by Cole Alpaugh
“Sorry.” Bagg shifted the cranky gears and rolled forward. He just wished he’d had another minute or two to spend with that last memory of his little girl.
Chapter 15
Graceful Gracie was hungry and tired. Her tutu was in tatters, all tangled with burs, and kept snagging on sharp twigs. The gentle old black bear loved the pink tutu her man had given her more than anything in the world. He’d scratched her ears and rubbed her chest to make her okay with having it snapped snuggly over her lower belly, but he didn’t need to do any of that. It was beautiful and smelled like flowers, and she was happy to show it off. No complaints about the extra scratching, though.
The human cubs who came to watch her adored her pink tutu as well; they made lots of happy noises. There were bright blinking lights when she rose up and danced on her hind legs. Sometimes, Gracie’s man would dance with her and feed her peanuts, although now that she didn’t have teeth, she could only swallow them whole.
This man was kind and gentle to Gracie and she loved him very much. She knew what it was like to be forced to wear a muzzle, which had pinched her lips and made her chest hurt because she couldn’t breathe. The muzzle wasn’t necessary. No matter how badly her first owner had treated her, she wouldn’t have tried to bite him. Not even when the man put her in that awful little cage where she was forced to stand on her back legs, making her hips ache like they were on fire. The ground turned red hot when the music came on, and she had to hop and dance to keep from burning. Gracie had learned that when the music played, the ground was going to get hot, so it was time to dance.
But Gracie had gotten old. Her stomach sometimes hurt for days and she couldn’t eat. And when the bad man tried to force a tube down her throat, she feared she really might bite him. She didn’t bite, of course, but she also didn’t keep the liquid in her belly. The bad man had kicked her, snapped the whip across her face, and yelled that he was going to get rid of her. Gracie couldn’t help that her stomach hurt so badly.
Her new man loved her, and she danced for him even when she was sick. This new man smelled terrible, with layers of grease and old urine–Gracie knew his mother had never taught him to properly lick himself—but he didn’t make her wear a muzzle and he never hit her with a stick. He even woke Gracie one night, stumbling against the lion’s cage and tripping and falling over metal tent stakes. The man had come to her cage and talked sweetly to Gracie, telling her a story in his human language.
Gracie was curled up in one corner, just watching her man with her yellow eyes, ears cocked, ready to listen to his lullaby, when she heard the chain rattle and the lock click open. Her man let out a grunt as he climbed into her home and began stroking the soft fur of her jowls. Gracie closed her eyes and the man stopped rubbing and settled down in the straw beside her, his smelly back to her. Gracie lifted her big right paw and pulled him close, and her man made a low murmur as she began licking away some of his filth.
Graceful Gracie’s safe cage and kind man were now lost. She was lost. Her tutu flapped like a broken kite, taunting the bad animals who were gaining on her. Gracie lumbered as fast as she could, with the yapping, angry animals in chase. She ran across an open field of perfectly groomed grass that looked like a gigantic carpet. Groups of strange men carrying bags and skinny metal sticks ran to their little white cars when they saw her charging toward them. I’m lost, Gracie wanted them to know, and I’m being chased. Help me! But the men in their brightly colored clothes—which Gracie envied, despite her current situation—were driving and running away from her.
Gracie knew this was all her fault. When the man who was shot out of the big blue and red machine flew into the tiger cage and broke it open, Gracie was scared and tried to hide under a truck and wait for her man to come find her. But then the truck roared to life, and a big herd of screaming cars and trucks with horrible flashing lights were after her, and she ran from her hiding place.
Grace scurried through the night, trying to escape the lights and hard ground, which hurt her old paws. She ran until she came to a shoreline of muddy salt water that smelled like dead fish and rotten grass. Gracie stopped to catch her breath, turning to look over her shoulder at the giant mass of buildings and the lights shining up on the clouds. Off in the distance, she could hear the screaming cars still looking for her, so she stepped into the cool water one paw at a time. The mud soothed her paws and she was tempted to just roll there in this sudden goodness when one of the screaming cars came wailing around the big building toward her.
