“What does that mean? Reactive to what?”
Mae clears her throat. “Most things. People. Dogs. A garbage can that looks at him the wrong way. It’s okay, it’ll be fine. I have a crate in the car. And you might have to leash Cinnamon when we’re all here.” Cinnamon looks offended. “I’ll wear him, just in case,” Mae goes on. “I should be doing that anyway.”
“How do you wear a dog?” cries Evangeline, fascinated. Natalie imagines a dog in a BabyBjörn.
“I put a leash around my waist, and I attach him to it. That way I keep him safe, and I can teach him things as I go about my day.”
“Attachment parenting at its best,” says Natalie.
She’s kidding, but there’s Mae, nodding seriously and saying, “You know what? I’m glad you brought Cinnamon. She’ll be a great practice dog. She’s so mellow.” Natalie doesn’t know what a practice dog is but she figures it’s all there in the context.Bang bang, goes the upstairs guest.Scratch.
“What is your trainee? Part elephant? All elephant?”
“Phant,” instructs Caspian sternly.
“No, he’s—” Mae glances at the kids. “Doesn’t matter. He’s a mix. He’s a rescue. He’s a good boy, just a little anxious. We’re working through it. I’ll go get him before he knocks the door down.”
“I’ll get our bags. Scarlett, why don’t you help me. Evangeline, keep an eye on Caspian. Caspian, keep an eye on Cinnamon.” (Cinnamon doesn’t need an eye, but as she’s said on her parenting Substack,it’s important for the youngest member of the family to feel a sense of responsibility as early as possible.)
When she and Scarlett return with the luggage Mae is in the kitchen, filling a glass at the sink. Around her waist is some sort of belt, and clipped to the belt is a dog leash. At the end of the leash, sitting next to Mae with his eyes fixed on her, is a gray dog with short legs, a short snout, and a wide white stripe down the center of his face. His chest, which is also white, looks so strong he could have just come from a CrossFit gym.
“This is Leo,” says Mae. “Don’t say hi right now. I’m working with him. Leo, you’re okay. Good boy. Stay.” Leo whines and rolls his head toward Mae; Natalie can see the whites of his eyes. Mae puts down her water glass and feeds Leo a steady stream of small treats from a pouch clipped to her waist contraption.
“Um, Mae. Is Leo a pit bull?” says Natalie. She takes Scarlett by the shoulder and backs her up.
Mae turns and moves to the far corner of the kitchen, keeping Leo right next to her.
“Only part,” she says. “Do you mind keeping your voice calm? ”
“You brought a pit bull with aggression issues around my children?” Natalie feels her voice go up an octave or two.
Mae sighs. “He’s not aggressive. He’s reactive. They’re not the same—”
Natalie cuts her off. “Where’s Cinnamon? Where are Evangeline and Caspian?”
“I asked Eva to—”
“Evangeline,” corrects Natalie. Natalie doesn’t allow nicknames.
“—keep Cinnamon and Caspian in the living room. I didn’t want to introduce the dogs yet. I thought that might trigger Leo.” She’s not looking at Natalie so she doesn’t see how dramatically Natalie rolls her eyes at that one. “You know what? I’ll grab the crate from the car.”
“Uh, yeah,” says Natalie, more snarkily than she means to. “Good idea.”
As Mae walks away Natalie can see that there are new tattoos on the back of one of her calves too. Natalie thinks her mother might turn over in her grave if she saw Mae now. Of course she would never use that phrase. It’s a ridiculous phrase, it defies logic (anyway, Theresa’s body had been cremated), and Natalie is a logical person. She’d been captain of the speech and debate team in high school. They’d gone to nationals twice. She’d been told throughout her education that she should drop data science and go to law school; she’d even gone so far as to take the LSAT. She’d scored really high, especially on the logical reasoning section.
“Let’s go find your brother and sister,” she says to Scarlett. “Then we can bring our things upstairs and unpack.”
Mae and Leo are back before she’s made her way upstairs—packing three children for six days is not that different from packing an entire household to move across the country forever. Mae is carrying a folded-up dog crate with one hand and using her other hand to keep Leo at her side. If Natalie weren’t so peeved about the whole situation, she might have been impressed.
“I just don’t know why you brought a weird dog on a family bonding week, Mae,” she says. “It’s going to become a whole thing.”
Mae unfolds the crate—she’s like a magician with that thing—and scatters a handful of treats on the crate’s padded floor. She whisks the dog inside, fastens the door, and turns to face Natalie.
“It won’t become a thing,” says Mae. “I have it under control. And he’s not weird. He’s just struggling with a few things. Who isn’t, right?” Her voice starts to wobble and then her eyes fill. “Also, I didn’t have a choice, okay?”
“Hello, sunshine!” their mother used to say when Mae toddled into the kitchen as a little girl, as an eight-year-old, at sixteen (nottoddling, obviously, by that age). And Mae would smile her beautiful, sunny smile. They’d all babied her; it was impossible not to. Her terrible twos had been un-terrible; what was supposed to be her teenage angsty years were remarkably calm. Maybe she’d been saving up and was going to have all of her bad years now, in her late twenties, with no mother to help her through.
“Aw, Mayday,” she says. She opens her arms and Mae steps into them; she’s enough shorter that Natalie can rest her chin on top of Mae’s head, right in her thick, glossy hair. Natalie is the tallest of the Shipman girls. Take that, birth order, she used to think during her own angsty teenage years, when she thought the world was against her (it wasn’t) and that being the middle child meant she’d always be forgotten one way or another (it didn’t). “I’m sorry,” Natalie goes on. “I don’t mean to be so cranky. I’m sure it’ll be fine. It’s just a few days. We can all pitch in to make it work. Dad and Jordan will be here soon, and unless there’s something I don’t know, they’re not bringing any dogs!”
