The double doors of the veterinarian’s office split wide open and a shaft of sunlight rushed into the waiting room like blood coloring a freshly slapped cheek. The room flushed with blinding light. Silhouetted in the doorway, a young woman stood in the darkness of her own shadow. Her head was low, fallen slightly forward, like she’d just run the whole way there, and now, after yanking the doors open, she’d used the last of her energy.
It hadn’t been the best morning for Blue. She started the day by screaming herself awake from a nightmare, which is why, when the vet’s receptionist called for the fourth time to tell her to pick up her cat, she hurried out of the house and forgotten her keys. Blue woke up in desperate need of nuzzling. She’d been feeling uncomfortable in her skin. But these days, who doesn’t feel like that from time to time? The trouble for her was, Blue couldn’t remember the last time she felt at home in her body.
Framed by the doorway, Blue gathered herself up with a short sharp breath. She stood to her full height. Tall for a woman. Behind her, the double doors swung shut. The offending sunlight disappeared as the doors swept closed and the room returned to comfortable darkness.
Approaching the receptionist, the air tickled Blue’s nostrils. It was iodine — that antiseptic smell, the perfume of a hospital. Blue instinctively curled her lip, sneering in reaction. As John Lennon once sang, “She’s not a girl who misses much.” Blue held her left hand before her nose. Her slender fingers were stained with daubs of color, some older than others. You could tell it was oil paint from the persistent glisten of its faded sheen. It looked like she’d finger-painted a rainbow last week. (Or fingered the rainbow, depending on your imagination.)
"Hi, I’m Blue Moon De la Cruz.” That was the name her grandmother picked. She hated it as a girl. It was too easy to make fun of, and a terrible mouthful to say."
Blue leaned her elbows against the counter, stared at the soft-bodied receptionist. She waited. After an awkward silence, Blue spoke again. Her words were punctuated by emphatic pauses, which made her thoughts come out stilted, the way overly-smart people often sound.
“You called me. A few times. About my cat. Steve. I was lost for a few days, but I’m better now. I’m here now. I’m here to pick her up. Where is she — and how much do I owe you?” Blue fell silent. She added a polite smile, like necessary punctuation.
On most days, sort of hollow is how most folks would describe Blue’s eyes. That day was no different. But being a religious woman at heart, the receptionist might argue that Blue’s eyes seemed haunted. “We’ve been trying to contact you… I must’ve called three, four times already. You’re a very difficult person to get a hold of. But I guess you know that,” the receptionist said, decorating her words with a plastic smile.
Blue offered no defense of herself, or her actions. “Is my cat ready?”
“There was a little problem. Was Steve allergic to anything you know of… medication?” the receptionist asked. But she didn’t wait for an answer. Instead, she turned, opened a file folder labeled: Steve the Cat.
Blue remained unsure if she was supposed to answer the question, or if it was rhetorical. Meanwhile, the receptionist consulted the folder for an answer. Purely for show. A curious phrase repeated in Blue’s mind. It almost slipped past her ear. “Wait — what do you mean was allergic? Where’s my cat? Where’s Steve?”
“We don’t offer long-term storage. It was a very difficult choice that we had to make. It wasn’t my fault… choice… idea. It wasn’t my idea. Dr. Beeler is the vet.” The receptionist absolved herself.
“It was less than three days.” Blue’s eyes burned, focused on a point in the center of the receptionist’s face.
“Let me call Dr. Beeler.” She spun around in her chair, and spoke into the phone in the hushed tones of a golf announcer. “Yes. Steve’s mom is here to pick him up. (listens) — What? No. (listens) — No, I didn’t tell her. (listens) — She’s in the lobby. (listens) — Okay, I’ll tell her.” Avoiding Blue’s eyes, the receptionist concentrated all of her attention on hanging up the telephone.
“Is she coming with my cat?” Blue’s teeth clenched tight.
“Dr. Beeler’s almost done shaving a rabbit for surgery. She’ll bring Steve out so you can take him home. I hope you know, we really didn’t know what to do. I mean he was here for — ”
“She. Steve’s a female. What the hell have you people done to my cat?!” An edge creeped into Blue’s words, giving them an unhinged bite.
Before the receptionist could answer her, a door opened. The receptionist sighed with relief. Dr. Beeler was an attractive young veterinarian, as far as veterinarians go. She pushed the door open with her shoulder. In order to squeeze through the doorway, she turned to the side, struggled a bit, but then stepped into the waiting room without incident. In her grip, a black trash bag with a skin of frost on it.
