What the Dog Ate (27 page)

“Man, that’s harsh. I
have
house plants. I have a spider plant in my master suite.
And it’s thriving, I’ll have you know. I have connections. I thought... Never
mind. I don’t need this.”

He put his hands up and lowered his
head as he thumped loudly, even though only in his socks, across her hardwood
floor.

“Fine then, leave.” She still held
the towel and twisted it in her hands.

“I will—as soon as your stupid dog
gives me my damn bike shoe.”

She stuck her head out of the
kitchen in time to see Russell pry the expensive shoe out of Kona’s mouth and
storm through the door.

“Bad boy, Kona!” she said. She
threw the towel back into the kitchen.

Hmmmph. Maybe
that Natalia was smarter than I gave her credit for. Get out while the getting
is good. Be the dumper instead of the dump-ee. Bet she could see that it was
only a matter of time. But... why am I so worked up about this?

The phone rang and she snatched it
up.

“Hey, Beautiful.” It was Brian.
“We’re invited to a Halloween party on Saturday.” He told her a gallery owner
friend of his was having a big party at his house in Del Mar overlooking the
ocean. “It’s come as your favorite artist or subject. Won’t that be fantastic?”

She sighed. “Yeah, that sounds
fun.”

“He said bring as many people as we
like, so I thought we could invite Helen and Raul.” The four of them had gone
out to dinner the previous week. She’d been proud of herself. Things were
crazy-busy at Clean N’ Green that day, but she’d left at five so she could go
home and get changed before their reservation. She’d been glad she hadn’t
cancelled, as she would have in her “former life” at BioHealth. The work had
waited and, better yet, Raul and Brian had hit it off. Even though a good
twenty years separated them, they’d bonded over their discovered mutual love of
opera. Raul, an architect, volunteered his time every year at the San Diego
Opera to help with set construction. He’d impressed Brian immensely when, in a
discussion of their favorite operas, he’d rattled off Puccini’s full name, said
in an over-exaggerated Italian accent: Giacomo Antonio Domenico Michele Secondo
Maria Puccini. They’d all applauded.

“I bet they’ll come,” she said.
“Halloween is Helen’s favorite holiday.”

“Is everything OK? You don’t sound
like yourself.”

“I’m fine. Just tired. And these
stupid Santa Anas always give me a headache. I’m going to take a nap. I’ll call
you when I get up, OK?”

She and Kona got into bed, but she
couldn’t sleep. As Kona snored, she replayed the fight with Russell on a
continuous loop. Maybe she had been a little harsh.
I don’t
even really know why that made me so nuts... I guess it just annoys me that a
great guy like him wastes his time dating bimbos. But... whatever. If he
chooses to stay in the shallow end of the dating pool, it’s none of my
business. Man, I am so glad we’re just friends. If we’d gotten together that
one time, that would have been a huge mistake. It wouldn’t have meant anything
to him, and I was way too vulnerable back then. So much better to just be
friends... Some friend I am, though. He tells me his news and I jump all over
him
.

She got up and went to her
computer, but then decided apologizing via email was the chicken’s way out. She
picked up the phone and went and sat cross-legged on the sofa. She hugged a
russet-colored velvet throw pillow to her chest.

She got his voicemail. “Look, I
apologize for before. I was out of line. I, uh, I guess these Santa Anas make
me a little crazy... OK, crazi
er
. Anyway, I hope you
aren’t mad at me. And I hope your shoe is OK. Kona, um, he has this thing for
sweat. Call me, OK?”

Then she called Brian back. “Do you
think we could invite one more person? You know my friend I ride with, Russell?
Well, he broke up with his girlfriend and I feel kinda bad for him.”
Or... badly about how I treated him when he told me the news
anyway
.

“Sure, go ahead and ask him. Did
you give any thought to your costume yet?”

“Not really. My favorite artist is
Matisse, but I have no idea what he looks like. I doubt anyone else does
either, so I can’t go as him.”

“He actually always sort of
reminded me of Freud. Similar white beard, glasses. So, no, you wouldn’t want
to go as him. How about a subject of his?”

