White horse

Some people might pull off wearing shoes with no socks, but Digby wasn’t one of those people. The moment he sunk barefoot into our sofa and flopped out his laptop, I detected a whiff of toe odour from across the room, mingled with the usual smell of warm wood.

“We’ll just be packing the car for a bit longer, then we’ll be off,” I said.

“Oh yes yes, sounds splendid,” said Digby.

Digby wore a collarless polar-fleece bush shirt, with a low neck that gaped to reveal wispy chest hair. He’d brought a little paper bag with him that I’d examined unintentionally, thinking it was one of our packages for the car. It contained some deodorant, shaving paraphernalia and a dark ball of clothing, a single garment of some sort. I put the bag down the moment I clicked that it was Digby’s, not wanting to pry further – but now I desperately wanted to take another look, to know which single garment Digby thought was worth changing during his five-night stay.

“Did you happen to get that Google Doc I sent?” I asked, pausing next to the sofa with a suitcase in each hand. “It’s got the wifi password and stuff in it, but also useful stuff about the pets and the house, like what can go in the dishwasher versus not.”

“Oh yes yes, that’s wonderful,” said Digby, not looking up from his screen.

“Is there anything you’d like to know more about, like the kitchen?” I asked.

Digby peered up at me over the thin frames of his glasses, then smiled briefly.

“I wouldn’t worry about the kitchen. My cooking skills extend to dialling 0800 83 83 83. Ha! The only thing I’ll be doing is reheating pizzas.” He went back to looking at his laptop.

I took the suitcases out to the car.

It doesn’t matter that we don’t know Digby, I repeated to myself, a mantra I hoped could be true. We’d had other house sitters from this website where my wife Vic found Digby, and they’d been great. One couple we had stay published a farm roster on our fridge to illustrate their routine for feeding our dog Teddy, our cat Wanda, and our chickens. They baked us a fruit loaf and when we found it on the table when we got home, it was still warm. A friend of theirs designed a thank-you card with a sketch of Wanda on the front. They’d set the house-sitting bar perhaps a little high.

We didn’t always use the house-sitting website. In midwinter the year prior, a German couple (friends of friends) looked after the place while we were away. Our only complaint was that they burned through a month’s worth of wood in a week. Vic and I joked that they must hail from the Black Forest, where we imagine wood is so bountiful it’s only natural to burn the fire white hot around the clock in winter, so that one may frolic naked about the lounge.

I didn’t get a chance to meet Digby before he arrived and settled into the sofa, but Vic had met him a few days earlier.

“He seems like a nice guy who really loves dogs. And he had great reviews on the website,” Vic had said.

Now I’d met Digby and had made my own impression. But we were due to leave on a trip to Taranaki, Digby was already sitting on the sofa, and it was just too inconvenient for me to speak my mind. Vic had put a lot of effort into planning this trip for my fortieth birthday. I decided to make it my mission to leave these reservations behind me. I needed to trust that Digby aspired to competence. I wouldn’t bug Vic about it either, as is sometimes my way. I wouldn’t even mention Digby.

We finished packing the car, and I started making some coffee to go.

“Want a coffee? I’m making some,” I asked Digby.

“Yes. Black,” he said.

I took the coffee over to him.

“Right, well, we’re off then,” I said. “Everything you need to know is in that doc, but feel free to flick Vic or me a message if you need. It’s not the most glamorous job, I’m sorry... but it would be a huge help if you could pick the dog poos up off the lawn and clear out the cat litter from time to time.”

“Yes yes, of course,” said Digby, tapping his bare foot on the floor.

“Okay, see you then,” I said.

I walked out past Digby’s shoes and the little paper bag.

I learned enough in my first thirty nine years to know that for me, relaxation does not merely float to the surface unbidden. It must be summoned. It is work. A therapist once suggested that I try visualisation as one way to reduce my anxiety. At the time, I was worried about my children, Neko and Ida, travelling long-distance with someone else. I kept imagining the worst. The therapist suggested I visualise a brilliant white light surrounding the children, one that would keep them safe. This did actually help, not to dispel my fears, but to push those fears to the edges while I focused on the light, something abstract but undeniably positive.

