Notes From a Liar and Her Dog (6 page)

I hate leaving him, anyway. I don’t like to be left alone when I’m sick and neither does he. Though actually, he is much better. The pills are really helping him. He’s almost his old self again. So, of course, this is when my mom remembers to check on him. “See? Didn’t I tell you to wait a few days?” she asked as she watched him trot around the backyard. “Didn’t I tell you he didn’t need to go the vet?” This made me so mad, I came very close to telling her the truth and blowing everything. That’s one problem with lying. Once in a while, it turns everything all around and the bad guys think they’re the good guys.

“So why are you doing this, anyway?” I ask Just Carol.

“Doing what?” she asks me.

The inside of Just Carol’s car is leather, the color of toast, and it’s so clean, I wonder if it’s new. If it is, she
sure slapped a lot of bumper stickers on right away. Just Carol is a member of everything.

“Taking us to the zoo on your day off,” I explain.

“I always go to the zoo on my day off. And I’m taking you because…Oh, I don’t know. It’s probably a bad idea.” She looks over at me as if I will confirm this. I’m quiet, wondering what’s going on. I’m not used to adults doing things they think are a bad idea or sharing a seat belt with Harrison in the front seat of a sports car driven by a teacher. I look over at Harrison to see what he’s thinking. He looks very happy, the way he does when he greets his chicken after a long day away. Neither of us is used to getting special privileges. At school it’s always girls like Joyce Ann Jensen or Alexandra Duncan who get the treats. At home it’s Elizabeth or Kate who get the special things. But today, it’s Harrison and me.

“Maybe it’s because I’m fond of Harrison and you remind me of me,” Just Carol blurts out suddenly, as if she’s been thinking about it and this is what she’s come up with.

“Me?”

“You.”

“I’m not anything like you. I am not anything like anybody,” I say.

“Always so suspicious.” She shakes her head, but her earrings don’t tinkle the way they usually do because she’s wearing tiny posts. Her bracelets are gone, too, and so are her big rings and her jangly necklaces. She has jeans and a T-shirt on and her eyes
look small and watery, not dark and dramatic the way she makes them up for school. She does not look like herself at all.

“Well, I’m not like you,” I say.

“So you said.”

“So what made you say I was?”

Just Carol looks into the rearview mirror to see if it is safe to change lanes. “When I was a kid, I never trusted anyone, either,” she says.

“I trust Harrison,” I say.

Just Carol smiles and pats Harrison’s cargo pant leg. “That makes two of us,” she says.

I wait for her to say more, but she doesn’t, so I watch the hills go by the window. One after another full of brown grass. In Las Vegas everything was flat and in Orange County there was nothing but apartments with little strips of grass by the sidewalk, and the hills were all stuffed full of houses. Here there is more room.

I’ve never been to this zoo before. And I’ve never, ever been to any zoo as an almost zookeeper. I’m wondering if I will get to wear a uniform, when I see the big zebra zoo sign. Just Carol turns up a small winding road and parks her car under a eucalyptus tree.

We follow her through a gate marked Exit, past some flamingos with legs as skinny as hanger wire, and an empty chimp exhibit. We go down a road and behind a gate with a sign that says Do Not Enter to a row of low buildings next to a big stack of chain-link fence parts.

The people behind the Do Not Enter sign are all wearing khaki pants and khaki shirts and big black rubber boots. Just Carol seems to know everyone. She nods and says hello to almost all the khaki people and takes us inside a round stucco building, which has lockers on one side and big silver feed bins on the other. On top of the lockers are cases of corn and mixed vegetables, boxes of tennis balls and pillow sacks, infant swings, and stacks of empty milk cartons.

It smells funny—warm and animal, like a pet store—and there are strange whooping, screeching noises that everyone is ignoring. I ask Just Carol who is making those noises. She says it’s the gibbons calling other gibbons, they do that all the time. Then she hands me and Harrison each a pair of big black boots. They are way too big for us, even with the extra socks she told us to bring. We wear them anyway.

Pistachio is wiggling in my pocket, as if he wants to get out. I don’t think he likes the gibbons’ whoops that build to an alarming pitch, like some kind of animal siren. Or maybe it’s the strange smells that have him interested. I stick my hand in my jacket pocket and search for his belly, which I rub, hoping he won’t groan.

“So this is them?” a khaki lady with very short black hair asks Just Carol.

