Island Dogs

When I kayaked in to shore early this morning, I was thinking about men. Richard, my brother and captain of the small sailboat tied to a mooring ball in a tiny bay on the back side of one of the British Virgin Islands. And Sam.

Having dragged the kayak over the sand, above the highwater mark, I left it between two of the open-air bars that trailed along the shoreline. The terraces were empty, the town quiet as the islanders began to come in to work as domestics and day laborers; most of the tourists, both boat people and beach people, were still asleep. The faint smell of wood smoke was beginning to drift in from somewhere above the beach. I am here in the Caribbean, instead of back home in the desert, to be with Richard, who is recovering from yet another breakup with yet another woman who doesn’t want to live on a forty-eight foot sailboat. He is forever chasing after women who break his heart.

Sam said goodbye the night before I left for the Islands.

Have a good time.

Say hi to Richard.

We’ll talk when you get back.

Whatever happened to:

Call me whenever you can.

I’ll pick you up at the airport.

Whatever happened to:

I’ll miss you.

Don’t go.

So now I’m here for two weeks of warm weather, Richard’s good cooking, sailing and swimming. There will be plenty of time to help Richard sort through the short stacks of books and CD’s, separating them into his and hers, stowing the keepers in the cabinets in the galley and putting the rest
into plastic bags. There isn’t much. She’d only been on the boat six weeks. I didn’t ask Richard how many days this one had stayed after he asked her to marry him. Her left-behind clothing will go to the charity box of some church on one of the larger islands; I might keep her red and orange hibiscus sarong and one of her sunhats if it doesn’t bother Richard too
much. We’ll trade the books at the bars for ones Richard hasn’t read yet and the CO’s for mangoes and lettuce and fish on the islands that have no markets. At least I didn’ t have to worry about Richard calling her – no forwarding address.

I love the nomad’s life on the boat, and the Carib is my favorite place in the world. The islands rise up out of the water like the tips of the Sangre de Cristo mountains in Northern New Mexico, rough and covered with twisted
scrubby brush. The land itself is dry, but surrounded by the sweet shush of surf and wind. Mostly we’re sailing the smaller islands, the ones with mooring balls in the bays instead of docks, the ones with fewer people, less civilization, more quiet. Cane Garden Bay, on the back side of Tortola, is a small beach town with a grocery, a laundry and diesel.

Santa Fe, where I live when I’m not on the boat, is a desert city in northern New Mexico, high, dry and dusty. Hot in summer, harshly cold in the winter. My house is always dusty, the kitchen counters, the bathroom floor, all covered with that light fine grit, the kind that gets on your skin and your teeth, in your shoes and your hair, and always shows up when you blow your nose.

But Sam’s house. Sam’s house is an oasis of clean in the dustbin that is Santa Fe. Sam isn’t the only man I know who has white carpet, he’s just the only man I know whose white carpet is still white.

Sam’s house is in one of the older neighborhoods of Santa Fe. Nothing special from the outs ide, the same dry and dusty flagstone walk up between the cactus and low ground cover, just like everyone else’s. Sam’s front door is turquoise, the same impossible turquoise as the Caribbean. The doorframe is white, just beginning to blister and peel in the tough New Mexico sun. Sam teaches eighth and ninth grade history in the public schools. He loves his job and loves his students. I don’t think he loves me.

I brushed wet sand off my feet, laced up my running shoes and set off. The road was nearly flat for the first hundred yards or so, then hooked hard to the right and began a wicked climb, one that wouldn’t let up until it reached the spine of the island where one can look down onto the Atlantic
Ocean on one side and the Caribbean on the other.

Just before the bottom of the hill, an American couple walked a pair of mixed breed dogs the size of Australian shepards. The dogs looked like littermates, with the same tan and brown markings and easy gait, except that one trotted with a limp.

I greeted and then passed the Americans, annoyed that they didn’t have their dogs on a leash. But when the dogs turned to follow me, I realized they were island dogs. They both looked well fed, or at least well enough, and one had a worn red collar, the one that didn’t limp. They must have belonged to someone.

I slowed to a walk and was relieved, perhaps unjustly so, when they went past me, tails up and wagging, unneutered males both of them; but then, I am not really a dog person.

They trotted by, turned to go up the road and stopped, looking back at me, waiting. The one with the limp stood on three legs, a canine Captain Ahab favoring his left front paw; they both panted in the hot tropic morning, long pink tongues hanging down like the sailboat’s telltale on a calm day.

I went on a bit and they stayed with me, pausing frequently to look back, not impatiently, just to make sure I was still there. Fine. So today I run with dogs.

The neighbor’s dog barked once in the still New Mexican morning air, but it was only me. I slid my key into Sam’s lock and let myself in.

