I dropped the massive heap of mail on Mom's lap.
"There you go, Mom. All your mail, for today."
"Thank you."
Envelopes spilled from her lap to the floor where Bailey jumped and tore at them.
"Bailey! No! Stop that. Oh, now she's chewing my toes. Greg, have her stop."
"Bailey," I said. "Bad."
"She's still doing it! Aiigggh!"
"Put on your shoes, then."
"I can't. My feet are swollen. Here, will you help me with all this? Why do I get so much mail? Oh, most of this is junk. This I need to keep, though. It's my cable bill."
"Sweet, sweet cable."
"And I'll need to pay my taxes. I'll have to pay so much this year!"
"Mom, here's a crazy idea, why not don't pay? What are they going to do to you?"
"I can't. I have to be a good girl. Bailey, stop that!"
"Right." I rubbed at my manly biceps, somewhat sore from carrying the many QVC boxes and USPS crates to Mom's apartment. "Pat wants me to join his gym. Or the gym he's thinking of joining. He showed me all these pictures of the guy who runs it..."
"I don't care."
"Can't I just pay for the blasted liposuction?"
"Pat isn't sure he wants to join, though. He says you can see the guy's porkpie in some of the pictures, and that he has definite chub in one of them."
Mom scowled and took up her phone. "That reminds me. I'm going to order porkpie for dinner tonight. Bailey! Don't do that! It hurts when you... Oh, look at that, I lost a toenail. Oh well."
"It's funny in a way," I mused, "since you have a young thing nibbling on your toes and Dad also has a young thing nibbling on his own toes. Maybe you two could swap? Dad can have Bailey go at his toes and Jeni chew yours? Maybe we can give them a call to set something up?"
"Please stop talking."
"But there's more Pat, as the fans demand: he wants to lose his pandemic weight and bulk up. It turns out he was too weak to catch his awful father while he fell in the parking lot dying. Working on your core definitely helps in catching dying parents. I think it's in the gym brochure. By the way, did you get the invite to Pat's dad's funeral? About five thousand are coming, according to Pat."
"What? Oh--! Bailey! Stop that! Ohh, this dog. There went my pinky toe. Greg, will you get that out of her mouth?"
I chased the fat dog around, finally getting Mom's bloody toe out of the dog's growling mouth.
"You know, Mom, you might want to put Bailey in her crate once in a while." I handed Mom her toe. "She needs discipline. And not the sexy kind."
"Thank you," Mom said, fitting her toe back on. "I'm not putting her in the crate."
"Why not? It's not that bad. Why did you get it, then?"
The crate was more bouncy castle than Alcatraz, with plush toys and pillows and doggie spa treatment around the clock.
"I'm not putting her in that. And that's final. Don't get on my nerves about-- Owwwtch! Bailey!"
Bailey had Mom's foot and scampered off with tendons hanging from her jaw, the li'l cutie. I wrestled with the puppy like Beowulf with the Cookie Monster, if my mythology serves me, and wrested the gore-smeared Mom foot from the dog's slavering maw mouth.
"Okay," I said, handing Mom her foot. "It looks like we're out of time for today."
"At least she hasn't been eating the Tide pods. She got into one the other day."
"Why can't Bailey just do meth like the other puppies?"
Just then Chris came in with the rest of the mail. He also had some empty boxes that he thought would make Mom happy. He set everything down and greeted Bailey.
"Nooo! Don't let her near your tasty face!"
Narrowly averting having his kiss bitten off, Chris fled the apartment.
"Good talk!" I called after him.
"Oh, no, there she goes," Mom said, still sorting through her mail. "Bailey," Mom called weakly. "Bailey, honey, get away from that... ohh, she's so awful..."
"At least she's not eating you, Mom."
"Bailey! No! Get away from there!"
Like a lioness by a waterhole waiting for a wildebeest, Bailey crouched near the kitty litter box. There she waited for a tender vittle to fall from the cat. In a flash she pounced and caught the cat-litter-sprinkled turd in her mouth and consumed it with a happy grin.
"Chris, wait up!" I said, fleeing. "I have a lot of barfing to do!"
"Don't leave me!" Mom said from under her mountains of mail. "Ohh, here's my Good Housekeeping magazine, how ironic is that? Wait--! Oh! Bailey--! Stop it! Heeellp!"
You know what they say: Happiness is a warm puppy that has red eyes and snorts black smoke and eats you ha ha.
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