Katie Up and Down the Hall: The True Story of How One Dog Turned Five Neighbors Into a Family (27 page)

Granny spent another twelve days in the hospital. “She’s doing very well,” the doctor assured me, but I didn’t agree. Yes,
her infection was gone and the operation was declared a success, but Pearl wasn’t the same as before she entered the hospital.
Her speech was sometimes confused and she was extremely weak—certainly not the woman who, just a few years earlier, was walking
briskly and doing all her own cleaning, shopping, and cooking.

It seemed to me that the events of 9/11 and the surgery that followed it had broken her.

It was finally time to leave the hospital—and we were all happy to be escaping it. In her undercover work as nurse’s aide,
Katie had done much to boost Pearl’s spirits, snuggling in bed with her each day (“the best therapy,” Pearl smiled). But it
was obvious we couldn’t take Granny home without first hiring an aide, as she could no longer care for herself.

She had once told me, “When I get to a certain age,
shoot me
.” But we weren’t going to do that, nor did we consider the idea of an assisted-living facility or a nursing home. Pearl was
going
home
—though she was going to need lots of help.

Considering her independent spirit, the idea of depending on somebody else was going to be a major adjustment. As always,
Pearl was stoic and made the best of things, but she didn’t realize how drastically her life was going to change, literally
overnight.

She now required help to do even the most basic things. She was unable to walk without assistance, and then only a few steps,
so she was going to have to learn how to use a walker. Her hands shook so badly that she needed someone to cut up her food
and feed it to her; and of course, she needed assistance in the bathroom too.

Katie seemed to sense Pearl’s fragile condition. She gingerly licked her hand and lay against her in her hospital bed, though
careful not to lie on top of her, as she had in the past.

I realized I couldn’t function as Pearl’s full-time aide, and it would have embarrassed us both for me to try. So the hospital’s
Social Services helped find a female aide to accompany us home to fill this function, at least temporarily.

Loretta was an experienced aide, a middle-aged woman who took her job seriously. On the day we left the hospital, she painstakingly
helped Pearl get dressed and transferred her into
the wheelchair, though Granny resisted her help from the minute she met her.

“Where’d you find this broad?” Granny whispered, a look of total disapproval on her face. “I don’t care for her and neither
will Katie.”

Indeed, on the ride home, Pearl wouldn’t even talk to Loretta, while Katie also ignored her. Over the next few days, Katie
walked around Pearl’s apartment with her tail down, unhappy with the intruder, while Pearl barricaded herself in her bedroom,
never speaking to Loretta unless she absolutely had to.

“C’mon Granny, she’s a nice woman and we need someone to help you,” I told her.

“I’ll send her down to your apartment and she can help
you
!”

One strike against Loretta was her bedside manner—way too bossy for Pearl, who was accustomed to being the boss herself. Understandably,
Pearl hated being treated like a child and felt embarrassed to need help, especially in the bathroom.

Second, Loretta was no friend to Katie. She complained that my dog dripped water all over the floor and that having her around
was “unsanitary.”

“I won’t clean up after her,” she huffed. Nor would she feed Katie, a custom that my dog had long grown accustomed to.

Insensitive and rigid, Loretta failed to grasp the intense bond between Katie and Pearl, nor the therapeutic value of having
Katie present.

Two weeks later, Loretta was gone.

Next was La-Teesha, a much younger woman who loved dogs and happily played with Katie (and overfed her) but spent most of
her time on her cell phone, talking to her boyfriend. She wasn’t very interested in Granny’s care and treated her as a nuisance.
We also found some of Granny’s English Spode china in her tote bag. She lasted a week.

After these two mismatches, we finally hit gold with a woman from the Republic of Georgia, Naia, who had been a licensed physician
in her native country and now worked as a nurse’s aide in the United States. Georgia, I explained to Pearl, had been a Soviet
Socialist Republic before the Soviet Union split apart.

“She a
Russian
?” asked Granny, suspicious of anyone I suggested after the last catastrophes. “A Communist?” she joked.

“Just meet her,” I insisted, desperate to find someone right away. “We’re very lucky to get her. She’s actually a doctor.”

“But does she like dogs?” Pearl asked. “I thought that first aide was going to cook Katie up into a stew for dinner.”

“She loves dogs. Just meet her.”

When I opened Pearl’s front door the day of the interview, there was Naia, a beautiful young woman in her early thirties with
long dark hair and magnificently arched eyebrows framing the most striking blue eyes I’d ever seen. As we talked, I was impressed
by her seriousness and intelligence. And I was grateful to know that she could check Pearl’s blood pressure and pulse, help
her with physical rehab, monitor her medications, and easily get her in and out of the bed with no assistance. Not to mention
the cooking and cleaning. She was a godsend.

Over the next few years, Naia would become a treasured member of our family—Katie’s new keeper and the granddaughter that
Granny never had.

But things were shaky at first. No surprise there. To put it politely, Pearl was aloof and not very receptive to Naia’s help.

“But I tried not to take it personally,” Naia later told me. “What I liked about Pearl was that she wasn’t phony. What you
saw was what you got.”

I wasn’t the easiest person to handle either, I admit. At first, I was overprotective and controlling, checking in too frequently
to make sure that Pearl was being properly taken care of.

“Glenn was a bit bossy,” Naia later told Lee. “But I admired his dedication. He used to come into the kitchen, open the refrigerator,
and ask, ‘Why isn’t it full?’ If I had one flavor of ice cream in the freezer, he wanted two. Everything was for Pearl. ‘Take
her to the movies, restaurant, hairdresser.’ Glenn wanted everything perfect for her.”

As the weeks rolled by, I was impressed by Naia, though Pearl still resisted her help and was predictably cold. Once she saw
how capable she was in terms of medical care, however, she started complaining about her housekeeping and cooking.

“This place is a mess and she can’t cook,” huffed Oldest. “Did you
taste
that stew? They’d serve that in jail!”

I started laughing and couldn’t stop.

A few nights later, after tasting the “foreign soup” that Naia had cooked up, Pearl was at it again. “This tastes weird,”
she scowled. “How about a matzo ball?” Naia soon caught on and made up lists of Pearl’s favorite foods.

“I like chicken—nice and spicy,” she ordered, but Naia refused, having been told by the doctor that Pearl could no longer
eat spicy food.

“No Graaaaany,” she told her, seamlessly adopting our pet name (and stretching it out just as we mispronounced it) for Pearl.
“Not too much spice.”

“Can you bake?” Granny asked.

“No, not really. But I’ll buy you anything you want.”

“Don’t bother,” she shrugged, “Glenn will do it,” and off she went into the bedroom to watch TV, leaving Naia alone to ponder
her difficult charge.

T
hings were humming along perfectly.

Naia ran Pearl’s household with great industry and was the most caring, meticulous aide anyone could ask for. I trusted her
completely and was thankful for her attention to detail.

And it wasn’t long before Oldest appreciated Naia too. Instead of merely tolerating her, Pearl began to genuinely like her—and
they became friends. They took long walks on the Esplanade with Katie and spent hours in Pearl’s bedroom—trying on clothes
and jewelry, watching TV, talking about news and fashion, or paging through scrapbooks as Pearl reminisced about her early
years with Arthur.

“After two or three months of working with her, it was fun,” said Naia. “Pearl had a great sense of humor and was very sensitive
to me. Some days when I was fighting with my boyfriend on the phone and was upset afterward, she always knew it (craftily
eavesdropping) and she’d try to cheer me up with little comments.”

“Men are strange,” Granny opined. “Don’t get so upset about so little. If they’re loyal and worth it, let them come back to
you—like a dog; otherwise, let them off the leash!”

Then, without missing a beat, Pearl would pull out her ancient metal Land O’Lakes sweet cream butter box, where she kept her
mother’s prized recipes. “Let’s try one,” she’d say, and within minutes they were in the kitchen, baking a cake together as
Katie sat on the floor, following their every move.