“I should’ve grabbed a cart. Don’t know what I was thinking. This thing’s surprisingly heavy.” Dr. Beeler said with the friendly sing-song of someone who has no idea what they’re saying is destroying someone else’s world. Blue stared at the black trash bag with the skin of frost on it, not wanting to accept the obvious. She couldn’t look away.
Her eyes followed a bead of water as it ran down the side of the trash bag. It paused at the lowest point, a corner of the bag. Blue’s eyes watched the drip fall and join the puddle that was growing on the office linoleum. Drip. Drip. Drip.
“What… what… what the fuck is that?” words fell from her lips with nearly the same rhythm as the icy water.
“I’m sure this looks terrible. Didn’t Glynnis explain it to you?” Dr. Beeler said, failing to hide her irritation with her receptionist. “I expected her to tell you what the situation is.”
The receptionist rolled her eyes, returned to her paperwork, but added, to further excuse herself from any involvement, “It’s not our fault. We had no other choice — you didn’t return my calls.”
“So, you had to kill my cat — because I didn’t return your fucking phone calls?! What the fuck is wrong with you?!” Blue had always hated linoleum floors. Now, she had this special memory to seal the deal. Her eyes remained fixed to the icy water on the floor.
“I don’t think there’s any reason to shout profanities.” Dr. Beeler said, hoping to imitate the calm tones of a kindergarten teacher who was lobbying for nap-time. She used the same joyfully affected sing-song — but it only gave her words more of an android flavor. Dr. Beeler was the sort of woman who chose to be a veterinarian because she’d never liked or understood other people. She preferred animals. She lifted the black trash bag and smiled robotically.
“Well, let me say, I’m terribly sorry for all this. It was very sudden. It happened during surgery. We think Steve suffered a fatal allergic response to the anesthetic. That’s also the good news. She probably died instantly from a heart attack.” Dr. Beeler added her most professional smile to make the news more palatable.
“How is that good news? You didn’t do Steve any favors! You were supposed to fix her. You killed her. I’m sick of people telling me ‘Oh, well, at least he died instantly. At least he didn’t suffer.’ There is more to suffering than death.”
Dr. Beeler tried to keep things calm, “You just said he. You mean she. But, yes, I understand. If it’s any consolation, we’re having a pet adoption day next Saturday. We do it in conjunction with the animal shelter. If you find a kitten that warms your heart… We’d gladly replace Steve.”
Drip. Drip. Drip. Blue’s eyes focused on the icy puddle spreading across the hateful linoleum. Dr. Beeler scanned her lobby. There was one old man, with his equally old beagle. Some pets really do resemble their owners. Both man and dog looked equally aghast. “May we help you to your car?” Dr. Beeler asked.
“I don’t drive… I walked here…” Blue said, talking to the puddle on the floor.
“Then why don’t — we’ll just put Steve back in the freezer until we can call you a cab. It’s on us. And I hope you know, I won’t charge you for this treatment. So that’s more good news, right?” Dr. Beeler said with a lift of her lip.
“It’s people like you that give humanity a bad name,” Blue said to the puddle. “What the hell am I supposed to do with a frozen dead cat in a trash bag?”
“Well, we could dispose of Steve in our biological waste dumpster — but we thought we should ask you before we did that. Judging by your temperament, we made the right call,” Dr. Beeler said flatly.
Blue looked up from the puddle, she stepped in close to the veterinarian with the android smile, “Give me my goddamn frozen dead cat, I’m taking Steve home! And you, call me a cab!”
* * *
A taxi cab shuddered to a stop in front of a two-story house. It wasn’t modest by any scale or measure, except the simple lawn adornments, the retro hedgerow, the toy rose bushes. They gave it a modest homey feel. The most distinctive feature of the house was its half-finished paint job. Huge sections were hastily painted primer white. Other sections were a clash of patchworks, color samples of varied tints, shoved together for comparison’s sake.
The doors of the taxi opened. A young man unfolded his lean frame from the backseat. He doubled back and reached in for something. When he stood, he situated a straw cowboy hat. It looked like he stole it from the head of a long haul trucker, perhaps in a Texas bar fight. You don’t typically expect such a hat to be on the head of a young black man. But the hat did fit his name. Since the Jimmy Stewart-Marlene Dietrich western Destry Rides Again was his favorite boyhood movie, his father figured Destry McBride was a good name for his son.
