2
Dog Smuggler
Daniel
Tuesday afternoon, I’m coaxing a Siamese cat out of a dryer and kicking myself for the millionth time for forgetting my best friend’s birthday when Tina the vet tech opens the kennel door carrying a black plastic trash bag of death.
I quickly look away from the bag. “Here, Houdini,” I say in my softest voice. “Tuna flavor, mega delish.” I extend a treat into the dryer’s dinged-up innards where he’s crouched, spooked by Roxy the husky’s loud barking ten feet away. “Come out, little kit-kat. I’ll make sure you’re safe.” I keep up a steady, calm stream of words, trying not to hear Tina’s footsteps as she walks toward the Freezer of Doom to put in the euthanized pet she’s carrying. When I started volunteering at the kennel a month ago, seeing anyone open the death freezer sent me to the bathroom in tears. Now whenever one of the vet techs brings down a bag from Dr. Snyder’s office upstairs, I go find the most sad or scared kennel resident and give them a hug or a snuggle to distract myself.
I guess today Houdini’s my snuggle buddy, if I can get the scaredy-cat out of the dryer. I’m so focused on him that it takes a minute to realize Tina has passed the freezer and her footsteps have stopped at room C, the cages we only use when the rest of the kennel is full. I crane my neck to try to see what she’s doing.
Houdini finally takes the treat from my hand and jumps out of the dryer. I scoop him up and return him to the relative silence of the cat room he escaped. “Guess we know why your name’s Houdini,” I tell him. “Bit off more than you could chew out here, didn’t you? All those doggos doing big, loud borks.”
Houdini puts his paws on my chest and rubs his head on my jaw, all affection now that he feels safe again. I scratch his chin, then carefully peel him off me and put him back in his cage, double-checking that the latch is fastened all the way.
I leave the cat room and glance down the hall. The door to room C is closed. I tiptoe over and lean my head against it. It’s hard to hear over Roxy, but between the barks, Tina is making the quiet murmuring sound she uses to calm an upset dog. I knock softly and the murmur stops. There’s silence for a moment, and then the door opens.
Tina’s lips are pressed together. I wait for her to explain, but she leans to look around me. I turn to see what she’s looking at. There’s nothing. “Uh . . . what are you doing?” I ask.
She studies my face like she’s trying to decide if she can trust an eighth-grade kid. Her dark eyes are bright like always in her warm brown face, as if they’ve sucked in specks of sunlight. But surrounding that, in the smile lines at the corners of her eyes and mouth, is worry and sadness. “You good at keeping your mouth shut?” she asks in her gravelly smoker’s voice.
“I’m good at forgetting important stuff.” Like Cole’s birthday. Like the fact that guys who are almost fourteen should never cry in public.
“Guess that’ll do.” Tina steps aside to let me in. When she pulls the door shut behind us, Roxy’s barking drops by thirty decibels. In the last cage, a ball of orange fur with tiny black feet twitches on a towel. “Chewbarka. Spared from death by a botched euth and lucky timing.”
I walk over and touch the sleeping Pomeranian’s fur. “Dr. Snyder used the wrong drug?”
“Nope. He gave her the Telazol, the injection that makes them fall asleep. Then he got called to sew up a mutt who’d been mauled by a dalmatian. He told me to do the second injection. The lethal one.” A muscle in her jaw moves like she’s grinding her teeth. “I didn’t.”
I’ve never seen Tina mad, but I guess this is what it looks like. “Won’t you get in trouble?”
“Who kills their little dog just ’cause she’s going senile?” Tina touches her mouth like she’s smoking, then realizes she’s not holding a cigarette. She kneels and runs her hands through Chewbarka’s fur. The dog twitches again and opens her cloudy black eyes halfway. “You’re okay, girly,” Tina croons. “You’re just a little loopy. Gonna be real thirsty soon.”
“Why thirsty?” My voice cracks and I clear my throat.
“From the Telazol. The guy who brought her in left when Doc Snyder did, soon as she was asleep.” She rubs Chewbarka’s ears. “I’ve wanted to stop so many euths. People put their pets to sleep for the worst reasons. A dog’s getting old and needs meds, or is peeing in the house because they’re incontinent, or a kid turns out to be allergic.” Her eyes are all anger and sadness. “Doc’s in charge, though. I’m just the assistant. But today, for the first time, I was in charge. So I skipped the barbiturate, stuck her in the death sack, and brought her down.”
I cover my mouth to keep in the giddy laugh. I’ve liked Tina since I started coming here, and now I know exactly why: She’s like me. Her heart’s too big. It’s impractical and causes problems. As my twin brother, Mitchell, would sneer, it makes you an overly emotional train wreck who cares too much about dumb stuff. “You just walked past Doc Snyder with her like no big deal?” I love the thought of her fooling him. He’s so crotchety and intimidating that the idea of sneaking anything past him is very, very satisfying.
“Yep. That’s the part where you keep your mouth shut. Case it ain’t obvious.”
“Yeah, I’ve got
