“What do you mean, crossed the line? What line?”
She patted her chest over her heart. “This one—this line. Remember it? For years, your father has said terrible things to me that hurt my heart, and you were there every time to hear him. But you never, ever told him to stop, or at least shut up. Fair enough—that was your right, because he’s your dad. But he isn’t mine, so I don’t have to put up with him like you and your mom obviously do.”
His mouth tightened. “What’s the matter with my mother?” His voice was a growl.
She growled right back at him, “Besides the hundred mean things she’s said to me, only in a quieter voice? She enables him; in her own slinky way, she eggs him on. You’ve said it yourself. But I’m done with both of them now, and you know why. Please don’t pretend you don’t. Go see them whenever you want—I’ll stay home with the dog.”
The first time he did go for dinner alone with his parents, she ate hers standing up in the kitchen. As usual, the dog sat on its haunches, watching. She thought it wanted a piece of the large chicken leg she held, but no, there was something else there, some sort of different look in the hound’s eyes that night as it stared at her.
“What? Do you want some of this?” She often spoke to the animal as if it were a person, and felt no shame or embarrassment doing it in private or when there were others around. She’d had dogs all her life and always considered them just another member of the family.
She was leaning with her back against the sink as she spoke, the dog directly in front of her. As soon as she finished speaking, there was a loud explosive shishhhh noise behind her. Shocked, she staggered forward then turned around to see what it was. The faucet was shooting water into the sink full blast, as if some invisible hands had turned on both hot and cold handles all the way.
“What the hell?” She knew she hadn’t touched them, and water doesn’t turn on by itself. The first surprise of the sound and discovering what it was receded, but she was still a little shaken up when she went back to the sink and turned off both spigots. Firmly. She stood there and looked down at them, trying to figure out how it had happened.
Then she remembered the chicken leg she had been eating. “Damn it!” She must have dropped it when the water started gushing. Looking down at the floor around her feet, it wasn’t there. For a moment she thought had she already finished it? No. It was definitely in her hand when the water started flowing, She was sure of it. But so where was it now?
“First the water goes crazy, then my dinner disappears. What’s next?”
What came next was the usual—when things got agitated in her life she almost always had to pee. Even the smallest things could set her off and start her bladder screaming NOW OR ELSE. Her husband thought it was cute and she knew he kind of secretly enjoyed her discomfort sometimes because normally she was such a control freak. But when it came to her bladder, she was its slave.
Stupid as it sounds, crazy water in the sink and a disappearing chicken leg set off the alarm this time, and she headed for the toilet. The dog watched her leave the room and padded after her. When she got to the bathroom, she opened the door and slid her hand up and down on the wall just inside, searching for the light switch. When she found it she flipped it on. The first thing she saw was the chicken leg placed on top of the lowered toilet seat.
After that, things got crazier in a hurry. They went from whimsical to worrisome and whaaaat? to dangerous and destructive. They kept coming and coming. But never once did either of them think any of it was because of the dog until finally, finally the writing appeared again on both of their bodies.
SPILKE changed everything.
One bright November morning, that name was inexplicably spelled out in clear black letters down the length of her right index finger. She did not notice it until she was brushing her teeth and saw it out of the corner of her eye.
Her hand froze and then slowly she lay the toothbrush down on the edge of the sink. Raising her hand to eye level, she stared at the finger, incredulous at what was written there: SPILKE.
Dennis Spilke. My God, how long had it been since she thought of that name, or him? He was her first boy crush when she was eleven years old. Because she loved and trusted her father much more than her mother and considered him her best friend in the world, he was the only person she told about her love for Dennis. Her father was such a good guy back then. Back before the drinking and later the drugs hollowed him out and shrunk him into someone unrecognizable, then crazy as a fly banging against a window, then dead at fifty-one. Even her girlfriends at school didn’t know about her short-lived swoon for Dennis. Even Dennis Spilke didn’t know. Only her dad, and when it was over weeks later, he was the one who comforted her. He said: Somewhere out there in the world right this minute is the man you will one day marry. Can you believe it? He’s out there doing stuff, living a life like you. But all the time that’s happening, he’s moving slowly, slowly towards you. Think about that for a minute: He’s coming—that boy is coming just for you. And when you two meet, you’ll be so crazy about him that all the Dennis Spilkes you’ve known till then will seem like cockroaches compared to this new guy. Just the word “cockroaches” got her laughing and, as always, her father’s words made the hurt of her small world less.
But now here it was again, SPILKE, a zillion years later written in black on the inside of her finger. That odd name, all the forgotten memories of a boy and that time in her life suddenly came back zap into her head like an electric shock. A moment later she happened to look in the mirror above the sink. In the reflection she saw the dog sitting in the bathroom doorway behind her. Very humanly, it nodded at her as if to say, Yes, it was me—I did that to you.
Days later, when she finally told her husband the whole story, he exploded. “What do you mean it nodded?“ Despite the loud skepticism in his voice, he threw a quick mistrustful glance at the dog lying near them on its bed. Its body was relaxed but the eyes were watching. When it saw the man look, its tail thumped once on the floor.
“Just what I said—it nodded, and then when I directly asked if it had written on my finger, it nodded again.”
“Bullshit! That’s completely bullshit!” He threw up his hands in exasperation. His wife could be nutty sometimes, especially about her obsessions, but this was way beyond that. This was stone-cold crazy.
She blew a strand of hair off her face. “Bullshit? Really? Then watch this.”
He glared at her.
“No don’t look at me—look at him.” She pointed to the dog.
He looked and the dog nodded to him.
He looked back at his wife. “It nodded. Great. Nice trick. So what? Dogs do stuff like that.”
“Now look at your fingers.”
He was right-handed. He saw nothing there. He looked at his left hand. Down the fat pad to the base of his thumb were black letters spelling TURLEY. Jennifer Turley was the name of his first girlfriend.