I was in the passenger seat, and we were just passing through Whanganui on the way to Taranaki. Everyone in the car was tuned in to something different. The kids were each listening to Stephen Fry narrate different Harry Potter books on their headphones. Vic was listening to a podcast about nutrition. The sun streamed across our laps. We flashed past bright green blocks of farmland. I closed my eyes.

I imagined Digby and a white light, not so much protective as supportive, a light which would imbue Digby with qualities I hoped for in a house sitter: Care. Respect. Cleanliness. Common sense. I didn’t intend to direct the vision this way, but now Digby was dressed in white, and riding a white stallion. In place of greasy, thin hair he had a blond mane. He wore fresh clothes. He had a scabbard, and in it, a sword. This Sir Digby gently closed his eyes and dipped his head to assure me, wordlessly, I’ll take it from here.

The car slowed down as we pulled in for petrol in Waverley, and I opened my eyes. After we fuelled up and pulled back onto the highway, I tried to get back into the mindset, but it was like trying to pick up a dream from where you left off after you get up in the night. My conscious mind now rejected the conceit, defaulting to my initial impression of Digby.

I do really want to be the kind of person who assumes good intentions, like Vic does. Perhaps I’m the one who needs to be the knight: noble, and willing to give people a chance to prove themselves.

As we passed through Hāwera, I turned down Vic’s podcast playing over the car speakers.

“So, do you really think Digby will be okay?” I asked Vic. “He didn’t really seem to be paying attention.”

Vic sighed.

“He’ll be fine,” she said

“Okay.”

After we spent a night with family in New Plymouth, we backtracked to an Airbnb just out of Waverley. On the drive, we got a message from our friend June, concerned that someone had stolen Teddy. Teddy isn’t difficult to spot: he’s orange with curly wool like a sheep. I texted back and forth with June until I felt confident I knew who the “strange man” was that she saw Teddy with. This was actually something of a relief to me, because it partway confirmed that Digby had taken Teddy for a walk. Sir Digby. Holding up the sword, catching the light.

The sweet little Airbnb house looked out over a black sand beach. All day the surf mashed into cliffs scarred from the effort of holding it back. It rained for most of our time there, but somehow that only made the place more perfect for a holiday, because it asked so little of us. It was equally easy to relax during fine patches, when we could take a two-minute walk down a rocky path to the beach, past rivulets crisscrossing as they sought the ocean, each reflecting pieces of a cloudy sunset. The dark sand and the towering cliffs made the place feel prehistoric. Outside normal time. Without conscious effort, I stopped thinking about any life besides what I might encounter on a short walk with my family about this wet little cove.

Our Airbnb hosts left a welcome package which included Digestive chocolate biscuits and marshmallows to make s’mores. S’mores were new to me, but in principle they sounded both simple and delicious. The kids were beyond excited to try this American delicacy. Although I picked a gap in the rain to light the fire pit, the wood was wet. I had to practically steam the wood dry with kerosene-soaked fire lighters just so a small amount of real burning could proceed. Neko and Ida were enthusiastic helpers at first, but the smoke made our eyes water, and the weather started to turn in, so as dusk settled the kids decided it was best just to watch Dad make s’mores happen from the warm interior of the house, looking out. After persisting far longer than I would have bothered under any other circumstances, I coaxed a pitiful cairn of embers to life. I went inside and fetched a torch, and the children joined me in the dark to roast their s’mores. The Digestive biscuits broke, not built to be employed in a sandwich, but each s’more was held together well enough by a mass of sticky marshmallow and melted chocolate. We ate them inside as the rain rolled in heavily and reduced our fire to a column of steam. We all had sniffles that evening, but we had partaken of the s’mores.