After he cocked his straw cowboy hat just right on his head, Destry turned toward the house. And he promptly stopped dead. The sight of the house triggered one thought. This fucking house. He slammed the door of the taxi.
The front door of the cab opened. The taxi driver shouted over the hood of his idling car, “Hey! Where are you going? I said sixty-seven fifty!”
Destry stopped mid-stride, swiveled his weight on the heels of his worn cowboy boots, and spun around, “I know. I know. I, uh, left my wallet inside.”
“Better have at least seventy dollars in it. You hear me!” The taxi driver was a worrier.
“I’ll pay you, Hoss.” He loped up the front walk. His boots struck a lazy cowboy rhythm against the bricks. After he crossed the lawn, Destry headed up the driveway. At the side of the house, he stopped. Looked around, stepped in past a tall hedge. He banged on an old double-hung window with his fist. With another bang of his fist, the window slid loose from the catch of the lock. Destry lifted the lower section of the window open and clambered inside like a clumsy burglar.
The cab driver was staggered with disbelief. He was pretty sure he’d just witnessed a black cowboy pull a break-in in broad daylight. He glanced around for witnesses, faces in the windows, anyone that might have the chance to snap a picture of him or his license plate. He saw no one on the quiet suburban street.
After enduring an anxious eternity waiting for his money, the cab driver felt overjoyed to see the front door open. The black cowboy strolled out like he owned the place. Destry held a pink purse, and rifled through it like a pick-pocket who’s safe in his hideaway.
“See, man. Told you I had the money. Here.” Destry said with an obvious satisfaction. He offered the taxi driver four crisp bills. “That’s eighty bucks. You keep the rest.”
The taxi driver looked around, nodded, slid back into the driver’s seat, and drove off.
Before Destry could step away from the curb, an almost identical yellow cab pulled up and stopped.
The back door shoved open. Blue pulled herself from the cab. She sobbed in convulsions. She pushed past Destry, who stood mute and confused. She dragged the frozen black trash bag up the grass of the front lawn. Destry watched her a moment. She was a pathetic sight.
“You her husband?” The new taxi driver asked.
Destry turned back, he rifled through the pink purse in his hands, “What do we owe you?”
“Forty-one eighty-five. The vet lady already paid me but then your wife asked me to drive around while she cried. That was an hour ago. Eventually, I turned on the meter.”
“Here. That’s fifty. Keep the change,” he handed over a crisp portrait of US Grant. Destry snapped shut the pink wallet and tucked it away in the matching pink purse he was holding.
“That’s a real cute purse. You two misfits must fit like a hand and glove.” The amused taxi driver folded the fifty in half, tucked it in his front breast pocket. “Tell me something — she sobbed the whole way here, talking to that trash bag like it had drowned. Is she, like, all the way crazy? But you know what? I get it, man. I bet she’s a fucking hellcat in the sack, right? The crazy ones always are.”
“Yeah? Huh. You know what? Maybe you should fuck off. Yeah. Get the fuck outta here.” Destry said without a blink.
The taxi driver didn’t expect that. He nodded like he was trying not to be offended. Business was done. He got back in his taxi and drove away.
Destry turned to check on the progress of the crying woman dragging a frozen black trash bag up the front yard. “Hey! You okay?!” He shouted after her.
Blue stopped, a crushed path of grass led to where she stood. She still shook with sobs. Destry jogged over to her.
“Here. Let me help you with that,” he offered, about as gentle as a summer breeze.
“Help me… with what?” Blue asked, ”You mean Steve?” A giant snot bubble expanded from her nostril, as fresh tears raced each other to leap from her chin.
“It’s okay… You’re safe. You’ll be okay. Steve won’t get you,” he said, attempting a hug.
Blue pushed Destry away. She yanked up the trash bag, “No. This — This is Steve! Those assholes killed Steve! They killed my cat — those motherfuckers!” Blue screamed into Destry’s face, wetting his cheek with bits of spittle when she reached the f in motherfuckers.
Destry looked down at the frozen black trash bag, “Wait. There’s … a cat … in there?”
* * *
The soil split easily for the shovel. Destry pushed it into the soft earth, all the way down, burying the head with just one stomp of his boot. Leveraging the handle, he tipped back the shovel and pried open the earth. He pulled the first shovelful of soil from what would soon be a deep and substantial hole. Destry flung the shovelful. The smell of flipped earth filled both their nostrils. It’s a good smell. It reminds almost anyone of happier bygone days of childhood. Dirt is so lowly it’s often associated with good unsoiled memories.
