Side Effects May Vary

  I sat there chewing on my bottom lip, a little mesmerized. She had this way, when she wasn’t talking about foreign politics or global warming, of making sense of all the complex things I never knew how to describe. And, yeah, maybe Debora was giving me shit about Alice, but I liked the way she spoke to me and not at me. I liked the way she just asked me, and I liked the way she expected only the same honesty she would give.

  I’d always known Debora in a third-party kind of way. Passing her bedroom door to get Dennis. Talking to her at school when Dennis didn’t feel like she was ruining his life. I wondered how long Debora had liked me and if it was a recent thing or a long time coming. I blinked and saw Alice standing by the front door of her house in that guy’s jacket, without a shirt on underneath. I tried to shake the memory.

  Debora had been honest with me, and whether or not I knew if it was true yet, I felt like it might be, so I said, “I like you too, Debora.”

  She watched her cheesecake like it might move. “What about Alice?”

  I wanted to lie to her and tell her that I didn’t like Alice in that way, but I couldn’t. “I don’t know. But I’m not on a date with Alice. I’m here because I like you. That’s not a good answer, but I won’t lie to you.”

  She looked up. “No lying. You swear?”

  I nodded.

  “So does this qualify as dating?”

  I almost laughed, but I stopped myself. I didn’t want to embarrass her or make her feel like this wasn’t okay. Smiling, I said, “Like, are you my girlfriend? I don’t know.” I paused. “Do you want to be?” A weight in my chest lifted, like a person terrified of driving who’d just realized the one thing standing between them and the open road was their own damn self. I’d never asked a girl that question before. With Alice, it was everything or nothing. There was no between. It felt good to take these steps. The crazy thing was that with Debora it was easy.

  Her feet bounced beneath the table and her lips did this thing where she was trying not to smile, so much so that the corners of her lips quivered. “Yeah,” she said. “Let’s try that.”

  We finished our desserts, and when my foot touched hers, she didn’t move.

  While we were waiting for our check, Debora scrolled through her phone.

  “What are you doing?” I asked.

  Not lifting her eyes from the screen, she replied, “Forwarding you my weekly schedule. I’ll need you to send me your work schedule too.” She looked up. “Are those pretty consistent on a week-to-week basis? Dennis’s are.”

  Dennis. I’d told him about our date a few days ago during lunch. When he finally realized I wasn’t kidding, he told me I was demented for ever wanting to date Debora. Last night, though, at work, we walked out to my car and he said, “Hey, you know I think Debora’s totally crazy, but try not to drag her into all your Alice drama, okay?” I nodded, and we drove home like everything was normal.

  The waitress brought my change.

  “Uh, yeah,” I said. “I guess so.”

  “Perfect.”

  When I dropped Debora off, I tugged on her hand before she walked up the steps to her front door. I wanted to kiss her, but I couldn’t risk Dennis seeing me kiss his twin sister. He knew I was taking her out, and he wasn’t protective or anything, but if he saw this, I think he might be eternally grossed out. I didn’t touch her face or her waist like I might have done with Alice. I wasn’t ready for the two of them to share the same territory. Holding Debora’s hands in mine, I leaned down to her and pressed my lips to hers. I opened my mouth a little, and she did too, but only to whisper, “Good night, Harvey.”

  Alice.

  Then

  I’d heard people say that being pregnant during the summer was miserable, but that shit had nothing on cancer. The humidity had exaggerated every little side effect of my illness. Nosebleeds, bloody gums, and aching bones combined with the fact that I was always either freezing or boiling meant that I was never quite comfortable. The life I remembered seemed like years away. That’s how it felt, getting closer to the end. Maybe it was a self-defense mechanism, but everything and everyone felt distant. Even Harvey. Prom had been a month and a half ago, but it felt like a whole other life—one that was worth living.

  Every day was the same thing: sleep, eat, watch TV, barf. And pain. Always pain. Dr. Meredith had tried a cocktail of different painkillers to ease it all. The meds that worked the best always knocked me out and made me someone I wasn’t. Even then, though, there were aches that couldn’t be medicated. I guessed there were just some things that had to be felt. Sometimes the discomfort was good because it reminded me that if I was going to live with such pain, then my life had to have been worth it. I had to have been worth it. And nothing I’d done lately had made me feel worthy of anything much.

  I sat on the front porch, hoping the muggy heat might thaw my bones. At least I didn’t have to worry about getting my hair all sweaty, there was always that. Since I’d stopped chemo, small patches of hair had begun to grow back, but it looked so lame that I kept shaving it. Closing my eyes, I let my body feel the noises of my neighborhood—a barking dog a few houses down, a lawn mower one street over, a sprinkler spitting water onto the sidewalk across the street.

  “But, Mom-my!”

  “Courtney, I’m sorry, but there’s nothing I can do.”

  I opened my eyes, my attention following the voices. My next-door neighbor stuck out her lip and crossed her arms in pure, unadulterated eight-year-old contempt. “They’re going to kill him, and it will be all your fault.”

  “Courtney, our air conditioner went out last week and that was very expensive to replace.” Miss Porter had enough patience to sustain a continent. “I just cannot afford the adoption fee until after my next paycheck on the fifteenth.” Miss Porter lived in the lone rental house on our street. It had belonged to Mr. and Mrs. Eugene. A few years ago, they both went to live in a nursing home, and their kids started renting out the place. Most of the street was still pretty pissed about the rotating tenants.

  “But . . . but the lady at the shelter said they’d have to put him down tomorrow at two if no one adopts him!”

  “I shouldn’t have taken you to the shelter until after I got paid, and I really am sorry about that, but my hands are tied until after the fifteenth.”

  “I hate you,” sobbed Courtney. Her voice sounded almost apologetic, like Miss Porter had forced her hand and for Courtney hating her mom was inevitable. She shrieked, stomping her feet, and crumpled up the flyer she clutched in her little fist before pitching it into the street. Miss Porter threw up her hands and followed her very tiny, very angry daughter inside.

  I walked down the driveway to the street, past my mailbox, and picked up the crumpled flyer from the ground. I set my fists on my hips, closed my eyes, and tilted my head to the sky to just breathe.

  After I made it back into the house, I took a few minutes to catch my breath again. Finally, I was able to sit up on the living room couch and study the flyer. The paper was wrinkled and dirty, but legible. I flattened it out on the coffee table and read over the advertised information. Below the adoption fee was a grainy photo of a black Pomeranian with patches of hair missing. He was adorable—sad, but still adorable. His name was Goliath and he was four and a half pounds. I appreciated the irony.

  I called number two on my speed dial, and he answered on the fifth ring. Six rings would have sent me to voice mail.

  “Harvey, I need you to come pick me up.”

  “I’m at work,” he whispered. I could hear that he was muffling his voice with his hand.

  “This is a time-sensitive issue.”

  “Are you okay?” he asked, his voice rising a little.

  “I won’t be if you don’t pick me up in fifteen minutes. I’ll be sitting on the front porch. Pull up as close as you can to the walkway. I’m having a shit day.”

  “Al, wake up.”

  My eyes opened reluctantly. Harvey’s hand rubbed the top of my back. I sat on the
front stoop with my legs drawn into my chest and my cheek planted on my knees. Wiping the drool from my legs, I handed Harvey the flyer.

  “What is this?”

  “This is me doing something nice for someone without taking any credit for it.” There was always a first time for everything.

  “Okay,” he said, a faint smile on his lips.

  “I forgot my money in the house. Could you grab it for me?” I wheezed. I hated for anyone to see me like this, and he did a poor job of hiding how much my discomfort pained him. Without a word, he opened the front door.

  “It’s in the Folger’s coffee can in my bra drawer.”

  “I know,” he called.

  “Two hundred should be good.”

  “Two hundies comin’ right up.”

