Year of the Dog Read Online Free Page B

wondering if she cried herself to sleep when he started up with me, or if she ripped out my pictures in the yearbook. Instead, I floated six feet off the ground because I, good serious Janey Daniels, working part-time at the pharmacy after school, had taken Curtis Prentice, hunk, away from Millie Dawson.
    All of this I needed to remind myself about, having just heard from the town’s biggest rumor-spreader, Mom, thatMillie had already been three months pregnant before I knew she’d stolen my one-time husband back.
    Whimpering enough to cause my wagging, padding, pale-faced puppy to settle down at my feet, on her tummy, paws forward, listening for her name, I tried to eat the plate of faux-Caesar salad with chicken I’d put together before the call home. Deciding lettuce didn’t do much for a squirrelly stomach, I added a cold bottle of Magic Hat beer.
    My brain remembered the thrill of that time, when everything about Curtis had stopped my heart. He’d walk down the street moving fast and smooth, like a halfback about to run for a tackle, eating a cone or a burger with one hand, waving to the town with the other. When he started hanging out with me, he talked a lot about my ambition. He wanted to catch some of it, he said, because he wanted to make something out of himself. So when it became clear I liked my job at the pharmacy and wanted to make that my work, he’d stop by, talking to me about what did I think about the emergency medical service, didn’t I think they did more than the doctors?—being right there on the spot when somebody had a heart attack or got themselves in a car accident? He got excited about the EMS, figuring if he worked for them we’d be in the same field: saving lives.
    By the time we got our diplomas, he’d begun riding with the ambulance crew, studying up on first-aid measures. And I guess I started to split in two at that time: trying to get my pharmacy degree and trying to hang onto Curtis. It didn’t take much persuasion to talk me into a wedding while I was still in school at USC. I guess at that time I’d have followed him nude down the street with a rose in my teeth if he’d asked.
    But things worked out differently between me and Curtis from what I’d expected. He gave up on making a living or even getting a lot of satisfaction from riding ambulances. He thought about being a nurse, but his buddies made a lot ofjokes about Nursie Curtis, and he’d given up on that. His dad suggested he try life insurance: Who helped the injured guy the most? Who helped him in his back pocket? So he did that, became a claims adjuster. That might’ve been fine, except that people in town kept telling him his wife had sure been a help, how she’d got their husband off his deathbed. People kept asking him, Are you Pharmacist Daniels’ husband? And then one day somebody brand new to town hollered out the car window, “Afternoon, Mr. Daniels.” And Curtis came home, his face blazing, and shouted at me. “You think you’re the tail, don’t you, Janey? Well, you’re not the tail and you’re not gonna be wagging me.”
    When he took the case for Mr. Dawson, promising to get him a truck-load of money for an injury to his back—some dumb nut hitting his car broadside in a pile-up—he made a trip by the pharmacy to tell me. “I’m gonna get him a bundle. Man just wants to get his car overhauled; I’m gonna get him enough to buy the dealership.”
    â€œIs that Millie’s daddy?” I’d asked. It came out of my mouth, the wrong question, old people in wheelchairs and a couple of regulars waiting, and me, all of a sudden, acting like I was back at Peachland High.
    â€œIf he is, what about it? You don’t remember that I haven’t been with her since the day I nearly broke my ass trying to hook up with you? You don’t remember that? I bet she remembers that. You want me to tell