On the day of my fortieth birthday, I received breakfast in bed, enjoyed some wonderful handmade cards Neko and Ida had illustrated for me, and played chess on a brand-new wooden board, a gift from Vic. We ended the day in a spa outside overlooking the sea, with the bubbles jostling about us. The cliffs turned black, the sun set the sky mauve, and the air smelled of chlorine and wet grass.

When it came time to pack and start the car journey home, it occurred to me that I hadn’t given Digby a thought for days.

On the drive home there was a lot of time to think. I closed my eyes and pictured Digby back on his white horse. He raised his sword into the air and flashes of white, yellow and pink light burst from the sword, so bright I had to squint. Earlier that day I’d watched the trailer for the Netflix release of the reimagined Masters of the Universe series, and some of the show’s special effects were merging with my visualisation. Not that I minded. I loved that show as a kid. Nostalgia can be a powerful salve.

I know that I typically assume the worst, but also that seldom does the worst transpire. This used to manifest most strongly in matters of the body, where I’d leap from a minor ailment or twinge to the most dire conclusion. Cancer. Hernia. Nerve damage. Brain parasite. I’ve tested the patience of countless medical professionals with such vague mystery complaints as “My tongue just... feels weird at the back, like something’s stuck in it” and “My vision is um, swimmy, like I can’t maintain a constant focus...”. Each and every time the outcome has been the same: nothing was wrong, and I just needed enough time to pass for me to cease fixating and forget what I was worried about.

It took effort, but eventually I became less alarmist about the human body. So I thought that I could change when it came to my impression of people like Digby, those who raised more red flags than I could ignore. This was a turning point. Vic does not worry about things by default, and will disregard minor concerns to avoid the angst of processing them. I used to think that such a philosophy was tantamount to fatalism. But it was dawning on me that Vic’s way – as it is for all people who are less stressed in general – is entirely the correct way.

Digby texted Vic at around 10:30am to ask when we’d be home. He wrote that he had to catch a train to another house, and would be gone by the time we arrived, which we’d estimated would be around 3pm. I wrote back to say that was fine, although I thought it would be a shame not to say thanks in person. I wished him all the best.

As we turned into our street in Paraparaumu late afternoon, I started a mental list of what I wanted to get done with what was left of the day: Unpack the bags. Check the chickens. Change the kitty litter. Put on some washing. Run the vacuum around.

We pulled up to the curb outside our place. Vic headed in through the gate and I started unloading the car. When I started lugging the first couple of suitcases up the path, I saw that Vic was rushing around picking up dog poo off the lawn.

“What’s going on?” I asked.

“Nothing. You just head on inside,” said Vic.

There wasn’t a lot of lawn space out front. We were building a deck around the back of our section, and the front yard had building supplies stacked all about. But what little grass space that remained was completely chock full of poo. There was almost more shit than grass. To Teddy’s credit, he’d spaced each deposit roughly evenly, in an elaborate poo grid, each about ten centimetres from its neighbour.

Digby.

I could see Teddy inside through our glass front door, waiting for us. His curly orange hair had grown a little over his eyes, so he had to dip his nose and peer underneath the wool to see. It made him look forlorn. When I opened the door he rushed out to see Vic with his tail wagging.

The hallway glowed orange from late afternoon sun bouncing off the wood. I felt grateful to be home. But something was wrong. The air was strange, somehow... viscous. There was an acrid, oppressive smell. It seemed electrical, like an appliance had short-circuited or blown up.

“What’s that smell?” I said to Vic, who joined me just inside the threshold. I often smell things other people don’t notice right away. I hoped Vic would say she couldn’t smell anything, but she screwed up her face and took a step back.

“Yeah, I don’t know. It’s bad,” Vic said.

It was starting to get cold outside, but we had no choice but to fling open every door and window. Neko and Ida seemed oblivious to the smell, and went off to reacquaint themselves with their things. Oh, the sweet oblivion of childhood.

I could taste a noxious film forming on the back of my throat. I went out onto the partly finished deck and paced back and forth, trying to put some distance between me and the house. I needed to know what had happened, what Digby had done. Vic tried to call him, but he wasn’t answering.

