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This story doesn't start with a dead dog tied up in front of our apartment. That would be a real turnoff. Way too morbid. You'd probably stop reading and ask for a full refund.
No, this tale starts with a flyer: DID YOU LOSE A PET? I FOUND IT. CALL ME.
Below the bold type, tabs had been cut into the lower half of the page, each with the same phone number printed in black. Anybody interested could tear one off and call later.
The first time I saw it, the flyer had been pinned to the bulletin board at our complex's postal center—a concrete hut carrying hundreds of key-entry mailboxes. The postal workers assigned to our zip code seemed to take delight in seeing how much they could stuff inside, often crumpling our bills and letters to make room for junk mail in pristine condition.
The fluttering flyer had seemed a little odd, but I dismissed the weirdness after noting that nobody had torn off a single tab. Apparently, none of our neighbors had lost their pets.
––––––––
A couple days later, my wife and I were walking out of the local bookstore after thumbing through the latest releases. As much as I like screen-reading, there's something about holding a book in your hands that will never get old. In some ways, it's even more special now with all the e-reading going on.
We passed the corkboard near the exit where community events, tutoring, and music lessons were usually advertised. There it was again: DID YOU LOSE A PET? I FOUND IT. CALL ME. Bold black on white paper, tabs with the same phone number—strange that I remembered it, I know. Sometimes my memory is really something.
"Would you look at that..." I stared, pointing it out to my wife. Again, no one had torn off a single tab.
"Nothing we have to worry about." She nudged me.
She'd been wanting to get a little dog for a while—a terrier, to be precise. But we both knew it wouldn't be fair to the creature to keep it locked up in our one-bedroom apartment while we toiled away at work all day. When we could afford a house with a yard, then we'd get a dog—and when we found a breed that wouldn't activate my allergies. As much as I adored furry animals, I didn't enjoy the itching and sneezing that went along with them. I know, there are drugs for it, but do I really want to carry around that crap in my liver? No thanks. In the meantime, our bonsai mini-forest would suffice. No itching, no sneezing, and no mess to clean up.
"How can they say they've got anybody's pet? I mean, just think about it." I shook my head and ran a finger across the fringe of tabs. "It's false advertising, really. Why don't they post a picture of what they've found? Or list the breed—species, even?"
She shrugged. "They probably want to make sure it's the owner who calls. Either that, or it's a social experiment."
I raised an eyebrow. "To see who makes the call, you mean?"
Another shrug from her, followed by a frown as I reached for my phone. "C'mon Sweetie, you're not serious."
Of course I was. I dialed the number as we resumed our stroll home. The day was cool and crisp with a clear sky and warm sun, the kind of weather San Diego winters are famous for. We're known for four seasons: summer, springfall, wildfire, and earthquake. That last one doesn't rear its ugly head too often, but they keep telling us the Big One is on the way. Whoever they are, they've been saying that for decades now. Nobody worries about it much. What good would it do, anyhow? What are we going to do—leave America's Finest City? Not a chance.
"Yeah?" The voice on the other end of the line came to the phone groggy.
My wife pinched me. "Hang up!" she hissed.
"You collect lost pets or something? Is that it?" I said. I'd toyed with the idea of pretending to have misplaced my own imaginary creature, but in the end, a more direct approach had won out.
"What are you looking for?" The guy sounded like he was fighting a serious hangover.
"What do you have?" I blurted, winking at my wife. She elbowed me in the ribs and mouthed Hang up!
Silence held the other end, followed by an audible sigh. "I can't help you," he said at length.
"Hey, wait a minute—"
But he'd already ended the call.
"They hung up on you?" My wife smirked.
"Weird, huh?" I frowned, returning the phone to my pocket.
"They've probably gotten more than their share of pranksters."
Post a flyer like that around town, you're asking for a few prank calls. But if I'd been some old lady desperate to locate her long-lost Fifi the Fluffy Poodle, I had a feeling it would have gone down differently. Don't ask me how I knew. It was just a hunch.
"I guess he could tell I wasn't serious."
––––––––
Later that night, my wife and I were slouched on the couch, about halfway through one of those survivalist reality TV shows—Top Chefs in the Amazon or something equally riveting—when my phone started vibrating in my pocket.
"Really, Sweetie?" my wife murmured with disapproval as I fished it out and glanced at the screen.
We'd made it a point early on in our marriage that time spent together would be spent together, not interrupted by texts or calls from friends and family.
Nobody is as important as the person you're with. Free advice, folks.
"Who is it?" she said.
"Nobody." I switched the setting to silent mode and dropped it onto the carpet. We resumed our quality time together, a rarity with our conflicting work schedules as of late.