“Ant, Harrison, this is Mary-Judy,” Just Carol says. Mary-Judy is short for an adult—a lot shorter than I am. She has big solid legs like a rhino’s, perfect white teeth, and a pink strawberry mark on her cheek. I
wonder at the name Mary-Judy. It doesn’t sound like two names that usually go together.

“You know,” Mary-Judy says, eyeing Harrison and me suspiciously, “I don’t normally take kid volunteers on my string.”

“What about Zoo Teens?” I ask Just Carol.

“That’s a Children’s Zoo program,” Mary-Judy says. “It’s only because Carol here has volunteered for me for so long. She persuaded me that you two were really nice kids, extra conscientious, and good at following rules. That’s the only reason I agreed to take you on.”

Harrison and I look at Just Carol. No one has ever described us as extra conscientious and good at following rules. Just Carol is nodding her head, though her smile looks a little wobbly.

“Oh yes,” I say. “We never do anything we aren’t supposed to do.”

“Never,” Harrison agrees.

“Never,” Mary-Judy repeats, staring at a hole in Harrison’s pants where the end of his pocket is sticking through. “Look, let’s get this straight, you listen to what I say and you do exactly what I tell you. I don’t give second chances. Not when your safety, my safety, and the safety of my animals are involved.” Mary-Judy gives me a mean look. I take my hand out of Pistachio’s pocket. I feel guilty about having him here, then I realize Mary-Judy is looking after her animals, just like I’m looking after mine. Mary-Judy would do the same thing if she were me.

“In fact,” Mary-Judy says, “I don’t give first
chances. If you give me the slightest reason to boot you off my string, I will in a hot second, without thinking twice about it. Understand?”

I nod my head. Harrison is nodding his head over and over again, as if someone has turned on his nod button.

“They’ll be fine, Mary-Judy,” Just Carol says as her hand disappears in a big Tupperware tub filled with cardboard egg cartons and reappears with a handful of live worms. I shudder. I’m not squeamish, but I never expected there to be a big bin of worms sitting right on the desk like that.

Just Carol tosses the worms in a small silver bowl half filled with cut-up oranges and apples and bananas. One of the worms tries to crawl out, but Just Carol pushes him back. She is casual about this, as if she has done it one hundred times before.

“They better be,” Mary-Judy says as she opens the handle of a large walk-in refrigerator and comes out with a bucket filled with dead rats. “All right, let’s get a move on,” she says. I try not to look at the dead rats. But I can’t help it. I check to see if their eyes are open. No. Thank goodness for that.

Mary-Judy and Just Carol are walking together now and Harrison and I are behind. I put my hand in my pocket to pet Pistachio. He is still anxious, though it’s better now that we are outside, walking behind the Do Not Enter sign and up into the main zoo.

Harrison is searching in his pockets as we walk. First the easy ones in front. Then the hard-to-reach cargo ones down his leg. This slows us down and we
lag behind Just Carol and Mary-Judy. They stop and wait for us. Harrison is half hopping, half walking, trying to hurry and hunt at the same time. Mary-Judy gives Harrison a strange look.

“Why is it you guys call Carol
Just
Carol?” she asks when we are caught up.

“Because she’s Just Carol, not Miss or Ms. or Mrs. Anything,” I explain as Mary-Judy unlocks a big brass padlock and unwinds a thick metal chain from around a chain-link fence.

“Cute,” Mary-Judy snorts, though I can’t tell if she means this is cute or not cute. She turns over a plastic-covered sign attached to the gate with a paper clip. Now it says: Warning, Keeper in Area: Authorized Persons Only. Wow! This is pretty great. I’ve never been an authorized person before.

“Step in the bleach,” Mary-Judy commands, pointing to a plastic basin half filled with liquid. “I lost a lion to leptospirosis, I’m not taking any chances.” She glares at us as if she is sure we are germ carriers. And just as I slap my boots into the basin, Harrison presses something into my hand. It’s a Milk-Bone. I can tell by the shape. Only Harrison would have this in his pocket. He doesn’t even have a dog. It worries me, though, because if he’s figured out Pistachio’s in my pocket, then maybe Just Carol and Mary-Judy will, too. I look at Harrison. He smiles his goofy smile.

Mary-Judy opens another lock and unwinds a heavy chain from around the door of a low cement block building. “During the day, the lions are out in the exhibit,” she says, “unless it’s pouring down rain,
then I take pity on ‘em and let them in. But at night, they stay in here.”