Gracie pushed out away from the shore into the black water and the bottom fell away quickly. Tucked somewhere in a far corner of her mind, where cub memories were stored, Gracie had images—like old Polaroid snapshots—that flashed across her vision. In them, Gracie was swimming across a pond with her mother, reaching her young paws out one after the other in easy, sweeping movements. Gracie decided there must be something good about swimming, since she had done it with her mother so many years ago. She swam in long even strokes, resting a few times by just treading water and arching her back to keep her nose in the air. And after a while, her paws found mud again and she pulled her sopping body up and out of the bay, giving a great and mighty shake that nearly knocked her over.
There was tall grass here. Gracie walked into the thickest patch, made a few circles to mat down a bed, and fell asleep in less than a minute.
The sun and complaining seagulls startled her awake a few hours later. She looked around for her food dish but then remembered where she was and a little bit about what had happened. Her pink tutu was streaked brown with mud and she hoped her man could make it clean for her. With a grumbling tummy, Gracie peed and pooped a great watery mess, then set off to find her man, heading away from the water and away from the bright sun.
Roads filled with cars seemed to intersect every option, but none of these cars were screaming that terrible noise or shining those flashing lights, so Gracie sprinted across the pavement each time the coast was clear. It was on the first patch of perfect grass that the angry barking had begun. Gracie’s old muscles were sore from the swim and she didn’t know how long she could run, so she either had to find help or a sturdy tree.
Running past the startled golfers, Gracie smelled the wonderful food even before she spotted the building the smoke and scent were coming from. Gracie felt energized by the idea of breakfast; she recognized the beautiful smell of hotdogs and hamburgers and the tasty buns they came in. Gracie’s dry mouth filled with drool, and a rush of adrenaline drained away her fear of the pursuing animals; she turned on them, rising as tall as she could, letting out a thunderous roar, and baring her mighty gums.
“Get away from me now!” Gracie thundered in her bear language at the pack of three mutts that had been nipping idiotically at her back paws and muddy pink tutu. The dogs nearly bowled each other over hitting the brakes, and their plaintive barks turned to yelps as Gracie transformed herself into a monstrous ballerina.
“Go!” Grace bawled and the dogs obeyed, leaving her with yummy hotdogs on her mind.
The snack bar was empty of customers, but the grill was going and only one human was foraging around in the cold box in back. Gracie pushed through the screen door and headed right for the grill, lifting herself onto her haunches and carefully brushing the two dozen sizzling hot dogs onto the floor, singeing just a few hairs in the process. Gracie dropped back down and began wolfing the hot meat, burning her lips and gums a little. But it was oh so heavenly good. Gracie barely noticed the woman who stumbled into her, fell onto her hairy back and started screaming bloody murder, as Gracie licked every last bit of juice off the floor.
Screaming humans were nothing new. Male humans regularly snuck up behind their females and pretended to push them too close to the bars of her cage. The females almost always screamed, as if they were in danger. The game had hurt Gracie’s feelings at first, until she realized it was just how humans played.
The screaming woman, who had fallen on her then rolled bene
ath the grill, was leaving her alone, so Gracie checked the kitchen for more treats. Nothing was as good as the hotdogs. The candy bars were okay, but tasted much better when human cubs took the wrappers off for her. The loaf of bread made her thirsty; she was trying to open a frustrating container of water when she heard the familiar screaming of the bad cars. Gracie’s heart sank and her stomach turned sour as the awful fear flooded back. Those cars that had chased her last night with spinning lights had somehow found her.
Gracie went for the broken screen door at first, but that’s where the cars were loudest. She backed away, searching for someplace to hide. Scrambling back into the kitchen, she nosed open a cabinet. The space was small, but she got quite a bit of her three hundred or so pounds into it, with only the back half sticking out. There were boxes of cleaning supplies under there that made her want to sneeze, but Gracie held it in.
The old black bear, with her pink tutu clad rear end sticking out of the snack bar cupboard, sensed that she would have to be as quiet as a mouse if she ever wanted to see her man again.
