On the third day of rain, I decided to buy a kayak. The water outside was only ankle-deep, but the weather forecast said there’d be ten more days of this shit; hard, relentless downpour. For three whole days the skies had been black around the clock. The heavens had been sullen, bad tempered, and threatened to scream. If the world was a toddler, we had been living throughout her 75-hour tantrum. As she bawled and threw her blocks and dolls, everyone took cover and streamed mindless television, praying their power wouldn’t go out.
The rain was no picnic, but almost worse had been the wind. Its whistle sent a draft through the cheap, clapboard siding of my home. Its sporadic gusts and variable speeds filled the quiet with irksome song, an ever-shifting pitch of highs and lows. It drove me crazy, reminding me of an ex I had who breathed like she was dying every night. The sex was good, but I rarely had the energy to commit to it, worn out and tired with sleepless nights.
The wind wasn’t fun, but worse by far had been the dogs outside my door. I lived across the street from a doggy daycare and boarding place called Puppy Tales. When meeting people, I often broke the ice by making the joke that I lived kitty-corner to a dog hotel. It gets more laughs than you’d expect. I think it’s all in my delivery, which I have been working on –in the mirror, I’m not afraid to admit. Practice makes perfect! But honestly, after three days of hearing those dogs moan and bark and howl as if they had arrived with the storm, as if they had come, tugging on their leashes to drag in the foul weather, the only delivery that occupied my mind was the immediate delivery that would transport the noisy dogs well out of earshot. Outside, it was raining cats and dogs. Even so, all I could hear were the canine narrations of Puppy Tales.
If my house was one of the characters from The Wizard of Oz, it would be the Tin Man. Why? The obvious reason: it has a tin roof. But more to my thinking: that it didn’t have a heart, or rather, that it was heartless, merciless, unrelenting with its terrible din that came with the rain. It should have helped drown out the dogs’ barking from across the street. Yet somehow, it seemed to amplify it, accompany it, like some cruel joint effort –a tandem assault on my hearing.
The percussion of raindrops only managed to drown out whatever dating show I had settled on after perusing the tedious Netflix catalogue. I suspect I didn’t really need to hear what the bikini-clad babes and beach-bod boys were talking about anyhow. After all, it was a visual show. Eye candy.
Six mindless episodes later, and the rain still fell in sheets and mighty lashings against the walls that managed to protect me from the storm’s chill, if not its noise. My lights flickered, but never went out. Up on my roof, the Tin Man whinged on and on. Kitty-corner from my home, dogs barked, distinctly audible, as if in the room. Outside, a flash of lightning revealed my new kayak floating across the lawn.
The next day, I woke to rain, black skies, and what might have been mid-morning or midnight. I was hungry, so I woke to breakfast. I woke to the Tin Man and his heartless disregard for my place of Zen. I woke to the endless chorus coming from Puppy Tales, to the harsh, staccato language of dogs, barks and whines, a piteous song which conjured a visual image in my mind: puppies stranded on a shrinking island dotting the nipple-high rivers that last week had been the roads.
I couldn’t take it any longer. I don’t like dogs, but I’m not the Tin Man; I have a heart. I put on my rain gear and went outside, greeted by cold rain and welcomed by bitch slaps of wind that forced my hood down no matter how many times I tugged it back over my head. In seconds, my hair was sodden, half blinding me while soaking together in strands like wet snakes that stuck to my face. Handicapped by my weather-induced impairments, by the vicious storm that baptized the southern half of Minnesota, I awkwardly boarded my new kayak, which as it turns out was one rocky motherfucker of a little boat.
I forded the neck-high streams that last Tuesday were paved avenues with stop signs and crosswalks. I paddled against the current in the direction of the lamentation of woeful puppy tales, my arms aching by the time I docked my vessel at the raised, pinewood deck that overlooked a parking lot that was now a lake.
