The contracts I had with my clients stated that the dogs go out rain or shine. Depending on the dog, though, their need to piss and shit did not necessarily mean they ventured out into the weather willingly. This was true of the dogs I was scheduled to visit first that day: the thin-skinned and neurotic greyhounds.
Flannel and Salvador lived in a three-story industrial loft in an up-and-coming, semi-industrial business and shopping district. As the hired help, I was allowed to park behind the building in the No Parking—by threat of death parking spot reserved for the tenants. When I stepped out of the driver’s side, I had to squeeze myself and my giant fanny pack between my car and their motorcycle, parked alongside the back fence. I wasn’t sure whether it was Matt or Darlene that biked, but suspected it was a shared passion, like adopting retired racing greyhounds.
To get into the loft, I first had to get through the tall wrought iron gate that opened into the small courtyard. The “dog room” looked out onto the courtyard, and I always took the utmost care not to wake the slumbering greyhounds when I came to the front door. The moment they sensed my presence, they went into a wild frenzy. I’d been cracked on the jaw by Salvador’s bony head before, and, ever since then, I was very careful to keep the dogs as calm as possible.
On this particular visit, the dogs must have heard my car or the clang of the gate. Both dogs were jumping and yipping madly before I even unlocked the plate glass front door. Salvador was the larger of the two, white with mottled gray-brown markings on his body. Flannel was more petite, but just as excitable. Her brindle coat stretched alarmingly over her frame. Her skin was so thin, I sometimes thought I could see her organs, pulsing and shuddering as they worked.
Flannel and Salvador’s owners were a rare case, in that I preferred the humans to their dogs. Matt and Darlene always paid on time, and in contrast to their hyperactive dogs, they were measured and approachable people. But, cool as they seemed, I never got over the squalor that their dogs lived in. Even though they got a whole room to themselves, which was separated from the rest of the sprawling interior by a wooden baby gate, the polished concrete floor was filthy, and their food and water dishes always looked as though they hadn’t been washed in ages no matter how recently I may have given them a good scrubbing. Wet food congealed around the rim of the stainless steel, and the remnants of the dry kibble were scattered all across the floor. More than once I’d arrived to find that an army of ants had discovered the feast. When the dogs drank, they splashed as much water on the floor as they consumed, leaving a lake of water dotted with swollen soggy kibble, which they tracked all over the room.
I couldn’t help myself and often grabbed a roll of paper towels from the kitchen and did a quick wipe down to get the worst of it up before we headed out on our walk. Usually, I stopped short of washing their dishes, too, as that felt like an obvious judgment and might have been insulting to Matt and Darlene. But I was always sorely tempted. The ants gave me a welcome excuse to wash down the whole area, all bowls included. I don’t know if it made the dogs feel better, but it eased my mind.
Each dog had a handmade cushion sewed by Darlene, which they spent much of their days lounging upon. The large island in the center of their room was heaped with mounds of mail and cryptic knickknacks. There was a six-pack of dusty, empty root beer bottles, a pile of costume jewelry, and a Rubbermaid container filled to overflowing with doll clothes. At the edge of it all sat Dog-Walker Barbie. This was the conduit through which I communicated with the owners, though it was usually with Matt.
The Barbie had shown up on the table months ago, blond hair braided, dressed in a green cargo skirt and rain boots, all strikingly similar to an outfit I’d wear to walk the dogs. I wasn’t quite sure whether to be amused or offended, whether this was a friendly joke or a creepy slight. Tucked within the mini messenger bag was a note that read, Flannel doesn’t like to go out in the rain. If you can’t convince her to go out on a walk, take them into the backyard instead. –Matt.
In most cases, it wasn’t the dogs that minded the rain, but their owners. I’d been visiting a Jack Russell named Kimchee, whose humans were about to have their first baby. The husband was very explicit that he wanted his dog thoroughly rubbed down and blow-dried after a walk in the rain, his paws washed of all mud, his sweater hung up to dry in the laundry room. Their house was decorated in shades of eggshell and ecru, so I could see where dirty paw prints might mar the aesthetic. For Kimchee’s part, he enthusiastically romped through the rain, getting as filthy as he could without actually rolling around in the swampiest puddles. Best of luck with that baby, I thought as I blew Kimchee dry, the two of us sequestered to the front doormat until all evidence that he’d been outside—that he was an animal, after all—was expunged. I wondered if Kimchee’s dad knew he was getting a dog when they brought home the Jack Russell, or if he thought he was bringing home an extra-animated throw pillow.
