by Bobby D. Lux
“Respect? Look what he’s wearing. Besides, we’re both going to hear about it, so let’s get the real story with no spin.”
For no good reason, I followed Ernie and Saucy behind nearby bushes where we interrupted some Yorkies eating rotten mushrooms out of the ground. I shooed them off and we hunched down as Nipper made his final approach towards the unsuspecting Scarlet.
“What is he supposed to be anyway?” Saucy said.
Neither of us could answer.
Scarlet was looking up into the sun with her eyes closed and her neck tilted up towards the light. Her costume was simple and fitting: a tiara. Nipper walked around in a nervous circle like he was debating what to say when Scarlet whipped her tail up and caught Nipper in the jaw.
“Excuse me,” Scarlet said. “I’m trying to get optimum sun on my tai… Lord, look at you, honey.”
“Hi Scarlet,” Nipper said, staring at the ground.
“My, my, my. Well, it is Halloween isn’t it.”
“Nice princess outfit,” Nipper said.
“Honey, I’m the queen. Don’t you forget that.”
“Oh yeah.”
“I say sweetie, you could be Petrucio’s dog with the way you’re dressed.”
“What’s a Petrucio?”
“Oh dear, that’s Shakespeare, honey.”
“What’s Shakespeare? Some new toy?”
“Toy? A toy? No, it is not a toy. It’s poetry.”
“Oh. I know poetry. Remember my poem?”
“How could one forget, Nipper? Now what can I do for you this fine day? But make it quick. The sun is unobstructed right now.”
“I was wondering if you wouldn’t mind,” Nipper said, “if you weren’t busy… Or if you were, that’s fine too, just let me know otherwise I totally understand and in fact-but-if-you’re-not-which-would-be-great-if-you-were-able-to-and-it-would-be-great-because-I-would-do-whatever-you-wanted-”
I couldn’t watch that anymore. I’d seen some grisly things out on patrol, but watching Nipper flounder like that was too much. He looked moments away from speaking in tongues.
“Hey Fritz,” Ernie said, as I came out from behind the bushes, “he’ll see you. Where you going?”
I had better things to do than watch this latest episode of Barks of our Lives. I was in the midst of an investigation. I scanned the park for those pugs. As a breed, they always seemed to know something though they played dumb at every opportunity. If I couldn’t find them I for sure wanted to have a chat with the mushroom eating Yorkies.
“Oh my,” I heard, from nearby, “now who is that wonderful hunk of dog sashaying away from me? ‘Scuse me, Nipper Dipper. You hold that thought of yours.”
“Okay,” Nipper said, remembering to again exhale.
“Where do you think you’re disappearing to?” Scarlet said, as a pair of paws trotted up to me from the side, and a warm breath of air found its way into my ear. “Well, aren’t you going to introduce yourself or am I the only one with any manners in this here park?”
“I’m Fritz.”
“Fritz. A rugged name for a rugged dog, I’m sure. Now here I was afraid I was just going to have to call you darling.” Her eyes were surrounded by smoky fur that faded perfectly into glistening white across her back.
“Fritz will do.”
“It sure will, sugar.”
“May I help you, ma’am?”
“I’ve never seen you here before. Maybe I can help you get to know the surroundings.”
“Okay,” I said, feeling like I was getting somewhere. “Do you know any dogs that go by Clay or Scamper?”
“Oh, now I know plenty of dogs, Fritz. But how about we just talk about you and me.”
“Clay is a large Rottweiler and Scamper is his sidekick; one of those Jack Russells. Know ‘um?”
“If it’ll keep you talking to me, of course I know them. Now how about I show you a few of the more quiet areas of the park?”
“Where can I find them?”
“Over by that tree in the corner where no one’s looking, that’d be good place to start.”
“I’m talking about Clay and Scamper.”
“Still on that, are you? Have I said how much I like a dog in uniform?”
“No.”
“Well then let me be the first to say how much I do.”
“Thank you. Now, can you help me?”
“Of course I’ll help, but don’t you think about playing hard to get with me. I’ll answer anything you want, but not here.”
