Problems with People Read online

  “Meals on Wheels?” asked Vivian.

  “Scuzz,” Lou said. “You get gouged so they can kill you with salt and cholesterol. But it’s not Meals on Wheels, it’s something else.”

  “Someone does the cooking.”

  “The chef who does rubber chicken for luncheons.” Lou raised his walker and banged it on the floor. “Do I look like I need a bib?” he wondered. “Fuck it,” he added. “Bill.”

  “Bill,” said Vivian. “Muzzle or no muzzle?”

  “We’ll get him suited up,” answered Lou.

  They wound through the house. There was a mudroom in back, and Bill was sequestered there, still making neurotic and murderous noises. Lou blocked him with the walker and said, “Up, you jerk, get up here, Bill,” and the dog immediately put its paws on the walker so that Lou could attach the leash to its collar. Vivian saw immediately that Bill wore a choke collar—chain links and a ring—and also a studded ID collar. He was a huge salivator with big green eyes. “Look,” said Lou. “It’s staring us in the face.” He meant the muzzle, in front of him, on a hook. “That’s where I keep it,” he said. “Can you grab it?”

  Vivian did, which provoked a growl from Bill. “Hey, shut up,” Lou hissed.

  He got the muzzle on. Then he gave Vivian the leash. “Go out this door,” he said. “You know the neighborhood?”

  “No.”

  “Go left—I go left. Bill likes to do his duty in the cemetery. You know the cemetery?”

  With the wire cage over his snout, Bill seemed subdued. He sat there panting. Lou touched his head. “Piece a shit,” he said. “Get out of here.”

  Wednesday came. Same drill—intercom, garage door, a half-hour of fussing, going in circles. Vivian walked Bill again. Outfitted in his preventative gear, he was a cinch, meek. He heeled perfectly, and performed discreetly in the cemetery. On Friday, Lou had an article for Vivian, cut from a magazine and folded sharply in half. “Getting Started in Small Business.” In the upper right corner he’d scrawled the magazine’s name, as well as the article’s date of publication. Lou’s handwriting was shaky and archaic. “You need this,” he said. “It’s the basics.”

  “I’ll take a look.”

  Lou gestured magnanimously. “Don’t look,” he said. “Read it.”

  Vivian read it over the weekend. “You were right,” she told Lou on Monday. “To start, I’m getting licensed, bonded, and insured.”

  “I told you,” Lou said.

  “After that,” said Vivian, “my rates go up. They’ll have to—I’m adding costs.”

  “Joker,” answered Lou.

  Each week, Lou had new troubles. His eyeballs looked yellow—in fact, one eyeball now looked bigger than the other. Something in his gut was infected, and whatever it was, it made him slower. His feet swelled. He told Vivian he had a ringing in his ears. His teeth looked darker, except they weren’t his teeth, they were a bridge, she could see, supported by gold crowns. Lou’s doctor told him not to eat anything fatty, not to have a drink, and not to do anything stupid. Meanwhile, he had pills in a dispenser with space for a thirty-day run—plus, he had to take a cab to the pharmacy, because his hip couldn’t handle it when he got behind the wheel. Groceries? Impossible. How would you get down the aisle with a cart? What were you supposed to do with your bags when it was time to carry them out to the cab? On the other hand, Meals on Wheels for breakfast, lunch, and dinner? Insane bills. A minor freebie: he had a friend who lent him videos, so he was watching a lot of flicks he’d missed. Over the last weekend, he’d run through The Hunt for Red October, The Godfather Part III, Pretty Woman, and Dances with Wolves.

  “Dinner on Wheels and a movie,” said Vivian. “The good life.”

  “Pathetic.”

  “What about other needs?”

  “Now you’re talking,” said Lou.

  “I mean toilet paper,” said Vivian. “Going to the post office.”

  “Yes, I wipe my ass,” said Lou. “I got housecleaning service for the bathrooms, the rugs. I—”

  “Say you need dog food,” Vivian countered. “Who goes for dog food?”

  “I’m fine.”

  Lou had Crohn’s disease. He had to have a colostomy. For a while he banished his dog to a holding pen. But then Bill needed walking again. Lou told Vivian it might be time to find Bill another home, because the jerk spent all his time barking and growling. Something was wrong with his fur—there were holes in it. “Bare patches,” said Lou. “He needs a vet. Maybe I’ll have to put a gun to his head. Fucking Bill,” said Lou. “You little bastard.”