“I love
Blue
Nude II
.” She pictured the image, a solid cobalt blue silhouette of a
seated female figure on a pure white background. It was simple, perfect. “But,
I’m thinking, stripping down and painting myself blue isn’t really an option.”
She etched a pathetic rendition of it with her fingernail in the thick fabric
of the pillow she still held on her lap, then rubbed it out with her palm.

“Maybe you can do that at the
after-party at my house,” Brian suggested.

“I wouldn’t want to get your sheets
all blue. I’ll think of something. What about you?”

“Definitely
The
Scream
.”

“Perfect for Halloween, but is that
really your favorite painting?” Maggie asked.

“It’s one of them. Think about it;
there are probably only a handful of paintings that are instantly recognizable
by the masses, and since I don’t want to go as
Mona Lisa
,
The Scream
is the next best thing. Did you know the
killer in the
Scream
movies is based on the
painting?”

“I didn’t, but I can see that now.”
She pictured the elongated white mask from the movie.

She could hear the excitement in
his voice as he told her about how hugely influential Edvard Munch had been and
the many pop culture references to
The Scream
.

“It was even in an episode of
Beavis and Butthead
,” he said.

She hoped she could come up with a
costume that she could be as enthusiastic about. She told him she had some
research to do and needed to call Helen and Russell and invite them, so they
hung up.

Helen was excited and couldn’t wait
to figure out a costume. Maggie didn’t tell Helen about the fight she’d had
with Russell. She didn’t want to make it into a bigger deal than it was. She’d
just been crabby. From the Santa Anas. It was nothing.

Helen hung up to call Raul. As
Maggie clicked the phone off, it rang. It was Russell.

They exchanged awkward hellos while
she squeezed the pillow tighter.

“Look,” the word rode a wave of his
breath. “Let’s not make a big deal out of this. I accept your apology so, let’s
move on and forget it.”

“Is your shoe OK? I’ll buy you a
new pair.”

“It’s fine. A little damp.”

She wanted to ask if he was mad at
her, try to explain herself, but he was right. Get past it. Kona sure would.
“OK, well, moving on then... Wanna come to a Halloween party Saturday with us
and Helen and Raul?” He didn’t say anything so she went on. “It should be fun.
It’s at Brian’s friend’s house. He’s got a beach house in Del Mar and it sounds
like he’s going all out. I bet there’ll be lots of beautiful, rich women.”

“Beautiful, rich women could be
interesting I suppose.” He agreed to go, but then hemmed and hawed when she
mentioned the art theme. She persisted until he relented.

“Alright, I’ll go,” he said. “I
guess I’ll finally get to meet your young stud.”

“Please don’t call him that,” she said,
but she was glad that he was already back to his normal teasing self.

“OK, but I’ll be thinking it. Hey,
I just thought of what I’m going to wear.”

“What? It’s not something to do
with young studs is it?”

“I’ll let it be a surprise.”

After they hung up, Maggie leaned
back on the sofa and closed her eyes.
Hmmm. Favorite
artists
. There were many: Matisse, Chagall, Picasso, Kandinsky, Mondrian.
The list could go on, but Chagall was definitely one of her all-time favorites
and his colorful, dream-like paintings would be ripe with Halloween costume
fodder. Her favorite Chagall came instantly to mind:
La Mariée
.
It showed a young woman in a red wedding dress, “The Bride” the painting was
named for, with someone hovering behind adjusting her veil. The vivid red and
white of the bride jumped out from the painting’s somber blue and green
background. In addition to the expected church in the distance, there was a
goat playing a musical instrument and a fish... She couldn’t remember what the
fish was doing. She’d have to look it up online. It had been years since she’d
seen the painting. She used to have a framed poster of it in her college
apartment, but at some point she’d sold it at a yard sale.

She got up. A quick Google search
and there it was. The goat playing... a cello?
He’s holding
it upright like a cello, but it could be a violin on end. After all, it’d have
to be a specially-made goat-sized cello. If the squirrel wasn’t in front, you
could see if it had that little spiky thing cellos have. Maybe Chagall put the
squirrel there on purpose. Maybe he wasn’t sure either. And, there’s the
fish... Playing a xylophone? No, maybe lighting candles, like in church. Those
little red votives that you light to say a prayer. That’s it—the fish is saying
a prayer
.