Then began the marathon of ferrying the canine horde, one by one, across the cold, ragging current of Poplar Avenue back to my doorstep. Okay, maybe not a horde, per se, but half a dozen dogs, breeds as numerous and unknown to me as their headcount. The chihuahua (I think) was easy enough. She sat on my lap with her bug eyes blinking in the rain and her malformed head bobbing with erratic rocking of the unstable kayak. But the mastiff (maybe) was a real problem. She was as big as a pony and, really, it’s a miracle we didn’t tip. The whippet (probably) was on cocaine, or seemed to be, and I nearly threw her over in irritation.
But in the end, we made it. After an hour and a half, my arms reduced to spaghetti noodles and my nerves frayed worse than the corners of a gnawed milk bone, all six dogs, and me, the noble ferryman, were back home and out of the rain. In my basement, the dogs sprawled out and casually panted. By all appearances, they seemed happy and in relative comfort. For now, they remained reasonably quiet.
It wasn’t until the middle of the night that I began to hear them narrate more of their loud puppy tales. I wasn’t heartless, but the Tin Man was. He banged away on his metal drums to drown out the canine chorus downstairs. For once, I was grateful for the storm, for the din of the rain upon the noisy roof. I allowed its overbearing white noise to blot out the dog-song.
In the morning, I’d kayak to the store for dog food. I’d placate the beasts with bones and meat. With these assurances echoing in my mind, I fell asleep and dreamed of wet dogs, of chihuahuas and mastiffs and whippets wading in deep water.
*
I awoke in the morning, which looked just like night, but my alarm assured me: 8 a.m. The Tin Man hadn’t slept, or if he had, he talked in his sleep, playing drums while he dreamed. The rain? It fell. It poured. It seemed it would never stop.
On the edge of my bed, I sat and listened to the range of voices coming from the basement, which hadn’t yet flooded, the merciful condition of my house located at the top of a slope. Downstairs, the steady metronome of a high-pitched yip emitted from the quivering lips of a Mexican breed with eyes too big for its amusingly-shaped head. Baritone barks sounded out, harsh and steady, protests from a border collie or that fancy looking dog that shared the same ancestry as Lassie. Low and terrible, louder than the rest, a deep, resonating bass howled from the cavernous belly of a hangry Saint Bernard.
Among all that noise, it was a miracle I had slept at all. Now awake, subject to that wild cacophony in a house filled with discordant music, I could hardly will myself to think. I was hungry, but the dogs were hungrier. The growls didn’t come from their stomachs, but it translated all the same: feed me, you human bastard! So I thought I’d better play the part of a man in this weird play entitled “Man’s Best Friend.” Lord knows I didn’t want to, but I geared up to face the rain, to face the rage of the storm, to go out in my kayak to get my best friends some food.
It took me two hours to paddle the five blocks upstream to the Petco. Outside, I used a bike lock to anchor my kayak to a traffic light that was halfway underwater and stuck on amber. I took that as a sign to proceed with caution, so I did, wading carefully up to the glass doors. Peering inside, I could make out the small, darting shapes of neon tetras and tiger barbs zooming in the much larger body of water that had liberated them from their tiny aquariums. When I splashed around in the cold water to activate the sensors, the automated doors parted open and a rush of water pushed me back. I didn’t want to see any kittens floating face-down in the water, so I closed my eyes and did the breaststroke down the dog aisle.
Inside, the lights were off but the happy shopping music was still playing. When my head bobbed up from under the water to take an occasional breath, I heard George Harrison sing “Here Comes the Sun,” which I thought was more than a little ironic. “It’s alright,” the third most popular Beatle assured me, but I wasn’t buying his advice.
Most of the dog bones were floating on the surface of the rising water, so I grabbed some squeaky chew toys and stuffed them under my shirt to act like makeshift water wings, freeing up my hands and arms to grab and cradle the biggest chunks of rawhide and pig ears that hadn’t yet sunk to the linoleum eight feet below.
