Canned Tuna, Canines, and One Cute Guy
When Mary saw him in the supermarket, he was different than any man she had seen before. He was her height and gray-haired as was she, but the look he gave her, that one moment in the produce aisle, caused her to feel a flutter like when she was 16, and a boy, or many, noticed her.
Mary saw that he was wearing an expensive zip-up hoodie with a nautical-sounding name that she associated with sailing or perhaps a life filled with regattas. She wondered whether he was from an area where such things were popular, like Newport, Rhode Island. And if so, did he own a boat, or even a yacht?
Besides being attracted to him, her first thought was that he was definitely a “second house” person. Followed by, why else would he be in this town? In the middle of nowhere? At this particular supermarket? Unless, she thought, a relative (fill in the blank - mother, father, sister, or brother) were dying. But since he was smiling, even briefly at her, she was sure he wasn’t there for a death watch. This made her happy but somewhat sad.
She began to wonder, if he had a second house nearby, what did it look like? And what about his first house? Or did he have a condo or a rental, thereby being able to afford two homes?
She remembered her own miserable attempt at trying to purchase an expensive co-op in a desirable area of upstate New York some years ago. The overly aggressive real estate agent tried to sell her on a spacious two-bedroom that she knew she couldn’t afford by touting its amenities.
“Wi-fi is included, it has a gym, and a heated garage!” Followed by, “You’ll never have to dig your car out of a snowbank again if you buy this!”
But when Mary looked at the apartment, she just didn’t see herself there. It had a suburban feel to it, with the nearest city an hour away, and no view to speak of. Mary remembered walking away from the open house admonishing herself for thinking she could take on a mortgage or HOA fees when she knew her budget wouldn’t allow any of those expenses. Which is how she ended up living where she is now. In a simple ranch house in the country with half an acre of land that allowed her to grow some flowers and a few herbs.
Mary was bold enough to think about asking him what he was doing in the supermarket. Instead, she decided to just follow him around, looking at the items he was throwing in his shopping cart and hope he wouldn’t notice. But he did.
“Hi,” he said.
She greeted him back.
“Do you know if they have a fish counter here?” he asked.
She almost guffawed. That was a word she rarely used but it would perfectly describe her failed attempt to laugh out loud at his question.
“Um, I think they only have frozen fish.”
Mary noticed he looked disappointed when she said that. And since she was intent on finding out more about him, she tried to think of how she could keep the conversation going.
“What kind of fish do you need?” she asked.
“Need?” he asked, but he smiled at her, so she only felt slightly mortified at her choice of words.
“Or want,” she added.
“Don’t know, maybe thinking of grilling some salmon or even swordfish,” he said.
She thought that was an odd response since it was bitter cold outside. And where they were now, near the Adirondacks, people just didn’t grill in the winter. Should she tell him that?
But she didn’t. Instead, she shook her head and said, “Hmm, well, they probably don’t have either of those, but you can probably find some frozen shrimp or scallops. And then of course, there’s always tuna. In a can, though.”
When Mary looked at him, she realized he was staring at her. It didn’t make her uncomfortable at all, but she found herself about to apologize on the store’s behalf for not having what he wanted. But she didn’t.
“Well,” he said. “No harm in canned tuna. Spaghetti with tuna and capers, that might work. My sons are up here visiting me, so, I need to feed two 20-year-olds. Two very hungry 20-year-olds.”
“You live here?” Mary heard herself ask.
He nodded. “Now I do.”
“Full time?” Mary asked.
“Yes.”
“Where did you move from?” she continued.
“Washington.”
“State?”
“D.C.”
Mary heard herself say, “Oh.”
So much for her Newport boat fantasy.
Followed by, “Well, I make that dish a lot too.”
Except that wasn’t really true. She had made it on occasion, but lately, whenever she couldn’t think of anything to make for dinner, she found herself just opening a can of tuna and making a sandwich. Even though she was worried about the amount of mercury she might be consuming.
Mary watched as he grabbed a bunch of parsley and put it in his cart. And then she realized that was the one ingredient she always forgot to add when she made that tuna dish.
“Thanks for your help,” he said.
And then he walked away. She decided not to follow him anymore, so she lingered in the beauty aisle looking at shampoo until she thought she had been there long enough. Surely, at this point, he had gotten everything he needed and checked out.
She wanted to put that man out of her head but found herself wondering whether he found capers. Only because the capers were usually in the aisle with the tomato sauce, not near the condiments, or other pickled things.
Two days later Mary found herself wanting to go back to the supermarket to see if, by chance, he would be there. She figured at that point he’d probably need more food to feed those young men. She was uncomfortable with the feeling that he might think she was stalking him. Would she do that? At her age?
She put that thought out of her head and decided she’d bring a hot thermos filled with tea and a cheese sandwich (she loved cheese sandwiches) and just sit in her car and wait for about an hour, but not longer. If he showed up, she was determined that she’d get out of the car and pretend she had bumped into him by accident.
A month later when she called her sister to say hello, and to tell her about the attractive guy she had seen in the supermarket, but never saw again, her sister wanted to know if she was “looking for a prince.”
“No, just a companion, I guess. Or at least someone nonjudgemental I can talk to.”
