Hating Olivia: A Love Story (16 page)

The mystery woman is beside herself over the pocket-sized creature. She’d like nothing more than to take Blake straight home with her, and if he wasn’t Livy’s property, I’d hand him
right over. Does she live nearby? Yes, just around the corner. We’ll be back again, I assure her, and no doubt she’ll be seeing Blake around town….

Back at the apartment I make a nest for him out of a cardboard box and place it next to the sofa in the living room. But the cur is restless, hyper, like a toddler—which he is, of course—throwing a tantrum. I try to soothe him, cajole him to sleep, but his mind is set on the bedroom. No matter what I do to distract him, Blake makes a beeline for the boudoir at every opportunity. After a few minutes of the fray, I’m ready to send up the white flag. So what if he sleeps in bed with us? But Livy won’t have it.

“I don’t want him in here!”

“Don’t give me any shit!
You
were the one who had to have this pooch! Now all he wants is a little affection. What the hell’s gotten into you?”

“Keep him out of here!”

“Damn it, Liv, I’m trying, but he’s just a baby. He’s afraid to be alone.”

“I don’t give a damn! Keep him away! I don’t want a beast sleeping in my bed!”

All right, okay already, Jesus
Christ.
When I shut the door on Blake, he sends up a heartrending shriek. Like a yo-yo, I travel back and forth for hours attempting to reason with him. “If you stay out there, it’ll be better for all of us, take my word for it, little guy.”

Finally, totally whipped, I stretch out across the doorway and block his entry with my body—but he still won’t take no for an answer.

“Oh, for Christ’s sake! Can’t you even control a two-pound animal?” Livy calls from the bed.

“You try it then, baby! Come on! Be my fucking guest!”

I push the ball of fur back into the living room each time he mounts a new charge for the interior, and his ass-first slide across the shiny floorboards transforms the pathetic scene into a ridiculous one.

“For God’s sake, Max,
please.
…”

A note of desperation has shown up in Livy’s voice—it’s as if she herself identifies in some strange, ineffable way with the hapless, whelping animal, and it’s
me, me
yet again who is the agent of her torment.

A hard lump forms in my throat.
I’m about to lose it here.
I sweep Blake up in my arms and carry him out to the living room, where we curl up on the rug and spend the night—and every night afterward.

A few days later, driving back to the apartment with bags of booze and groceries, I brake at the light near the park. Someone—an escaped mental patient, a psycho case off her medication—is creating a scene near the azalea bed. She’s by herself, convulsing on a bench, her head bobbing, tears rolling down her cheeks. She rants, she raves, she pounds the planks with her fists, gesticulates wildly to no one.

I look closer. It’s the lady who took such a shine to my dog.

The signal changes. Someone behind me leans on his horn. It’s all clear to me now. The world is against her, too.

29.

Blake developed a cough. At first it was nothing much, but within days it turned into a spasm that wracked his entire, diminutive torso, buckling his legs in mid-caper, and robbing him of his typical high spirits. All day long he did little but lie around and mope. His watery eyes told me he was sick, and that it was serious.

“He has to be seen by a vet,” I informed Livy.

“So take him already.”

“We don’t have that kind of jack. As a matter of fact, baby, we haven’t even paid off the pet shop—in case it slipped your mind.”

“What do you want me to do—rob a bank? Make a decision, Max—I can’t think of everything!”

I opened the telephone directory, closed my eyes, and lowered my finger into the listings for veterinarians. After examining Blake, Doctor Goodson made the diagnosis that the animal was suffering from distemper—in other words we’d been sold a defective piece of goods by the pet shop and had the right to a refund.

The doc prescribed some medicine, but frankly, the prognosis wasn’t good. With enough long-term therapy distemper could be licked, but it was going to cost. On the other hand, when you’re attached to a vulnerable creature, what does money matter?

I forked over sixty bucks and brought Blake back home.

“What do you want to do with the dog?” I said to Livy.

She didn’t know. She had no suggestions. She ducked into the bedroom and stayed there while I tended to the puppy. In the end I knew there was only one thing I could do.

