The doctor was a tiny lady, with big glasses and intense dark eyes. She stuck something in my ear and called out to a girl who wrote down everything she said. “We’ve probably got some mites in here. Left ear has a tear that should be stitched up.” With strong fingers, she felt my body from neck to tail. “Underweight, probably malnourished. Eyes could use some cleaning and drops.” She pulled up my tail.
“Hey!” I cried. “There’s no need for that!”
“I want a stool sample, see if we have any parasites. Now, let’s look at that leg.” Very carefully, she examined Spike’s farewell present. “He’s going to need some stitches. Start him on antibiotics.” The doctor looked at me carefully and stroked my head. “He’ll be okay in no time. Put him on the adoption list. How many more have we got?” And just like that, I was taken out and put in another room where they stitched and bandaged my ear and leg, and gave me medicine. I was scared, but I never felt any pain.
They fed me, then put me in a large cage with six of my friends. “Sorry it’s so crowded,” Milo said. Crowded? Was he kidding? He wrote something on a piece of paper and slipped it in front of the cage. “We’re going to call you … Daryl.”
Daryl? “My name is Pumpkin!” I told him.
“It’s my middle name,” he explained with a smile.
I plopped down next to Ernie. “Don’t feel bad,” he said. “They named me Brutus.” I couldn’t help but laugh.
“Brutus? Really? What about you, Daffodil?”
“Princess!”
“All I want is a new home,” another dog said. “We heard that people will be coming tomorrow and maybe adopt us. Better get some sleep.”
I curled up next to Daffodil and Ernie — I mean, Princess and Brutus — and dreamt that someone wanted to adopt all three of us.
The next morning, eager, boisterous groups of moms, dads, girls, and boys came pouring in to meet us.
“Stand up straight,” Ernie told us. “Let ’em see those tails wag!” We crowded to the front of the cage, each doing our best to stand out and find a new home. Paco stayed in the back. All of his long, matted hair had been shaved off, and he wore a huge plastic cone-shaped collar so he wouldn’t chew his infected paw. “I like it here,” he said. “I don’t want a new home.”
Daffodil was the first to go. “I’m going to miss you guys!” she said as Milo reached in for her. I’d miss her too, but her new family seemed so happy and excited. Ernie was next, and then the others, until only Paco and me were left. Several times I thought it was my turn until I heard a conversation that went something like this:
“Look at this orangey one. He’s cute.”
“Yeah … but he’s got bandages on his ear and his leg. That could be a problem.”
“And vet bills can be so expensive.”
“Hey — look at that one!” Off they’d go and some other dog would have a new home. By late afternoon I was disheartened, and my tail hurt from all that wagging. Then two women stopped in front of our cage.
“I can’t believe Thanksgiving is next week,” one said.
“I got off easy. All I have to bring is a pumpkin pie.”
Did she say Pumpkin? My ears went up, my head snapped around.
“Hey, they’re talking about you,” Paco whispered. “Stand up.”
“I make them from scratch. First I buy a pumpkin, cook it, and grind it up myself.” Paco and I stared at each other in disbelief. A pie? From a Pumpkin? “Oh, look, this little dog might be a good one.” I backed up slowly.
“I go a little pumpkin crazy at Thanksgiving: pumpkin cookies, pumpkin bread, pumpkin ice cream, pumpkin mousse… .” My teeth chattered, my whole body started shaking. I had to get out of this place before she thought of any other recipes to put this Pumpkin in.
“Hide in back of me,” Paco said, “behind the collar.” But it was too late.
The pumpkin-eating lady said, “I think I like this one best.”
“Let’s see them all first,” her friend said, “then we’ll decide.”
“You are in trouble,” Paco said, when they’d gone. “What are you going to do?”
I was so upset. I liked it here, I liked the people, and now because of one pumpkin-crazed person I was going to have to leave. “I’m going to run away.”
I circled my cage twice. The door latched on the outside, but they opened it to put our food in. That’s when I’d make a run for it. It was almost closing time so dinner would be soon.
“Where will you go?” Paco asked.
“I don’t know. Back to Walter’s?”
“You’ll never find it. And they took him away in an ambulance. You’d be alone.”
“I’ll figure it out. No one wanted me anyway.”