Her sister took offense to that, saying she didn’t judge her. Followed by, “Maybe you should get a dog.”
Mary didn’t want to tell her that she liked Golden Retrievers but thought that particular breed of dog might be too big for her to handle. She loved Beagles, too, but worried she would fall in love with one, and then it would die on her since she knew they had short life spans. She didn’t think there was a dog out there that could grow old with her. Or was there?
Nevertheless, she found herself at the local humane society one afternoon in February. After she parked her car in the lot and navigated the slippery walkway, hoping she wouldn’t fall on the ice, she found herself inside the building listening to many dogs barking. She signed in and reached for her wallet to stuff a $5 bill in their donation jar. When she looked up, she saw him.
He looked at her so intently she bit her lip, not sure what to say.
“Hi, there!” he said.
He had a dog on a leash that looked like a Husky.
“Wow, that’s a big dog,” she managed to say.
“Yeah, didn’t think I’d find an Alaskan Malamute here.”
“Big eaters, too I bet.”
He started laughing. “Yeah, well, with two sons I’m used to spending a lot of money on food, so….”
Mary was about to tell him that she had wanted to see him again, when he beat her to it.
“Thought maybe I’d see you at the supermarket,” he said.
“Oh?”
“Yeah. How have you been?” he asked.
Mary wasn’t sure what she should tell him. Should she say she found herself making tuna with pasta and capers more often now. And she’d still forget to add the parsley. And that at least every few days she’d sit in the supermarket parking lot with a thermos of tea, and if not a cheese sandwich, then a cookie or two, hoping they’d run into each other.
But she didn’t. She asked him what he was doing there.
“Thought I’d hang out and see how I feel about a dog. It’s kind of lonely up here; summers are different. I can go outside, but these winters, that’ll take some getting used to.”
“Why did you move up here?” Mary found herself blurting out.
“I’m embarrassed to tell you.”
Mary leaned down to rub the dog’s neck and then its ears. The dog must have liked it a bit, because he started sniffing her, followed by a big yawn.
“Don’t be,” she said.
“Had some money issues and needed a cheap place to live. My wife died last year but I had all these medical bills that still needed to be paid so...”
Mary heard his voice drift off and she didn’t want to say, “Sorry, so sorry.” Or anything else people normally say when confronted with someone else’s loss, so she didn’t.
She realized he was still wearing the expensive-looking hoodie she had seen him in that day, so instead, she told him she liked it.
He rubbed one hand over his chest a bit when she said that.
“Picked it up at the thrift store. I wear it all the time, it’s pretty warm.”
Mary wanted to tell him that she thought he had come up here because he was just another rich guy with a second house. And because of the hoodie he was wearing, she had mistakenly assumed that he owned a boat or at least belonged to a boat club somewhere. But she didn’t. She realized though that her hunch about someone dying had been pretty accurate. She felt strange about that.
“We should have coffee together sometime,” he said.
Or pasta with tuna, Mary immediately wanted to offer.
“I prefer tea,” Mary said.
And then she realized she came off sounding both snobby and annoyed with him. Although she wasn’t in the least.
“I have a thermos of tea in my car. I can offer you some if you’d like,” she said quickly.
He looked at her briefly but then focused on the Malamute he was still holding onto.
“Sit,” he said to the dog.
And the dog sat down. And suddenly, Mary wanted to sit down on the floor, too. So, she did.
“What are you doing?” he asked.
She looked up at him and worried briefly that he would find her strange, but he was laughing.
“I’m sitting on the floor,” she said.
“Yeah, I can see that. Is it comfortable?”
“It is actually. Do you want to join me?” she asked.
Mary started patting the space next to her, until he sat down as well. She watched as he crossed his legs and sat “Indian style,” although she didn’t know if she was allowed to call it that anymore. And when he did that, she crossed her legs, too, and they both just looked at each other and started petting the Malamute.
Mary started to wonder what it would be like to move to Alaska with him and take the Alaskan Malamute with them. Would the dog feel comfortable in the place its descendants were from? Would they? Could they eat canned tuna and pasta with capers to keep themselves warm? She figured Alaska would probably only be a tad colder than the climate they were living in right now, so she thought it might be okay.
When he turned to her and said, “I’ll take some tea from that thermos you have.”
Mary nodded.
“I’m Rob, by the way.”
“Mary.”
“Pretty name.”
And when she looked at him, she thought, why would they have to go to Alaska? Why couldn’t they just stay here?”
“What do you think we should call him?” he asked.
Mary was confused. Why did he say “we” rather than “I?”
But she didn’t waste any time. “Robby,” she said. “After his owner.”
Rob nodded and she thought maybe she saw a bit of sadness in his eyes, but it passed as quickly as it came. She wondered briefly if his wife had called him that.
Mary suddenly had an overwhelming desire to buy him a brand-new hoodie. She thought for a moment about what color he might like, and realized that a light gray, to match the Malamute would be perfect.
She must have been smiling thinking about that because she heard him ask, “What’s so funny?”
“The summers here are really nice you know,” she said. “I grow a lot of herbs, too.”
Rob nodded. “Even parsley?” he asked.
“Especially parsley.”