  Harvey returned and held out a hand to help me up. I relied on him pulling me more than I relied on my own muscles. Every joint in my body begged me not to stand. His hand fell to my lower back as he guided me into the passenger seat of his Geo.

  “It’s the shelter on Swanson Avenue,” I said once he was behind the wheel.

  I didn’t sleep, but I did rest my eyes the whole way there.

  “We’re here,” said Harvey after about ten minutes.

  The cold air from the AC in Harvey’s car sent chills up my spine. I watched my reflection in the side-view mirror. My cheekbones stuck out—an improvement from the chemo chipmunk cheeks—and my eyes looked like blue pebbles sunken deep into my skull. My chapped lips stung. I opened Harvey’s glove compartment and dug around until I found his Carmex. The inside of my mouth felt dry, but it wasn’t anything that could be fixed with water. A few weeks ago, my gums had started to bleed and it was uncomfortable. Actually, no, it wasn’t uncomfortable. It was fucking miserable. And gross too. Really gross.

  “What’s the game plan, Al?”

  “I’ve got cancer. I don’t need a game plan.”

  “Okay, so if you try to adopt this dog, like I assume you are, then you do understand you must be at least eighteen years old to actually do that, right?”

  “I know.”

  “And you have a plan?”

  “Yup.”

  “Am I, in any way, a part of this plan?”

  “You’re the wheels of the plan. You’re my dashing driver, Harvey.” I leaned over and kissed him on the cheek. He fished around in his pocket for my roll of cash and slapped it down into my open palm. I smiled a thank-you and got out of the car.

  As I opened the depressingly heavy metal door to the shelter, Harvey called out to me. “Please make sure they give you some kind of carrier. I really don’t want that thing marking its territory in my backseat.”

  I gave him a thumbs-up.

  After the door fell shut behind me, I pinched both of my clammy cheeks as a last-ditch effort to give myself some color. The smell hit me, that pungent animal-shelter-bleached-feces smell. Nausea rolled my stomach.

  “Hey, Allyster,” I said as I approached the sign-in desk, thankful that it was him working this afternoon. Allyster was a retired veterinarian in his early seventies. Instead of living the good life in Florida, he spent his days here, caring for the animals no one wanted.

  “Well, look who it is! The kennels started going crazy a second ago, and now I know why. They”—he hiked his thumb over his shoulder at the kennels—“must have known you were coming.”

  We’d never had any pets except for the occasional hamster when I was a kid, but Mom had known Allyster for as long as she’d been a lawyer. He’d been her first client back when she practiced estate law. Now she did general practice, but he’d followed her to her new firm because he liked her so much. He always sent my parents a bottle of wine and a tin of popcorn and me a twenty-dollar check for Christmas.

  “My mom sent me in for . . .” I paused, pretending to search for his name. “Goliath? She wanted him for her secretary’s son. He’s been begging her forever for a dog, and she told Mom that she finally cracked, so Mom wanted to do something special for them.”

  “Just in time too! He expires tomorrow afternoon. You know,” he said, “I’m going to get your mom to take home one of these guys for herself someday.” He squinted his eyes. “Is she in the car?”

  “No, she couldn’t make it,” I said, pushing out my bottom lip.

  “Could you give her a call? You gotta be eighteen for the paperwork. I could authorize the adoption over the phone for her, not a problem. A one-time exception, though.”

  “Oh, shit,” I said.

  Allyster chuckled at that. Old guys love when girls curse. It’s the darnedest thing.

  “She’s in court all day, Allyster.”

  He sighed, and I knew this was my moment to strike.

  “Can’t you let me take him? Just this once? He’s a purebred and young too. Come on.” I rubbed my bald head, like I’d expected to find hair there.

  He glanced back at me. “Ah, hell,” he said as he shook his finger in my face. “I’d hate to see this little guy get put down. This will be our secret?”

  I lifted a finger to my lips.

