I worked as a professional house sitter for a while. Why shell out money for my own place when I could just move from one job to the next – holiday watches, winter siestas, families abroad for the season – I hunkered down in some pretty fine quarters. But it wasn’t all china service and feather beds. Consider the Rockford sit, Margot and Harold’s place. This couple was hell-bent on spending their inheritance. Snobby and self-centered, they talked down to common folk.
“Do? We don’t do anything.”
They lived alone in a 6000 square foot ‘cottage’, preaching the virtues of consumption as a vocation, and I had to keep reminding myself they were my new employers. All the while, my subconscious said trash the joint.
The Rockfords wintered in Naples and asked me to drive them to the airport. We took Margot’s sporty red Mercedes. She wanted me to stop at the dry cleaners on the way back and pick up some garments that were ready, so I raced along a busy frontage road, looking for the storefront. It was a lovely afternoon in late fall, the last fade of Indian summer, and I had the top down and the radio up, pretending to be Paul Newman or something. I focused on a parking spot that was opening up along the opposite curb and turned smack into a city bus. The Mercedes folded like it was made of linen. That was my first day on the job.
Right away I got acquainted with their cat, a fat feline with sour digestion. This was the only cat I knew that could belch like a truck driver. Tinkerbelle cried every time she was hungry, which was all the time. I tried staking the fussy puss in the back yard, out of sight, out of mind, but she cut loose with a horrific meow that woke the neighbors. I’d had previous dealings with the County Humane Society and didn’t need any more of their therapeutic interventions.
So I stopped feeding the cat. We were living in the belly of suburbia, after all, an ample sprawl where all creatures were well cared for. Plump songbirds hung out around fancy feeding stations, nibbling on suet cakes and cracked corn, complacent squirrels relaxed on sunny deck rails, kids raised guinea pigs and bunnies – Tinkerbelle would be fine on her own.
I hosted a New Year’s Eve party and had a few friends over. Harold took an African safari years ago. Like Hemingway, he shot up all of Kenya. He had a trophy room which I’d been told was off limits, but I managed to pry the door open with a screwdriver. There were zebra skins spread across the floor, an elephant foot sawed off and used as an end table, lion heads still attached to showy manes, wildebeest, slender gazelles stuffed whole and lounging around like domestic hounds, ashtrays crafted from giraffe tongues – it was grotesque. We partied like savages.
At some point in the evening a large purple balloon got fixed onto the nose of the Cape buffalo. That was his prized mount, centered over the fireplace. We took pictures, danced, and drank all his scotch. Around three in the morning the buffalo shuddered, coughed once and fell, the magnificent beast reduced to shards on the gleaming terrazzo. Try finding a replacement Cape buffalo shoulder mount in upstate New York; or anywhere.
Other caretakers might have packed it in about then, but I’ve always been stubborn. Harold was the North American chairman for Ducks Unlimited. He was crazy about ducks and had a dozen varieties mounted in pairs and hanging in the long hallway that led to his bedroom. There was also a freezer in the garage full of carcasses from the fall hunt. One day I unplugged the freezer to hook up a CD player. I liked to sit in the garage and listen to Patti Smith tunes when I smoked. My intent was to return with an extension cord, but several weeks passed and I forgot about the freezer. I was preoccupied, haggling with the body shop over the mangled Mercedes. They wanted cash upfront, which I didn’t have.
April arrived and Margot returned home a week early to get her house spruced up. She looked around for Tinkerbelle. I told her that we had been exercising together, taking long walks, and the kitty was probably out for a solo jaunt. She got out a dog whistle and honked on that thing until every hound in the neighborhood howled. Sure enough, the cat appeared on the back steps a short while later, looking all sleek and sassy, a splendid creature that now carried herself with confidence, and Margot had tears in her eyes.
After coffee, Margot led me around the property, checking off some concerns. She looked about as crushed as the front of her car when I told her about the accident, but gamely stated that she was glad nobody got hurt. Of course they had insurance. Next topic was the Cape buffalo. She confided that she hated those old trophies, they were a pain to dust, and she thought the sport was barbaric. She was also sure they had another one in storage somewhere. Things were looking up until we got to the freezer. Then she came unplugged. Our conversation went something like this:
“How long has that freezer been like that?”
“Like?”
“Like disabled. It’s April and it’s 60 degrees.”
“Yup, sure is a lovely day.”
“That freezer is full of Harold’s beloved ducks.”
Margot threw open the freezer door and the smell was so bad she fell backward in a dead faint. I caught her before she smacked her melon on the cement, but then I turned and barfed all over the hood of the Mercedes. I raised the garage door a crack and Tinkerbelle yowled and streaked for the street. She ran right through the paperboy who was staggering down the sidewalk with his T-shirt pulled up over his head. It was like a house of cards falling apart when the ceiling fan is turned on, everything going from bad to worse in a hurry. Birds fell from feeders and tender shoots of grass curled up and turned brown.
I dragged Margot into the house by her heels and we took turns holding our heads under cold running water. Then I laid her out on the couch and opened all of the windows. I considered bolting at that moment, but realized the only decent thing to do was clean up the mess. A painting crew had left supplies in the basement so I rummaged through their stuff and found a filter mask, goggles, rubber gloves, and coveralls. This was going to be a real job.
The first thing I did when I returned to the garage was pop in a Patti Smith disc and pump up the volume. Patti was belting out “Summer Cannibals” and I realized she could be singing about me. I wasn’t any different than the Rockford’s or their haughty friends. I didn’t do anything either. I stalked the suburban refuge, fed off the fat like a cannibal; consumed. As I shovelled carrion into a large plastic leaf bag and mopped pools of rancid blood, I sang along with Patti: Eat, Summer Cannibals, Eat-Eat.
I decided to haul the ducks away in my truck, look for a secluded dump site, and then keep on driving, as I had stayed at least one day too long already. But I felt compelled to offer some sort of amends. In consulting my own checklist I realized I had chased away their cat again, ruined the house, Margot’s car, and most likely their very reputation and social standing. Who knows, they might just put the house up for sale and leave too.
So I snuck back inside, figuring I’d write her a farewell note with a half-assed apology. But opening the garage service door sent a wave of putrid air through the house. Margot moaned and rolled off the couch. When she started dry heaving over the Persian rug, I got the hell out of there.
The first dumpster I found was located behind an elementary school. I checked into a Motel Six and saw the report on the evening news. A janitor emptying trash stumbled onto the foul, leaking package. He hefted the bag, considered its lumpy mass. Here was a man who watched crime shows. He called 911.
The cops strung yellow caution tape, set road blocks, and brought in forensic experts, expecting to find hacked up children – but of course the leaf bag only held Harold’s ducks, individually wrapped in freezer paper from the local butcher shop and stamped with his name and address. They brought the bag back to Harold’s house and dumped the rotting pile on his front steps. I curled up in my motel room that night and made changes to my resume. Then I applied to law school.
About the author:
Scott wrote short fiction as a student at Iowa in the late 70′s (my God, that’s a long time ago…) He took some time off to do lots of other things. Now he’s having fun writing fiction again. He has been finishing up a first novel, “The Carnivore of Yod”, and has a flash piece in the Spring 2010 Issue of Burst. He has received grants from The McKnight Foundation and The Five Wings Arts Council.
