. Mona peeked in. “Everything okay in here?” she asked.

George jumped to his feet. He looked at Mona as he pointed to me. “Your boss is a terrible therapist!” he yelled. “She is the worst therapist I've ever met.”

Mona feigned a look of sheer horror. “That explains why nobody ever gets better!”

George flounced from my office and out of the reception room. “I'm in the wrong business,” I told Mona.

“Don't talk like that,” she said. “Even Dr. Phil has bad days.”

I chuckled. “Face it, Mona. I'm never going to have my own TV show.”

 

At lunch I
drove home to check on Mike and the puppies. I was annoyed to find that Bitsy had still not washed the paint off, but I didn't have time to worry about it.

Mrs. Perez had left a note, promising to check back at three o'clock. I looked in the laundry room. Mom and kids were doing well, and Mike looked eager to see me. I let her out the back door so she could do her business.

“I need to make a doctor's appointment for you and your little ones, to make sure you're all okay,” I said, once I let her in. “And we have to get you on birth control, because you've definitely exceeded your two-point-two limit.” She wagged her tail as I thumbed through the Yellow Pages for a veterinarian in my area.

I dialed the number and explained my situation to the woman on the other end of the line. I was offered an appointment for eleven a.m. on Friday. I checked my purse-sized appointment book, saw that I was free, and promised to be there.

Mike returned to her box. Her children had caught on fast; they'd quickly discovered how to reach the milk supply. Well, all but one had, I noticed. The runt was having a hard time latching on to a nipple. Bad enough his eyes and ears were sealed closed; he had to try to squeeze between his larger brothers and sisters. I very gently aided him as Mrs. Perez had taught me, and I carried a chair inside so that I could sit and watch him. Once or twice he seemed to lose interest, but each time I led him back to a nipple and made sure he took in his mother's milk.

 

My last appointment
of the day was with a nine-year-old boy with ADHD. He'd spent a portion of the previous school year serving in-school suspension, driving his parents crazy, and terrorizing the family cat until the poor animal began losing its hair. His parents and I, along with his teacher, had worked closely together, and we'd seen a lot of progress. The cat's hair had grown back.

Thad called as I was preparing to leave for the day.

“I'm ten minutes from your office. Can you meet me for a quick drink?” He paused. “It's urgent.”

“What's wrong?” I asked.

“I'd prefer discussing it in person.”

Thad sounded on the level. It didn't sound like he was going to ply me with wine before dangling a room key to the nearest hotel in my face. I thought of Mike, but I knew Mrs. Perez would have let her out several times.

“There's a new place not far from my office,” I said. “It's called the Bistro.” I gave him directions.

I stepped inside the restaurant fifteen minutes later and spotted Thad at one of the tables in the back. It would have been impossible to miss him, what with his thick blond hair and silk Italian suit. He was tanned, toned, and handsome. Thad had the sort of slick good looks you find in fashion advertisements, while Jay was the type you'd expect to find in an outdoors magazine.

Thad stood and pulled out my chair as I approached the table. I saw that he'd already ordered a glass of white wine for me.

I waited until we were both seated and I'd taken a sip of wine. “What did you want to talk to me about?” I asked.

“It's really embarrassing,” he said. “It's about Thomas. He's having serious marital problems; in fact, he and his wife have separated.”

“I'm sorry to hear that,” I said. I knew very little about Thad's younger brother, Thomas, having only seen him a couple of times at family functions. He did not resemble the blond and polished Glazers; his hair was dark and hung past his shoulders in a ponytail. Instead of attending an Ivy League college as was expected of him, he'd bought a feed-and-seed store far north of the city. I had not met Thomas's wife, a woman who was some years older and owned a small pig farm.

“The whole thing has gotten really nasty,” Thad said. “I'd like for you to talk to Thomas before it escalates into something worse.”

I held up my hand. “Wait. You're asking me to become involved in your family problems? No, thank you.”

“Thomas likes you, Kate.”

“He barely knows me!”

“Okay, the truth is, he likes you better than he likes his family. He'll listen to you. All I'm asking is that you calm him down before he goes off the deep end and does something he'll regret. Something we'll
all
regret,” Thad added.

“Why would he go off the deep end?” I asked.

“I'd rather let him tell you,” Thad said.

“Why me?”

“Because I know you'll keep it hush-hush. It wouldn't look so good for the family if it got out.”

“Oh, so this is really about saving all of you from humiliation and has little to do with Thomas.”

“Right.” Thad nodded, then frowned. “Well, we
do
care what happens to him.”

“I know I'm going to regret this.”

 

Mike looked happy
to see me when I arrived home; but, then, I was carrying a bag of fast food, so I wasn't certain whether it was the smell of fries sending her tail into a frantic wag or whether she had missed me. I let her out, checked the puppies, and replenished her food and water. I tried not to feel guilty as I stuffed my body with junk that was sure to clog my arteries.

After she ate, we went for a short walk, but I could tell by the time we turned back for the house that she was anxious to get back to her babies. Bitsy Stout was watering the plants on her porch and didn't see my approach. She gave a startled look when she glanced up and saw me standing on the sidewalk in front of her house.

“We need to talk about my front door,” I said.

“You can't prove it was me,” Bitsy said, and hurried inside her house before I could respond.

When I stepped through my front door with Mike, I noticed I had phone messages. Again, Jay had called and asked me to call him back. Just hearing his voice sent a shiver up my spine and filled my head with X-rated pictures.

I tried to push him from my mind. If I thought of him, I'd have to think about the upcoming divorce, and then I would have to wonder if I was making the biggest mistake of my life. On the other hand, I was almost certain that agreeing to see Thad's brother would top even that.

I could go round and round asking myself “what if” where my marriage was concerned, and it would get me exactly nowhere. Better to practice my multiplication tables.

There were a couple of hang-up calls, both accompanied by heavy breathing. I looked at my caller ID, but it read “unavailable.”