Walking Off Heaven's Shore

Walk the Dog

That's d**k on the phone, but I'm not going to answer it.

I don’t need to go for a ride.

After all, I know for a fact he just kicked Mae out, sending her back to her momma.

She’s been living with him for six months, I guess, cleaning his house and cooking for him and drinking his beer.

It’s his own fault for bringing her up here from Savannah.

How drunk do you have to be to pick up a chick at a bus station and carry her home like a bag of leftover French fries?

I'm not that desperate.

Mae's heart is bad, and he is a sucker for a damsel in distress.

She was always having to go to the emergency room or the free clinic with palpitations or something, which makes it hard on d**k since he doesn’t drive—too many run-ins with the law.

He’ll never have a driver’s license in this county again.

I should know better.

He ran afoul of the old-boys-network, back in the Reagan administration, when their grip on the local political scene began to slip.

He badmouthed them to the newspaper, and served them up some more of it when they came around to chat.

“We could have done this easy,” they said, “But now it’s going to be hard.” They called him a biscuit eater to his face.

Word got around that he was a d**g dealer, so he couldn't pull out of his driveway without a black and white on his bumper.

He’s had his share of trouble—got his jaw broken two different times in bar fights—even had to have his mouth wired shut—that’s cruel for a man whose bark is worse than his smell.

The man doesn’t know when to shut up.

I should know. He spent an hour one time telling me how he wasn’t good enough for me. I have been called hard of listening.

Just yesterday, I got a call from Rivka up in Chicago, the married one that d**k's been doing on the side.

He made noises about marrying her there for a while—if she left that rich boy husband.

He sent her a magazine for her birthday about some artist she likes, with my return address on it just to be on the Q.T.

But Rivka calls me to tell me she’s going to put the cops on me for aiding and abetting him for stalking her.

She thinks they broke up six months ago.

Dick's always jawing about how crazy she is, off and on like a neon light with a short.

It's the first I heard of it. I'd have thought he would mention breaking up with his Yankee hottie.

Rivka ranted on, practicing what she was going to explain and to whom, mostly worried that her hubby will leave her for the cheating dog she is, if he finds out.

Wonder if this is her first time or just her first redneck? I guess d**k is pretty exotic when you are used to normal men.

I bet she never thought of that while she was walking the dog.

Text messages and email is not my idea of stalking.

You have to be up close and personal to be a stalker…within harm's reach.

Dick’s way down here in Jonesville, with no ride and no job and nobody to give him the money to get to Chicago.

She ought to know that. She ended up paying for their second rate romance—no third rater for her—whether she meant to or not.

He’s not likely to be able to get near her to do her any dirt.

Too many cats to chase closer by, and he sure doesn't want her old man or his lawyers to come down here and call him out.

Dick talks a good game, but he don’t deliver.

At least not to me.

I talked her out of calling the cops, though.

A restraining order hasn’t helped anybody I know, and I really don’t want to explain to a cop that I just go out to eat or maybe a movie with the guy now and then.

Of course, he usually wants to go somewhere to do his business, like paying a bill or going shopping.

But the law might enjoy knocking d**k’s door down again anyway just for old times' sake.

That's a happier thought.

The phone's still ringing. He can be persistent when he wants something.

He’s not home anyway. Since the ice storm, he’s been staying with his other friend, Dolores, who thinks she’s his one and only.

Her power apparently didn't go off, though I was in the dark for a week. She gets to mother him and pet him and his German shepherd, Princess, too.

Dolores is kind of like a free kennel.

Why Dolores likes me, I'll never know. Mae always thought I was some kind of rival for his affections.

Princess likes me too, because d**k generally buys her a roasted chicken to eat when we go out, so she's learned to salivate at the sound of my old 4-banger.

Trust me, his affections for my car are a lot warmer than for me.

He made that clear that time we went to the pig-picking—I found out just how much a man can drink and still walk.

He calls me Sweetheart this and Honey that, sends me Christmas and birthday cards with Regan postage stamps.

He lays it on thick about my computer skills, but I have learned his game. He just wants me to do the work for him.

I gave him the whole website, code and all, to copy from my last client.

I know he just wants a ride, but he’s willing to make it look like a date. We used to go out to dinner and a movie nearly every week at the Steak’n’Bake until Mae got involved.

At least I never offered to clean his house. There ain't that much liquor.

I just didn’t want to get into the middle of that mess.

Dick’s got his way of being sweet when he wants to, but he’s got a temper too.

He let loose at Deloris for trying to sell her old Dodge. He didn’t think she was asking enough for it, not that he had any money to buy it or could even drive it.

I’d never seen him act that way, and I wouldn’t take him home to make his grand exit until he apologized to her.

I thought about making him get out of the car halfway home, but he would’ve got laid three times before he got home.

Any woman but me.

When he got home that time, he found Mae's heart medicine in the trash can. A bad heart, like I said.

The phone can just ring all it wants. I don’t have time or energy to go gallivanting around with d**k, bless his cold, little heart.

Let the dog walk.