  It was Vivian who finally took Bill to a vet. Bill had the mange. He had other problems, too—a heart murmur, wheezy lungs. Vivian had to call Lou to okay Bill’s pills. “What are my options?” Lou asked her.

  “You could have him put down.”

  “Have him put down or spend money on the son of a bitch,” said Lou. “All right, go ahead, blow money on dog pills. I like to throw good money after bad.”

  Lou had kids from two marriages—two boys—and a granddaughter. “I got a problem with Boy Two,” he told Vivian. “He’s an alkie, and I don’t approve of his lifestyle. Boy One’s a frigging straight arrow, but he’s pissed off at me or something. My granddaughter, it’s different, whatever she does is good. I mean whatever she does—it doesn’t matter—but she’s in Guam. She actually lives in Guam. It’s like Mars. And it presents me with these out-a-sight logistical problems. Why couldn’t she be like other people’s grandkids and live in California? I know what I sound like,” Lou said. “You got kids?”

  “Boy. Twenty. Living with his dad and doing nothing right now that I can see.”

  “Ought to go to college,” said Lou. “You ever fly to Guam?”

  “No.”

  “I’ll impress this on you. It’s moon travel.”

  “Thanks.”

  “How she stands it, I don’t know,” said Lou. “I’m starting to think she might be a lesbian. You know how I can tell?”

  “No.”

  “I can’t. She doesn’t make it obvious. But it’s between the lines for me. There’s omissions.”

  Another thing: finances were starting to drive Lou crazy. He had mutual funds, but he would read so much about them—prospectuses, reports—that he lost faith. He had annuities, but they irritated him, he said, “because they’re behind the ball.” The statements Lou got from banks and insurance companies, from Charles Schwab and the IRS—all of it had to be organized and entered into Quicken, but his screen gave Lou headaches. “Look at my eyes,” he told Vivian. “Look close. They’re bloodshot. I got these bags now, double bags, I gotta take my brows between my fingers and lift them up because they’re hanging in my eyes. And my so-called computer. It does its own thing. I had a guy here three months ago to clean up the so-called hard drive, but as far as I can tell, I’m back where I started. Call Hewlett-Packard sometime. You call Hewlett-Packard, you’re on the phone till Christmas. They don’t want to help you; it costs them too much. What I’m saying is obvious. I don’t have to say it. The idea is to bog you down till you surrender. These people are excellent. They evaporate. Poof.”

  Bill slowed down. He was phlegmy, and he hacked. Lou became philosophical about him. “Congestive heart failure,” he told Vivian. “He’s all backed up. His lungs are drowning. Poor fuck,” he said, “he’s shitting on the floor now. I’ve had it up to here with him. Bill’s become a pill. It’s probably time for him to go kaput. What do you think? What’s your opinion?”

  “Maybe,” said Vivian.

  She heard more complaining. Doctors were a source of anguish. “Just because they went to medical school, they now have the right to treat you like shit? Doctor comes in, I make him slow down. I chew his ear off. Come on, let’s talk a little. My theory is, you see sick people every day, pretty soon it’s a living, even if you’re an idealist, even if you think you want to save the world. You see Soylent Green?”

  “No.”

  “You were l
ike six when Soylent Green came out. This movie, they invent a ‘Soylent Green.’ It’s what people eat. And it’s made from geriatrics. You get old, they turn you into—what do they call it—food staples.”

  “Something to look forward to.”

  “Shit,” said Lou.

  Bill died in the mudroom. Vivian wrapped him in an army blanket Lou had in his garage and dropped him at the vet. When she came back, Lou was drinking Crown Royal. “What else?” she asked. “Are you good?”

  “I don’t get sentimental about canines,” Lou growled. “I’ve had seven now, all gone to doggie heaven. I’m drinking in front of you. You want a drink? In there’s the liquor cabinet. You know where it is. I don’t claim to have clean glasses around here. Help yourself, take what you want. To Bill,” he added. “That fucker.”

  “To Bill.”

  “It doesn’t count if you don’t have a drink.”

