Hearing no response, Betty glances over at Liz in the passenger seat. "You're certainly quiet this morning," she says.
"I'm just thinking," Liz answers. She hopes she won't get fired on her first day.
Aside from the odd babysitting job, Liz never had a "real job" before. Not that she would have minded having a job. She even offered to get one at the mall when Zooey had, but her parents wouldn't let her. "School's your job," her father was fond of saying.
And her mother was in agreement: "You have your whole life to work." Liz's mother certainly had been wrong about that one, Liz thinks with a smirk.
What troubles her is this business of speaking Canine. What if she couldn't pick it up and was fired soon thereafter?
"I remember my first job," Betty says. "I was a hatcheck girl at a nightclub in New York City. I was seventeen years old, and I had to lie and say I was eighteen. I made fifty-two dollars a week, which seemed like a great deal of money to me at the time." Betty smiles at the memory.
As Liz gets out of the car, Betty snaps her picture with an old Polaroid camera. "Smile, doll!" Betty commands. Liz forces her mouth muscles into a position that she hopes will resemble a smile.
"Have a nice day, Liz! I'll pick you up at five!" Betty waves.
Liz nods tensely. She watches Betty's red car drive away, fighting the urge to run after it. The Division of Domestic Animals is housed in a large A-frame building across the street from the Registry. The building is known as the Barn. Liz knows she has to go inside, but she finds she can't move. She breaks into a sweat, and her stomach feels jittery. Somehow, it reminds her of the first day of school. She takes a deep breath and walks to the entrance. After all, the only way to absolutely ensure things will go badly is to be late.
Liz opens the door. She sees a harried woman with kind green eyes and a mass of frizzy red hair.
The woman's denim overalls are covered in a mix of dog hair, cat hair, and what appears to be greenish feathers. She holds out her hand for Liz to shake. "I'm Josey Wu, the head of the DDA.
Are you Aldous's friend Elizabeth?"
"Liz."
"Hope you don't mind dog hair, Liz."
"Nah, it's just a little present dogs like to leave behind."
Josey smiles. "Well, we've got a lot to do today, Liz, and you can start by changing into these."
She tosses Liz a pair of denim overalls.
In the bathroom where Liz changes into the overalls, a medium-sized, rather rangy, blondish dog of indeterminate lineage (in other words, a mutt) is drinking from a toilet.
"Hey, girl," Liz says to the dog, "you don't have to drink from there."
The dog looks up at her. After a moment, the dog cocks her head curiously and speaks. "Isn't that what it's for?" she asks. "Why else would they fill a low basin thingy with water? You can even get fresh water by pressing this little handle, right?" The dog demonstrates, flushing the toilet with her left paw.
"No," says Liz gently, "it's actually a toilet."
"Toilet?" the dog asks. "What's that?"
"Well, it's a place where people go."
"Go? Go where?"
"Not where,'' Liz says delicately.
The dog looks at the bowl. "Good Lord," she says, "you mean to say all this time I've been drinking from a place where humans pee and . . . ?" She looks on the verge of throwing up. "Why didn't anyone ever tell me? I've been drinking from toilets for years. I never knew. They always had the door closed."
"Here," says Liz, "let me get you some fresh water from the sink." Liz locates a little bowl and fills it with water. "Here, girl!"
The dog laps up the water excitedly. After she is finished, she licks Liz on the leg. "Thanks. Now that I'm thinking about it, I think my two-leggers tried to tell me about the whole toilet thing before.
My man, Billy he was called, was quite conscientious about shutting the lid." Lick lick lick. "Had I known, I certainly would have stopped drinking from toilets a long time ago," she says. "I'm Sadie, by the way. What are you called?"
"Liz."
"Nice to meet you, Liz." Sadie holds out her paw for Liz to shake. "I just died last week. It's weird here."
"How did you die?" Liz asks.
"I was chasing a ball and I got hit by a car," Sadie says.
"I was hit by a car, too," says Liz, "only I was on a bike."
"Did you have a dog?" Sadie wants to know.
"Oh yes, Lucy was my best friend in the whole world."
"You want a new dog?" Sadie cocks her head.
"You mean you, don't you, girl?" Liz asks.
