Woman's Best Friend -- A Short Story

 By Cal Orey

Woman’s Best Friend

At 20, I wanted to join the Army, train dogs and travel.  I never made it into the service. I may have failed the male-biased aptitude test, but I still love dogs—all breeds, sizes, and ages. So rather than globetrotting in a uniform, I found myself hiking around the country with a beautiful 6-month-old black Labrador retriever named Stone Fox. Stone Fox and I walked and hitchhiked to the Pacific Northwest, Midwest, Deep South, East Coast and even Mexico and Canada. We were on the road like John Steinbeck and his Standard Poodle Charley for more than one year. Taking care of my carefree and upbeat dog and letting him take care of me helped me become a happier and more confident woman in mind and body. He was the dog of my life…

 

A DOG LOVERS’ CRATE

We were lucky to find the widow’s ad for domestic help because I read “No Pets Allowed” in every other “Rooms for Rent” advertisement in San Jose, California. When I applied for the live-in housekeeper position, I explained to Mrs. Thurman that Stone Fox was my best friend and we had just finished traveling cross-country in search of America. The widow, who was soft spoken, said she needed a maid who charged cut-rate prices, and I needed a little R&R for a while. It was self-preservation in a nutshell.

I am not a hypocrite, so I must confess that if I didn’t have my young black Lab with me, I wouldn’t have lasted a minute. Living with the widow would have been too confining at best. But I was in luck because the widow was a dog lover. Her place was a blue and white trailer house—not great for a big dog—landscaped with red bark chips scattered around cacti shrubbery. But there was a creek one block away, which I suggested could be a good dog run. (Later it became me and my dog’s refuge.) So, the widow decided to ignore the “No Large Pets on Trailer Court Premises” rule. Rules are made to be broken, we agreed. Our “we love dogs” motto prevailed.

The widow had the will to subsist inside her coop because of Tweetie, her 11-year-old, devoted Yorkshire terrier, the kind of small pooch that yaps, begs, and wears frilly bows. (I favor larger breeds.) But the spoiled dog did liven up the widow’s low moods, I must admit. I often watched her talk to Tweetie about trivial matters like, “The air is bad in the kitchen” (after she finished frying her bacon, tomato and onion sandwich).  And important issues were covered, such as “Should we sell the Oldsmobile?” and “I don’t want to have the operation for my osteoporosis.” Despite the dog lover’s woes, I felt secure inside the widow’s coop, complete with its colonial style furniture, lacy curtains, and color console television. I didn’t even feel deprived when I was told my fifty-dollar-a-month allowance would be cut in half because of her “too many bills.”

One evening, while returning from a good romp around Quailhollow Creek with Stone Fox, the trailer manager, Ms. Weed, confronted me as I was entering Space 88, the widow’s lot. She spoke of the trailer park regulations, emphasizing that dogs over 15 pounds were not permitted. I told her Stone Fox was my seeing-eye dog straight from San Rafael Dog Training Center for the Blind.

“It’s just a matter of time,” I lied, “before my vision will fail me—for life.” Ms. Weed glared at me with that cosmetic smile of hers. I bet she had plastic surgery. You could sort of tell because her face was too perfect. But it didn’t really match the sloppy way she dressed (purple polyester dress hiding an older woman’s body. She looked like an overweight senior spayed cat, I thought. As she adjusted her large straw hat, she studied me: a hippie girl dressed in baggy blue jean overalls and a peasant blouse, and barefoot. I brushed my shaggy light brown hair out of my eyes when she suggested I should keep my 70-pound Labrador on a very tight leash whenever I walked him on the Quailhollow premises.

That night I confided in the widow almost everything. I told her how Stone Fox and I traveled. A lot. How we hitched and hiked through high and flat deserts of the southwest, fighting off cowboys in the prairies. (They tried to run us off the road. Stone Fox barked and growled. I felt protected.) How we were stranded on on-ramps during a blizzard in Cheyenne, a sandstorm in Winnemucca, and a monsoon in Tucson. And I told her that through our good and bad escapades we learned more and more about each other, and our bond of friendships strengthened.

 

LETTING OUR GUARD DOWN—DOG DAY AFTERNOONS

Stone Fox had helped me through life’s rough spots. And I guess Tweetie’s loyalty and unconditional love aided the widow. We both needed that.

The widow then told me that when her husband was dying, he chose to return to Europe and she stayed in California. She said she loved him, but it was too hard on her to move because he was going blind. (I don’t think she really loved her mate.) When he left for their homeland, she bought Tweetie. “Tweetie is more affectionate and less demanding than Arnold ever was,” the widow whispered to me as I glanced at a photo of her on the wall when she was young, blonde, and pretty. “I love being on my own. Men are like babies. They always want something!”

We laughed together. Her guard came down the more we talked. Then I told the widow about Ms. Weed.  “I told her that Stone Fox was my seeing-eye dog. I couldn’t think of anything else to say.”