Flannel’s aversion to getting wet was just one of an encyclopedic list of quirks I’d noted about these greyhounds in their crowded file. Foremost on that sheet of idiosyncrasies was her unusually placed urethra, which caused her to pee straight backward instead of down onto the ground. More times than I care to recall, I’d been following too closely and had my Chaco-shod foot sprinkled with hot urine. She also pooped between three and four times on a walk, and it was rarely, if ever, solid. On Salvador’s list of bad habits was his proclivity to walk with his snout permanently placed between Flannel’s hind legs, which had resulted more than once in Flannel pooping directly on the crown of his head.
I had long ago given up on getting the dogs to walk in the rain. Flannel especially could only be coaxed out if I held an umbrella over the dogs. Juggling both leashes and a polo umbrella large enough to accommodate two fully-grown greyhounds in their doggy ponchos left me out in the rain and without much leverage to manage them. And managing them was critical. The dogs lunged at anyone in uniform, subjecting the mailman, UPS delivery people, even the poor kitchen staff at the nearby bakery taking their cigarette breaks, to their sudden, bug-eyed snarls. I could rarely predict what new and obscure moving object might trigger them. Skateboards, strollers, bicycles, rollerblades, and the dollies used by delivery people had all set them off at some point.
Compounding all of this was their aggression toward other dogs. Luckily, the shopping district was more commonly populated by well-dressed professionals, tourists, or wives and mothers spending their day out doing their vestigial gathering duties. But other dogs certainly weren’t unprecedented.
Early in my walking relationship with the twitchy beasts, we were returning home past the ceramics gallery two doors down from the loft. In what felt like an instant, Flannel had slipped backward out of her collar and escaped my rein on her. Lest I ever forget that she was once a racing dog, her speed was unmatched. She charged through the open door of the gallery, her target the proprietor’s geriatric toy poodle. Salvador and I charged after her, bringing the total of dogs in the small display room up to three.
“Flannel, no!” I bellowed. I used one foot to bar Salvador from joining in the mayhem, using my other leg as a wedge between Flannel and her tiny victim. Somehow I managed to slip her collar back over her head and pull her away from the prized centerpiece of the room, a giant raku vase on a pedestal, which she had been savaging the poodle beside.
From the threshold, the dogs behind me strained for more action within. I shakily apologized to the owner, who seemed miraculously unruffled.
“This dog has escaped death more times that I can count. When I found him, he was out on the tracks. Been hit by a train!”
Looking at the shivering handful of kinky cream fur, I found this hard to believe. Yet this death-defying poodle seemed largely unscathed, despite Flannel’s best efforts. No blood or broken bones that the owner could detect in her rather cursory examination. I’d been so sure in those frantic moments of separating the dogs that I was looking at a broken neck—and some pretty pricey broken pottery—on my record.
Apologizing again, I retreated with my charges, returning them to their holding area before they could do any more damage. I walked away with a bloodied toe from Flannel’s untrimmed nails and the residual chest pains from a minor heart attack, but no lawsuit. My toe was still attached, and my poor heart would surely recover. I would certainly request special greyhound collars for both dogs, too. Since greyhounds’ bony, narrow heads are smaller than their necks, the specially designed collar constricts as they pull, and escapes like Flannel’s are thus prevented. I cursed myself for not suggesting this to Matt and Darlene sooner. It should have been first on my list when I signed them as clients. That was a bona fide bush-league error. After that, we always walked across the street from the gallery, eliminating any possibility for a rematch between greyhound and immortal poodle.
Because navigating the street scene with the two loopy greyhounds was already a trial without the additional challenges that rain presented, I preferred to just let them loose in the semicovered backyard of the loft. This had initially seemed easier than the full-on walk, but it proved to be a charade all its own.