On the other side of the store, a parakeet was flapping its wings in the small space between the top of its cage and the advancing water lapping over its little, wizened, harpy feet. With the bones in my hands, I had to doggy paddle, which I suppose was fitting. To reach the frantic bird, I had to swim through an armada of drowning crickets. Worse, I had to wade through a mob of anoles and geckos which labored to feed on the insect flotilla. They skimmed the water with alien grace and gave me the eye in such a way only a lizard could pull off. It gave me the willies, but I couldn’t let that bird thrash itself against the bars of its cage in a blur of blue and green feathers simply to drown a few minutes later. So I clamped the dog bones under my arms and reached out to open the top of the birdcage. I watched the parakeet fly up safely to the rafters, and from there, it looked down at me and shat. I felt the warm droplet on my lower lip for a second before the cold water washed it away.
“You know we’re closed, mister.”
I was so startled by the presence of another human being that I nearly dropped my dog bones to be lost forever among the plastic Corinthian ruins and sunken pirate ships in the aquarium section. When I saw the girl, her pretty face, her Petco uniform and dog paw tattoo on her bicep, I fell in love right there on the spot. It’s not the sort of thing one can plan or expect, but there I was, drowning as much in my instant infatuation as I was the deep, churning rainwater.
“I’m just kidding,” she said, looking out over the sub-aquatic aisles from her lofty vantage, standing up on the checkout counter. “Is that your kayak out front?” She asked.
Bones in hand, I nodded.
“Get me the fuck out of here?”
I smiled, and together we paddled back to my place to feed the dogs.
*
The kayak wasn’t a two-seater, but the Petco girl, whose name was Dorothy, had a backpack filled with tennis balls and cans of Pedigree that functioned almost as well as a life preserver. She sat behind me and straddled me with her strong thighs, wrapping her arms around my waist. In the wind and rain, I was freezing, but somehow Dorothy stayed warm to the touch, keeping me vital if not comfortable. Travelling with the current, we flew like a gale, going double the speed limit down Poplar Avenue. In just minutes, we were home.
When we walked through the door the sound of the dogs was obvious. Scratch that –it was downright deafening. Highs and lows; whimpers and whines; howling and growling and yowling. I was nervous Dorothy might think I had some torture chamber set up in the basement. In an awkward effort to break the ice, I dropped my signature line: “I live kitty-corner to a dog hotel.”
“What?” She was more than merely puzzled. What was that expression? Annoyance? Disgust? I think it was disgust.
“Do you like dogs?” I asked instead.
She looked at me like I was an idiot. In answer, she pulled up her sleeve and flexed her bicep. She tapped her dog paw tattoo with two fingers capped by chewed nails and black, chipped nail polish. The ink was centered in her ample muscle, which led me to believe she worked out, perhaps kayaked, during her spare time. If we needed to go back to Petco for more dog food I’d be sure to let Dorothy wield the paddle.
“Come on,” I urged, leading her to the door that descended into the basement. “Oh, and bring the food. I think these guys are starving.”
At the top of the steps we were assaulted by half a dozen rabid wargs. Well, that’s what it seemed like to me. Dorothy sat down on the last step and opened up her arms, bared her throat, letting the mongrels prod her with their noses and massage her with their tongues. I wondered if I was invited to do the same? I withheld my urge to become one with the pack.
“Be careful with that Saint Bernard,” I warned. “He’s a real grouch.”
Dorothy turned to face me, receiving a pummeling of puppy love with good grace, and told me I was wrong.
“Wrong about what?”
“This isn’t a Saint Bernard,” she held a serious face for a second before it melted into a bright, mischievous smile. “It’s a Saint Bernadette,” she corrected, laughing out loud.
I guess something was funny, but if it wasn’t the chihuahua with its tragic face then I sure as hell didn’t know what. “I’ve never heard of a Saint Bernadette.”
“That’s because there is no such thing!” She buried her laughter into the revolting jowls of a dog that looked exactly like the one in that family movie, Beethoven. She kissed the big, ugly beast on the nose and laughed again for good measure. “She’s a girl,” Dorothy explained. “Get it?” I didn’t. “Saint Bernadette –a female name.”
