50 OCTOBER 2023 | THE FOREIGN SERVICE JOURNAL of the trip. During that phone call, I get an email from a do.not. reply address. It’s got a GIF of Wile E. Coyote getting crushed by an Acme safe. In different fonts, like a ransom note, it says my dog isn’t going anywhere, ever. Signed: GAMMA. Did Susanna know about this serial killer email? Is Susanna in on it? Of course she is … she knew she wasn’t helping me from the beginning! It was a ruse. That chipper voice, that ease of completing simple tasks! I want to call her back immediately and demand to know why she delights in my pain. Instead, I get Heath. “Hold please.” Four months in, I am weathered wood and indestructible, yet also just about ready to shatter into a thousand glass pieces if someone asks me the wrong question at the wrong moment. There is a small, worried voice within me asking if I want to maybe, possibly, perhaps drink 64 ounces of water or look outside at a tree or listen to some Aesop Rock. I do not. I just stare at the screen. They will not get me. I will get this dog into the airplanes. I’m going to go on leave and relax. I’m going to relax. I’m. Going. To. Relax. Janice repeats herself, no matter the question I ask. She doesn’t like that I’m sarcastic. She doesn’t care how much I’ve done. She blesses me at the end of our call, which I take with grace because I’m damn graceful. I’m a professional. And Janice says it’s done—each leg confirmed and clean in the computer’s system. I lean back on the couch, unsure. I don’t feel like it’s true. I feel like a dog that’s caught its own tail. I tell my husband that it’s settled. He’s incredulous as well, having listened to me hum “hold please” guitar music and twitch in my sleep. We sit in silence and hope. I now must admit to my mistake. I am not perfect. I am tired. It’s been weeks into months. I did not call the night before to confirm. I just … couldn’t. My brain stopped, full of fuzz. I played video games and drank a tequila and thought these words aloud: “Things are settled. We’ll be fine …” “Ma’am, I’m not seeing a dog on your reservation. Did you call us ahead of time?” The agent, Marie, is unimpressed as I fail to respond, stammering, stunned. I step out of the line to make another call. After all this, it comes down to me on hold with the airline and the agent on the phone with another part of the airport. Marie, who sees that I’m pushing rudeness into an ulcer I’ll deal with later, does something that I’ll appreciate when calm. She works hard. She makes more calls, and she translates my problems into lingo. The three hours prep I gave myself disappear. Soon I won’t be able to make my flight at a flat sprint. “It’ll be 400 euros for the dog.” Movement? Money? I have some money! I throw down my card. “Also I see that you have extra bags. You only get one each.” I throw down the other card and my carry-on bag. A tag prints out. Marie trots to the crate and slips the tag through the crate door— Brussels to Washington, D.C. “This needs to go to DH—” Before she’s finished, my husband has already taken the relay baton. He is off at a record-breaking sprint, luggage dolly leaving skid marks on the gray floors. I love him. Then we run. I know the airport. I ask people for kindness, and people oblige. I move to the fronts of lines. I jump escalator stairs. I cut through duty-free like a pickpocket. I hear people exclaim as I dodge and weave. My legs complain (I had given them no warning). Someone cheers us on. Someone scolds. Neither husband nor I are allowed to board. We’re sweating from the sudden exertion. Ushered to one side, we look longingly at our plane. The long last minutes of the boarding time float by. I’m lightheaded. The gate agents here are typing our data into several different computers, pointing at things. “Excuse me. You have a dog? How much does it weigh?” In Schiphol, I watch my dog getting loaded onto the flight to the States. She’s turning around in her crate, which is on an elevator. She must be miserable, but the luggage handler I now fight laughter when the rep asks if the combined weight of the dog and crate is less than a wet swan in summer.
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