I shouldn’t have gone, I guess, but I didn’t know what else to do. I was leaving in a few hours and my favorite swimsuit was still in the drawer in Sam’s bedroom, the drawer I appropriated when I started staying over sometimes. I didn’t like hauling all that stuff around in my gym bag. Deodorant’s one thing, but after the day the only tampon I had in my bag was gummy and damp from my toothbrush, I started leaving stuff at Sam’s.

I closed the door behind me and toed out of my shoes, leaving them on the hemp mat just inside the door. I remember the first time I saw Sam sweep under the mat- the dust patterns, mostly red, were intricate like the sand paintings of the Navajo, beautiful, spiderwebby circles and wavy lines. He lifted the mat off the smooth hickory floor and the top layer danced up into the air and hung there, twisting and turning and glittering in the desert sun. And then gone, swept off the floor and out the door, last traces damp mopped, last motes pulled out of mid-flight by the ionizer in the air conditioner, whirring quietly, constantly in the corner.

I stepped off the rug, past the memories, and through the entryway. Sam was at school, wouldn’t be home until long after I left. I padded across the living room, toward the bedroom, my wool socks slippery on the hardwood floor. It’s cold in Santa Fe in February, and I don’t like to be cold. And I don’t like to sleep alone.

The run up Tortola’s highest hill lasted twenty yards before the road pitched upward again and I had to slow to a walk. The road was lined with crushed aluminum beer cans, empty cardboard boxes, discarded clothing and other castoffs. One of the dogs made an easy leap to the top of the stone wall that served as both fence and token guardrail, scattering a small herd of goats on the other side. They didn’t seem interested in the scruffy little island chickens.

Ahab heard the first one coming before I did. He stopped in the middle of the pavement, between me and the approaching car, grinding in its lowest gear down the steep road. I lifted my hand to the driver. Ahab wheeled and
charged, barking and snapping at the back of the car. Steady Freddy watched him go by, then looked back to me again, as if to say no big deal, are you coming? Happy from the chase, tail wagging, Ahab loped to catch up.

By the time we reached the overlook, six or seven cars and pickup trucks have been threatened and chased. A couple of drivers just ignored the small dog with the big bark and the slight limp. Most slowed down, but one sped up and swerved toward him, just missing him.

I stood at the top of the island, looking east over the steely grey Atlantic, my back to the stark turquoise of the Caribbean bay to the west, thinking about dogs and men. I have a friend back home who says dogs are more easily housebroken than men. I don’t think that’s true. Sam keeps a cleaner house than I do, and Richard’s boat is cleaner yet.

Sam’s bedroom is light and airy, with the big bay window beside the bed, the center glass double-hung and all double paned to keep out the summer heat and the winter cold. The window looks out over the arroyo that separates Sam and his neighbors from the houses behind them. Sam’s bonsai trees are arrayed across the dark blue tile of what used to be a window seat. The loamy smell of wet dirt lingers low in the air by the window. Sam waters -Lhe bonsai every day, even in the winter. They are spare and stark miniature trees, but they are not creatures of the desert. Not like me or like the cactus and yucca and yarrow outside the house. Under the smell of the bonsai is the sharp bite of lemon and ammonia.

On our first month anniversary, I gave Sam a bonsai tree, a tiny pine, not much bigger than a teacup. Not a desert creature either, but I was trying to compromise. Sam never made room for it on the window seat.

Five months later, I knelt on the white carpet to get my suit from the bottom drawer. It was so quiet in there, the windows closed up, the rhythmic click of the electric floorboard heaters, and the bonsai, just waiting. I needed my suit. Really. I did.

I dug through my stuff, looking for my green suit, faded and smelling faintly of chlorine and salt. Toothbrush, hairbrush, assorted tampons and condoms, t-shirts, socks. I snagged my favorite bra, pushed it into my pocket. But no suit.

The bonsai I had given Sam was no longer on top of the dresser. Neither was the framed photo of us, at the Pueblo in Taos, I had given him on our second month anniversary.

Sam had offered to help me carry my things to my car.

I ‘ll help you.

I didn’t want help.

A clean break. He didn’t look at me, but I think he actually meant it. It’ll be easier this way, if you take your things now and let me have my key back.

I didn’t want to take my things. I didn’t want to leave Sam’s key.

Could we talk about this?

There’s nothing left to talk about. He held out his hand for the key, but I couldn’t. I just couldn’t. I knew I had to let him go, but not yet. Not yet.

Okay. Sam put his hands in his pockets. Those warm, gentle hands that used to… We’ll talk when you get back.

But I knew we wouldn’t, that he wouldn’t change his mind. He’s like that when he decides something. Like how he always sweeps the dust out from under the hemp mat by the front door. I didn’t want to talk. I wanted Sam.