She sniffed my nose as close as she could without our noses touching and left.
“Where?” I said, yelling after her, wanting to follow, but feeling paralyzed.
She answered me with her hips. They bounced up and down and swayed to and fro. I stood there like a lump. A lump who was having a hole seared through him by the laser eyes of a dog a few yards away dressed like a lollipop junkyard.
CHAPTER 11 - On the Other Side of Town
Since my departure, Nitro had the Grand City kennel all to himself. My bed was gone. My bowl was gone. My scent was washed away.
I pictured the overbred dope alone in my kennel late at night, thinking no one was watching him. I imagined that they took the opportunity to knock the kennel down and completely rebuild it for Nitro as one of those projects they use leftover budget money on. I was sure that it had wall-to-wall insulation and a heating system. I was sure it had soft light. I was sure the barks didn’t echo for minutes in there. I was sure it had multiple windows. I was sure it was ventilated and didn’t trap in unwanted smells. I was sure it had a life-like human dummy hanging from the ceiling with bungee rope. One that Nitro could tackle and attack like it was the real thing. I was positive Nitro gave the dummy a ridiculous nickname too; something like “Chewy.”
I pictured him living it up in there with all the perks I never had. A working speaker mounted into the ceiling. They’d turn on the radio for him and he’d romp around hyping himself up for a chase.
“You got this brother,” he’d tell himself, as he slobbered and salivated at the thought of tackling some scumbag and taking a clean bite off a sweaty forearm. “You’re the dog. You’re the envy of the canine race. No one holds a candle to you, Nitro. Get some, Nitro. That’s it. Oh, dog, you’re getting a medal for this one. Here comes the news, you’re getting that camera time. Nitro, the hero, coming to you live at eleven o’clock from the crime scene. No fear. All action. All Nitro. All the time.”
Nitro was in better shape than I was or ever had been. I knew that when we worked together. He was lean and muscular. The veins on his arms and hind legs were like ropes. He was faster than me too, but what did you expect? Now they have bio-engineered food for every stage of your life from puppy to adult to mature. Me? I just got food. Big fifty pound plain sacks of grub were just fine for Fritz. Food that made the same sounds twice a day as they poured it into my bowl. Clang-clang-clang-clang-clomp-clomp-clomp. That’s it. There was nothing for my skeletal health or my digestive track or my circulatory system or for muscle density or to promote strong teeth. I got knuckle-sized clumps of dry food sprinkled with what people think a chicken smells like. Year after year after year.
If I wanted to strengthen my bite, I had to get creative and deal with whatever I had to work with. If that meant I had to chew on a spare two-by-four that one of the other cops gave me after they remodeled their home, then I destroyed that thing until you could pick a lock with it. Toss me an old crow bar and in six months you’d be left with tin foil. I didn’t get tennis balls to chew on; I sharpened my enamel on steel wool wrapped together with rubber bands.
When I ran, it was on flat ground or up a hill. Sometimes they’d take us to where the firemen trained and we could run the stairs. That made the Dalmatians throw a piss fit. Now they have a whole obstacle course at the academy for the dogs with ropes, tires, netting, hurdles, bushes, and forts to climb through.
Instead, I was now curled up in the backyard of the Hart residence after
a day of playing make-believe while entertaining my insomnia with a view of the stars and power lines.
It’s wasn’t my place to say what’s fair and what wasn’t in the world, but I couldn’t help the way I felt. If I had the advantages Nitro had, or if I had the great fortune of his year of birth, then maybe I would’ve been in the kennel with Nitro the night when Clay and Scamper showed up looking for me.
What I know is that there was a crash outside at the kennel when there shouldn’t have been anyone out there. What Nitro was doing at the time was anyone’s guess (he later claimed “nothing much”). Since I’m the one unraveling this yarn, I’m going to speculate that he was training to a corny song like what they play at the police banquets when all the officers are too drunk to walk straight; something like “Kung Fu Fighting.”
