by Nick Pirog
Once we hang up, I track Cassie down at the back of the store. A young woman in a red apron is squatted next to Cassie and is rubbing Cassie’s chest.
Cassie wiggles her butt and clowns it up for her.
“Hey,” I say, interrupting the girls’ party.
The woman turns and glances up. She has straight blonde hair held back in a ponytail and light brown eyes. Her face is roundish and a big dimple craters in her right cheek. She stares at me for a long moment, her face in a daze. After a long moment, she shakes her head and says, “Oh, hi.”
I realize Cassie must know the girl from coming here with my father and I say, “I see you two know each other.”
“No, we just met.” She gives Cassie a tickle in the armpit and says, “She’s such a little lover.”
I cut my eyes at Cassie.
Who are you and what did you do with my dog?
The woman stands and brushes her hands on her apron. “I’m Megan,” she says.
“Jerry,” I say, giving her hand a light shake.
“Have we met before?”
She’s more girl-next-door than runway model, but she’s attractive enough to be memorable. “I don’t think so.”
She cocks her head to the side. “You sure we didn’t go to school together when we were kids?”
“Not unless you went to school in a small town in Oregon.”
“I did not,” she says, her gaze soft, her brain seemingly somewhere else. After a short pause, she asks, “So are you guys in town for the 4th?”
“No, we live here.” I add, “So maybe that’s why I look familiar.”
She shakes her head as if to say, Naw, that’s not it.
I ask, “Have you lived in Tahoe all your life?”
“I left for college, but I’ve been back for a little over a year now.”
“Where did you go?”
“The Art Institute in Sacramento?”
“You’re an artist?”
“A culinary artist.”
“What are you doing working here?”
“I only work here a couple of days a week. I’m the pastry chef at Jimmy’s.” Jimmy’s Restaurant is inside a boutique hotel on the lakefront. It’s one of the most upscale restaurants in South Lake. “I want to open up my own dog bakery at some point,” she continues, “so I picked up this job to learn the ropes.”
I nod toward the glass-encased bakery near the register. “You make any of that stuff?”
“All of it,” she says, flashing a radiant smile.
She takes a few steps toward the bakery window and I follow.
“What’s your specialty?” I ask.
“Hmmm,” she says, holding her chin in her hand for a brief moment. “I’d have to say it’s a toss-up between the Pawcake and Woof Creme Pie.”
“Well, in that case, why don’t you give me one of each.”
She walks around to the back and pulls out a little cupcake with coconut sprinkles, then a layered cake with white in the center and a chocolate frosting.
“Is that chocolate?” I ask.
“No, it’s carob. It tastes similar to chocolate but is safe for dogs.”
“And what’s that in the middle?”
“Honey yogurt.”
“Tasty.”
“You want to give one a try?”
“I’ll pass.”
“Your loss,” she says with a snicker, then wraps both treats in wax paper and puts them in a box. As she’s doing this, Cassie walks over and drops a pig ear at my feet.
“You can get one more thing,” I tell her.
Cassie smiles and pants.
“Are you sure?”
She sits down.
“Okay, but don’t say I didn’t offer.”
I pick up the pig ear and put it on the counter.
Megan rings me up and I pay.
“It was nice to meet you,” I say.
“You too,” she calls, then makes her way around the counter and squats next to Cassie. “And it was nice meeting you, sweetie.” She plants a big kiss on Cassie’s nose.
Cassie’s tail helicopters.
My headache is starting to return with force and I say, “Okay, Cassie, let’s go.”
I give her leash a light tug and we start toward the door. When I have eclipsed the opening of the propped open door, I feel a sharp resistance and glance back over my shoulder. Cassie is lying on the floor just inside the shop.
“Cassie,” I call, giving a light tug. “Come on, time to go.”
She doesn’t budge.
“Seriously, Cassie, we need to go.” The Advil have officially run their course and my temples are beginning to pulsate. I shake the box of treats at her and say, “When we get home, I’ll give you a Woofcake.”
“Woof Creme Pie,” I hear Megan mutter from somewhere within.
“Right. When we get home, I’ll give you a Woof Creme Pie.”
Cassie shakes her butt and barks.
She’s in protest mode.
“What?” I ask, shaking my head. “I don’t know what you want.”
Two more barks, which land like explosions on my eardrums.
I lean down. “Please,” I beg.
She pushes herself up and I let out a satisfying breath. Then I feel her pull—pulling me back into the store.
“No!”
She barks four times.
I’ve only heard Cassie bark four times in a row a handful of times and each time she was trying to protect something Hugo was trying to hunt.
Finally, I lean down and pick her up and carry her to the car.
~
An hour later, I’m lying in bed watching Netflix in my pajamas. Cassie has her head on my chest. Her eyes flit open and closed as she fights off sleep. I move the half-eaten pig ear from beneath her snout and toss it lightly to the carpeted floor. I softly rub the white fur above her nose, until her eyes close for good.
It took me a long time to realize what Cassie was trying to tell me at the pet store.