That day, the rain had slowed to a drizzle, and the dogs willingly ran from their enclosure through the open back door and into the yard. I checked the Barbie satchel for a check before joining the dogs outside. I’d left an invoice the previous day and was counting on the money. I had $2.65 in my account and had written a personal check for gas that morning, banking on the chances that I could deposit this larger check before that one cleared. My finances felt like a Rube Goldberg experiment gone awry. If three clients pay me by Monday, I can pay the electric bill. If only Matt and Darlene pay, I can at least put gas in the car and buy some milk and toilet paper. If I get gas, I can fill the tires up for free. Otherwise, it costs fifty cents. Or maybe Ian can pay this month’s PG&E and I’ll cover the next one . . .
Ian had recently secured one of the most coveted jobs on the western seaboard with a tech company in the Peninsula and was being shuttled to and from his cushy, high-paying job on a Wi-Fi enabled corporate bus. He left in the mornings wearing jeans and aviators and returned with a backpack full of free gum, Odwalla smoothies, sodas, and animal crackers. Despite this proliferation of snacks in the house, little else had changed with our living arrangement. Meals were plentiful and completely gratis at his office, so the fridge remained bare but for my paltry offerings. He had money now, but he spent it all on his student loans and accumulated credit card debt, and any leftovers went to beer and courting the ladies that seemed as plentiful as the employee perks. I still had to hound him for his share of rent and utilities.
With Matt and Darlene’s always-prompt payment, I was grateful that I could bring my balance back up above $100, however briefly. I put the check in my pocket and headed out to the back of the loft, umbrella in hand just in case the rain picked up again and Flannel required shelter.
Somehow the dogs never collided with the armless marble busts and abstract pieces of angular rusted metal that apparently passed as outdoor art. I had to stand stock still in hopes that the dogs might forget my presence long enough to take a crap. If I spoke or moved around, both dogs were sent into a frenzy, feeding off the other’s insanity. I’d tried staying inside while the dogs were out back, but they hurled themselves at the French doors until I either joined them or allowed them to come back inside. So I stood like a statue myself, the misting rain accumulating on the short brim of my rain hood and fogging my glasses. Today the dogs peed right away, and Salvador was pooping within minutes. Bless it, I thought; I knew both dogs would poop inside without hesitation.
The week before, I’d arrived to find both of them skidding through a puddle of runny shit. After going through an entire roll of paper towels to clean the floor, I was left with only soapy toilet paper to get the brown stains off Salvador’s white coat. I left a terse note with Barbie:
Somebody had an accident today. I washed the floor, but it’s still a bit stained.
Much as I worried about them getting it all out in the backyard before I restored them to the front room, I was intensely grateful not to oversee their emissions out on the street in full view of well-dressed businessmen and -women, brushing by the bushes in their fine, dry-clean-only suits that Flannel and Salvador had just finished peeing all over. So many times, the dogs dropped their loose loads right on the sidewalk. I didn’t come equipped with a hose, and there wasn’t much I could do about the dirty brown stain left behind on the concrete to be stepped around or through by patent pumps or a fine pair of brogues. Nothing was worse than having to pull Salvador from between Flannel’s legs as she peed all over his face. In the safety of their backyard, the depravity was well concealed from the world and could remain our nasty little secret.
This loft, as with many of the client’s homes, was a singular perk of the visit. I occasionally had extra time in my schedule to explore—rarely touching, only admiring. Matt and Darlene’s home was a museum of kitsch. In the kitchen was an antique vending machine with hand pulls and a Plexiglas display window. The original inventory was housed within; there were Boston Baked Beans, beef jerky bites, Cracker Jacks, or a square packet of Planters peanuts. There was an impressive collection of vintage lunch pails, which lined the staircase up to the sleeping mezzanine on the second floor. I didn’t recognize any of the characters adorning the rusted lids. In the bedroom, the clothes were displayed on a circular department store rack. On a mannequin torso beside it hung articles of Darlene’s fabulous wardrobe. A fedora, a feather-trimmed jacket, scarves of many colors.