As their relationship developed, Naia did everything possible to improve Pearl’s quality of life. Although Oldest had come
back home from the hospital as an invalid, she regained her mobility thanks to Naia’s encouragement and care. “Pearl could
soon walk with no assistance, go to the bathroom, take a shower, and dress herself,” said Naia. “I left the door open to her
bedroom and kept an eye on her, but she was fine.”

Having Naia on hand 24/7 allowed me to protect the essence of my relationship with Pearl as it had always been—conversational
partners, confidantes, and neighborhood comrades-in-arms. All the other caretaking Naia did. Even though Pearl could no longer
clean, shop for groceries, do the laundry, or go the doctor, bank, or dry cleaner alone, I think she secretly enjoyed the
luxury of having someone do it all for her.

Part of Pearl’s rehabilitation extended to updating her wardrobe and linens. “Granny is wearing old, ripped clothes,” reported
Naia. “Everything, including the towels, has holes in it.” So I gave Naia a credit card and told her to start shopping, and
off they went to Pearl’s favorite store, Loehmann’s—“great bargains!” Pearl enthused.

“One day, when we were at the store,” Naia remembered, “I was looking at a wildly flowered blouse when Granny said, ‘It’s
too busy.’ I didn’t understand what she meant. I didn’t want to embarrass myself with my lack of English. And she kept repeating,
‘It’s very busy.’ Finally, I asked, ‘What
is
this busy?’ She explained and we both laughed about it for days.”

Girl talk now filled Pearl’s apartment 24/7. One day, I
walked into Pearl’s bedroom and saw that it had been turned into a salon. Pearl was on the bed, having her hair, nails, and
makeup done by Naia, delighted with hot pink nail polish and the sensation of being primped and pampered. Katie sat on the
bed alertly watching as Pearl had her hair set, curled, and blow-dried, something my dog was quite accustomed to.

“There’s nobody like that girl!” Granny now bragged to all her older women friends, some of whom were jealous of Pearl’s new
“find.”

And Pearl wasn’t the only household member being seduced by Naia’s charms. One night, just before bedtime, I let myself into
Pearl’s apartment to pick up Katie for the night. And there was my dog, sitting on Naia’s lap, hypnotized as Naia sang a lilting
lullaby to her—in Georgian! What a scene. Katie soon dropped her head on Naia’s lap and fell asleep, Naia stroking her head
like a baby.

Katie was entranced by Naia and followed her everywhere, as hopelessly in love with her as she was with Ramon.

And so, as if Pearl and I didn’t lavish enough attention on Katie, Naia was now doing double duty, acting as Katie’s aide
as well—feeding her, cleaning out her water and food bowls, taking her on walks, brushing her ears, giving her vitamins and
medicine, making special snacks for her, and kindly cleaning up after my fourteen-year-old when she had accidents.

“I love dogs, don’t worry, it’s nothing unmanageable,” Naia assured me, fully aware of how therapeutic it was having Katie
in Pearl’s apartment. “Katie,” she wisely surmised, “is Pearl’s baby—but more like a queen.”

After six months of intense involvement in our household, with all her industry, I could see that the stresses of the job—and
homesickness—were getting to Naia. She sorely missed her family, all of them back in Georgia.

I worried about her, as did Granny. “That girl works too hard,” Pearl told me. And I agreed, soon suggesting that she take
weekends off. So we hired one of her Georgian friends as the weekend aide.

On Sunday nights when Naia returned, Katie practically leapt into her arms, racing around her in circles before trotting over
to a living room cabinet and sitting still as a statue in front of it, staring at the Humpty Dumpty cookie jar where Naia
kept her snacks.

Then, there we were, sitting around Pearl’s table just like in the old days, though the players had changed. John and Ryan
were gone, their chairs now filled by Naia and Lee—who visited almost every day.