The Stardust Lounge_ Stories From a Boy's Adolescence - Deborah Digges [33]
Things sway and totter. Much we simply let slide, much sits unfinished waiting for later or never—the gardens, the stone walks. There will be no man coming home at the end of the week, or at the end of two to point out all that should have been done, or redirect the doing—no one, in an attempt to father, to sneer at Stephen's hair or tell him to pull up his pants.
I know there are good marriages out there, good men and fathers, stepfathers. I know that Stephen's father and Stan had good intentions. But I begin to see how destructive the dynamic was and the expectations and disappointments it created. In this regard I consider my responsibilities and my complicity, my earnestness in trying to make it work.
I vacillate, finding my way into rapt relief that I don't have to be that woman anymore, no one's long-distance wife and lover attempting to make up for lost time, covering up flaws to make the weekend or the holiday appear as if all were well. Stephen and I no longer have this distraction.
There are dishes on the roof—Blue Willow—where we have taken our dinner, tools in the kitchen, birds’ nests in the dining room, books waterlogged and swollen but not unreadable on the patio, half-finished drawings, wallpapering, remixes, half-swept floors, half-finished poems.
The house becomes roomy. It blurs with the outside. At night we prop the doors open for the breeze and fireflies float in. We switch off the lights and watch them. By morning there are many various and colorful moths clinging to our ceilings.
Father stones / Photo by Stephen Digges
One day on his bike Stephen finds a stray cat, tucks her in his jacket and brings her home to live with us. He names her Mugsie. A few weeks later she gives birth to a litter of kittens, four in all, which we end up keeping, every one. And when Charles goes to live and work in Russia, we agree to look after his San Francisco—born basset hound, one-year-old Rufus. And we adopt another bulldog, this one, as we know, with epilepsy.
A neighbor who has seen me walking G.Q. has told me about Buster. The dog was her brother's, but her brother has moved into Boston and cannot have pets where he lives.
Her brother gave Buster over to the care of a family in New Hampshire, but now that family can't cope with his epilepsy. About once a month, my neighbor explains, he has cluster seizures—one, two, three, as many as twelve over a twenty-four-hour period.
The family keeping the dog in New Hampshire has notified my neighbor's brother that it can't keep up with the dog's problems. The family has taken Buster to a veterinarian who recommends that he be put down. His epilepsy is severe, says the vet. Unless the family is willing to put in a great deal of time and effort, it might be better for the dog to be put out of his misery.
One Saturday in October, leaving Stephen in charge of Mugsie and her kittens, Rufus, and G.Q., I drive up to New Hampshire to meet Buster the bulldog.
I know little except what the New Hampshire woman has told me—that he is about four, that he is good with kids and other animals, that he takes a battery of medications each day on a precise schedule, medications the New Hampshire family will gladly give me for free if I take the dog off their hands.
“He loves to play with balls,” she adds.
As instructed, when I reach the city limits, I stop at the 7-Eleven and call the number she has given me.
“I'm here,” I say to the woman who answers. “If you could give me directions to your house now …”
“Just wait there,” the woman says. “We'll bring the dog to you.”
This is odd, I think as I hang up. I am a bit nervous about adopting this dog with epilepsy, sight unseen, from people who don't want me to know where they live, who know nothing about me, and who are so desperate to get rid of him, they'll hand the dog over to me at an interstate 7-Eleven. Were I to consult Stan at this moment, he'd explode,