Paco looked like he was sad for me. “Good luck, buddy.”
Soon Milo appeared with two bowls of food. I didn’t want to get him in trouble, but I had to leave. “Here you go, guys.” He opened the cage door, and before he could put the bowls down, I took off.
“Hey! Come back!”
I remembered where the front door was: to the right, down a hall, left to the lobby. My leg was sore from the stitches and the bandage made it hard to run, but my timing was perfect. A family of four was just coming in the door. The dad was holding it open for his toddler.
“Look!” the mom cried, pointing to me as I zoomed past them.
Milo cried, “Daryl! Daryl!”
It was dark and cold outside. Where should I go? Where? Several cars were parked off to my right. I ran under the first one, then the next, until I was under the one farthest from the front door. Before I could decide what to do, a car pulled in next to me. I held my breath.
The driver got out, then opened the back door on the passenger side. What was that sound?
“Don’t cry, mija,” he said softly. “It’s going to be okay.” I inched closer so I could hear everything.
“But, Papa, I don’t want anyone to see me!” She sniffed and cried softly.
“It’s only a patch on your eye. Think how much better you’ll see when it’s off!”
“I hate it. And I hate my glasses.” She cried some more. “I’m ugly now.”
He knelt down. I could have reached out and touched him. “Listen to me. Rosita bonita — isn’t that what I’ve always called you? Beautiful little Rosa?”
She gasped for air. “Yes.”
“Your patch will be gone in days. And glasses make people look smart!”
“Not mine.”
“Yes, yours. They shout, I am a smart girl who loves to read!” She laughed. “Give me a hug, Rosita la bonita! Rosa la inteligente!” She laughed some more, and sniffed her tears back.
“Come on. Your abuela said she’d make tamales for this new dog of yours.”
Abuela? Tamales? I couldn’t believe my ears. I hadn’t let myself think of my family’s abuela who loved me so much before I got lost. Every Sunday we sat together while she made tamales.
This new family was my destiny, and I’d almost missed it. I had to get back in. But how? Just slip out from under the car and let them see me? No, they might think I’m a stray. I ran back to the car closest to the front door. Surely Rosa would enter the building first, and then her dad. I’d sneak in after them and run to my cage. They’d see me and know I was the dog for them.
Except — the door was locked. The dad knocked. Finally a man opened it. “It’s okay. Come on in,” he said, and locked the door behind them.
I was dumbfounded. “But … you’re my family! I know it,” I called out. If I didn’t get in there right away they might adopt another dog. The wrong dog.
I ran to the front door and started barking. No one came. I glanced around the parking lot. It was made up of small pebbles. I quickly sucked one into my mouth, and spit it at the glass door. It made a pitiful little ping. I tried a bigger one, and got a slightly louder ping. No one would hear that, no one would come to investigate.
I inched closer until my nose touched the glass and s
tarted to howl. Rosa would go home with someone else. I whimpered. I’d been so close to finding the perfect family. Just as another whimper shook me, I heard the door open. “There you are!” Milo exclaimed, bending to pick me up. “I thought you were lost!” As he carried me in, all I could think about was Rosa. Where’s Rosa? We went down one hall, turned, and almost ran into the pumpkin eaters.
“Oh, look!” one of them said. “Is he still available?” I leaped out of Milo’s arms, landing hard on the floor, hurting my bandaged leg.
I ran, up one hall and down another, until I found them. Rosa was staring into a cage, looking sad.
“Rosa!” I barked. “I’m here!” And limping, barking, and whimpering, I ran, and with all my strength I jumped as high as I could, and … she caught me. In both arms.
Never had I licked a face, neck, or ears so enthusiastically, letting her know just how much I was meant to be hers.
She giggled and held me close. Her dad looked amazed. “Papa, look! He likes me. And he has bandages. Two of them!” She laughed as I put my paw on her shoulder and nuzzled her cheek.
Her dad ran his hand over my head. “He could be the one.”
Milo came running up. “You found him.”
“He found me,” Rosa said. Milo reached out for me, but Rosa turned away and shook her head. “He’s ours.”
Later, when we were driving home, Rosa said, “I don’t think Daryl is his name. He needs just the right name.” I nestled in closer to her as she studied me. “I think I’ll call him Calabazito.”