  “Fine,” said Vivian. “I’ll have one.”

  Lou had decent gin. She poured some over ice. They sat in the living room, facing the picture window, with its view of bark and gravel and of the house across the street. “This is nice of you,” said Lou. “I’ll pay you extra.”

  “Do you get weeds in your beauty bark?”

  “Do I get weeds in my beauty bark.”

  “Growing up, I never saw beauty bark,” said Vivian.

  “They started having it, I don’t know, a while ago, I guess. So what did the vet say?”

  “I didn’t see the vet.”

  “What’s the scenario?”

  “They just took him. I don’t know.”

  “If I wasn’t such an invalid, I’d have buried his royal ass. Save a few dollars, turn him into dirt.”

  “My guess is, they cremate.”

  “With horses,” explained Lou, “they turn them into dog food. So maybe they’ll turn fucking Bill into horse food. I spent time in China, and that’s all a myth. No one eats dogs there. It’s not on the menu. You want to know something? The Germans were eating dogs—I was there. People were eating shoe leather. Whores were a nickel. And people like to say it was the so-called good war. We did Japan about a year before my wife went—a year and three months. We checked out Hiroshima—you want to get depressed? And that was a drop in the bucket by comparison. In my opinion, the doomsday clock is running. But that’s someone else’s problem—I’m checking out. Hey,” said Lou. “Don’t forget.” He raised his glass. “Here’s to Fuckface.”

  “I have to say, he looked great in that muzzle.”

  “Bill was stand-up,” Lou insisted. “I loved his attitude. I admired his bullshit. He’d tear the door down. He’d kill you for looking at him. He had this thing he did with his face.” Lou snarled, curling his upper lip. “ ‘I’m Bill, don’t cross me, I’ll tear your throat out. I’ll rip your head off.’ Fucking king of the jungle. Actually, Bill was a junkyard dog—did I tell you this? I got him from the pound. He was beat down, a slinker. My wife used to give him raw hamburger, with salt.”

  “To Bill,” said Vivian. They drank.

  For a moment, neither of them knew what to say. “You don’t have to stay here,” Lou said. “It’s not like I’m in mourning.”

  “Right.”

  “Fucking dog,” said Lou.

  “Maybe you can get another.”

  “What for?” said Lou. “You angling for work?”

  “Just carrying a conversation. ‘You can always get another dog.’ That’s my line, I have to say it.”

  “True.”

  “But the next dog should be smaller.”

  “You sound like my wife. Harangue, harangue. Needle, needle, needle. Take out the garbage. Get another dog. And make sure it’s a smaller dog—a smaller dog, Louis!” Lou again brought his glass to his lips. “Nostalgia,” he said. “At least I still remember shit. You heard of transient global amnesia?”

  “No.”

  “I got it,” said Lou. “One out of approximately thirty-five thousand people gets it, and I got it. You’re just sitting there. It could happen right now—you’re sitting there, nothing special, no warning, bang, you don’t know where you are or how you got there. This is one of those things,” said Lou. “On top of everything else. I know I’m me, knock on wood, I’m me, but the room? The site? The venue? The place? I could literally be anywhere. I’m lost—I’m clueless. I was told this can happen from blowing your nose. Something as stupid as blowing your nose. The type where you pinch your nostrils closed? They say you can get it from diving into cold water. From sex, I mean, Jesus. Hey, what about that? From vigorous sex, you don’t know where you are? I told them I was willing to do that experiment, free of charge, for the good of science.”

  “Hmmm.”

  “Old guy babbling bullshit,” said Lou. “Let me pay you now, so you can go.”

  Vivian said, “On angling for work. For other clients, I do errands and odd jobs. Whatever they need. So, if you decide you want some help with something.” Vivian shrugged. “I’m available.”

  “Nah,” said Lou. “I don’t need any help.”

  He called a day later. “I thought of something,” he said. “You charge the same rates if it’s not dog walking?”

  “What is it?”

  “Let’s confirm the rate first.”

  “Yes—the same.”

  “Okay,” said Lou. “I need someone to drive over to UPS and pick up a package they’re holding.”

  “What?”

  “Just a package.”

  “I’m not getting involved in anything illegal.”