I have heard better jokes from a family movie about a lovable, but destructible Saint Bernard. I have heard better jokes from Saint Bernards themselves. I have heard better jokes in the mirror. I have heard better jokes often, yet this did not stop me from laughing as if I had rarely been so amused in my entire life. I was so zeroed on Dorothy, her delightful, rough-around-edges charm, that I think I would have laughed at anything she told me was funny, even if it was a relief sculpture crafted from Saint Bernard shit, the crude likeness of someone detestable, like Hitler or Steven Seagal.
Yip. Yip. Yip.
“Oh, don’t mind him,” I said, looking to cash in on my own joke. “He’s just hungry. “¡Yo quiero Taco Bell!”
“Huh?” Again, she looked at me like I was as clever as a pile of bricks.
“The chihuahua,” I explained feebly. “Like those old Taco Bell commercials? With the Spanish-speaking dog? The ones in the late 90s?”
Dorothy shook her head. “I was born in 2001, thanks very much. And by the way, this dog is not a chihuahua.”
“Is it a rat?”
“It’s a papillon,” she said, which was French for who-the-fuck-knows. She fingered its heart-shaped dog tag and cooed. “Its name is Toto.”
Things weren’t going well, and I really didn’t want to squander my chances with Dorothy, so I told her to keep the dogs company while I went to get the cans of Pedigree and soggy milk bones sitting at the top of the stairs. When I came back down and scattered the food into wet clumps of six separate, stinky mounds, the dogs inhaled their meals and chewed their bones in relative quiet. Dorothy smiled at each one in turn, then turned to scowl at me.
I attempted simple discourse –light conversation. I alluded to the rain, to the water levels that were rising by the hour, and that we might have to live together with the dogs as one happy family for a few days, maybe a few weeks. She shook her head and said she’d take the kayak home, which was only four more blocks downstream. She added that she would leave within the hour, or as soon as the next lull in the storm allowed.
Her plan of action was miles from aligning with my own hopeful expectations. What was it, exactly, I had been expecting? I don’t know. Sex? I mean, sure, that would be great. Friendship? Long lasting relationships are often cemented in friendship. Romance? One could hope, right? Is it so far-fetched to meet a girl in a flood and fall in love in the span of a storm in the presence of six dogs that do not belong to either of us? Is that so much to hope for? To strive for? To live for, at this point?
Dorothy leaving… it just wouldn’t serve.
“Stay here,” I said. “I’ll be back with entertainment.” She rolled her eyes at me and started playing with the little dog that was not Mexican, but French. Toto and Dorothy, I mused. And who does that make me? I went upstairs to gather the things I’d need to keep my visitor in my home longer than she had planned. At the moment, I felt like a lion who had found his courage.
It wasn’t easy, but with Dorothy’s uncommon strength, together, we lugged the big screen downstairs. I retrieved the longest extension cord I could find, and prepared our entertainment. I told her to sit. “Sit right there,” I said. “No. Right there.” I pointed. She scooted over with her back up against the radiator, the freaky little dog asleep in her lap like a curled up Cinnabon.
“Why here?” She asked. “This radiator up against my back isn’t comfortable, you know?”
“Here,” I chucked a cushion at her, which she wedged behind her back. Then, as she busied herself cooing the little French fry in her lap, I quickly wrapped the extension cord around her arms and waist, pulling taut and going round and round again, finishing up with a neat, tidy knot.
“What the fuck?” She was angry, not scared. She clenched her fists and her dog paw tattoo spread large with the swell of her flexed bicep.
“It’s for your own good.” I tried to remain calm, but my heart was beating faster than the Tin Man’s rooftop rhythm. It was thumping away, a vital organ that the metal man had coveted for himself.
“How the hell is tying me up to the radiator in your basement for my own good?”
She had me there. I tried to think fast. “I didn’t want you to go out into the storm,” that much was true. “There’s no place like home, Dorothy.”
“Yeah, that’s sort of the point of leaving.” She raised her voice. “This isn’t my home, asshole!” The dogs began to bark and bared their fangs. They edged towards me with fierce faces. The six of them in my basement, ranging from the size of a hot dog to an alpha wolf, made up the oddest pack of beasts I’d ever had the displeasure of fearing as they backed me into the corner.