She did want a second thing.
She wanted Megan.
Chapter 14
“CHINATOWN”
Hugo
Some people call her Chris.
But most people call her Rayna.
She’s great.
She feeds me three or four times a day (these little tins of food that taste really good) and she gives amazing rubs. We spend a lot of time in her tent. Snuggling. Wrestling. Eating beef jerky.
Each night she leaves for a few hours. She puts on these tall shoes and smelly spray and she goes. She keeps the tent open a few inches in case I want to leave.
Each time she goes, she says, “Okay, little man (she calls me little man), I’ll be seeing ya. If you’re here when I get back, I’ll have some jerky for you.”
Well, of course, I’m not going to leave if you’re going to have jerky for me.
But it’s more than the jerky. I like Rayna. And I don’t think she really wants me to leave. When she gets home each night, I can smell it. Sadness. (Some smells are light. Some smells are heavy. Sadness is one of the heaviness smells.) But after some wrestling and a few well-placed face licks, this goes away.
But I can’t stay here forever. I know that. And I think Rayna knows that. That’s why she leaves the tent open.
On the fifth night, Rayna leans down and picks me up. She gives me a little kiss on the nose and says, “Okay, little man, I gotta go to work.”
I give her a lick on her chin. (It’s rough. Rougher than the day before, but I don’t let this stop me.) I give her a bunch of licks.
Maybe she can store them up for later.
~
I go through a bunch of alleys. It’s been a few days since it last rained and the alleys are dry. I can smell food in every direction, but I’m not hungry. Rayna left out a tin of food and I ate it right before I wiggled my way out of the tent and into the darkness.
I pitter-patter down the dark alleys and down a few sidewalks. It’s noisy. There are humans walking and a bunch of cars, but I’m able to stay in the shadows and no one sees me. I dart down another alley. Then another. When I poke my head out of this last alley, I gaze upward. All the buildings have green metal roofs that slant downward at a steep angle. There are a bunch of rounded red lights hanging everywhere. But the craziest things are the smells. They are sharp and twisty.
What is this world?
I’m about to investigate further when I hear, “Pssst.”
I whip my head around.
Standing on top of a green dumpster a few feet behind me is a cat. He’s white with black markings on his face.
“Don’t go out there,” the cat says, hopping silently to the alley floor. “It’s not safe.”
I take a couple of small steps back into the shadows.
The big white cat slinks toward me and leans down. Half of one of his ears is missing. “What’s your name, kid?”
“Hugo,” I meow.
“You lost, Hugo?”
I’ve never been lost before, but Cassie used to talk about lost dogs. She said most of the dogs at the Shelter were lost. She called them “Strays.”
“I think so,” I tell the stray.
“Well, the last place you want to be lost is out there, kid. It isn’t safe.”
“Why?”
The big cat lifts his head and sniffs. “You smell that?”
I sniff. I smell a lot of cooking.
“You know what that smell is called?”
I shake my head.
“That smell is called Lost Cat.”
~
“Where are we going, Gus?”
“You’ll see,” he says without turning his head.
I scamper behind him, my little legs needing three strides for each one of Gus’s. We run through two alleys, then down some steps, through a door, and into a musty basement. Light from the street shines through two broken windows. Nestled against the wall are a bunch of boxes and lying on the boxes are three cats. All three jump down as Gus and I approach.
One of the cats is orange with white stripes and a pink nose. Another has long gray hair and bright blue eyes. The third is tan and black with a flat face and big bulgy eyes.
“Found this little guy about to walk onto Sizzle Street,” Gus says.
The orange cat slinks around me and gives my butt a long sniff. The cat with the long gray hair does the same. (Finally, something I understand.) The orange cat is Ringo. The blue-eyed cat is Harriet. The flat-faced cat, though we never meet officially, is Eddie.
“Chinatown is no place for a kitten,” Harriet says, giving me a push with her gigantic paw. “What are you doing here?”
I’m about to push her back, but then I realize the big cat will clobber me.
“I think I’m lost,” I say.
“Little lost kitten,” Harriet says, about to give me another push. Luckily, Gus hisses at her and she backs away.
“Where are you trying to go?” Ringo asks.
“Back to the Lake and the Mountains.”
Harriet falls over laughing. “The mountains?”
I don’t like Harriet.
“You’re a long way from home,” Ringo says, his whiskers twitching. “A long way from home.”
“How far?”
“Don’t know,” Ringo says. “I’ve never seen them. But I’ve heard stories.”
“How do you know about the mountains?” Gus asks.
“I lived there for a long time.”
“You lived there for a long time?” Harriet snorts. “You’re barely off the teat.”
I don’t know what a teat is, but this makes all the cats laugh.
“I lived there when I was a dog,” I shout. The words come out before I have time to think how crazy they must sound.
Gus scrunches his nose and leans his head forward. “Did you just say that you lived there when you were a dog?”
“Oh, uh, yeah,” I mumble. “I used to be a dog.”
