Snack (19 page)

I couldn’t concentrate at work. Managing to write five paragraphs about my latest assignment took all day. My heart wasn’t in it and my brain kept playing back visions of my weekend with Snack, while simultaneously trying to piece together the words to end things with Henry.

Entering my apartment, I throw my purse and phone on the bar in the kitchen, scoop up Wookiee to give him a kiss, and then head to the bathroom.

The lights are sort of low in the place, but there’s enough light coming in that I don’t think to turn on a light. And I
really
have to pee after my long ride on the ‘L’ from downtown Chicago to Hyde Park. Henry must not be home. I don’t even yell out for him, because secretly I’m happy for a few more moments to think before I have to talk to him.

Wookiee barks at the bathroom door as I wash my hands. I run my hands through my hair and quickly brush my teeth. I check my watch: 4:36. Henry must be home.

Looking in the mirror I give myself a little pep talk. “Come on, Minnie! Since when have you been such a wimp? Get your fucking act together. If you want to be with Snack then you have to let something go. And really, what are you letting go? You know you don’t love Henry.”

I nod once and then turn, open the door, and stride through with conviction.

The room is even darker, but now there is the soft glow of candlelight all around and music playing. Henry pops up from behind the bar in the kitchen with a roasting pan in his oven-mitted hands.

“Good, you’re finally out.”

What the fuck! What’s going on? Romance? Candles? Has Henry been knocked on his head?

“Wow,” I say.

Henry places the pan on the bar and yanks off the oven mitts, dropping them on a barstool as he passes.

“I wanted to surprise you.” Henry motions to our small dining room table. It’s set with my nicest dishes and flatware, cloth napkins, candles, and flowers.

I shake my head in confusion. “Well, I’m definitely surprised.” It’s going to be so much harder to tell Henry what I need to tell him now that he’s gone and done this. “What’s this all about?”

Henry comes right up to me. He takes a piece of my hair that has fallen in my face and tucks in behind my ear. Then he takes both my hands. The mood in the room shifts from surreal to serious.

“Minnie,” Henry says and straightens his back. “We’ve been together for what… eight, nine months? I like you. We work, ya know? You do your thing, I do mine and then we have really hot sex. And well, I think that’s a pretty major thing, too. I think I missed you this weekend. I’ve never really missed you before, so I was thinking maybe we could…” Henry lets go of one of my hands and reaches into his back pocket.

There is an insistent knock on the door of the apartment. Henry tries to ignore it.

“I was thinking maybe we could…” More knocking. “God dammit!” He stomps off to the door and throws it open. I can’t see who it is because Henry’s blocking my view. “What do you want?”

“Is, uh, Minnie here?” Oh, no. It’s Snack.

“Yeah, who are you?”

“I’m Snack.”

“Snack, oh, man, good to meet you. It’s kind of not a good time.”

I hear Snack ask, “Who are
you
?

I run to the door and arrive just in time to hear Henry declare, “I’m Minnie’s boyfriend. She’s my girl.”

In unison, Snack and I say, “What?” both with disbelief and anger.

I look down at Henry’s hand and see a black velvet ring box opened with a shiny ring sitting on a pillow of white satin.

My mind spins. Fucking Henry. And what the hell is Snack doing here?

“Snack, what are you doing here?”

Snack’s voice is tight, emotionless. “I got your address from your dad. I texted you. Didn’t you get it?”

“No, I haven’t looked at my phone since I got home.” I pat my pockets and then turn my head and look over at the bar. “Where’s my phone?”

Snack lifts his phone up, types something and Henry’s pocket lights up. He has my phone! He pulls it out and hands it to me. I snatch it from his hand, the anger boiling in my gut. “You took it? You were hiding it?”

“It was on the bar. I saw you had a message from Snack.”

I look at the message.

As I read it, Henry keeps talking. “It only convinced me I needed to ask you sooner rather than later.”

Snack snaps at Henry. “Ask her what? To marry her? Minnie, what’s happening? What about last weekend?”

“It’s not what you think, Snack,” I say.

“Yeah, I was,” Henry adds. “What the fuck happened last weekend?”

Wookiee interjects into the verbal spar, barking at Snack and growling at Henry while jumping and running around their feet.

I hold up a finger. “Wait, just wait”—I look at Henry—“‘I’m her boyfriend?’

Fuck! Seriously, Henry? That word has never,
ever
escaped your lips before today. What are you thinking? My girl? I was never your girl. What’s gotten into you?”

When I spin around from unloading on Henry, Snack is gone.

“Snack?” I yell down the hallway. The hallway is quiet and he’s nowhere to be seen. A few of the neighbors opened their doors a crack to see what’s going on.

I snap at them, “Mind your own fucking business!” Wookiee is no longer barking. Where is he?

I shove past a dumbstruck Henry and survey the apartment. Wookiee is nowhere in sight! He must have followed Snack down the hall. I can only hope he didn’t get into the elevator.

I run down the hall. No Wookiee. He must be to the ground floor by now. Hopefully, Snack picked him up and will bring him back. I charge down the seven flights of stairs to try and catch the elevator carrying the two most important men in my life.

When I reach the ground floor, there’s nobody in the lobby. As I exit the building, I hear screeching tires and see Snack’s Honda Odyssey pulling away from the curb, but no Wookiee… until there is an audible thump and a squealing cry of pain behind me. I turn my head away from Snack’s vehicle just at the moment Wookiee’s body flies in the air and drops with an awful smack against the curb. I roar like a howler monkey! The motorcycle that just hit him buzzes away and I scream.

“Wookiee!” I run to the curb and fall to my knees; I can already hear his pitiful whines. He’s obviously hurt, but thankfully appears conscious. His breathing is shallow and one of his front paws is off at a strange angle. His little body so still. The terror in his eyes is heartbreaking. He’s so scared. I don’t know what to do. Is it safe to move him?

“Wookiee, monkey puppy. I’m here. It’s going to be OK.” I stroke his ears and run the back of my hand down this face. I’m afraid to touch him too much, but I need him to know I’m here. “I love you. I love you so much, Wookiee.” My vision is blurring with tears.

I feel someone hovering behind me and can make out Henry’s voice. I have no sense of what he’s saying.

Wookiee vomits blood and as it trickles to the ground, his eyes close. There is not a moment to waste. I scoop Wookiee up next to my chest, jump to my feet, and yell at Henry to get the car. I only hope I haven’t injured him further, but I can’t just stay here and watch him die.

I feel Wookiee’s ribs gently and can make out that he’s still breathing, but not deeply. Even though his eyes are closed, he whines softly and I loosen my grip.

Henry calls the vet and once they answer he lets them know we’re coming in emergently.

I can’t breathe. I can’t think. I can’t imagine a life without Wookiee. And I don’t want to.

It’s altogether possible that I was out and in the vet’s office before Henry even stopped the car. All I know is we were greeted at the door by a tech that gathered up Wookiee.

“Give us a minute. We’ll be right out to get you,” she says.

I thrust my hands through my hair and fall to the floor of the reception area. I look down to see the front of my tunic top covered in Wookiee’s blood, my leggings ripped and wet from the snow. I sensed myself being lifted and then being seated in a chair, but I would never have been able to tell you how or who got me there.

“Minnie?”

My head is buried in my hands and I squeeze my eyes shut. When I finally open them, a pair of familiar shoes are in my view. I don’t want to talk to him. If we hadn’t fought over him calling me his girlfriend, we wouldn’t be here.

I don’t look up at Henry. “Your shit needs to be out of my apartment by the time I get back. Do you hear me? Leave!”

Henry starts crying. “What about Wookiee?”

Now? Now is when he finally shows some emotion. I can’t even look at Henry. I just shake my head. “He’s none of your concern.”

“Please let me stay here with you,” Henry squats down in front of me. He reaches his hand out toward my knee, but when I flinch, he pulls it back.

“Why?” I raise my head and spit at him. Then I stand, wobbling on my feet. “What could you possibly do for me? Or for Wookiee? If you hadn’t taken my phone or planned that fucking proposal, Wookiee wouldn’t have gotten hurt. Leave, Henry, now!”

“If you hadn’t fucked Snack, we wouldn’t be here either!” He’s right.

I collapse back in the chair and cover my eyes with my hands. Through heaving sobs I say, “Don’t think I haven’t thought that.” When I finally look up, Henry is gone.