Chapter 16
A cop car blew past Lennon Bagg’s Jeep and rocked it with turbulence, lights flashing and siren blaring. The sight of the speeding black and white stirred something in Bagg, and he couldn’t help but feel a rush of excitement.
The radio calls from the police dispatcher had themselves piqued his interest. Apparently, an enormous black bear had attacked a pack of dogs, then smashed through a concessions building door and went after a young woman. By the grace of God, the woman had escaped with only minor injuries.
A black bear down in these parts would have made one heckuva long trek, Bagg thought. There was a good chance it had crossed the Delaware somewhere up in North Jersey, or maybe came all the way down from New York. Whatever the case, he’d never heard of a black bear breaking down a door or attacking dogs. Maybe if a dog cornered it. But smashing through a door … from hunger? Rabies?
Bagg began writing the first paragraphs of his story in his head. Glancing down, he was surprised to see that the speedometer had edged over eighty miles per hour. The back nine holes were now zipping along the left side of the two-lane highway, and Bagg backed off the gas pedal, searching for the stone archway entrance to the Absecon Golf and Country Club. With no pay increases in the newsroom for the last couple years, Bagg had grabbed a few freelance assignments from the sports department by covering some Saturday gigs. Most of the work had been high school football games, but he’d also written up a few high school golf matches at fifty bucks a pop. Writing about golf was much easier than football, where you had to log every damn play, and the weather was crappy every other game. Golf was a spring sport that was cancelled if it rained hard, and you could write your entire story from the 18th hole in about thirty minutes.
Bagg pulled in under the big AGCC sign and followed the narrow drive around past the clubhouse, continuing along a service road to where an ambulance and the cop car were parked. The concessions building was a low, one-story structure, no more than twenty by thirty feet, with a covered patio and a half dozen round metal tables and chairs. Everything was painted a fresh coat of white and stood in stark contrast to the lush green fairways. Bagg was no golf fan and had never swung anything but a bright blue- or red-handled miniature golf club. But there was something special about the bucolic settings, the meticulous gardening, and the grounds keeping that went along with golfing. Golf courses reminded Bagg of Walt Disney World, with the topiaries and tulips and small signs instructing visitors to go this way and that. Bagg wasn’t a golfer, but he certainly envied their playground.
The Absecon police officer who had roared past Bagg’s Jeep was at the back door of the ambulance huddled next to a woman holding an ice pack to her forehead. With them were an EMT and two crisply dressed men in collared shirts and shiny leather golf shoes. Bagg cranked his emergency brake and shoved his reporter’s notebook into the tan Domke camera bag that carried his Canon T90 and short zoom lens. He untangled his press pass from his stained tie as he walked toward the group, while keeping an eye on what must be the bear-occupied snack shack.
“The back door is solid and is always kept locked,” one of the men in golf shoes was telling the young cop. Bagg knew a couple of the town cops, but this kid looked right out of high school.
“Is Fish and Game coming?” Bagg asked, joining the group in the shade of the shiny, hulking ambulance. He flashed his dangling press pass and added, “The Beacon.”
“Ted Shamsky.” One of the golfers stuck out his hand and showed his bright and perfect set of teeth. “I’m the pro. S-H-A-M-S-K-Y.”
“William Montrose.” The other man took his turn shaking Bagg’s hand. “Spelled just like it sounds. I own Carpet World, in case you’ve seen the commercials.”
“Their ETA is an hour, maybe more.” The young officer didn’t seem the least bit pleased to be interrupted. According to the gold nameplate over his shirt pocket, his name was Officer Gates. Skinny, with big ears and black frame, military-issue eye glasses, he looked an awful lot like the world’s richest computer nerd with the same last name, but didn’t seem to be in any sort of mood to discuss the coincidence.
“We got the bear cornered in there.” Officer Gates lifted his chin to indicate the snack shack as he scribbled notes on a pad much smaller than Bagg’s.