Blue listened to the rhythm of dirt landing against dirt. The clumps of grass made a soft sound as they cushioned the fall of soil. Destry turned the earth to a steady metronomic beat. He’d been doing manual labor longer than he’d been in school. Faintly, he hummed to himself. The slight afternoon breeze obscured most of the humming from Blue’s ears. But she caught enough of it that she could relax into it, as it mixed in with the other breeze-blown sounds of the day. Blue listened to Destry duet with a songbird, and then with an afternoon train.
Blue sat on a blanket, next to her was a bucket with a bottle of red wine leaned against the lip. She held a glass in each of her hands, one empty, the other one half full. For the moment, Blue felt comfortable in her skin. Destry kept humming and digging. The black trash bag continued to thaw.
***
With a final stomp, Destry buried the head of the shovel in the mound of dirt next to the substantial hole he’d dug in the backyard. He wiped his dirt-crusted hands on his shirt, leaving behind stains of earth and blood from his freshly opened blisters. Blue watched him, pertly.
She’d been waiting to hand him a wine glass. Rather than lay it down in the grass, she’d held onto the damn thing ever since she brought it outside. “Thirsty?” Blue asked.
“Yeah.” Destry said, with no hint of charm. “I’m thirstier than an AA meeting.”
Blue paused, she needed to work out the logistics. She handed Destry her half-empty glass, “Just hold it.”
She grabbed the bottle and topped off Destry’s glass. She filled it to a pinky finger from the rim. She returned the wine to the empty ice bucket, swiveled back around, and handed the now full glass to Destry with an impromptu flair, “And here… you go.”
The moment deserved an awkward smile. Both of them were willing to give it one.
Blue raised her glass for a toast, ”To the dead ones.”
Destry held his glass. But he did not offer it up for a clinking of glasses. Instead, he just nodded. Blue noticed that, and how his eyes grew dim, but said nothing. She took a sip of wine. Destry followed her lead. But his first sip turned into a long slug.
“Shit. That’s not bad. Is that one of the Spanish wines Ines buys?” Destry admired the legs of the wine, running down the sides of the glass, lit up by the lingering sun of late afternoon.
“Pretty sure it is one of her Spanish wines. You’re her cousin… do you share the same taste in wine?” Blue asked, burying the intent and focus of her query.
But Destry spotted her intent the way a criminal on the lam spots a cop in traffic. He smirked, took another long sip of wine, appreciated it. After the wine’s velvety after-taste melted across his tongue and faded into memory, he looked at Blue, “I’m not her cousin.”
Caught at her game, Blue grinned widely, but hid it from Destry. She took a sip, and savored the flavor of the Spanish wine. After she breathed in its aroma, she said, without hesitation or pause, “No, you’re not handsome enough to be one of her cousins. Plus, you’re too big. How tall are you?”
“Six foot even, out of my boots.” Destry said, unsure where her line of questioning was headed.
Blue took another sip of wine, admiring the hints of plum she’d failed to notice earlier. Destry swirled wine around in his glass, sniffed a sample of the wine’s bouquet with a long slow inhale, and then subtly moaned his appreciation of its aroma with a long and steady exhale.
“To the dead ones,” Destry said. He held his overfilled glass up to catch the last of the sunlight. He pressed the glass to his lips, tilted back his head, and drained it dry in big gulps.
Blue watched him, puzzled by his sudden change in demeanor. Destry leaned forward, his wine glass now empty. He grinned with his newly wine-stained smile and handed the empty glass back to Blue.
“Just hold it.” Destry stood up, over the fresh hole in the backyard, and took off his hat like a cowboy in a prairie burial in an old Western movie. “May I place Steve?” he asked with a noticeable solemnity.
“Please,” Blue answered.
Destry puts his hat back on, picked up the black trash bag that now sagged from all the water inside. It had grown slick and shining black in the last of the afternoon’s sunlight. Destry held the bag at waist height.
Blue refilled his wine glass, holding both glasses between her spread fingers. Destry managed the weight of the water and the frozen cat in the trash bag and tried not to look terribly awkward while doing it. But Destry’s grip on the trash bag wasn’t as good as he would’ve liked. With his final step toward the edge of the hole, the bag slammed against his right leg, slipped from his fingers, and dropped directly into the hole. Crack!
The sound of ice breaking is far more unsettling if you know it’s a cat that’s shattering.
