Lost Dog

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The tiny Chihuahua was obviously lost. She was running down the middle of Gracewood Drive, tail between her legs, oblivious to the cars driving too fast for the curving residential street. I stopped my car and called her, but she ran in the opposite direction. Motorists stared at the spectacle: a man pursuing a diminutive dog who had no intention of going with him.

An Asian woman, recognizing the problem, stopped her minivan, got out, and shooed the canine into a yard. A skinny young man smoking a cigarette got up from where he had been seated on the front steps and tried to corral the dog. Nobody wanted to pick her up. (Speaking for myself, some of the meanest dogs I’ve known have been small ones; I guess big dogs don’t have anything to prove.) Finally, we cornered the animal so that the only place she could flee to was into the open rear door of my Civic.

“I’ll take her home with me,” I said, and pointed out my street, in case anyone came looking for her.

The dog whimpered pitifully during the two-block drive to my house, and refused to get out of the car. Even my beef stew left over from lunch couldn’t coax her out. (I worry a little when an animal that licks its butt refuses to eat something I cooked.)

So I left her in the car while I went to eat supper. Meanwhile, a violent thunderstorm churned its way through Greensboro with thunder and lightning and torrential rains, and I knew there was no way the dog was going to get out in that.

I had a tutoring session to go to, and so there was no choice but to take my new charge with me. I drove through the deluge thinking that I needed a pair of outboard motors on the back of my car to navigate the river that flowed down West Market Street.

We made it to my student’s apartment, the Chihuahua and I, where I left her in the car with instructions to behave. I checked on her through the window a couple of times and saw her curled up asleep in the passenger seat, and wondered what, exactly, I was going to do with a tiny dog.

I stopped at Harris Teeter to pick up some dog food. She barked at me as I got back in the car, and seemed to be gaining a little confidence. When we arrived home, she bounded out of the car and followed me around the yard, her tail up in the air.

“She thinks she belongs to you,” Teresa said.

She also thought she was going inside. The rain began to fall again and the little creature began scratching at the back door. She was obviously a house dog–she knew how doors operated, but inside our house is a cat who, to put it mildly, would not take kindly to having her home invaded by a DOG. She would be in therapy for years.

And of course the dog had no intention of escaping the rain by going inside a trashcan turned on its side, even with a plate of food and a towel inside. So the only option was back to the car.

She wagged her tail and climbed in my lap.

“You can’t live in the car for the rest of your life, you know,” I told her. She licked my hand.

Just then, a pair of headlights appeared at the end of my street, moving slowly. Very slowly. A young girl’s voice called out from the open window.

“I think someone is looking for you,” I said to the dog.

I stepped into the street as the minivan approached. “Y’all looking for a dog?” I asked.

“Yes! A Chihuahua”

“I’ve got her in my car.”

I opened the door and the dog bounced up, dancing and wagging her tail. The girl scooped her up and kissed her. “I’ve been so worried about you,” she said.

The girl extended her hand in a very grown-up fashion. “Thank you so much for caring for her,” she said.

It was my pleasure.

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