“So the bear attacked you?” Bagg asked the pretty young woman who was dressed in sharp white slacks and a light blue button-down top. Her name tag said “Bonnie,” and she sat on the top step of the ambulance. The EMT, whose blue shirt had “Jake” written in script over the left breast pocket, sat next to her, saggy rubber gloves dangling from his fingertips. Jake looked disappointed that the victim had no treatable injuries, which was probably why he’d pulled out the ice pack. “When in doubt, grab an ice pack,” was a motto Bagg had heard at countless accident scenes. With nothing more to do unless the bear started mauling people, Jake seemed to be concentrating on breathing in the girl’s perfume.
“Yeah, I just got the grill going and was coming back from the freezer when this huge bear appeared out of nowhere right there in the kitchen.” Bonnie was talking too fast, her voice genuinely shaking. “It stood up on its back legs, snarling, and its teeth were like this long.” She took the ice pack from her head to use both hands to show how big the bear’s teeth were.
As if to punctuate her demonstration, a metallic clanging rang out from deep inside the snack shack.
“Holy shit!” The cop unholstered his gun and pointed it down at the brown divots of the tenth hole tee area where they stood. The snack shack was maybe a twenty yard chip over a deep oval bunker.
“It musta got rabies or is just plain crazy out of its mind.” Bonnie shook her head, and each member of the group turned toward the dark place beyond the broken screen of the front door.
“How’d you get away?” Bagg pulled out his notebook and flipped to the first blank page.
“Gosh, I don’t really know. I just ran screaming. I thought it was following me. I could feel its awful breath on the back of my neck as I was pulling open that door.” She pointed. “It was like I knew I was about to die.”
The EMT took the opportunity to comfort the pretty woman, reaching one rubbery hand around to rest on her shoulder, taking an obvious peek between buttons at her lacy bra.
“I’m going in.” Officer Gates apparently recognized this as his big chance.
Gates stepped away from the group and keyed the microphone clipped to the epaulet on his left shoulder, the mic cord curling down to the radio hanging from his belt.
Officer Gates tilted his head toward the microphone. “Unit Sixteen to Dispatch.”
“Dispatch. Go ahead, Sixteen.”
“I’m ten seven to take a ten sixty-two. All other units code four.” His voice was hushed.
“Ten four, Sixteen,” said the dispatcher. “Let me know when you’re back in service.”
“Code four?” Bagg understood that the cop was telling
his dispatcher he was out of service to take a report from a citizen, but why code four? Code four cancelled all other responding units. And why the secrecy? Why was the cop practically whispering this stuff?
The cop turned to the golf pro. “Take Mr. Montrose up to the clubhouse. Go back along the eight and nine holes and stop anybody from coming down here, okay?”
“You bet, officer!” The pro seemed more than happy to be given a job away from the cornered bear.
“You three … inside the ambulance!” Gates was talking to the EMT, Bonnie, and Bagg, but Bagg wasn’t budging. Instead, he fished the Canon out of his camera bag and loaded a fresh thirty-six exposure roll of Fuji film.
“I’ll come with you,” Bagg told Officer Gates, as the EMT helped the sweet-smelling Bonnie to her feet and back onto the single gurney locked to the floor.
“Yeah, baby!” Jake the EMT mouthed at Bagg as he turned away from the girl. Apparently things were looking up for him. He winked at Bagg and mouthed, “Nice tits.”
Gates eyed the expensive-looking camera and also seemed to decide things were looking up. Perhaps he was planning how to pose for tomorrow’s front page newspaper photo.
“C’mon.” The cop held the black gun out in front with both hands. Bagg let his Canon lead the way, as he followed the cop down into the sand trap and back up toward the snack building.
“Just stay behind me,” the cop whispered. “Out of my line of fire.”
“Yeah, I’m right here,” answered Bagg, as the pair crept onto the patio and made their way between the round tables. Bagg noticed the sweat dripping down the back of the officer’s neck, despite the cool afternoon and the nice breeze. In fact, the entire back of the cop’s uniform shirt was drenched in sweat.
“Busted right through the screen,” Gates said to Bagg, as they looked at the hole where the animal had obviously busted right through the screen. Bagg reached around the cop to pluck a torn strip of pink taffeta snared on the broken wire.