Everytime I think that things are starting to settle down, they get weirder.
From my perspective, this started with a missing pug.
I can only imagine where this started from Ricky’s perspective, to say nothing of Araceli’s.
Anyway… yesterday (Wednesday) evening, round about doggy dinner time, I came up one dog short. Polly Prissy Pants was following me around as always, but no matter how loud I called, and no matter where I looked, the Puggy Wonder was absent. This is odd because while he likes his dinner as well as the next dog, his primary motivation is to be around people. Unless there’s a convienent sun beam to nap in, the pug is in whatever room the people are in.
I searched the house, I searched the yard, I searched the garage, I even wandered out to the green belt out back, but there was no pug. I started to panic.
And then I remembered that there was one room in the house I hadn’t touched: Ricky’s.
I went and knocked lightly on the door. I heard nothing, so I knocked a little louder. Still nothing. So I knocked louder still and cracked the door open, and the pug came trotting right over. But, of course, I’d been noticed. And one of the sweetest, nicest voices I’ve ever heard quietly invited me in.
I’ve dubbed Araceli’s mother Joy because she is absolutely the nicest, sweetest person I’ve ever met, and is an absolute joy to talk to. Honest to god, the woman makes me think of that They Might Be Giants song, “She’s An Angel”. We didn’t talk long, I just explained that the pug had been missing, and somehow he’d been trapped in there with them… I think she knew, and didn’t mind. Ricky ignored me through the whole thing. The whole thing was just so surreal. The vibe from Ricky was basically “take the dog and go away”. But the vibe from her was just… I don’t know how to describe it. But being around her is simply a joy.
And, of course, since I was in there, and kind of caught up in the moment, I asked if they needed anything. It just seemed like the polite thing to do. Joy was adament that they were fine, so I took the dogs and closed the door behind me.
Later that evening, Rita invited me to dinner at the Cat Ranch, and I put the incident out of my head. I stayed late, and got home at about 4 AM.
It kind of hurt when Monacita’s alarm went off 4 hours later, but I was well on my way to going back to sleep when there was a knock on the door. It took me a moment to figure out what was going on… Monacita was still in the shower, plus god knows she doesn’t have to knock to come into her own bedroom. I got up, just barely cognicent of the fact that I was wearing a pair of pajama bottoms and nothing else, and managed to open the door and hide behind it at the same time. On the other side of the door was Ricky. He stood there with one hand holding his stomach, looking weak and groaning. I immediately began to wonder whether or not I should call 911.
After a moment the part of my brain controlling speech kicked in, and I asked him if he was okay. After a moment’s thought, he responded in a wheezing, groaning voice, “Please, I’m starving.”
The man was knocking on my door asking for breakfast.
I know for a fact that Araceli has been fighting with him for the last week about food. He requests things, she makes them, then he refuses to eat them. She’s finally started letting have things he’s not supposed to (he’s diabetic) just because he eats so little of anything that it really doesn’t matter. I know that she keeps trying on the off chance that he’ll finally get around to eating. And I KNOW she didn’t just leave them without fixing them something to eat first.
“Araceli didn’t REALLY leave without feeding you, did she?”
He admitted that she hadn’t, but protested that it had only been toast and coffee. I heroically refrained from pointing out that that was because he wouldn’t bother to eat anything else she fixed him.
After another awkward moment, I asked what he wanted, and he responded that he wanted hot cakes.
I looked at him blankly a moment. “Pancakes?” I said stupidly.
“Yeah!” He seemed pretty into the idea.
“I don’t know how to make pancakes.” I said. Some part of my brain had kicked in enough to not bother to explain that since I can’t eat them I don’t bother to know how to cook them. “I can make you oatmeal…”
He muttered something, and then just stood there. (I think he said something about wanting toast and coffee too. I pretended not to hear that part.) I think we stood there for a full minute before I opened my mouth and said the only thing that came to mind: “my clothes live in the other room, so you need to go away so I can go change.”
He muttered something else I didn’t catch, but then went away.
Monacita came out of the shower, and seemed pretty irritated by the whole thing.
I wandered in, brain dead, to try and figure out how to make oatmeal. Turns out it’s pretty easy, even if it doesn’t come in a packet.
When I took him the bowl, he even seemed grateful. And Joy was a dear as always. I didn’t think much more about it until Araceli came home for lunch, and apologized about the whole thing.
And informed me that he didn’t eat any of it.
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