Her father laughed. “It’s a little long, but good.”
That’s when I knew I was really home. My old abuela used to call me the same thing. “Ay, mi calabazito,” she’d say.
In English? “Oh, my little pumpkin.”
Randi Barrow is the author of Finding Zasha and Saving Zasha. When dogs entered her life a dozen years ago, the effect was profound, and dogs have continued to inspire her writing. Randi lives in Los Angeles with her husband and their Chihuahua-mix companion, Manuel. For more about Randi, visit her website at www.randibarrow.com.
The last thing Evelyn Maybeck needed was another creature to care for. Everyone in Pawley knew she kept her three-bedroom place stuffed with critters that needed looking after. They were mostly kids from Social Services, but also the occasional dog or cat from the Pawley Rescue Center, weekending classroom rodent, or down-and-out friend.
Evelyn didn’t turn anyone away, because while her house was small and stuffed to the rafters, her heart was enormous and could expand to fit. If her heart had a tag, it would read: ONE SIZE FITS ALL. And it would actually be true.
Whenever Evelyn got a call from Social Services she welcomed the new foundling with an open door, open arms, and little regard for the extra work it created. She knew that her job, providing basics — clean clothes, enough food, a warm bed, a ride — was easy compared to the emotional curveballs a kid in transition was fielding. Bitter divorces, legal problems, hospitals, painful pasts — these were the things that shattered families, pummeled children, and dropped them on her doorstep. Evelyn did all she could to soothe their bruises with warm food, kind words, and a safe place to stay.
So while it was not unusual to see Evelyn balancing a baby on her hip while she looked over long division homework and unpacked groceries to start dinner, it was unusual to see her generous backside sticking out from under her peeling porch. But that was exactly what it was doing on a Monday morning in May.
“Come on out of there,” Evelyn coaxed the mud-covered something cowering in the corner. “I won’t hurt you.”
“Won’t hurt,” Kirby, a mop-headed toddler, echoed at her heel. He held out a crust of toast temptingly.
Evelyn, Kirby, and Jora, who was ten, had been aware that something was under the porch for several days. At first they thought it was Captain Jack — the one-eyed cat Evelyn had taken in a year or so back. Jora thought perhaps Jack had returned for more tuna. Only the frightened beast was too big to be a cat. Whatever was hiding under the stairs was large enough to shake the whole porch when it trembled against the rail post, and frightened enough to keep the porch vibrating almost constantly.
“All right, have it your way. I’m in no hurry.” Evelyn backed out slowly, hips swinging. When she stood up, her knees were dark with damp spring mud and she had a smudge on her cheek. She brushed at the spots, rubbing in the dirt, but there was no time to change. Jora needed to get to school. Kirby was out of Goldfish. And Evelyn was picking up a new charge today — an older child. Thirteen, they’d said. So much could happen before a kid reached thirteen.
Evelyn told Jora and Kirby that they’d need to be kind. That they’d need to be extra patient. All three of them — four — would need some time. Jora nodded. She remembered when she was first with Evelyn.
After Kirby dropped his toast by the opening under the stairs and waved good-bye to the mystery creature, Jora strapped him into the car seat in the rusting Volvo. She tugged on the seat belt, worrying about who would sit with her at lunch. About how things would go with a new foster sibling. She hoped it would be a girl. A girl would be nice. Evelyn wondered what time they’d be back — maybe the scared critter would be gone by then.
When the Volvo pulled back into the narrow drive it was nearly dark. Kirby was sound asleep in his car seat, a half-eaten apple browning in his hand. Jora gathered her books into her backpack and started to unbuckle the three-point harness.
“I’ll get that, plum cake,” Evelyn said tiredly. “You get to your homework.” It was late. Dinner wasn’t made. Evelyn was worn out, and worried about her newest charge. They’d been together for five hours, but Charlie, a boy, hadn’t said a single word. He just followed, at a distance, while they went to the grocery store, picked up Jora from school, and stopped for underwear, socks, and other essentials (Evelyn guessed at the size). And now that they were at the house, he made no move to get out of the car.