“Ni-TRO was fast as lighting,” he sang, as I imagined him taking a flying leap across the kennel. Knowing Clay and Scamper, they didn’t just go up and tip their hand with an outright disturbance. They wouldn’t have gone without a proper plan; one that surely would have included some recon. Clay would have forced Scamper to squat down so Clay could stand on his shoulders to get a good peek in through a window, unbeknownst to the training buffoon.
Clay got a good look inside with his empty eyes and doesn’t see me. Instead, he saw what would appear to be a rhythmic dance routine. Then the breath from his nostrils fogged up the window in a half-circle. That’s when Scamper’s legs gave and Clay crumbled to the ground.
That had to be the crash that Nitro told me he heard. Clay, disgusted by his partner’s lack of sustainable lifting strength, improvised and sent Scamper and his cramping body to the door while Clay took cover out of sight.
“Can I help you?” Nitro said, opening the door to a grimacing Scamper.
“Umm, yessir,” Scamper said, hoping on three legs. “I was here to see if you’ve mailed in your census form for this year and if not-”
“Census was last year.”
“Well, you know how slow the government can be. We can’t help-”
“What was that noise?” Nitro said.
“Noise? What noise? I didn’t hear anything,” Scamper said, too quickly for a seasoned cop not to raise an eye.
“It sounded like something fell. Like a thud.”
Nitro took a look around. Clay held his breath in the shadows and squinted his eyes to abduct all reflection from them.
“It was me,” Scamper said, reeling Nitro’s waning attention back in to him. “I’m scared is all. I don’t really work for the census. I just needed a reason to knock on the door.”
“Don’t be silly, you’re at the police station. What can I do for you? I’m Nitro, the new guy in town.”
“What happened to the other one? That’s who we’re, I, me! That’s who I’m after. I mean, looking for.”
“Fritz?” Nitro said, spitting out of the side of his mouth. “Figures.”
“That’s his name?”
“I thought you knew him?”
“Just by reputation only. They say he was the best, right?”
“They may have said that at one time, but I’m the best now. How can I help?”
“You can tell us where to find Fritz.”
“Who’s us?”
“Me. Sorry. Me. I just mean me. So, where is he?”
“He got old and retired somewhere out in the suburbs, pal. Look, you want help, you got Nitro. It’s my kennel now. Fritz can’t help you anymore. What do you want with a beat up old-timer like him anyway?”
“He’s retired and beat up now, you say?”
“Last time I saw him. You sure I can’t find a way to help you?”
“Well, I just wanted to tell him thanks. You see, he saved me and a friend of mine. I guess it was right before he retired and we just wanted to return the favor if we could. I guess you can’t help us.”
Scamper turned his back to Nitro, stood up straight, and walked away. Nitro had to feel a pang in his chest; was it rejection or was it something else? Ineptitude? Suspicion?
“He’s living with Officer Hart at his house off of Sycamore,” Nitro said, trying to be of service somehow. “If that helps you at all.”
Nitro waited by the door for a thank you that wasn’t going to come. He returned to the kennel and his funk jams. He didn’t run around the kennel and he didn’t practice on Chewy. He sat there and wished for the day when I was no longer around.
While he sat there, I can only hope that before Nitro joined me that night in a late-night double-date with the insomnia twins, that he noticed the hulking shadow that emerged from nowhere. The shadow that caught up to Scamper and engulfed him before both sets of footsteps vanished into the night’s echo. I want to think he did.
CHAPTER 12 - A Mild Distraction
While Nitro wondered if that Jack Russell had told him the truth, I was in the Hart’s backyard with my eyes zeroed in up towards the sky. Stars can make excellent company in short doses. Their constant blank stares taunted me like they knew the world’s secrets and would love to tell them to me. I was just too far away. I wished that I was consumed on finding a way to track down Clay and Scamper. I wished that backyard had seen the last of Fritz. I wished that Nitro’s kennel was going to be mine again. I wished my leg didn’t scare me.
