“I wish I could,” he said with a grin. “But if I did you’d be the first to be thrown in jail, and we can’t have that now, can we?”
“You’d throw your own mother in jail?”
“The law is the law. Can’t bend it just for you, Mom.”
“Oh, hell. What good is it to have a cop for a son if he can’t even keep you out of jail?”
“I kept you out of jail now, didn’t I? Indecent exposure is a serious offense, Mom.”
“Poppycock. It’s the beach. Everybody’s indecently exposed. It’s ageism is what it is. Pure ageism. There should be a law against ageism.”
And so it went on, until they arrived at the library. Odelia was glad to drop Gran off with her mom. She loved her to pieces, but a little of the old woman went a long way, and for now she’d had more than her fill.
Chapter 13
We got home fully expecting to find Brutus and Harriet in the throes of a touching make-up scene. Instead, the moment we walked in, we were shocked once again. Just like on the beach, Dooley and I were forced to close our eyes when we caught Diego and Harriet on the couch—my couch!—doing the kind of stuff Odelia had warned Gran about.
“Omigod!” Dooley cried, immediately averting his eyes. “It burns! It burns, Max!”
Unlike Dooley, I had the opposite reaction. I couldn’t stop staring. It was like a train wreck. I just couldn’t look away. All I saw was a lot of orange, a lot of white, and a lot of pink. In my own home! On my own couch!
This was just too much. This was just… And then I heard it. A soft sobbing sound. It seemed to come from somewhere nearby. I glanced at Dooley, thinking it was him, but he was still squeezing his eyes tightly shut. The sobbing seemed to come from somewhere close by, though. So I went in search of it, and then I saw a shadow flit by. It was a dark shadow, and it hurtled past us with such speed that it was like a black blur. The shadow streaked out the window and was gone.
Harriet and Diego didn’t seem to mind that they’d suddenly gained an audience. They just kept smooching and making weird kissing sounds. Yuck.
So I walked out, gesturing for Dooley to come along. But since he still had his eyes closed, that didn’t work.
“Dooley,” I hissed. “Let’s get out of here!”
“I’m not opening my eyes, Max,” he promised me. “No way am I opening them. If I do I might not survive. And since my health isn’t what it used to be, I’m not taking any chances!”
“Oh, all right,” I grumbled, and guided him to the French windows and out.
The fresh air did me a world of good. “You can open your eyes now,” I said. “We’re safe.”
He first opened one eye, then the other one, and looked relieved. “Phew, that was a close call, huh?”
“Yeah. Did you see that shadow? No, of course you didn’t.”
“I did hear the sobbing,” he said. “Do you think that was Brutus?”
I eyed him intently. “You think so?”
He nodded. “Imagine walking in on your girlfriend with… that.”
I shivered. “Yeah, I see what you mean.”
We both looked at the house next door, where Dooley lived with Brutus and Harriet. The hedge between the two gardens had a large hole in it, and we slipped through it, preparing ourselves for the worst. Then I halted. “Are you sure we should get involved? I mean, Brutus isn’t exactly our buddy.”
“I think everybody needs a friend in their hour of need, Max,” Dooley said earnestly. “Even though Brutus isn’t everyone’s cup of tea, he’s a cat in need.”
“Oh, all right,” I said on a sigh, and we padded into the next backyard. And there he was. The big, bad brute. Sitting on the back porch swing and crying his heart out. Even though I’d never gotten along with the cat, my heart went out to him.
We hopped up on the swing and glanced at one another. I’m not exactly the world’s best Samaritan. I mean, if I applied to work at the crisis counseling hotline they probably wouldn’t accept me.
I cleared my throat awkwardly. “There, there,” I murmured, raising my paw to clap Brutus on the shoulder. “There’s a lot of other cats out there.”
In response, he just sobbed louder, his shoulder shaking. “Go away!”
“Max!” Dooley hissed. “Not helping!”
“I don’t see you trying!” I hissed back.
“I went through this, you know,” Dooley told Brutus.
“Just… go away!” Brutus sniffed, turning away from us. It was obvious he was embarrassed that we would see him like this.
“It’s actually a funny story,” said Dooley, undeterred. “You came into our lives and got involved with Harriet and I was the one feeling sad.”
“It’s karma,” I said.
“Max!” Dooley loud-whispered, giving me a look of abhorrence.
“Well, it is, isn’t it?” I asked. Crisis counseling? Not my strong suit.
“It will pass, you know,” said Dooley, addressing Brutus once again.
“It will?” asked Brutus in a strangled voice.
“It will,” Dooley assured him. “I’m over Harriet now. Seeing her with another cat does nothing to me.”
I gave him a critical look.
“Oh, all right. It does something. But I don’t fall to pieces over it anymore.”
“I’m not falling to pieces,” Brutus said, his voice smothered. “I just got something in my eye.”
“Of course you have,” I said. “A big chunk of Diego, right?”
Brutus produced the loudest wail yet, and Dooley was back to rolling his eyes at me. I shrugged and mouthed, ‘What?’
‘Shut. Up!’ he mouthed back.
“Did you see her?” Brutus asked now.
“Yeah, we saw her,” Dooley said with his best pastor’s voice.
“Was she still… you know?”
“Yep, she was still giving mouth-to-mouth to that orange menace,” I said.
“Oh, God!” Brutus cried, and buried his head in his paws. “Why?!”
“It’s just a fling,” Dooley said. “She’ll snap out of it. She’s just temporarily blinded by passion. Once the initial zing wears off, she’ll see Diego for what he really is: a cad and a nasty piece of work. Trust me, Brutus, once she sees through him she’ll come crawling back to you.”
Now it was my turn to make eyes at Dooley. I pointed at him. “Come back to you, you mean,” I whispered.
He shook his head. “I’m in the friend zone, Max. I’ve always been in the friend zone, and I’ll always stay there as far as Harriet is concerned. And I’m fine with that. There are more important things in life than being Harriet’s boyfriend.”
“No, there are not!” Brutus wailed.
I went back to patting the big guy on the back. “There, there,” I muttered, for lack of anything better to say.
“I promise you, Brutus,” Dooley said, making a last-ditch attempt to get Brutus to back away from the precipice. “This pain will go away.”
For the first time, he looked up. He looked horrible. His eyes were all red and weepy and his nose was all runny. He wasn’t the Brutus I’d come to know and hate. Not by a long shot. “Promise?”
“Promise,” Dooley said.
He gave us both a watery smile. “You guys are the best friends.”
“That’s what we’re here for,” I said blithely. Even though I’d shaken paws with Brutus and declared ourselves buds, I still had my doubts about his intentions. But now wasn’t the time to get into all of that.
“Us cats have to stick together,” Dooley said. “Hey! I’ve got an idea! Why don’t I wrangle us up some chicken wings?”
“Can you do that?” Brutus asked between two sniffs.
Dooley tapped his brow with a knowing smile. “Power of the mind, Brutus. Power of the mind.” And then he squinched his eyes shut and thought really hard, even placing his paws on his temples to speed up the process.