It’s more than an hour later when the vet comes out to talk to me. I’ve been antagonizing the techs at the desk every ten minutes. They have been so patient with me.

The doctor ushers me to a small consultation room. “Ms. Cooper, I’m Dr. Gerard. Wookiee is stable.”

I finally exhale all the anxiety I’ve been holding since Wookiee was hit. A long sobbing breath escapes my mouth. “Thank God.”

Dr. Gerard continues, “Critical, but stable. He has several broken ribs, a punctured lung and two broken legs that will have to be surgically repaired. We need to discuss what to do next.”

There is no question about what should be done, and I tell the doctor just that, “Do everything. Anything. Do whatever you need to do to make him better.”

Dr. Gerard lifts his eyebrows and cocks his head. “He’s badly injured. The next twenty-four hours are critical. It will be a long recovery. It could be quite expensive.”

“I don’t care.”

When I ask if I can see him, I’m told Wookiee is sedated. I can see him when he wakes up, but right now they are keeping him comfortable and monitoring his breathing because of his lung. The vets and all the techs implore me to go home, but I don’t. The clinic is open twenty-four hours a day. Even if I can’t see Wookiee, I want to be here when he wakes up, so I sleep sitting up on the hard chairs in the waiting room.

I wake to the sun streaming through the windows in the waiting room. Fucking happy sun! It’s pissing me off. Everything is making me mad. The weather refusing to spontaneously reflect my mood is just piling on. God, I can’t breathe. Even though Wookiee is out of the woods, the sadness in my heart and the fucking inherent happiness of beautiful day are choking me. There needs to be a fucking hurricane outside. That would be the only appropriate meteorological response to what lives in me right now.

Fuck, Henry! Fuck his stupid proposal and his stupid fucking too late half-assed declaration of affection.

Damn, Snack! Why did he run away? If he’d just stayed and listened, Wookiee would be fine!

Even though I’m mad at everything and everyone, I’m particularly pissed at myself. All my plans and dreams shot to hell. I cheated on Henry. I lied to Snack. And Wookiee! I’ve focused so much energy on Snack and my stupid unrequited love for him for so long that I neglected to see I’ve been living with the man of my dreams all along.

Wookiee.

My eight-inch tall stud muffin.

Some fucking luck I have—I’m in love with a man I’m sure I’ll never have and a little man I could lose.

I look around the waiting room. I’m the only one here. Checking the time on my phone I see it’s quarter to seven. I never would’ve slept this late if I were at home. With Wookiee. I would’ve been up an hour ago for our morning walk. If Wookiee was OK. A sudden involuntary sob escapes my lungs.

I look at my phone again. Two texts. One from Henry.

And the one from Snack I never got to answer.

I begin to sob even harder, trying to decide which text to respond to first. I decide to text Snack, but then a vet tech approaches and places a hand gently on my shoulder. “Ms. Cooper, Dr. Gerard left instructions after the surgery last night to bring you back to see Wookiee as soon as he came out of sedation.”

I’m surprised and pleased the doctor stayed and operated. I jump up from my seat. “He’s awake?”

“Yes,” the tech says. “He’s awake but still pretty wonky. He’s also got a paralytic onboard and he’s intubated. When he sees you he’ll probably try to move. Don’t encourage him.”

I nod and she ushers me to the back. I spot Wookiee the minute I walk through the doors to the recovery area, but I’m scared to move toward him. Even this far away I can see the tube taped to his mouth and a large lime green cast on his back leg.

“It’s OK to go closer.” The tech placed a hand on my arm.

“I’m scared.”

“It’s going to be OK. Wookiee’s a strong boy.”

With each step my heart breaks. It’s not only his back leg that has a cast, but the front one that was bent badly also. There are huge patches of fur shaved away near his ribs, which are wrapped and have a tube coming out of them, on both his casted legs all the way up to the shoulder, and on his other front leg where he has an IV. The tech explains all the tubes and stuff, and as she does, Wookiee opens his eyes. The scared look is gone, and he acknowledges me with a drunken stare and an almost inaudible whimper

The tech was right. Wookiee tries to move. He lifts his head but I tell him in a tear-filled whisper, “Hi, Wook. Hi, my brave boy. Don’t move. I’m here… I’m—” I can’t stop the sobs. I turn to the tech. “Can I kiss him on the head?”