14
"I'm gonna get it from ya! Yes, I am! Yes, I am!"
Clancy growled as he gripped the rawhide toy in his sharp little teeth and tried to pull it away from his former master.
Kneeling on the floor, Richie Cordova was amazed that the little terrier still had this much play in him. He had to be ten years old, the equivalent to seventy in a man. Or so they said.
Every so often Richie got this urge to see Clancy and play with him. The divorce agreement granted him visitation rights, but supervised.
Supervised! It still rankled him. What'd the judge think he was going to do, run off with the pooch? Hardly.
The worst part was that he had to visit Clancy in Neva's apartment. She was such a slob. Look at the place. Nothing where it should be and it stank of cigarettes.
A place for everything and everything in its place, Richie always said.
"Neva!" he called.
Her scratchy voice echoed from the kitchen. "Yeah?"
"C'mere a minute, will you?"
She took her sweet time traveling the ten feet or so to the living room. She stood in the archway, wearing a housecoat and puffing a butt.
"What?"
"Don't you ever clean this place? It's a dump."
Her face reddened. "I clean it just fine. I dare you to find a speck of dust."
"I ain't talking about dirt. I'm talking about straightening things up. Everything's tossed every which way. And you've got mail on that table and keys on this table, and—"
"Cram it, Rich. You're allowed to come here to visit Clancy, not bust my chops."
"1 don't think Clancy should have to live in all this clutter."
Shit, he loved this little dog! He never should have allowed Neva custody.
"Clancy's doing just fine. Aren't you, baby?" She bent and slapped the side of her leg. Immediately Clancy forgot about Richie and ran over to her. She scratched his head. "Aren't you, snookums?"
"And I don't think the secondhand smoke is good for his health."
Neva glared at him. "Up yours, Rich. Don't you remember why we split? Not some other man or some other woman: you. You and your neatnik ways. You and your need to control. You make Monk look like Oscar Madison. Everything has to be just so, and yet you walk around—or maybe I should say waddle around—looking like the Goodyear blimp."
Richie said nothing. He wanted to kill her. Slowly.
This wasn't the first time. Every goddamn time he came here it was the same thing: He wound up wanting to wring her scrawny neck. He couldn't think of anyone else on earth who could piss him off this way.
"You still studying those horoscopes every day?" she said. "What a laugh. A guy who wants to control everything and everyone around him thinks his life's being controlled by a bunch of stars a zillion miles away. It's a riot."
"You got no idea what you're talking about. I use them for guidance, that's all."
"Stars are pulling your strings. Ha! You believe in flying saucers too?"
Hauling himself to his feet took a lot out of him. He had to lose some weight soon.
"You're pushing it, Neva."
"Yeah, well why not? You pushed me around for five years. About time someone pushed back."
"Neva…"
"I ain't afraid of you, Richie. Not anymore."
"You should be." Feeling like he was about to explode, he took a step toward her. "You really—"
Clancy bared his teeth and growled. The sound pierced him.
You too, Clancy?
"Fuck the both of you."
Richie Cordova turned and left his ex-wife and his ex-dog to wallow in their shit hole.