The truth was… Truth was… Those hips. Scarlet and her hips walked for miles and were no closer to getting out of my mind as when they began their jaunt hours ago. And not just those hips, that voice. Like a tipsy songbird caroling like no one was watching. Every note massaged the part of the spine that even the most limber of stretches will never reach. I tried to focus on Clay, but she kept creeping into the foreground.
Ernie had it on good word that we were being taken to the dog beach in the morning. He also advised that Saucy and Scarlet would be there. My plan was to see what she knew about Clay or if she knew anyone who did. I had to focus on that. She seemed like the type who knew a lot of dogs. But the more I pictured her in my mind, the more I wanted to talk to her about anything besides police work.
Maybe this would be okay after all, I thought. Maybe I was overreacting to losing my job; maybe it was time to reinvent myself. I could be a lover. I could be a playboy like Ricky in Internal Affairs. Scarlet wasn’t a potential informant, no, she was new start for me. A new Fritz who wasn’t consumed by the past. A Fritz uninterested in a quest to recapture something lost. I could be a dog who might be able to track down something new. Something I hadn’t had since the salad days of my career. A future. Hours passed and the stars held their ground. If I wasn’t going to sleep, no one was.
“Ernie,” I said, to the snoring heap out cold on his back leaning into the stucco with his arms extended over his head. “Ernie. Ernie. Get up. Hey.”
“I lost my collar,” Ernie said, half-awake, “I’m licensed, don’t worry.”
“Ernie.”
“Look it’s a public alley, anyone can rest here, pal.”
I bopped him a little with my paw. It took three bops until he saw my face staring down at him. His eyelids dribbled and he squirmed like a poked balloon until he eventually landed on most of his feet.
“What’re you doing?” he said, yawning. “You don’t do that to someone who’s sleeping. You made me lick the wall.”
“You wouldn’t get up.”
“I know. That’s the point. You look terrible. Have you slept?” I shook my head. “Aw, come on. Is something wrong? Stupid question, of course something’s wrong. Spill it.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“I’m gonna go get some water to get the taste of paint and dirt out of my mouth and when I return you’re gonna tell me what’s eating at you. If, at that point, you still don’t know what I’m talking about, I’m going back to bed and if you wake me up again, I’m gonna bark until they come out and scream at us because if I’m gonna be miserable, we all are.”
Ernie stumbled to his water bowl, took a few sips, started back, thought twic
e, got some food, a few more sips, and then sat down against the wall.
“You were saying?”
I didn’t know what to say.
“So?”
I didn’t know how to say it.
“Last call.”
I didn’t know if I even wanted to say it.
“Fine. If my eyes open again before-”
“Okay. Wait. Give me a second.”
“Fritz. Listen, clearly you’ve been up all night with whatever it is. The last thing you need is more time with it, so just spit it out. First thing that comes out. Open your mouth and let’s go already.”
“It’s just that… I think that… The thing is-”
Ernie slapped me.
“A. That’s for waking me up. B. I don’t want to hear an ill-prepared speech, and C. I’m still basically asleep, and oh my god, I just slapped a cop. Dogs have been put away for less. I mean, you have to understand that when a dog needs his sleep and he doesn’t get it that said dog who may or may not be me, otherwise yours truly, is prone to do something that he doesn’t mean and instantly regrets it and hopes that it’s something that can be forgotten about in no time. In fact, if I keep talking and you just stay still and don’t make a sound, I’ll never know if you’re even mad at me and I think that I actually prefer it that way-”
I slapped Ernie back.
“We’re even,” I said. Ernie nodded. “I need your help. You’re sure they’re taking us to the beach?”
“That’s what Saucy said. Her person was talking to our people so it seems to be the case. Usually that’s how it works.”
“What should I do?”
“You woke me up for that? Easy. You run, you get wet, you get dirty, you eat stuff buried in the sand, and then you get a bath when we get home. Was that really something that couldn’t wait?”
“I’m talking about with Scarlet.”
“I knew it. Me and Saucy saw the way you were looking at her. She does that to everyone, but unlike everyone else, she did it to you on purpose.”
“She didn’t do anything to me.”