“Sorry… about that. The hole’s a little deep.” Destry apologized with his eyes and voice.
“Okay. Let’s begin,” he said, hoping the momentum of the funeral ceremony would distract from the whole shattered cat business. Blue watched him. Neither amused nor critical, she was sort of game to see what might come next.
“To Steve the cat!” Destry said.
Blue raised her glass. She thought a moment, and then handed Destry his refilled glass. He raised it to the sky, took a gulp. Blue followed his lead and enjoyed a healthy slug of Spanish wine, then breathed out the aroma through her nostrils. Tension went with it.
“Steve is dead. Long live Steve…” Destry continued. “A wise woman once told me you can’t hide from the truth, because the truth is all there is. Steve is dead. That’s true. But this is only part of the truth. Birth, life, death… All are just chapters in that big book we call the Great Mystery of Life. Yet, there’s also memory… Memory is like a book all its own. It extends past the dark divide. Some things don’t end at death. Love is one of those things. You live long enough and you see how life only ends when memory ends. I never met Steve. But I know he’ll remain with this woman. Yes, Steve is alive… until the last person to hold him — ”
“Her. Steve was female. I know, it’s confusing. If you met her it would make more sense. She was a total Steve.” Blue interrupted. “But, please, go on.”
“Now you’ve fucked up my rhythm.” Destry gulped down a mouthful of wine, as he tried to regain his train of thought. It came back quickly, his eyes lit up as proof of its return, “Right! Okay. She may be dead… but Steve remains alive until the last person that holds her in their heart passes away. Long live Steve! You’re already missed but not forgotten. Fuck death.”
Blue nodded, “Goodbye, Steve. You… motherfuckers.” She tilted her head back and finished off her glass of wine. Once it was empty she tossed the glass at the fence. It broke with a crystalline splash of violence.
“Thank you for that,” Blue said, noticeably calmer.
“Every living creature deserves a few words,” Destry said.
“At least this time they didn’t put a price on the life. I don’t think I could take any more blood money in this lifetime. I’d burn the whole pile.” Blue said. Her words, like her teeth, were colored by wine. Since she’d shattered her glass, Blue drank from the open bottle.
“You want more wine? I’m gonna finish this bottle — but I can run in and grab another one for you to open,” Blue said, almost sounding like she was flirting.
“We’re definitely gonna need another bottle. Does Ines have more of that exact wine? Because that was tasty as fuck,” Destry said, his tongue thick and equally wine-stained.
“She does have more,” Blue said. Only a deaf man could’ve missed the wicked glee in her voice. “Okay, I think I figured it out. Are you one of Gerald’s cousin?” Blue asked.
“He doesn’t have any cousins. But don’t worry, I am family,” Destry said, rather certain his answer still wouldn’t provide Blue the understanding she craved.
“I’m gonna get us another bottle of wine, maybe use the ladies room. Stay here,” Blue said.
“Where else would I go? This is where the heart is, right?” Destry hoped this might help solve the mystery for Blue. But he knew that was unlikely.
Blue shook her head, as if she had no answer for where the heart is; instead, she hopped up and headed inside, as though she might not make it to the bathroom in time without sprinting.
Destry smiled to himself, watching her go. He wondered if, once she’s alone, sitting on the toilet seat, it will suddenly dawn on her just who he is. Maybe, when she got back from the bathroom, he wouldn’t have to tell Blue that her dead husband is his dead brother.
But if he did have to tell her, he would. He’d remind her that he’s the guy she called her husband’s deadbeat brother, he’s the one she despised for how he made her husband’s heart hurt, the one she refused to invite to their wedding. And the one who, weeks later, wasn’t invited to his baby brother’s funeral. That’s why she couldn’t place his face. She’d never actually met him.
He gazed up. The sky shifted in color from the golden hues of afternoon sunlight to the sky-blue-pink of evening. Destry always found it terribly amusing when people hated him, especially without having met him. As he waited, he debated with himself whether Blue would figure it out on her own. Would she walk out of the bathroom still hating him now that she’d finally met him, or will he have to tell her who he is, and then see if she still wanted to hate him, now that they knew each other?
Either way, Destry felt like he’d been gorging on butterflies. He watched the sky turn pink above the treeline, and smiled again. It’s always important to have something to look forward to — it gives you hope for tomorrow. Most days, a bit of hope is worth more than a pile of money. Destry heard the toilet flush. His heart rushed with a tiny thrill of hope.