In the early morning, that last day in Santa Fe, after Sam had gone to work and I went to look for my suit, I dumped everything back into the drawer and banged it shut. My tiger striped panties caught on the side, sticking out and keeping the drawer from going all the way in. I yanked the drawer back out, shoved everything down, scraping my wrist on my hairbrush, and slammed it shut. My hairbrush used to be on top of the dresser, along with the tiny pine bonsai, and now it was shut away in the drawer. Sam must have thrown the little tree away. Or had taken it to school and given it to
the botany teacher. Or to one of his precious students.

I crawled to the side of the bed, Sam’s side, ignoring my CD’s and books stacked in a box by the nightstand. I tugged the covers out from under the mattress and got in. I clung to the life raft of we’ll talk when you get back. He hadn’t changed the sheets yet and the bed still smelled of him, of male sweat and goodbye sex.

I turned my face into the pillow and inhaled the faint peppermint scent of his soap.

Freddy, the island dog, flopped in the long morning shade of a short, wind-bent tree at the top of Tortola, panting and waiting. It was already hot, the air heavy with the scent of litter and goats. Ahab marked the stone guardrail in a couple of spots and sniffed at a small mound of trash. Sam would have loved the view; Richard would have loved someone, anyone to share it with. I stretched a bit, my knees aching from the climb, then started back down the hill, wary of the loose gravel covering the cement pavement in large patches.

The driver of one pickup truck, going past a second time, returning from whatever early morning errand had taken him over the hill, slowed enough to ask me if they were mine. No way! I called back over Ahab’s loud barking.

It was like being shadowed in the mall by a pair of adolescent boys, one of who is behaving badly. They’re not my dogs, I wanted to shout to the drivers who glared at me when they went by. Sometimes, when I was a sophomore in high school and Richard was nine, I used to feel that way about him. I don’ t know that kid, I’d shrug, walking six steps ahead of him at the store or the library or the movies. He’s not my brother. One time, he followed me and two of my friends all the way to the girls’ dressing room at Sweet Sixteen. He lasted twenty minutes after we’d slammed the door on him, giggling and talking about boys, before he started to whimper.

I wanna go home.

Big baby, one of my friends said.

When are we gonna go home?

Don’t you know when you’ re not wanted?

I cracked the door open and hissed at him to be quiet, to stop making such a fuss or I’d really make him cry. He wanted to be with me so bad, he’d curled up on the floor, right in front of the door. I thought I’ d die from the embarrassment.

But I never left him behind.

I heard it – a small thump. The joyous barking cut short and punctuated by a canine shriek. The car never slowed down. I turned to look, but Freddy didn’t. Ahab, his limp more pronounced, loped to catch up to us, tail wagging, panting, head up as if to say it had been well worth it. But he let the next three cars go by without so much as a longing glance.

We were nearly down off the hill, just above the turn into town, when he couldn ‘t help himself any longer. Barking and snapping, he started up again, rushing the cars going by. You ought to be on a leash, I growled. On second thought, I glared at the two dogs, both of you ought to be on leashes!

I just wanted to run down, back to the kayak and the beach, to get away from the possibility of something really awful happening, but the hill was too steep. I’d like to think I wouldn’t have been cowardly about it, but I’d already decided that if he got badly hurt or even killed I was going to keep
going, leave him on the road, and report it to someone, anyone, when I got back to the little town on the beach. Sam would know how to help a broken dog, where to find a vet before anything was open, how to comfort without being bitten. Even Richard would have been unafraid. I tried to pick up the pace, but not enough to risk falling on the gravel.

Far below, the boat rocked on the in-coming tide, the mast swaying above the tightly furled sails. A haven at the end of my run . My favorite green suit hung over the railing to dry, the suit that had turned up in the bottom of my duffel once I’d gotten to the boat, the suit I hadn’t left at Sam’s.

I saw him misjudge the distance and get hit by the truck. He wasn’t run over, just clipped on the side of the head by the bumper, a sick thud of metal to flesh and bone. He yelped, I cringed, and even his littermate turned to look.

Ahab limped along, slowing every few steps to shake his head, pawing at his ear. Incredibly, there was no blood, no ear ripped off, no skull crushed. His spine wasn’t broken, leaving him to drag his back legs behind him, crippled like a seal on the beach. And it wasn’t the last truck he chased that day.

The two dogs followed me all the way back in to town, to the top of the crumbling concrete steps leading down to the beach, where I’d tied up the kayak. There they turned to follow a trio of Canadians, one of the women cooing and calling them good dogs.

The dogs trotted along with the Canadians toward where the road began to climb and the traffic grew thicker as the island came fully awake. I watched them go, thinking about men and women. And dogs. How they only chase you when you run. I wondered which truck, bumping over a furry body, would be Ahab’s last one.

As for putting them on leashes, I know that’s a bad idea. The smart ones you don’t have to worry about. They go where they want to go, see what they want to see, generally keep you company, and stay out of traffic. The others I’m not sure can be helped.

Maybe it runs in the family. Richard and Ahab and me. The dogs and the Canadians disappear around the first bend in the road. I turn to look for a phone to call Sam.