‘Hey! Hey, there,’ said Shelly, striding back toward where the other two still sat on the end of the bed. Meg put her arm around C.C. Shelly squatted in front of her, her hand on C.C.’s knee.
‘Ceece?’ said Meg. A small whimpering cry slipped out of C.C; she placed her wet cheek on M.J.’s neck, wetting her fur with tears.
‘Is this about her calling us senior citizens?’ asked Shelly, the anger rising in her voice again.
C.C. laughed, then sniffed. ‘No. I don’t care about that. I just, well–I realized that we’re going to have to…give MJ. back’ She shook her head miserably. ‘I already love this little dog so much.’ She rubbed her wet cheek against the top of M.J.’s head. ‘It’s like I had a little Italian Greyhound-size hole in my life, and I didn’t even know it, but she just jumped in and filled it.’ C.C. wiped her sleeve across her eyes. ‘Like a puzzle piece,’ she said, her voice breaking. She took the tissue Meg handed her, wiped her eyes, dabbed at her nose, and looked up at her friends. ‘You know?’
Both women nodded. ‘Dogs are sneaky, that way,’ said Shelly. ‘You give them an inch of your love, they’ll take a mile.’ She rubbed a finger behind M.J.’s ear.
‘I hate to rush you when you’re feeling low, honey,’ said Meg, ‘but speaking of miles, I’d like to put as many as possible between us and that TV crew. You okay to get in the car?’
C.C. nodded. ‘But I don’t want to see Purdy! I’m all–puffy! And I’d start crying again and he’d get the wrong idea, and, oh! Why is life so complicated?’
Meg stood. ‘Don’t worry. I’ll give him your goodbyes, and settle up the bills.’ She grabbed her purse off the desk as she strode across the room, then disappeared out the door.
Shelly gently lifted C.C. by the elbow. ‘C’mon, Puffy. We’ll take our things out and load up.’ C.C. stood, and Shelly grinned at her, rubbing her palms together. ‘Come on. Isn’t this a little fun? It’s like a James Bond movie or something. We gotta make a quick getaway before Prissy Galore arrives, a.k.a. Miss Malevolent Marcia.’ She cackled. C.C. shook her head, but smiled. Shelly punched her lightly in the arm. ‘Ready, Agent Puffy, and her trusty sidekick, M.J.?’
C.C. inhaled deeply, boosted M.J. up in her arms, squared her shoulders, and said, ‘Ready.’
Shelly had insisted on loading all the luggage while C.C. sat in the car with the dog. ‘You keep M.J. safe and sound in there, and that way you’ll also avoid any goodbye scenes with Purdy.’ C.C. gratefully slumped down in the back seat, out of view, but none the less feeling at a loss. She would have said goodbye to him-wanted to, in fact. If only she hadn’t been crying, and gotten all red-eyed and swollen. She would have liked to thank him personally for all his kindnesses. She had imagined maybe even giving him a hug.
But no. She shook her head, telling M.J., ‘It’s just as well we’re in here. He might have gotten the wrong idea.’ Men often got the wrong idea about hugs. But she didn’t think Purdy would be like that.
Suddenly both front car doors flew open, Shelly on the driver’s side and Meg the other, hurling themselves into their seats. ‘Hurry! Hurry!’ shouted Meg, wrestling with her seat belt. Shelly wasn’t taking the time to buckle up, simply started the car, revved the engine once, then threw it into gear and floored the gas pedal, throwing C.C. into the back of the seat, M.J. into C.C. C.C. clawed at her seat belt, but suddenly the centrifugal force of the car careening across the road and turning around, made her instead grab on to the door arm rest and M.J., and hold on for dear life. Meg was dissolved in nervous laughter up front.
‘What’s going on?’ C.C. glanced frantically out every window. ‘Is the TV crew here?’ They drove past Mick and Kirby, the latter dressed in an ill-fitting suit coat, his hair greased back, small tooth marks from a comb still evident. Kirby turned away from Mick, waved his arm over his head at something in the opposite direction, then pointed toward the women’s speedily retreating car. Mick was pushing roughly at Kirby’s arm, but Kirby kept waving and shouting and pointing. Finally, Mick pulled his arm down and grabbed a fistful of his shirt and they tussled, till Kirby broke away, running north, heading toward a white SUV with a big dish on the top, a trail of dust behind it.
‘It’s them!’ C.C. shouted, just as Shelly turned the car south, heading toward the interstate.
C.C. breathed a sigh of relief as the SUV turned west, into Tupper, apparently none the wiser from Kirby’s efforts. M.J. jumped up, her front paws on the top of the back seat, looking out the back window, now that they weren’t careening around or peeling out, just steadily gaining speed to merge onto the interstate. She didn’t bark, her tail wasn’t wagging, and she wasn’t trembling; she appeared just to be watching the retreating scene. C.C. watched too. Kirby was still jogging toward the SUV, with Mick running after him. But something caught C.C.’s eye, the other direction. In front of the restaurant. Purdy. He wore a full, white apron. Maybe he had been cooking lunch, C.C. thought. His arms hung by his sides, his white bar towel hung limply from his left hand as he watched their car drive off.
C.C. lifted her hand, waved. But as she did, Purdy turned, draped the towel over his right shoulder, and walked slowly into the restaurant.
‘Whoa! Big bump!’ Shelly yelled, swerving but not in time. The car bounced mightily over where the asphalt had heaved, making M.J. momentarily airborne. Even C.C. felt the jolt lift all of her, briefly, an absence of gravity for a fraction of a second, like an astronaut, untethered, unmoored. Both she and the dog landed roughly back on the seat. And suddenly C.C. felt the opposite of weightless. She watched the spot where Purdy had been, till Tupper itself disappeared from view. She gathered M.J. into her arms and turned back around in her seat as they merged into the morning rush hour on the interstate, feeling like she, too, had disappeared.
Kathryn grabbed the phone and angrily punched the intercom, for the second time in as many minutes. She took a deep breath, held the handset to her mouth, earpiece down, and said, ‘Can we have another checker up front, please? Now?’
She knew she had not succeeded in keeping the irritation out of her voice. She would no doubt be ‘having a little chat’ with Mr Knelbrecht again about the importance of intercom etiquette, which he infuriatingly pronounced ‘eti-kwett’. Chat, my ass, she thought, grabbing a stack of Lean Cuisines from the carry-basket, sliding them over the scanner one at a time. As she reached for the bag of apples, she looked up to see if any of the other checkers were coming. But all she saw was her line of angry customers. Only old Mrs B. smiled at her. Kathryn glanced at lane six, the only other one open. Marianne had just three people waiting in her line, but each had large carts, all very full. As Kathryn continued to scan items, she noted that all three of Marianne’s customers were moms with toddlers and/or babies in the front, bulbous legs dangling through the leg holes of the cart, chubby hands idly playing with keys or a pack of gum, while Mom flipped through a gossip rag for a few minutes of escape. Marianne was smiling and chatting with two of the women. The stay-at-home moms were almost always nice. They were rarely in a hurry.
She mechanically but speedily grabbed and scanned items. She knew it made sense for her to be in lane one; she was head clerk, the most experienced and fastest. But she hated the express lane. The endless queue of people with their overbooked calendars invariably blamed her for their lateness and stress, no matter how fast she was. She was beyond tired of their impatience, their lack of even minimal courtesy, and especially their creative math when it came to fifteen items or fewer. ‘Oh, sorry. I counted the apples, oranges and pears as one item because they’re all fruit.’ Or, even worse, the petulant: ‘So, I’m a couple of items over. Sue me.’