Remembering the state of the lawn, I went back inside to check the cat’s litter box. It was overflowing with poo, and there was litter scattered all over the surrounding lino. It looked like Wanda had tried to be as neat as Teddy, but she had even less space to work with.

I checked the pantry and saw that Digby had been collecting the eggs, at least. The smell quickly became too much for me, and I started to feel light-headed. I went out the back door, threw on my gumboots and stomped down to the chicken coop. Their water troughs were bone dry, and the food barrel looked about as full as I’d left it. I stormed back up the path, kicked off my gumboots so hard they went flying off the deck, and went inside to grab my phone.

Back out on the deck, the light of the day was starting to fail. There was still much to do before it got dark. I called a couple of times but Digby’s phone went straight to voicemail. On my third attempt he answered.

“Hi Digby. How are you?” I said. “Hey, I need to ask you about the house. There’s a terrible smell, like something’s burning – do you know anything?”

I needed to know what I was dealing with. This detective state was the only thing holding back my fury. My initial politeness was like a blade, freshly whetted.

“Ah yes, hello—” Digby said, and then the phone cut out.

I texted him: “Hey, you cut out? Okay to call back?”

He called back a few minutes later.

“Yes, hello again. Sorry about that,” he stammered.

“So: the smell. What’s happened?” I said, now straining to keep it remotely cordial.

“Ah yes yes. Well. You see,” Digby started. “I, ahem, I put an egg on the gas to boil, and then I got a phone call. I must have forgotten about it. Yes. Next thing, I hear this bang like a shotgun going off! And I rush in, and there’s all this smoke, and there’s egg splattered everywhere.”

“So, the egg exploded? That’s the smell?” I did some mental maths to work out how long it might take for all the water in a pot to boil dry, and then to superheat a dry egg to explosion point. Over half an hour, surely.

“Yes, there was egg,” said Digby, “but really it was the pot handle. It burned up, and it took me some time to find tongs to pick it up with.”

“So, the smell is the burnt handle?” I asked.

“Yes, I imagine so. It’s quite a distinctive smell, isn’t it?” said Digby. “I opened up a window on the side—”

“You mean the kitchen window?” I said, confused.

“Yes, the window on the side,” Digby continued, “and l left it open for a while, but then I had to leave to catch the train, and I didn’t want anyone to climb in the window, so I had to close it up.”

There was so much I wanted to say here. Like, if I had the choice, I’d rather air out the place properly and risk being burgled. Plus: You locked up my dog in a house full of noxious smoke.

“When did this happen?” I asked.

“I’d say about mid-morning,” Digby said.

So, around the time Digby sent us the text to ask when we’d be back. He might have thought to mention some of this. Any of it.

“The egg really went everywhere,” he added.

“Huh?” I said.

“The egg,” said Digby. “When it exploded it went all over the wall, the bench, the floor. I think you’ll agree that those areas were pretty well wiped down and clean. Plus, I vacuumed up what was on the floor.”

I had to take a deep breath to compose myself after I think you’ll agree.

“Huh. Okay, so – it’s pretty bad here,” I said. “We may need more details from you in the coming days. I’ll see what the insurance company has to say.”

“Insurance… company?” said Digby, his voice wavering.

“Yes. The insurance company. I’ll be in touch.” Then I hung up.

I took a deep breath of the cold outside air before plunging into the kitchen to confirm a few things for myself. For starters: Where was this pot and handle? I could now understand the little pieces of what looked like yellow rubber spattered across the white tiles behind the stove, and over the coffee grinder. The stovetop had been wiped and looked cleanish, except for one spot where the molten pot handle must have touched. There was a dark mark on the stainless steel, and some ash. I looked inside our bagless vacuum cleaner, but could see no evidence of egg, or anything else.

I wasn’t sure whether what I was seeing was evidence of dissemblance, ineptitude, or a leaky memory. I kept looking.

I opened the utensils drawer and there, amongst the knives, was the pot handle. It was normal dark-grey bakelite at one end, but a scorched mess at the other. It looked like one of the logs from my fire pit a few nights back, after the rain had rolled in and doused the flames.

