The Blessings of the Animals: A Novel - By Katrina Kittle Page 0,24
my hands in his—he had enormous hands with long, lovely fingers. “Having second thoughts?” he asked.
I nodded. His voice made me breathe. We whispered, since Olive kept watching us. “But not about Bobby. About me. Am I up for this? Worthy of it?”
Vijay’s nostrils flared. “Worthy of Bobby?”
I’d been so quick to correct him, I’d never registered his reaction until this moment. “No, no, of marriage. What will happen to us? Will we do okay?”
He’d smiled, his teeth so white against his caramel skin. “Well . . . that would be reading the last page of the book, wouldn’t it?”
Our favorite teacher in high school had fondly chastised Vijay, saying he needed to relax, he couldn’t plan every aspect of his life, he couldn’t—as I knew he did—make a list of goals, then move on-schedule through life checking them off. “If this were a book,” Mrs. Norvell had teased him, “I’m afraid you’d read the last page!”
He’d looked at her, his expression revealing his opinion: Of course! Who wouldn’t?
I wouldn’t, I told him later. “Life is an adventure. Think how boring it would be if you knew right now how it all turns out. Where’s the fun? The mystery? The discovery?”
Lying there on Olive’s bed, years after those conversations, I said, “You know what? I want to see that last page.”
He laughed, a rich, low sound that always made me think of dark desserts—chocolate mousse, sticky-toffee pudding, melt-in-your-mouth truffles. “I’ll tell you what your book says: you end up happy and discover the life you’re meant to live.”
Hadn’t this been the life I’d been meant to live?
“I meant Bobby’s book,” I said. “I’m really worried about him.”
Vijay snorted. “I think he just changed his story pretty profoundly.”
“And mine.”
“He can affect your story,” Vijay said. “He can change it somewhat, but he can’t change you. You don’t have to be reduced by those changes.”
Maybe it was the doctor in him—that part of his nature he’d displayed since elementary school. He could diagnose and treat just with the sound of his creamy voice. He was in Botswana, leaving in ten days, and promised to fly to Dayton as soon as he was back on this continent.
I stayed on Olive’s messy bed after we hung up. I listened to my daughter and brother rehashing the packing escapade and narrow escape. This project had occupied a couple hours and had kept me focused on something beside the fact that my life had been hurled upside down.
My arm hurt. I needed to tend to the biter. And check on the three-legged cat. Those would be the next projects to get me up off of Olive’s bed.
Chapter Seven
OLIVE
OLIVE SIPPED HER MOCHA AND WONDERED HOW SHE’D DO it. How she’d break up with Nick. They were speeding along I-75 toward Cincinnati, and she dreaded another gathering of his friends with every muscle in her body. His goddamn married friends. There wasn’t a single one of them not married.
Nick hummed and tapped his fingers on the steering wheel. Why was he so damn happy today?
Olive tried not to hear her mother’s grating voice in her head: “Well, why shouldn’t he be happy? He’s sitting pretty, isn’t he? Why should he buy the cow when he gets all his goddamn milk for free?”
Cow? Fuck you, Ma.
Olive had shut her up once with, “Why should I buy the whole pig when all I want is the sausage?”
Ma had scowled. Then she’d slapped Olive on the shoulder: “The sausage. That’s good.”
But it wasn’t true. Olive had to pretend it was. Just like she’d have to pretend she was okay with not being engaged at yet another gathering of Nick’s smug married friends. Did they pity her, showing up year after year, still with a bare left hand?
She looked at him, driving along, singing now—off key—and hated him. She didn’t even want to marry him. If he asked her now, right this second, she’d say no.
“You’re quiet today,” he said. He put his right hand on her left knee and squeezed it.
Olive did the right thing. She put both her hands on his and smiled at him. “Just thinking,” she said, making sure her tone was light, her voice pleasant.
“About?”
Should she just tell him the truth? Should she just say, I was sitting here wondering if you’re ever going to fucking marry me or if you think I’m the biggest goddamn patsy you ever met. But she didn’t. She made her voice all flirty and said, “You.”