  He slid the clipboard across the countertop, and I filled out the necessary paperwork. When I was through, I smoothed out my bills and paid the hundred-and-fifty-dollar adoption fee. Allyster completed the transaction and left for a minute, then returned with a white carrier that looked like a mini cardboard house. On each side of the box, in big red letters, were the words: I LOVE MY PET.

  The box panted and shook as Allyster handed him over. He squeezed my shoulder and looked at me in a way only people over the age of seventy ever did. He understood. Allyster, like me, was only a couple steps ahead of death. He narrowed his eyes and motioned to my scalp. “Beat this thing, would ya? You’re too young for all this baloney.” I assumed he was talking about the cancer and not the dog.

  The exchange left me feeling uncomfortable, and all I could offer him was a single nod and a quick wave as I backed out of the door with Goliath in tow.

  Harvey had practically pulled the Geo up onto the sidewalk. He jumped out of the still-running car and rushed around to the passenger side. I handed him the carrier as he opened my door, and I collapsed into my seat, exhausted. He placed the carrier in my lap, and we were off.

  “Pawsitively Pets,” was all I said, between gasps.

  In the parking lot of the pet store, I gave Harvey my remaining fifty bucks and a specific shopping list. He left the car running, and once he was inside, I pulled the top of the carrier open to find a puppy so ugly, he was cute.

  If he had been taken care of properly, Goliath would have been flat-out adorable, but in his current matted, mangy, malnourished state, he was more on the dilapidated side.

  Goliath backed into the farthest corner of the box and shivered, shaking the whole carrier. I stretched my hand, palm out, to him. He sniffed for a few minutes before running his tongue over the tips of my fingers.

  “Okay, I had to get a different brand of dry food because the one you wanted was out of the puppy stuff,” said Harvey as he opened his door.

  Goliath jumped away from my fingers and back into his corner.

  “You scared him.”

  Harvey tossed the bags into the backseat and rolled his eyes. “I think maybe you meant to say thank you.”

  I sighed. “Thanks.”

  I held my hand out for Goliath again, and Harvey leaned over me to get a good look at him. “All right, what’s the final stop for this guy?”

  “Back to my place.”

  “Alice, are you planning on keeping him?” What he didn’t say was, You’re dying. Not really the most opportune time to acquire a new pet.

  “No, Harvey, I’m not, but Goliath needs a bath almost as much as you do, asshat.” I smiled.

  Harvey shifted the car into drive. The corner of his mouth lifted as he shook his head.

  At home, I changed into a swimsuit from too many summers ago and pulled out an old tank top to cover the unfortunate sagging. I sat in my tub and waited patiently fo
r the tap to run lukewarm. Harvey held Goliath tucked beneath one arm, like a football. When I gave him the okay, he handed him over.

  Harvey knelt down next to the tub for damage control. All four and a half pounds of Goliath tensed with stress in anticipation of the running water, but once he felt the warmth hit him, his body melted entirely. I massaged the shampoo deep into his fur, and his neck drooped a bit as I loosened cakes of dirt that the shelter had missed. Harvey rinsed him down using a big plastic cup and then wrapped him in a fluffy towel straight from the dryer.

  After toweling off Goliath and letting him loose on the bathroom floor, Harvey reached down with both hands and pulled me to my feet. My knees wobbled, and my feet slid beneath the soap suds, but he steadied me, holding me firmly in place. As I stepped over the tub, Harvey reached for another towel and draped it over my shoulders.

  At that moment I wanted nothing more than to burrow myself into Harvey’s chest. He wrapped his arms around my waist and dipped his head to my shoulder, where he rested his cheek. Goliath explored the bathroom floor and licked our feet experimentally.

  Harvey held me tightly like I might slip away, and just once I tried to. I tried to fall out of his arms, but he pulled me back to him. I reached up, circling his neck with my arms, and played with the overgrown curls at his nape. He sighed quietly.

  Harvey picked his head up from my shoulder and his brown eyes found mine, and then it occurred to me: nothing was private anymore, not between us.