It’s cool and dark in the night house, and it reeks of bad meat and urine and mildew. I can feel Pistachio smells it, too, because he’s scrambling in my pocket, trying to get out.

Then I see the lions. They are in chain-link cages along the back wall. One male and three females. They are so big! Their backs are as tall as my chest, each paw is as large as my head, each of their heads is the size of half of me.

Pistachio is twisting and squirming, trying his best to get out. I ease the Milk-Bone into my pocket. It doesn’t help. Pistachio is too excited to eat.

The lions are pacing back and forth in their cages, making strange noises, almost like dog barks. This surprises me, but I’m glad about it. If Pistachio makes a noise, everyone will think it’s the lions.

A female lion jumps up on a low wooden bench in her cage and then down again. Her paws strike the cement with a velvet thump.

“Stay here,” Mary-Judy barks as she walks down the row.

Don’t worry, I think.

“Hi, Peggy,” Mary-Judy says to one of the lionesses, who is standing on her hind legs, her front paws resting on the chain link. She is taller than Mary-Judy, yet she doesn’t look scary. Her posture is friendly. She is rubbing her cheek on the chain link. She looks as if she wants to rub her face on Mary-Judy. She is saying hello to her, I realize, half expecting Peggy to open
her mouth and give the top of Mary-Judy’s head a big lick. Now, all of the lions seem like giant house cats and I want to pet them really bad.

Suddenly the male roars and lunges at the chain-link cage. My heart jumps in my chest. I hop back. He bellows deep and loud. The sound fills the small building, like music turned unexpectedly loud. He throws his weight at the fence, determined to bring it down.

“All right, Junior, that’s enough,” Mary-Judy says. “For goodness’ sakes! Why the dominance display? I’m just trying to see if you ate your supper last night.” Mary-Judy walks in the empty chain-link cage next to the one where the male lion lives. She is even closer to him now. Is she nuts? Isn’t she afraid? Mary-Judy is leaning over, looking for something.

“God, I need glasses,” Mary-Judy says as the lion roars again and lunges at the fence, which bows with his weight. Mary-Judy is still leaning down. Why doesn’t she get out of there?

But suddenly the male lion seems to lose interest. He turns and paces the distance of the cage. He sniffs the ground. He looks at us. He licks the fence—the tip of his big pink tongue curls through the chain-link diamond and he rolls his cheek against the mesh. He is easy now, content, sweet almost, as he swings his hind end toward us, lifts his tail high, and then I feel something wet. My hands fly to my face. Harrison pushes me. His elbow pokes my collarbone.

“Honest to God, Junior.” Mary-Judy shakes her head.

It seems like the lion just sprayed us with pee, but
I can’t quite believe this. The lion leaps on the wooden platform in his cage. He looks proud of himself.

“Yuck,” Harrison says. “Chickens never do that.”

“He’s marking his territory,” Just Carol says.

“We’re his territory?” I ask.

“Apparently so,” Just Carol answers.

Mary-Judy laughs in a friendly way. “Welcome to the zoo, ladies and gentlemen,” she says. She shakes her short-haired head again. The way she does this, it seems as if there’s something missing from her head. I wonder if she used to have long hair. “That’s okay, guys. It’s happened to all of us one time or another. It’s my fault for not warning you. Someone here wearing perfume?” Mary-Judy looks at me.

I shrug. “Just a little,” I say, edging myself away from Just Carol. Pistachio is wiggling like crazy. The smell is making him nuts. I hope he doesn’t sneeze. I wonder if it will look suspicious if I walk out the door. I edge toward it.

Mary-Judy nods her head and puckers up her mouth. “That’s why. Junior here likes perfume. He’s particularly fond of the real musky ones. We always tell our keepers not to wear scents, because you never can tell what an animal will make of them. Especially one of our cats. You wouldn’t believe some of the things perfume is made of—squashed beaver testicles, whale vomit… and who knows what those kinds of scents signify to a lion.”

Mary-Judy is clearly enjoying herself now. She walks to the back wall, where there are pulleys marked with numbers. She grabs ahold of number 3
and hauls it down. The pulley makes a noise like rusty metal threading rusty metal and pulls open a door, which leads out of one of the lions’ cages into the big exhibit area outside. The lion darts out, even before the door is all the way open. The way she moves, I know this is what she has been waiting for. Mary-Judy lets the pulley go back up, and the door comes down again, closing off the bright square of sunlight. The pulley door gives me the creeps. It reminds me of a guillotine I saw in a book at school.