On the third floor of the loft, the décor was that of a swinger’s bar: a leopard-print chaise lounge next to an overstuffed purple velvet sofa. There was a full bar and an antique turntable. French doors led out to a covered deck that overlooked the bay and San Francisco beyond. Nothing in my job description necessitated my trespass on the third floor, but neither did it prohibit a little peek now and then. Sometimes on a Monday morning, the remnants of a party remained: martini glasses littering the chrome coffee table, record sleeves along the sofa—Rolling Stones, Velvet Underground, Bowie. This was a world I could get used to. Below, the dogs scuttled and scratched behind their gate. As always, I descended to rejoin them.
Since Ian had moved in, he’d dated at least two girls I knew of and had slept with as many or more. Sometimes it was hard for me to tell exactly who he was with on the other side of our thin shared wall. I didn’t necessarily envy the temporary nature of these connections, but I did note with a measure of melancholy that he was actually meeting people. He was making connections, period, however casual or meaningless they may have seemed to me.
Inspired to meet anyone my age with remotely similar interests beyond Ian, I’d recently taken to utilizing MySpace’s search function. I’d posted plenty of pictures to my profile, and, in an attempt at tongue-in-cheek humor, the song that played when anyone landed on my page was Rod Stewart’s “If You Think I’m Sexy.” I assumed, probably too confidently, that anyone visiting my page would get the meta-nature of the joke. This was probably too much to ask.
I’d also created a rather less sardonic presence on Friendster, another social media site, which had netted me a robust but ill-advised flirtation with my best friend’s brother. He and I had tried to date in college, and I felt pretty sure it would’ve taken had my friend not been so opposed. My loyalties were clear. Yet here I was, a mere two years after we’d definitively abandoned any possibility of a relationship, rekindling the romance with him from afar. Loneliness seemed to be the culprit and my defense for all manner of bad behaviors.
I’d never guessed I might rely upon a social networking site to meet someone. I fancied myself old-fashioned, and relying upon a photo and self-scripted digital persona felt like a more drastic measure than I might otherwise resort to. It certainly didn’t seem like the most reliable means of meeting a potential mate, but I had been largely friendless and entirely boyfriend-less for going on one year, and I considered these desperate times.
Thanks to the advance search fields, I had come across a guy a few years my senior that lived in the area, played the trumpet in a jazz band, wrote nice poetry, looked to be quite tall, and had a great job at an ad agency that happened to be located on the same street on which I walked the foul-mannered greyhounds. We’d yet to meet but had exchanged a few safe messages via the site’s private mail function.
I think my lack of socialization was starting to erode my innate sense of normal behaviors and boundaries, as I started showing up at his favorite bar and the restaurant where his band occasionally played impromptu sets, hoping more for an in-person glimpse than an actual encounter. Of course, he was never present at any of these locations when I was, and I resorted to drinking alone, ashamed by my lurking. At a certain point, I must have mentioned to myself that this behavior of seeking him out bordered on stalking. I probably replied to myself that it was better than sitting at home hearing Ian’s headboard thudding dully against the wall.
As it turned out, it wasn’t at his favorite bar, or at any of the venues where he played music, that I finally saw him. I wasn’t dolled up, with good hair or a carefully selected outfit. I didn’t have a drink in hand, or my game face on. No, indeed. I was out with Flannel and Salvador. In the midst of navigating Flannel toward the bushes to do her business while trying to keep Salvador’s head out of the way, I noticed a handsome, familiar-looking figure on the opposite sidewalk, striding in our direction. I recognized him immediately from his pictures, though he was taller and even better looking in real life.
I started to raise my hand in a knee-jerk greeting when I realized instead of slowing or acknowledging me back with his leash- and dog-free hands, his pace noticeably quickened, and he started to look very intently upon his feet, the shrubbery lining his side of the street, anything but me and the dogs by my side. He passed us at record speed, and I was left feeling mortified, Salvador snuffling at my pocket, and Flannel having painted the nearest holly bush brown.
We stopped chatting online after that, and I actively stayed away from anyplace where I could possibly bump into him. I couldn’t risk a chance encounter, since he’d obviously avoided me that day on the street. The dogs weren’t to blame for this humiliating missed connection with my Internet mystery man, but I blamed them anyway. When I was with them, that memory had a way of surfacing, unbidden, making my guts bubble with shame. Of course, I harbored no illusions about the glamour factor of my job, but I’d never before considered that other people—say, an eligible bachelor I was interested in—might judge me by my work.