L
ate that night at the park entrance I was stopped in my tracks by weeping and the gnashing of teeth. Blake’s ears pricked up. You motherfucker—you’re unclean!
I don’t give a goddamn shit what you say about me!
Cunt! Cunt! Cunt!

Sometimes I can hear God. Understand? You think I don’t know what I hear? I hear the voice of God!

No. You’re nothing. God wants nothing to do with you. You’re a cunt. A motherfucking cunt.

If you don’t stop swearing at me I will tear my skull from my shoulders, rip it off before your eyes! You don’t believe me? Try me—watch me. All you ever do is watch me anyhow. I’m sick to death of you watching, watching, always
watching
me. Your filthy eyes everywhere! Your eyes everywhere like the devil’s! You
are
the devil!

Trash!

Satan!

Whore!

Streetwalker!

Slut!

Two souls were locked in a battle to the death, their ranting a mad poetry that made no sense and struck a perfect logic at the same time. By now I knew who it was.

She’s perched on her favorite bench.
“Blake!”
she cries, coming out of her demented trance when she spots the little mop scrambling
along the sidewalk in the shadows.
“You don’t know how much I’ve missed you!”

All at once her mania subsides. Magically she comes back to herself, and a shy smile appears on her lips. The dog pirouettes at her feet, licking her hands.

I took the bench opposite, set fire to a Marlboro, and watch the two of them devour each other. What’s the hurry, after all? Where do I have to be? Why not let the poor maniac have one last night of pleasure before she’s carted off to the bughouse forever? Frankly, Blake would be better off with her than with me, and I’d let the crazy gal waltz off with him were it not for certain hard monetary realities that have to be reckoned with.

Like a prison guard I grant them a half hour together. When it’s time, I gently pull the pooch away.

“You’ll bring him back tomorrow, won’t you? Please? I have to see him or I’ll die!”

I’m going to lie, I’ve got no problem with that, in order to give hope, to help her through the night of her demons. What else can I do? Soon enough she’ll be back in the asylum anyway, climbing the walls with the other bedbugs.

“Sure, of course. It’s obvious how much you love him. How could I keep the little fella away from you? I’ll bring him back tomorrow night.”

She plants a kiss on Blake’s slavering mouth.

“Till tomorrow, honey pie! Sweet dreams!
I love you!
“

I thought I’d already hit the depths, but this was something altogether different, putting on a disabled human being. It was actually fascinating to me—how much lower could I sink? Walking out of that park, I felt as if I just committed murder.

L
ivy can’t bear to accompany me to the pet shop. She locks herself in the bedroom and refuses to come out to say farewell to Blake, the cute little doggie she couldn’t live without. Whose fault is this entire mess? Neither of us says a word. Maybe it’s all gone beyond words.

A brutal, stifling July day…. As I drive, I talk to my companion, who’s shut inside his box, his shiny button eyes peering up at me helplessly through the air vents.

I didn’t mean to do this to you, buddy, you gotta take my word for it. But it just wasn’t going to work out between the three of us. It’s a disaster, Blake, nothing short of a fucking disaster. It started out as love between that girl and me, and now I don’t know what it is. So under the circumstances it’s best if you go back to where you came from so you won’t have to bear witness, so you won’t have to bear the brunt of our misery. Maybe somebody will come in who can take proper care of you, somebody who’ll have the jack to cure you of your disease. Maybe somebody who can give you a proper home, with kids and all that. I’m so goddamn sorry, Blake….

Aside from a lone whimper, the dog is quiet, resigned. When I set the box on the counter, I can hardly open my mouth.

“I … I … I have to return this animal…. ”

I show Doctor Goodson’s report to the clerk. He reaches in and lifts Blake out of his transport.

“Mm-hmm. Distemper, you say? All right then…. Sheesh, he’s a cute little guy. Sure you don’t want to hold on to him? Maybe we can refund your vet bills.”

“I really can’t. See, my girfriend’s allergic…. ”

What the fuck does it matter what I say? That lump is in my throat again.

“Have it your way. Just give me a minute to do the paperwork.”

Those few ticks of the clock are an eternity in Hell. I lay my hand on the pup’s fuzzy head, but I can’t bring myself to
look
at him—that would be the true Judas kiss.