I dropped the DVDs which I had intended to pacify Dorothy with, to lull her into a false state of belonging with cheap humor and family fun. They scattered on the floor, a fine collection: Lady and the Tramp, 101 Dalmatians, Turner and Hooch, and for the sake of the Saint Bernard, Beethoven, which I had dusted off from the childhood box that remained entombed in my home because I am a hopeless, sentimental fool.
The mastiff, or whatever it was, stepped over a movie case and cracked the plastic. Inch by inch, it closed the space between us. I tried to back up, but my spine was flush up against the wall. All I could do was tremble in the corner, anticipating the unfavorable outcome of being mauled. If only I had a milk bone or a tennis ball… Yet sadly, all canine-worthy distractions were far out of reach. So I whimpered, waiting to die.
“Sit,” Dorothy said with surprising command. So I did. I sat.
“Not you, dumb-ass,” she berated. “Sit,” she said again, a word spoken so firmly, so calmly, that I had little doubt it would have worked on a brontosaurus –if only we had a time machine. At once, the half-dozen dogs planted their fuzzy asses on the cold cement of my basement floor. In spite of my situation, I was rather impressed.
“Stay,” Dorothy commanded. And they did. As did I. I was afraid to move a single inch. “Now, as for you,” she went on to say, turning with bull muscle in her neck to face me, the orange cable straining against her prodigious strength. “If you get up and walk over here, untie me and let me go, I’ll call off the dogs.” She paused, and in that horrific gap the growling of savage mongrels and the thrashing of hard rain seemed to devour the world. I could feel my heart beating. It was beating right out of my chest. But I couldn’t hear it. It was lost in a soundscape of doom. “Or,” Dorothy finally finished, “you don’t let me go and, instead, I sick the dogs on you.” As if on cue, they growled as one. “Your death will be more amusing than these stupid DVDs you call a collection. What sort of grown man are you, anyways? Abducting women, for one –shameless bastard. But these movies? I mean, Jesus, man! Talk about pathetic.”
The Saint Bernard or mastiff or rottweiler or whatever was so close I could smell the Pedigree on its breath. Its fangs and predator eyes were white and gleaming. The piss that flooded my trousers was warm, but my blood ran cold. “Just get him off me,” I begged, nodding at the big dog. “Get him, and all these other dogs, off me.”
“Her,” Dorothy corrected.
“Whatever.” I didn’t really care. A dog is a dog.
“We’re all girls,” she pointed out. “Six dogs, seven bitches.” She said it, not me. But hell, who am I to argue?
In the end, I did as she asked. I unfastened the knot and loosened the extension cord which had bound her. She was free of the radiator. She was free of me. The moment her bindings hit the floor Dorothy sucker-punched me in the jaw and I fell flat. My world was spinning, a crazy carousel of hazy dog faces and one blurred bitch looking down at me while wrapping me up, good and tight, with an extension cord to a warm radiator. Confused, but aware, I watched a she-wolf and her train of pups ascend a mountain. Elevated high up above me, they had reached the apex of their saga, the end of their epic puppy tales.
From the top of the stairs, Dorothy turned around and looked back down at me. “Check it out,” she said, gesturing to the half dozen canines that looked up to her with lolling tongues and gormless, joyful faces. “Six dogs…” I listened to her, nodding, and worked my jaw, moaning, trying to reach for my face but unable to, my arms tightly bound to my sides. “…And one little bitch,”she finished, emphasizing her last word while pointing down at me from above, her outstretched finger capped by a chewed nail and black, chipped nail polish. Like a black enchantment, some sort of malignant curse, it cast a long, dark shadow over my constrained body before the door shut to leave me alone and afraid in the bellows of a drowning house.
I screamed for a time. Then I screamed some more. But it was no use. It would do no good. No one was there to hear me. And even if they had been, my screams would’ve been drowned out, lost among the orgy of clamor that came with the storm.
Outside, the weather raged on. The Tin Man banged his drum. The rain? It fell. It poured. It didn’t let up even by a fraction. It seemed it would never stop.