That following morning, she explained the “truth” to Ms. Weed. “Callie has problems seeing at dark because of her bad retinas,” she said. She said Stone Fox functioned as my guide dog, even though I walked him on a regular dog leash, not a harness like seeing-dogs wear. Thanks to the widow’s awareness of eye diseases, Stone Fox and I were allowed to remain on the premises at Quailhollow Trailer Park.

I continued to serve Mildred coffee in bed every morning (she no longer wanted me to call her Mrs. Thurman). Twenty minutes afterwards I would bring her more coffee (prepared with non-dairy cream because of her calcium allergy) and bona fide Quaker’s oatmeal since the she was keen to the distinct flavor difference between instant oatmeal and cooked oats.

Sometimes, while cuddle up with our dogs, we’d pass the mornings together by idling in her rustic bedroom, a cluttered quarter brimming with memorabilia, twin beds covered in blue-daisy comforters and a closet-and-a-half stuffed with clothes neatly stored in cellophane wrappers. She told me about her fusspot neighbor who called her one late night and that is when Mildred fell and broke her hip—the beginning of the demise of her health.

As the weeks passed, Mildred was determined to hobble around on those wooden crutches of hers. The bicycle she once pedaled around the mobile park was shut away in the shed. Her 1952 Oldsmobile was sold (she needed the extra cash for the coast of an arm and leg brace). And I was Tweetie’s sole caretaker, from walks to feeding.

But on Wednesdays, Joey the neighbor’s kid came by Mildred’s, which seemed to cheer her up. Joey wore horn-rimmed glasses and had messed up hair, plus ambition to grow a ponytail like the hippies. He bummed a root beer or two from Mildred.

Maybe he was a user, or maybe he really cared about Tweetie. He did brush the dog. This made Mildred because the dog salon was too expensive now. I felt it was therapeutic since she appeared less worried during his visits and Tweetie’s pampering time.

 

THE BOND IN DANGER

One morning a “First Warning” notice welcomed me when I pulled out an assortment of bills. It was one those 30-day termination slips, but this one had a personalized flair to it. It advised unauthorized tenants to remove large, barking dogs or vacate the premises. I thought Stone Fox was an exception. I was confused. I tore up the notice and postponed coping with the warning.

I continued to curl the widow’s thinning white hair bi-weekly, while Tweetie sat in her lap, bathe her every other day, and serve her favorite fried chicken legs (the Swanson’s TV frozen kind) during the six o’ clock news. And week nights after I walked Tweetie I watched Johnny Carson, while she recycled stories about her life in the good old fifties.

Two weeks passed without me telling Mildred about the notice. I didn’t want to upset her. So finally, Ms. Weed paid us a visit; not a social call she said. “You have seven days left to vacate or get rid of that large mutt,” she screeched at us. Mildred, who was still mentally keen, reminded Ms. Weed that I was near blind. “For four years,” she lied with all her heart. “Since the day they met, Stone Fox and Callie have been together.” She told Ms. Weed it would be inhumane to separate me and my dog, or me and Mildred

Ms. Weed claimed she had called the headquarters of San Rafael Dog Training Center. According to the placement coordinator, Stone Fox and I were non-existent. The truth was confirmed—Stone Fox was just another dog. “Seven days,” she warned, “or I will proceed with further legal action.”

 

A HUMAN-DOG LOVE CONNECTION

The widow knew I would never give up Stone Fox, no more than she’d surrender Tweetie. We’d rather die than give up our best friends. I had to leave. It was self-preservation. The widow understood my decision without discussion. I got a new job as a live-in babysitter for a rich doctor and his two kids that were supposed to start in a week.

The widow started ringing a little bell whenever she needed something. I overheard her telling Twee tie that she was sick of “flighty domestic help” and was scared to go away to a home “like senile Annie.”

But I left one morning. We said our goodbyes and the dogs…well, they were never were close. They kept their distance and tolerated one another. Sort of like the widow and me.

One summer day when I was driving the kids around, I drove by Quailhollow Creek—they wanted to see where I used to work. I couldn’t resist stopping for Stone Fox’s sake; he loved to retrieve driftwood I’d toss into the creek water. But it was dry because of the drought. I saw Joey riding his bicycle by the creek, and he shouted, “Hear about Mildred?” He stopped moving, turned his head around and shouted, “Died last month. She didn’t make it through that operation.”

I peered down Quailhollow Drive and saw the widow’s sapphire-and-white house trailer. It looked the same but a FOR SALE sign was there.

“Who’s got Tweetie?” I asked, as the doctor’s kids were fighting around me. I watched Stone Fox dig a hole in the dry creek bed. Joey pedaled ahead. “Tweetie died one week before Ruth” echoed down Quailhollow Drive. I wanted to cry out but I couldn’t.