After I brought the rain-damp dogs in from the backyard, they got a thorough toweling down and a dog biscuit each. Their water refreshed and the mess of crumbs from their treats wiped up, I latched the baby gate and took my leave.
It wasn’t just the rain or Ian’s marked success with money and significant others that had me dispirited and distracted that day. On the way up the road toward my afternoon clients, before the bank, I had another stop to make.
The pawn shop, and my destination, was on San Pablo, past the BevMo! near the big shopping center with the Ross and Payless ShoeSource. I passed it daily on the way to my Richmond clients, which had given me the idea in the first place. I had long been toying with the idea of selling some jewelry to help me make ends meet, and I’d finally reached the point at which it was less an option and more a necessity. I’d been wearing the same cracked galoshes for long enough that, despite my duct-taping job, more rain seeped in and soaked my socks than was repelled. I’d ordered replacements—good ones that I could walk many miles in and that would presumably last for a while—but I kept canceling the order to use the money for something more pressing. I still had plenty of duct tape.
In free fall, it’s hard to know where the bottom is exactly. Where on the wide spectrum of failure did pawning my personal possessions fall? I was a far cry from compromising my morals and had yet to consider trading anything more than sentimental gifts for cash. But I was feeling pretty piss-poor about the choices that had resulted in my entering a pawnshop with intent to sell. Jewelry. My jewelry. I couldn’t bear to part with the sapphire ring my sister gave me for my twenty-first birthday, or the gold tree of life my mom brought back from Egypt, so I settled on an amethyst ring from my aunt and a pair of diamond studs from my sixteenth birthday.
I almost kept driving, but there happened to be a curb spot right in front of the store. I took this as a sign that this was a good idea and I should see it through. Also, I needed the majority of this check from Flannel and Salvador to cover an overdue cell phone bill, and the gas tank was millimeters from the dreaded E.
The facade was fancy, all green marble and gold lettering. But the interior was completely the opposite. Everything was locked down or behind bars. The guy at the counter stood behind Plexiglas. I had to lean over and talk into a little speaker.
“Hi,” I said, “I have some things to sell.” He looked at me blankly, waiting for me to produce. “I don’t really, uh, know how this is done.”
He gestured to the narrow slot beneath the divider and the mouthpiece. I pushed the earrings and the ring through, and he scooped them up in his massive hand. He put on an eyepiece to examine the diamonds, and I worried that maybe they were fake and he’d think I was trying to swindle him. I cast my eyes around and realized that my diamonds looked like Grape-Nuts compared to some of the stuff under the counter. He pushed the earrings back through to me. He’d linked them, the one stud through the other and clasped to keep them from separating, in a way I’d never seen before. So tidy.
“I couldn’t give you more than $16 for those; you might as well give them to a kid niece or something.” I swallowed hard. I’d never give them away. I loved them too much. Yet I’d been moments from trading them for three-gallons-worth of gas. My eyes were smarting at this betrayal in progress, but I refused to let this guy see me squirm.
Meat Hands pawed my ring next.
“For this I could give you $24. The band’s worth more than the stones. Just melt it down . . .” his voice trailed off as he fingered the ring, so tiny between his sausage of a thumb and pointer finger.
I held out my hand, implying that I wanted it back. I pocketed the ring and the earrings both, nervous sweat beading my upper lip and dampening my shirt.
“Sorry,” I said. But I wasn’t apologizing to him. I’d done myself really wrong the moment I slid my baby diamonds and priceless ring beneath that bulletproof partition.
I pushed through the barred doors and into the spitty rain. I still had a sixteenth of a tank of gas left. The warning light would blink on at any moment, but there was still some juice in there. I also had some change in the console, which would get me a little less than a gallon in case of emergency.
Back in the car, I felt safer, and better now that I was breathing normally. I transferred the earrings and ring from my pocket into the cup holder, then changed my mind. I slid the ring onto my left hand and unlinked the diamonds, pinning the studs into each ear. Fancy dog walker. Dog-Walker Barbie. That was much better.