Sadie lowers her head shyly.
"I don't know if my grandmother will let me, but I'll ask tonight, all right?"
Josey enters the bathroom. "Great, Liz, I'm glad to see you met Sadie," Josey says as she scratches the dog between the ears. "Sadie is your first advisee."
Sadie nods her soft yellow head.
"Aldous didn't mention you speak Canine, by the way," Josey says.
"About that," Liz stammers, "I don't."
"What do you mean?" asks Josey. "I just heard you have a whole conversation with Sadie."
And then it dawns on Liz. She was speaking to Sadie.
Liz grins. "I've never spoken it before. Or at least, I never knew I was."
"Well, looks like you're a natural. Remarkable! I've only met a handful of natural Canine speakers in my whole life. You're sure you weren't taught somewhere?"
Liz shakes her head. "I just always seemed to understand dogs, and they always seemed to understand me." She thinks of Lucy. She thinks of that dog in the park. "I never knew it was a language, though. I never knew it was a skill."
"Well, looks like you were destined to work here, Liz," Josey says, patting Liz on the back. "Come on, let's step into my office. If you'll excuse us, Sadie."
Sadie looks at Liz. "You'll remember to ask your grandmother, right?"
"I promise." Liz scratches Sadie between the ears and leaves the bathroom.
"So, as a counselor for the Division of Domestic Animals, your job basically entails explaining to the new dog arrivals everything about life on Elsewhere and then placing them in new homes. For some of the dogs, speaking to you will be the first conversation they've ever had with a human. It can get rather hairy, in both senses of the word." This is obviously not the first time Josey has made this joke.
"Is it very difficult?" Liz asks.
"Not really. Dogs are a lot more flexible than humans, and even though we don't always understand dogs, dogs understand us pretty well," Josey replies. "Since you already speak Canine, you're halfway there, Liz. Everything else you can learn as you go along."
"What about other animals?" Liz asks.
"As a DDA counselor, you'll mainly deal in dogs, of course, but within our division, we also deal with all household pets: cats, some pigs, the occasional snake, guinea pigs, and so on. The fish are the worst; they die so quickly, they spend most of their time just swimming back and forth."
At that moment Sadie pokes her head into Josey's office. "You haven't forgotten, right?"
"No, but I'm sort of busy right now, Sadie," Liz answers. Sadie lowers her head and slinks out the door.
Josey laughs, then whispers, "You know, you can't take all the dogs home with you."
"I heard that!" Sadie calls out from the other room.
"And you'll find they all have excellent hearing," Josey says. "Let's find you an office, Liz."
After Sadie, Liz's next advisee is an insecure little Chihuahua named Paco.
"But where's Pete?" Paco asks, his intense little eyes darting around Liz's new windowless office.
"I'm sorry, but you probably won't see Pete anytime soon. He's still on Earth," Liz says to Paco.
"Do you think Pete's mad at me?" Paco asks. "I sometimes pee in his shoes when he leaves me home alone too long, but I don't think he notices. Maybe he notices? Do you think he notices? I'm a bad, bad, bad dog."
"I'm sure Pete isn't mad at you. Yo
u can't see him because you died."
"Oh," says Paco softly.
Finally, Liz thinks to herself. "Do you understand now?" Liz asks.
"I think so," says Paco, "but where's Pete?"
Liz sighs. After a moment, she begins her explanation one more time. "You know, Paco, for the longest time, I wasn't sure where I was either ..."
When Liz leaves work that night, Sadie follows her to Betty's car.
"Who's this?" Betty asks.
"This is Sadie," Liz says. And then she lowers her voice. "Is it all right?"
Sadie looks expectantly at Betty.
Betty smiles. "Seems like Sadie's already made up her mind." Sadie licks Betty's face. "Oy!
Welcome to the family, Sadie. I'm Betty."
"Hi, Betty!" Sadie hops into the backseat. "Did I tell you that I was named for a Beades song? My full name's Sexy Sadie, actually, but you don't have to call me Sexy unless you want to. I mean, it's a little presumptuous, don't you think?"
"What's she saying?" Betty asks Liz.
"Sadie says she's named after some Beades song," Liz translates.