Jora trotted to the stairs, which seemed to start the porch shaking again. Evelyn was so distracted by the new boy that she’d forgotten about the quivering mystery creature. Kirby, groggy on her shoulder, dropped his leftover apple over the rail. “Here, kitty.” He yawned before flopping his head back down and burrowing further into sleep.
“Evelyn?” Jora asked softly, glancing back toward the car. “If it’s a cat, could we keep it?”
Evelyn smiled. She loved it when the kids in her care used the word “we,” like they were a family. Because “we” were all they had for the moment. “We’ll have to see,” she told Jora. “Whatever’s hiding under there might need help. Remind me to call Joe at Pawley Rescue Center to come take a look — if we can get it to come out.”
Jora scrambled back down the stairs to peer past the lattice into the dark, her backpack sliding. “I see eyes!” she cried.
So did Evelyn. Charlie had emerged from the Volvo, his eyes peeking out from under the beanie he wore pulled down to his lower lashes. They were a bright hazel color, like gold-flecked gingerbread. They brightened for the slightest instant, then went vacant. A pang of tired worry spread through Evelyn’s chest.
“Careful now,” Evelyn warned Jora. Cornered creatures could lash out, and an excited kid, even one as cautious as Jora, could seem loud and intimidating. “Speak softly. He’s probably scared.”
Jora nodded and whispered encouraging words into the darkness. Charlie took a few steps forward and stood, half looking, for a long moment.
“Wanna see?” Jora waved him closer.
Charlie lowered his gaze and slunk back to the car.
Evelyn watched the skinny boy go and shifted Kirby higher onto her hip. Sometimes it took days for a foster child in her care to trust her. Sometimes weeks. Sometimes they never did.
While Charlie shifted from one foot to another by the car, Evelyn thought that maybe this time she’d made the wrong choice. Maybe thirteen hard years were just too many. Jora was still crooning and Kirby was getting heavier by the second, so s
he took him inside and laid him on the couch. The little guy had missed his nap and it was too late to be dozing, but she couldn’t bear to wake him. She covered him with a tattered quilt and went back out for the groceries, looking kindly at Charlie but not saying anything. After seven years of fostering, Evelyn knew that some kids needed time and space to think, especially the older ones. She just hoped it was enough.
Charlie came inside for dinner — grilled cheese sandwiches and tomato soup — but kept his jacket on and didn’t eat much. And when supper was over he disappeared back to the porch while Evelyn settled Kirby into bed and Jora at the table with her math notebook.
Standing at the sink with a tub full of warm suds, Evelyn watched the boy through the window. He had half a sandwich in his hand — the half she thought he’d eaten — and held it out beside the porch. He stood very still and stayed quiet. Even as a dark snout began sniff, sniff, sniffing its way out from underneath, Charlie stayed perfectly still.
Evelyn held her breath as the dog’s mouth opened. In the yellow porch light she saw a purplish tongue. Dark lips pulled back and gently, so gently, the dog put his teeth on the sandwich, as if it might shatter. Charlie didn’t move as he released the offering. The nose disappeared, and Charlie stood. Several minutes passed before Evelyn pushed open the screen door and called the silent boy to bed.
Charlie shuffled inside without glancing at Evelyn. She showed him his bed, the clothes she’d gotten for him, the new toothbrush on the sink. He didn’t even nod.
Tomorrow I’ll call Joe, Evelyn told herself as she folded laundry. Joe would know what to do about the dog. She smiled, thinking of Pawley Rescue Center and the Cole family. Yes, Joe knew about strays. He would know what to do.
The next morning, Charlie wasn’t in bed. Kirby noticed first. “Charlie? Charlie? Charlie, where you go?” he asked, wandering the house in footy pajamas.
Evelyn’s heart began to race. Maybe she’d pegged the boy wrong. Maybe he was a runner. But when she opened the front door to shout for him, she saw the top of his knit beanie over the railing. He was sitting cross-legged beside the hole under the porch. A damp snout with a black licorice tip stretched out of the dark, just touching his jean-clad leg. Evelyn exhaled and eased the screen door shut so it wouldn’t slam. The lunch meat she’d bought the day before was gone from the fridge. She made peanut butter sandwiches instead, herded the children into the Volvo, and dropped the older two at school. Charlie climbed out of the backseat without saying good-bye.
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