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“Attila?” she says, unsure.

“Hi, Ava.”

“What are you doing here?” she asks, dangling her arms loose at her sides.

“I don’t know,” I shrug. “Is Grace here?”

“You came to see Grace?”

“No, mostly I came to see you. But I miss Grace.”

“What are you really doing here?” she asks, narrowing her eyes.

“I don’t know. I miss you.”

“Damn straight you miss me. I didn’t trust you to realize that though.”

“Huh?”

“Oh just come in and shut up.”

“Okay.”

I follow my wife inside our vinyl house.

BEN NESTER

34.

Compelling Thunder

The sky has gone mad and a massive storm is drumming at the windows of Ava’s friend’s cottage. Crow is lying on the blanket I’ve put down for him and he keeps putting one paw over his face, as if protecting himself from the thunderstorm. I’d like to just lie down next to him and put my own paws over my face and hope for it all to go away but it’s not that simple.

I’m sitting on the lone chair in the place. There’s a futon in one of the two bedrooms but I’ve only taken small naps now and then. I have to keep my vigil. The girl is locked in the cabin behind the cottage and, although I boarded up the windows, she could still conceivably find a way out if I don’t pay attention.

The rain is coming harder and one of the windows starts leaking. A crash of thunder lets loose and Crow howls, compelled to add his song to that of the sky.

Ava has loaned me a cell phone and I take it out of my pocket now, trying Ava’s home number for what seems like the thousandth time in the last twelve hours. Again, no answer. I haven’t talked to her since leaving the track, when I called to tell her about the change of plans and how I’d had to take the girl instead of the jockey. She’d seemed a little surprised by this, but told me to go ahead and take the girl upstate. Ava was supposed to call again though and she hasn’t.

I get up and go into the little bathroom with its ancient blue tiles. I relieve myself and look out the bathroom window toward the cabin. I suppose I have to feed the girl now. I go back into the kitchen and look into the fridge where I’ve put the few groceries I bought back in Queens. When I open the package of sandwich meat, Crow comes running over and starts doing a dance. When that fails to make me feed him, he jumps straight into the air, then lands and chases his tail. It’s pretty impressive. I give him a piece of bologna. I make a sandwich for the girl, tuck a bottle of water under my arm and then tell Crow to follow me outside. We both trot through the little yard between the house and the cabin, trying to dodge the raindrops that are falling and turning the snow to slush. I have to put the sandwich down so I can pull my keys out of my pocket and I issue a threat to Crow not to eat the prisoner’s sandwich. It takes me a minute to unlock the huge padlock and I manage to get pretty wet.

As I push the door open, I find her standing there, staring at me.

“Please,” she says, “my cats need to be fed, please let me call my neighbor.” She’s obviously pretty worked up about it, has her face all bunched up and there’s no color in her lips. She’d tried this one yesterday afternoon, on the ride up here, piping in every twenty minutes or so about her cats. I figured it was just a ruse but now I’m starting to wonder. She does look like a girl who’d have cats and, to my chagrin, Crow continues to feel drawn to the girl, is in fact nuzzling her right now as she pets his head.

“Crow!” I call out to the disloyal dog.

“It’s fine,” the prisoner says. “I like dogs,” she adds, entirely missing the point, which is that I don’t like my dog kissing up to strangers.

“I’d like for you to imagine you’re in my shoes,” the girl says now. “You’re trapped somewhere and your dog is at home, starving. If the positions were reversed, I’d let you call a neighbor to have them feed your dog.”

She stares at me so hard I’m convinced she’s trying to bend my mind. I stare right back at her, feeling torn—on