Finally the moment comes to return Blake to his cage next to the Labs and cocker spaniels. I’m rooted to the spot. I watch as the clerk hoists his frail body and places it inside, then turns his back and resumes his position behind the counter, as if he’s just stacked a can of beans onto a supermarket shelf.

“Sir? Excuse me … would you mind stepping aside?”

Sure…. I have to move along. I’m blocking the way….

But before I go I just want to make sure he’s all right. I shuffle toward Blake’s prison just in time to see him push his snout through the bars.

He’s looking for me, his master, the guy who’s been feeding him and sleeping with him, the guy who took him to the hospital when he was under the weather. When our eyes meet, he sends up a shriek that freezes me all over again.

I was going to say a final good-bye—but I can’t, I just can’t. It’ll be better this way, if I don’t prolong the pain.

I turn and bolt for the exit. All the way down the mall concourse I can hear the dog’s plaintive howling, until I push through the doors….

Out in the car I drop my head onto the steering wheel and sob like a baby. A little old lady carrying a shopping bag stops and stares.

“Are you okay, young man? Do you need some help?” “No thanks, ma’am. Nobody can help me now.”

30.

Neither Livy nor I ever brought up Blake’s name again—it was like the dog never existed. Only when we passed a pet shop did the debacle come back to us, and then only in silent embarrassment.

The fiasco was one more ugly, ignominious flop for the two of us. Livy was right: no matter what we did or tried to do, it was doomed. We’d been mysteriously cursed, it seemed, and we didn’t have what it took to cast off the evil spell.

The refund for the return of Blake to the pet shop only postponed the inevitable. Within a couple of weeks we were down to our last few dollars and cents, and there were no paydays on the horizon. In a desperate stroke—one I thought was nothing short of brilliant at the time—I drew the last thirty pesos out of my account and handed it over at the corner newsstand for a roll of lottery tickets. The prize was a whopping $1.5 mil, to be parceled out over a period of fifteen years. Man, it seemed as if every week I read about some slob who turned his life around with the purchase of a single lousy ducat! With thirty to play with, I had to be a lock for five hundred bucks at least! And even if I took home only fifty—the lowest possible jackpot—I would recoup my original investment and be a twenty spot to the good.

After all the shit, our luck had to turn at some point, didn’t it? According to the transcendentalists and yogis, there was no reason it couldn’t happen, especially if enough bolts of positive energy were projected into the ether. And when was a man’s luck likely to turn? When he was on the bottom rung of the ladder—precisely where I stood.

When I rushed home with the newspaper the next morning, Livy and I huddled over it with the roll of chances. This week the winning combination was 765412. A number with a nice, lucky ring to it.

“Come on, Max, what do we have? Hurry, hurry,
hurry,
I can’t stand the suspense!”

“Stand still, baby—here we go: 337863 … 980011 … 666799…. ”

No, no, and no, but we still had twenty-seven shots at it: “290655 … 912607 … 875420 … 152859 … 831760 …

653098 … 773205…. ”

“Jesus, Max, you sure can pick ‘em…. ” “Don’t fucking jinx me!”

But she was right—so far not even two stinking numbers matched…. By the time we reached the last ticket—521090—it was obvious that we’d been had again, that somebody else was going to waltz home with that cool one point five, that we were going to have to face the future with the last few pennies in Livy’s passbook—if she still had one.

31.

You’re weak, she tells me over and over again whenever we bicker, which is damned near every day now during the long, hot summer. You’re worthless, you’ll never amount to anything, my mother was right about you. You’ve dragged my life into the gutter.

I make a feeble attempt at standing up for myself, but there’s not much left of me anymore. My agoraphobia has reached the acute stage—according to Livy’s text on abnormal psychology, my case would be categorized as extreme, with shock treatments and antidepressants the antidotes. Livy takes to bed with her vials of pills and bottles of liquor. If the mood hits her she might stay there for days. And yet she’ll almost always allow me to bang her, even if her mouth is sealed shut from a full-blown attack of cankers. Yes, for us there is always the elixir of sex. One Saturday night, with Belushi and Aykroyd performing a skit on the portable black and white, she begs me to give it to her straight up the ass….