She really wanted to go as the
cello- (or violin?)-playing goat, but she wasn’t creative enough to figure out
that
costume. The bride would be much easier. And she’d
carry a stuffed goat. She could get an old wedding dress at a thrift store and
dye it red. Would she have time one night after work, or maybe on a lunch hour,
to hunt for a cheap wedding dress? It’d have to be just right, with long
sleeves and...

Wait a minute.
I’ve got a freaking long-sleeve wedding dress with a full skirt
. She
marched to her guest room and pulled open the closet door. There on the upper
shelf was the special heirloom box she’d stored her dress in.

Huh
. She
snorted.
Heirloom schmeirloom
.

She reached for the box and set it
on the guest bed. She yanked off the lid and the layer of acid-free tissue
paper, like pulling off a Band-Aid. When she saw the dress, folded with such
care on the day she’d packed it away, she wasn’t so sure about her plan
anymore.

She’d loved this dress. The memory
of standing in the store, circling this way and that before the fan of full
length mirrors while Mom beamed and told her she looked lovely, rushed back. It
was pushed aside by the image of Dave’s face as she walked down the aisle. That
was when she’d felt the most beautiful, seeing the look on his face. The little
stab of sadness that Dad hadn’t been there to walk her down the aisle came
back, as fresh as on their wedding day.

Am I really
going to ruin this?

She thought of all the symbols of
their marriage: her ring, still in the Altoids tin in the kitchen junk drawer;
the photos she’d stuffed unceremoniously into a garbage bag in the garage; the
license—she’d forgotten about that as well. It would still be in their
fire-proof safe, as worthless as the paper it was printed on. The dress was
just one more token, once a treasured keepsake but now a useless reminder, of
their love that hadn’t lasted.

Maybe if we’d
had a fish say a prayer for us things would have been different
.

There was absolutely no reason to
keep this dress, was there? She lifted it from the box and held it up to
herself. It smelled like candle wax. Her fingers slipped over the cool satin
fabric. She spread the skirt out and looked in the standing full length mirror.
Her princess dress. She felt tears creeping up; they were in the back of her throat.

Then she thought of her “prince”
who’d run off with the village wench and wanted half the kingdom, even though Maggie’d
footed more than half the castle bills.

No crying, she lectured her
reflection.
This was a happy reminder at one time, but now
it’s an albatross. I’m going to do it. It’ll be cathartic
.

“Kona,” she called, tossing the
dress in a heap on the guest bed. “Walkies. Let’s hit the drug store. Momma
needs some red dye.”

The five of them had agreed to meet
at Maggie’s before the party. She’d just finished putting Kona’s devil-horn
headband on him, which he seemed content enough to wear, when the doorbell
rang. She opened it to find Andy Warhol and Marilyn Monroe. Raul wore a black
suit with narrow tie, large glasses. His black hair hid under a white wig that
he’d ratted up so that it framed his face in wild tufts. Helen, in a white
halter dress, voluminous blond wig and lots of blue eye shadow, fluttered her
false eyelashes.

“You guys look fantastic,” Maggie
said. She gave them each a quick hug while Kona whined and wiggled for some
attention.

“Thank you,” Helen said in a
breathy voice. She struck the classic bent-knee, hands on thighs
Marilyn-over-the-street-grate pose while Raul patted the dog. She stood
straight again and added in her normal voice, “Andy here wanted to come as Van
Gogh, but I nixed the idea when he wanted me to be a Potato Eater. I was never
an Atkins believer; I mean, I love potatoes in any form, but I’m not going to a
party dressed in a drab getup like that.”

“No, Marilyn’s much more
you
, although you sort of look like an anorexic version of
her. I think she had more meat on her bones,” Maggie said.

“She definitely had more boobs. I
had to stuff my bra to fill out this halter.”

“I helped,” Raul grinned and winked
as he grabbed at Helen. She beat him back with her purse and he held up his
arms in defeat. He took Maggie’s hands, held them out and assessed her costume.
“You look great too; Chagall right?”