Catsby: A Novel

Chapter 20

The day seemed to go on forever. Just when I was beginning to think Dandelion would leave her family and move in with Catsby—God knows there was enough room even if she brought her eleventy-thousand children—she returned home to New York.

That afternoon wasn't the last time I saw her around Chalet Catsby. Not by a long shot. As the summer wore on, she visited the Jersey Shore several times a week. How she did so without raising her husband's suspicions was beyond me, but I suppose he was tied up with his mistress. For my part, I kept my mouth shut about the whole thing. Other people's problems, yo.

Around the first of August, I was shooting clay pigeons in one of Catsby's living rooms when the doorbell rang. Catsby and Dandelion were aboard his boat, I think. They'd invited me—they always did—but I'd declined. In my experience, third wheels only work on tricycles. I waited a minute for the butler to answer the door, but he was obviously preoccupied. Whenever Catsby left the house, he seemed to disappear. When the cat's away....

I opened the door a crack. A timid-looking fellow wearing thick-rimmed glasses and a fedora was standing on the doorstep, rocking back and forth on his feet.

"Can I help you?" I asked, shotgun still in hand.

He gulped. "I'm, uh, looking for Mr. Catsby."

"He's not available," I said. "Can I take a message?"

"I'm a reporter with the Daily Peanut," the man choked out. Ah. I'd known a few reporters back in my college days, but hadn't realized they were still around. The Great Recession had killed off most of the newspapers. These days, most of them just sat at home in their underwear banging out thousand-word recaps of episodic TV shows.

"What's this regarding?" I asked.

"Just wondering if he has, uh, anything to say, about—"

I slammed the door in his face before he could finish. Like I had time for his stammering act? I was stinking drunk at one in the afternoon, answering the door in my old hospital gown. You might say I'd been in a bit of a funk since breaking things off with Cordon. After that passionate day in Times Square, we hooked up a few more times, the last of which was around the middle of July. I know it was after Independence Day, because she'd already won the world-famous Statham's Hot-Dog Eating Competition on the fourth of July. After we bumped uglies that last time, our relationship fizzled out. It was a typical occurrence in those days: My phone died. I couldn't find the charging cable, so that was it. With no way to text Cordon, we just sort of drifted apart.

In the aftermath of our breakup, there was little reason to get out of bed. I had an entire library branch just down the hall from my room, but couldn't muster the energy to read. It was as if the life had been sucked out of me. Why had ever I left my life of relative comfort? I was tempted to return home to Naperville and crawl back up into my mother's womb. When I talked to her on the phone, however, I learned there was no room at the inn. She was pregnant. Probably my father's child, but who could tell with them anymore?

What about the job, you ask? The one Catsby'd offered me? Well. Ahem. Despite my debilitating depression, I was still technically employed as his financial consultant. He seemingly hadn't noticed that all I was doing was shifting papers from one filing cabinet to another. The numbers, as I've said, made no sense to me. My eyes blurred just looking at them. Or maybe the blurring was related to my alcoholism. Either way, I don't think Catsby even cared what I was or wasn't doing in his office on the rare occasions I showed up for "work." Even a casual perusal of his records through blurred eyes led me to believe his story about being an Amway salesman was grade-A horse manure...but, again, other people's problems.

When Catsby returned from his daily sojourn with Dandelion, I pulled him aside and mentioned the curious visit from the Daily Peanut reporter. After a brief look of concern on his face—a flash of nervousness I hadn't seen him exhibit since his reunion with Dandelion—he relaxed.

"Grab some wine coolers from the fridge and wait for me out back by the swimming pool. I'll send Dandelion on her way, and then it'll just be you and me, Old Spice. I think it's time I told you the truth."

Catsby was rumored to be involved in any number of schemes. I'd heard all of them: that he'd killed a man in Reno just to watch him cry, and then tried to kill Johnny Cash for taking credit for his life story. I could either sit here and go through every rumor one by one and debunk them, or I could tell you his story, from beginning to end.

Really? You want option number one?

Sorry. That's not how books work. At least the kind of books I grew up reading and writing, unless you count Choose Your Own Adventure books. No, the book you're reading right now has one course, charted by yours truly. Strap in and enjoy the ride. If you hate it, leave a nasty review on Goodreads or Amazon. See if I care.

So here it is: Catsby's story, as true as James Deen is long: