The Blessings of the Animals: A Novel - By Katrina Kittle Page 0,19
wanted to say, I’m not you, Mom! But I didn’t. I didn’t like who I became in her presence—reduced to my eleven-year-old self. I did say, “Maybe I wouldn’t take him back.”
My mother’s face flushed. She wiped nonexistent crumbs from the Portuguese tile.
I hated myself. Hadn’t I just been thinking what she suggested—that he might return before anyone else had to know? Why was I so awful to her?
“You should eat,” Big David said, always the peacemaker. “I’m baking you some rosemary bread. It’ll be out in ten minutes. But we can rustle up a meal, too.”
The rosemary bread was one of my favorites from David’s bakery. We called it “funeral bread,” because Ava always made it for friends when someone died. It seemed all too fitting.
A wave of memory crashed against me—the way Bobby held my face in his hands and bent his head to mine. How his fingers always carried a scent of citrus, or of basil.
“Don’t tell anyone yet, okay?” I asked the Davids. That was as close to an apology to my mother as I could muster.
I HAD NO IDEA WHAT THEY HEATED UP FOR DINNER. Whatever it was tasted like sawdust, but I sat with them and forced myself to bring spoonfuls to my mouth to chew and swallow.
I was relieved when everyone went home and it was just me and Gabby. I showed her the new horse. We stood outside, since the kicker still refused to enter the barn. Gabby slid next to me, putting her arm around my waist, her head on my shoulder.
I was so sorry this was happening to her this way. A message? Really? I watched the horse scarf his new pile of hay. “You didn’t really think I’d attacked your dad, did you?”
“Well,” she said. “You can be pretty kick-ass, you know.”
I kissed her forehead. I didn’t feel very kick-ass at the moment, but the compliment warmed me. I loved this person with every rational thought (and plenty of irrational ones) that passed through my brain. Her opinion mattered more than almost anyone’s to me.
I’d give my moody, morose husband time. I’d give him space. I’d get him back here and we’d make it better.
Because even though I’d never wanted to be married, there’s no way in hell I wanted to be divorced.
Chapter Six
MY PULSE’S DRUMBEAT THROBBED THROUGH MY BITE marks. Max and Gingersnap both knew I was awake and were staring at me. If I rolled away from them, they moved to face me again.
“Stop it,” I said. Max licked my face. I gave up and wandered downstairs to my home office.
Hoping for something from Bobby, I checked my e-mail. Nothing.
I e-mailed Vijay. My subject was “Emergency.” I typed, “Are you awake? I need to talk. Don’t worry about what time it is.” As soon as I hit send, I wondered where he was—in New York or still in Botswana? Although his “real” work was with HIV/AIDS for Doctors Without Borders (sometimes in Zimbabwe and Botswana for months at a time), he was most known for his hour-long weekly show on the Discovery Channel. Outbreak was, in spite of its melodramatic title and sometimes gruesome coverage of infectious diseases around the globe, a well-respected program with an almost cultlike following. Vijay’s brother Asheev jokingly called him Dr. Hollywood, but Vijay contended that the show brought much-needed attention—and, more important, funding—to the work of Doctors Without Borders.
Because of our last names—Anderson and Aperjeet—Vijay and I had been in homeroom together from first grade until we graduated. He’d helped me with my calculus; I’d helped him with his English papers. We’d represented China in the model UN trip to Chicago, and we’d been busted for having wine in my hotel room on the French club trip to Paris. If I hadn’t missed so much school, traveling to my father’s competitions (and landing in the hospital for starvation), we might have tied for valedictorian, but as it was he’d taken the honor alone. We’d shared sleepy rantings about medical and veterinary school and listened to praise and complaints about each other’s various dates. I’d read a poem at his wedding. He’d been an usher at mine.
No e-mail popped up. My cell phone didn’t ring.
I put my head down on my desk to wait.
Poor Vijay. Rita left him before Christmas, four months ago. I’d been sympathetic and supportive, but now I knew I hadn’t done enough. I’d had no idea what this felt like.
WHEN THE DOORBELL WOKE ME IN THE MORNING, GINGERSNAP