  “Come on,” said Lou. “I’m geriatric here. The most illegal thing I get into is cutting tags off of mattresses. With dull scissors.”

  She did the errand. He gave her a solid tip. In the package was a new lightweight walker, which she assembled. “Fuck,” said Lou, trying it out. “This is bullshit.”

  “Don’t give up.”

  “Who are you—Winston Churchill? I thought you were Ma-sippi. Hey,” he said. “There’s one more thing. Come in here for a minute. In the kitchen.”

  She unstuck the ice maker by putting a screwdriver up a slot and pushing something. “Another thing,” said Lou. She cleaned the lint trap in his dryer. “One more,” said Lou. “It’ll only take a second.” She started the station wagon’s engine so its battery wouldn’t die. “I’d do it myself,” said Lou, “but you gotta pump that pedal. I ought to sell the thing—it’s like owning a bus. My wife used it. I used to take the seats out and cram it full of crap. You want to buy a station wagon?”

  “No.”

  “I’ll give you a deal.”

  “Do you need help selling your car?” asked Vivian. “I can put an ad in the paper, show it, you sign the title, it’s gone.”

  “Maybe,” answered Lou. “Let me think about that.”

  He sent her to the library. He wanted her to look up Blue Book on the station wagon and make a copy of the page. She was supposed to look for three books he wanted, two on investing and one called Fly Cheap! “I need to drag my ass to Guam,” he said. “One of these days. Guess what? My granddaughter’s pregnant.”

  “I thought she was a lesbian.”

  “I think it’s artificial insemination.”

  “She doesn’t say?”

  “She won’t say.”

  “That’s great,” said Vivian. “Congratulations. That’s wonderful.”

  “I don’t know if it’s so wonderful,” said Lou. “Who the hell knows who the father is?”

  Vivian didn’t answer.

  Lou was hospitalized that week: gut complications. But he got out again the next month. He called and said, “Vivian, it’s me, Lou. Back from the dead. Remember me, Lou? With the Rottweiler?”

  “Hi.”

  “I’m still alive. Missing a few parts, but alive—alive and kicking.”

  “Way to go, Lou. That’s good. I’m happy.”

  “Got a query for you. You do medical? Like a nurse—medical stuff?”

  “No,” sa
id Vivian. “I don’t do medical.”

  “Because for medical your rates would be good,” observed Lou. “For home care. This and that. Medical stuff. I’ve got problems and limitations. I gotta have help. As humiliating as it is, it’s gotta happen.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “Is that a dismissal?”

  “I just don’t do medical.”

  “Some of my stuff’s easy. Errands. Like before.”

  “Call me for those things.”

  “I am calling,” said Lou. “Where do I start? I got a list made up. You want me to read it to you? I’ll read it to you.”

  “Read.”

  “I don’t have it next to me. I’ll have to get up.”

  “Forget it,” said Vivian. “Don’t get up.”

  It turned out Lou had colon cancer, tumors pressing on his colon from all directions—“a lot of them, like thirty,” he said. He needed special bedsheets, special bed pads, an ozone machine, and a visorlike reading magnifier, which, together, took Vivian half a day to locate. He wanted a certain shampoo and certain razors. For his letters of complaint to doctors and insurers he wanted heavy bond paper, with a letterhead of his design in an intimidating font, from Copy Mart. He wanted certain stamps, the ones with flags, and business envelopes, the ones you couldn’t see through. There was a wasp nest under an eave which she could bat down early in the morning, if she was willing to risk it, before the wasps got surly. Vivian hit it with a broom. She sold the station wagon for Lou—all he had to do was sign the paperwork. He broke his glasses—she got him new ones. She shopped his quirky lists—pepperoni sticks, Häagen-Dazs, mouse poison, talcum powder. She got familiar with the rotating home-care nurses, Jean, Toni, and Barb, and the housecleaner, Esmerelda. Jean had a wandering left eye and, because of extra weight, often sounded out of breath. Nothing fazed her, not even Lou’s colostomy bag. When Vivian asked about it, Jean said, “I don’t know. It’s just not gross.”

  “That’s all?”

  “Yeah.”

  “A colostomy bag?”

  “I guess.”

  “It doesn’t gross you out?”

  “No,” said Jean.

  “That I don’t get,” said Vivian.