When Vic came into the kitchen I was standing there laughing, with the handle in my hand.

“What’s so funny?” Vic said.

“He…” I had to pause to wipe a tear from the corner of my eye, “he… just put it away, in the drawer, with the knives. As though that’s something you do when you nearly burn down the house. You just put the charred remains in the nearest drawer!” We both laughed.

I had a little insight into Digby’s thought process now, so I opened the pans cupboard, and there it was: nestled amongst the other shiny stainless steel cookware was the blackened remains of the pot that Digby tried to boil an egg in. When I pulled the pot out to take a closer look, behind it was… another blackened pot, in much the same state, although the handle was still attached, and not as badly burned as the first.

“Jesus,” I said to Vic. “How many times did this happen?”

We stopped laughing.

The final exhibit I found was a steel tray, still in the oven. It was dark brown and covered with a thick layer of baked grease. The top layer was still runny, and glistened in the light. This was the tray upon which pizza upon pizza had been heated, each floating on and contributing to the oil of the last.

Vic and I got to cleaning what we could. It was dark and chilly, but the doors and windows had to stay open.

When I went to taekwondo a few nights later, I imagined the kicking dummy was Digby.

Okay Digby, here’s an axe kick to the top of the head. Whumph.

Now, a push kick to the solar plexus. Poof.

Roundhouse to your ribcage. Oomph.

Spinning heel kick to the neck. Thwack.

This was not the kind of visualisation the therapist had originally recommended. But it made me feel a little better.

Back at home, we tried a few different sprays to neutralise the smell. But they merely layered cloying, floral smells over the bad one. We set out wet dishes of baking soda. These delighted the kids, because once each dish dried out they pretended the baking soda was snow. If we kept the house entirely open all day that would take the edge off, but we’d inevitably close the doors at night and wake up each morning to the smell of a recent kitchen fire.

We had a minor breakthrough when we noticed that one particular curtain near the kitchen had been so tainted it was perpetuating the stink – enough to rattle our lungs if we leaned in close. We took the curtain down and threw it outside. Over the next few days I wiped down every conceivable plane of the kitchen and dining room: ceiling, walls, cupboards, floor, each individual wooden slat of the blinds. It was putrid and monotonous, but incredibly satisfying. Underneath the filth was a fresh skin with which we could start again.

I called Digby one more time, explaining that we were investigating an ozone machine and waiting on an insurance assessment.

“Oh my lordy,” he said. “By the way – if I give you my address, could you please send my cellphone charger? I think I left it.”

Although we were still waiting on the insurance rep a week later, it looked like we wouldn’t need the ozone machine or the insurance assessment after all. The place was starting to gleam from the supercleaning – something good was coming from this – and the smell was starting to subside. All we’d have to show the rep would be a burnt pot and handle. Times two.

I could claim vindication. I could cite this episode as evidence for anyone who might tell me that my worries are unwarranted, my impressions out of proportion. But this would doom me to be perpetually caught in a cascade of concerns. Forever catastrophising. To be a person at once tedious and sanctimonious.

I didn’t want to be that kind of person. Anymore.

Thus it was important I set the right tone when I retold this story to friends. I wasn’t charitable enough to say “Someone looking after our house had an unfortunate accident and burnt a pot, and they were unsure what to do afterwards, but they’re doing okay.” That’s a version I might reserve for a friend or acquaintance who went a little off-book looking after our place. I was able to move on from my impulse to imply nefarious intentions and say something like “This stranger nearly burnt our kitchen down and poisoned our dog – and they’re still at large.” Ultimately I found it therapeutic to settle somewhere in the middle, essentially with what I believe to be the most lighthearted version of the truth: “A neglectful buffoon nearly burnt our house down by reducing our cookware to ash, starved our chickens yet tried to eat but ultimately wasted their eggs, didn’t change his clothes in six days, and then asked me to send him his forgotten phone charger in the mail.”