Harriet bounds up the boxes, then down, then back up. She can’t control herself. “A dog?” she shrieks, giving Eddie a shove. “He thinks he used to be a dog.”
“Take it easy on him, Harriet,” Gus says. Then turning to me, he asks, “What makes you think you used to be a dog?”
“Because I was. I was a big dog too. I lived in a house with Jerry and my best friend, Cassie. We lived in the Mountains next to a big Lake. Each year it would snow. Big white clouds of snow. And Jerry would feed me bacon and cheese. And I would sleep in bed next to him. And Cassie would sleep with her head on my belly. And I would chase squirrels and birds. And I would chase cats. Yeah, cats! And then I chased a rabbit into the street. And then something happened. And now I’m a cat.”
I stop.
All four cats are staring at me, even Eddie, who was busy licking his paw. After a long few seconds, Harriet lets out a loud wail, “He thinks he was a dog!”
Ringo and even Gus join in the laughter.
I begin to slink back toward the stairs.
“Hey.”
I turn.
It’s the flat-faced cat.
Eddie.
“Follow me,” he says. “I think I know someone who can help you.”
~
“She won’t see you for free,” Eddie says, swiveling his head back and forth, scanning the alley. “You have to bring her an offering.”
“An offering?” I ask, trying to keep up.
“Yes, a gift.”
“And what happens when I give her this gift?”
“Calandia will answer all your questions.”
Calandia?
“Oh, okay. So what can we bring her?”
Eddie stops and turns. “Mice, Hugo. We bring her mice.”
~
I don’t have any luck catching any mice, but Eddie catches three.
“Wow,” I say. “You make it look easy.”
“It is,” Eddie says, batting at one of the mice with his paw. “Just wait until you get a little older.”
Eddie carries two of the mice in his mouth and I carry one. We sneak down a few alleys, but we have to cross two streets. We scamper under the big red hanging lights and then we squirm into a black opening in the street that I know is called a “sewer.”
It’s only a four-foot drop and Eddie slinks through and jumps. I follow. The mouse falls out of my mouth when I land and I pick it back up. The sewer is dry and smells like Cassie’s farts after she ate Jerry’s scrambled eggs that one time.
Eddie and I scamper down the dark tunnel, then come to a metal grate. Eddie lets the two mice fall from his mouth, then lightly scratches his claws against the metal. The sound echoes through the tunnel.
A few moments later, there’s a rustling and glowing orange eyes appear in the darkness. Eddie pushes his two mice through the small openings in the grate, then I do the same. The three mice disappear and the grate swings open.
“Good luck, Hugo,” Eddie says, then turns and disappears back the way we came.
~
The orange eyes belong to the biggest cat I’ve seen. He is twice the size of Harriet and twice as poofy.
“I’m Rajah,” he says. “Calandia has accepted your offering.”
I follow behind him, my little heart thudding against my ribs.
Is this huge cat leading me to my death? Is this all a big joke? Did I think Eddie was helping me, but actually he’s the worst of them all?
“Right through there,” Rajah says, stopping at an opening to another tunnel. I wait for him to leave, but he sits next to the opening. He reminds me of Cassie standing guard over the tadpoles.
I remind myself that everything I’m doing is to get back to her.
And to Jerry.
Be brave.
“Go ahead,” Rajah prods. “She’s waiting.”
I peek my head into the opening and slowly t
ake a few steps. Sitting on a ledge, surrounded by three mice, is the strangest looking cat I’ve ever seen. It has no fur. Its skin is pink and wrinkled. Its ears are large, raised, and pointed. And one of its eyes is green, the other blue.
“Hello, Hugo,” it says.
~
“Are you Calandia?” I meow.
“I am,” she says, blinking her eyes twice slowly.
“They said you could help me.”
“I will try.”
I sit back on my butt, then say, “I’m lost.”
“We are all lost.” She pauses. “Do you want to be found?”
I remember back to Sara holding me in her arms and screaming, “I’m so glad we found you.”
“No,” I say. “I want to go Home.”
“And where is home?”
“The Lake in the Mountains.”
“Oh, yes.”
“Have you heard of it?”
“I have.”
“Do you know how to get there?”
“I do not know how to get to the lake, but I know how to find the mountains.”
If I can make it to the Mountains, I know I can find the Lake. “Please, tell me.”
“I must warn you; it will be a dangerous journey.”
“I can make it,” I assure her.
“I fear that you won’t.”
“I can make it.”
I have to.
“Very well.”
Calandia leans down, picks up one of the mice by the tail and slowly sucks it into her mouth. The mouse slides down her throat in a lump, then vanishes.
She licks her lips, then says, “Follow the morning sun. Then walk above water. Follow the brightest star for two nights. Then follow the morning sun once more.”
~
Calandia makes me repeat this back to her until I have it memorized. It would have taken Cassie only a few minutes, but it takes me a long time. When I finally have it down, Calandia says, “Is there anything else you want to ask me?”
It’s as if she already knows.
“I used to be a dog,” I tell her.