"Oh sure, I know that song." Betty sings, " 'Sexy Sadie, what have you done?' Or something like that, right?"
"That's the song!" Sadie says. "That's exactly it!" She places a paw on Betty's shoulder. "Betty, you're a genius!" Sadie barks a few bars of the song.
Liz laughs again, a pretty, twinkly laugh.
"What a lovely laugh you have, Liz," Betty says. "I'm not sure I've ever heard it before."
The Well
Despite her modest salary at the DDA, Liz quickly pays back all of Betty's eternims. She soon finds she has a great deal of spare ones and nothing really to spend them on. She lives with Betty and pays a small amount for her room and board; she doesn't need health insurance or car insurance (unfortunately) or renter's insurance or any other sort of insurance; she doesn't have to save for a down payment on a house or retirement or college or her children's college or a lavish wedding or a rainy day or anything else. She doesn't go to the OD anymore. She would buy a car, but what would be the point when she can't drive anyway? When you aren't preparing for old age, senility, sickness, death, or children, there is relatively little to spend on, Liz thinks with a sigh.
"Aldous," Liz asks during her monthly progress meeting, "what am I supposed to do with all these eternims?"
"Buy something nice," Aldous suggests.
"Like what?"
Aldous shrugs. "A house?"
"I don't need a house. I live with Betty," Liz answers. "What is the point of going to work if I don't really need the eternims anyway?"
"You go to work," Aldous pauses, "because you like it. That's why we call it an avocation."
"Oh, I see."
"You do like your work, don't you, Elizabeth?"
"No," Liz answers after a moment's reflection, "I love it."
It had been just over a month since Liz began her avocation. In that time, she had become known as one of the best counselors at the Division of Domestic Animals. She was in that rare and enviable situation: she excelled at her work, and she loved doing it. Work helped the rest of her first summer in Elsewhere pass quickly. Work took her mind off the fact that she was dead.
She worked long hours, and what little time was left, she spent with Betty, Sadie, or Thandi. (Liz apologized to Thandi not long after she started at the DDA, and was quickly forgiven.) Liz tried not to think about her mother or her father or her old life on Earth. For the most part, she was successful.
Liz even convinced Thandi to adopt the confused Chihuahua Paco. Initially, Thandi was skeptical.
"You sure it's a dog? Looks more like a little rat to me."
Paco was skeptical, too. "I don't mean to be rude," he said, "but why aren't you Pete?"
"I'm Thandi. You can think of me as New Pete."
"Oh," said Paco thoughtfully, "I think I finally understand. You're saying Petedied. Is that it?"
Paco had drowned in a kiddie pool, which he had apparently forgotten again.
"Sure, you can think of it that way if it suits you." Thandi patted Paco gingerly on the head.
Many nights after work, the two girls walk Paco and Sadie in the park near Liz's house. On one of those evenings, Liz asks Thandi, "Are you happy?"
"No point in being sad, Liz." Thandi shrugs. "The weather's nice here, and I like being on TV."
"Do you remember when I thought everything was a dream?" Liz asks. "I can't believe I ever thought that, because now it seems like everything on Earth, everything that came before ... It sometimes seems like that was the dream."
Thandi nods.
"Sometimes," Liz says, "I wonder if this is all there is. Just our jobs, walking the dogs, and that's it."
"What's wrong with this?" Thandi asks.
"It's just, don't you ever long for a bit of adventure, Thandi? A bit of romance?"
"Wasn't dying enough of an adventure for you, Liz?" Thandi shakes her head. "Personally, I've had just about all the adventure I can take."
"Yes," Liz answers finally, "I suppose you're right."
"I think you're already on an adventure, and you don't even know it," Thandi says.
And yet one thing tugs at Liz's mind. Liz's father's forty-fifth birthday is the week after next.
Several months before his birthday, Liz had been in the Lord & Taylor's Men's Department with Zooey. While Zooey had been comparing silk boxer shorts to buy for her boyfriend John on Valentine's Day (tiny glow-in-the dark cupids? Pairs of polar bears locked in perpetual kisses?), Liz had spotted a sea green cashmere sweater that was the exact color of her father's eyes. The sweater cost $150, but it was absolutely perfect. Liz had the money saved from several months of babysitting. The logic part of her brain had begun to protest. It's nowhere near your father's birthday, it said. It's a bit extravagant, it insisted. Maybe you could get Mom to pay for it, it taunted. Liz had ignored the voice. She knew if she didn't buy the sweater right then, it probably wouldn't be there when she went back for it. (It had never occurred to Liz that shemight not be there.) Besides, she hadn't wanted her mother to buy it; she had wanted to buy it herself. There was something more honest about it that way. She had taken a deep breath, plunked the money on the counter, and bought the sweater. As soon as she got home from the mall, she had wrapped the sweater and written out a card. She had hidden the package in the narrow space underneath a loose floorboard in her closet, where she was quite confident no one would ever find it.
Of all the things that could be bothering Liz, the thought that her father might never receive the sweater irrationally torments her. Her father would never know that she would spend $150 of her own moneyon him. Her father might move from their house never finding her gift, never knowing that Liz had loved him enough to buy him the perfect sea green sweater. It would remain hidden, eventually attracting moths and deteriorating into unidentifiable shreds of perfect sea green cashmere. A sweater that beautiful, Liz thinks, is not meant for such a tragic end.
She knows that Contact is illegal, yet she refuses to believe that getting one insignificant sweater to her father could really cause that much trouble. If anything, she is sure it will facilitate her father in the grieving process.
And so for the second time, Liz decides to dive to the Well. She already has the equipment, and this time she actually has a good reason. Besides, life is better with a little adventure.
Liz arrives at the beach at sunset. The dive to the Well is the most ambitious one Liz has ever attempted. She doesn't know exactly how deep it will be or what she'll find when she gets to the lowest point. Liz pushes those concerns to the back of her mind. She checks the gauge on her Infinity Tank one last time and begins to swim.
The deeper Liz dives, the darker the water becomes. All around her, she senses the presence of other people. Presumably, they are also going to the Well. Occasionally, she discerns indistinct shapes or odd rustlings, lending her descent an eerie, almost haunted feeling.
/> Finally, Liz reaches the Well. It is the saddest, quietest place she has ever been. It looks like an open drain at the bottom of a sink. Intense light pours out of the opening. Liz peers over the edge, into the light. She can see her house on Carroll Drive. The house appears faded, like a watercolor painting left in the sun. In the kitchen, Liz's family is just sitting down to dinner.
Liz speaks into the Well. Her voice sounds garbled from being underwater. She knows she has to choose her words carefully, if she is to be understood. "THIS IS LIZ. LOOK UNDER THE
CLOSET FLOORBOARDS. THIS IS LIZ. LOOK UNDER THE CLOSET FLOORBOARDS."
At Liz's old house, all the faucets simultaneously turn on: every shower and every sink, the dishwasher, even the toilet gurgles. Liz's family looks at one another, perplexed. Lucy barks insistently. "That's odd," Liz's mother says, getting up to turn off the kitchen sink.
"Must be something wrong with the plumbing," Liz's father adds before going to turn off the shower and the bathroom sink.
Only Alvy remains at the table. He hears the faintest high-pitched something coming from the faucets, though he isn't able to identify what it is. From the Well, Liz watches him push his hair back behind his ears. His hair is so long, Liz thinks. Why hasn't anyone cut his hair?
Having turned off all the faucets, Liz's mother and father return to the table. About five seconds later, the water starts up all over again.
"Well, I'll be damned," Liz's father says, standing to turn off the water for the second time.
Liz's mother is about to stand when suddenly Alvy pushes his chair away from the table. "STOP!"
he yells.
"What is it?" Liz's mother asks.
"Be quiet," Alvy says with remarkable authority for a person of eight, "and please don't touch the sink."
"Why?" Liz's parents ask the question in unison.
"It's Lizzie," Alvy says quietly. "I think I can hear Lizzie."
At this point, Liz's mother begins to sob. Liz's father looks at Alvy. "Is this some kind of a joke?"
he asks.
Alvy puts his ear up to the spigot. He can just make out Liz's voice.
"ALVY, IT'S LIZ. THERE'S SOMETHING FOR DAD UNDER THE FLOORBOARDS IN MY