But while we snuggled there under a blanket and basked in the glow of our TV's gamma radiation, I couldn't help noticing out of the corner of my eye that my phone kept lighting up with every incoming call throughout the course of Survivor Chefs and Wall Street Wannabe's that followed.
After my wife had turned in for the night, I checked my voicemail. There were no messages, only twenty-seven missed calls from the same number, the one I'd dialed earlier. That number I remembered from the flyer: DID YOU LOSE A PET? I FOUND IT. CALL ME.
I didn't tell my wife. After all, she'd said not to make the call in the first place, and this would prove her right. She's right about most things, though I'd never admit that to her, and I get to the point sometimes where I really don't want to be wrong anymore.
Regardless, there was obviously something very wrong with the guy I'd spoken to on the phone earlier.
––––––––
I didn't realize how wrong until I picked up our mail after work the next day. The flyer was still there on the bulletin board where it had been before, not a tab missing, but something had changed. The tabs were different.
They now carried my phone number.
I blinked, sure this had to be some kind of mistake. Maybe my eyesight was deteriorating. Isn't that the next thing to go after a thinning hairline?
I reached for the flyer.
No mistake.
My number.
I tore it down, crumpled it up and stuffed it into the trash nearby.
I looked over my shoulder.
In case you've never been afflicted, paranoia is a fast-acting cancer. I was suddenly sure the guy was hiding somewhere nearby, watching, waiting for me to see what he'd done. He'd been there recently to switch out the flyer, I knew that much.
I couldn't go home.
He would find out which unit was ours. Instead of calling and hanging up twenty-seven times, he'd be knocking on our door at all hours of the night. Maybe something worse.
But I had another thought: the bulletin board at the bookstore. Had he changed that flyer too?
I climbed back into my truck and gunned it out of the parking lot.
––––––––
"Who came in with this?" I held the flyer in front of the startled cashier's pimply nose.
"Sir, I-I can't really say." She glanced around the sparsely populated bookstore. "I don't think I can help you with that."
"Don't people have to get approval before they tack up stuff in your store?"
"No sir, but we—"
"So it's a free-for-all? Anybody can put anything they want up there?" I crumpled the flyer in my fist and gestured toward the corkboard.
"Sir, I'm going to have to ask you to leave."
"Fine." I stormed out without a glance back, clenching the flyer into a tight wad. Only the last four digits of my phone number remained visible.
I climbed into my truck and slammed the door, taking out my frustration on the interior like a toddler throwing a tantrum. I realize it now: I probably looked ridiculous. But at the time, all I knew was blind, boiling fury. The steering wheel got the worst of it. I beat the heck out of that thing and blessed it with more than a few choice words.
My next choice may not have been the wisest.
"Yeah?" the same hungover voice answered my call.
"What kind of game are you playing? Putting my number on your damn flyers?"
"I don't like your tone."
I didn't know how to respond to that.
"Listen—" I forced myself to take a breath. "Don't call me anymore, and don't put my number on your flyers. You hear me?"
"Or what?"
"Huh?" Not my most articulate response.
"What will you do if I fail to comply?"
Honestly, I hadn't thought that far ahead. "I'll go to the police. If you don't stop, it's harassment." It had to be. "You're going to leave me the hell alone from now on. Got it?"
Silence. Then in a very quiet voice: "That's a nice truck you've got."
He ended the call.
I stared out the windshield without seeing much of anything. There were other cars in the parking lot and other people walking around in slow motion, oblivious to me. My hand dropped to my lap. CALL ENDED and the time elapsed glowed on the screen of my phone. Fear held me in a cold paralysis I'd never experienced before. But I couldn't let it beat me.
My eyes focused elsewhere, creeping side to side as they scanned the lot. It was ridiculous, I realize that. He could have been anyone. Anywhere. And more than likely, he was still back at the apartment complex, waiting in the bushes to follow me home.
I couldn't go back. I knew that much.
Paranoid? Yeah, I admit it. I had it bad.
I should have gone to the police. I should have told my wife. I should have done a lot of things. But instead, I redialed his number and tried my best to breathe normally.
"Yeah?" he said.
"What do you want from me?" It came out as a question instead of a demand. So far, so good.
A soft chuckle. "You're the one calling me. What do you want?"
I licked my lips—a nervous tick. "Right. I...I want this to stop, and I'm sorry if I did or said something—"
"It's how you said it."
I stopped short. "How—?"
"Your tone."
He'd mentioned that earlier, during my recent fit of righteous indignation. "I was angry." But now I was pleading. For my life. For my wife, already home and probably wondering where I was. "I'm upset—was upset. I don't understand why you changed the number on your flyers."
"Yesterday."
I frowned, clenching and releasing the steering wheel with my free hand. "How's that?"
"You called me yesterday to mock me." A pregnant pause. I held my breath. He continued, "The loss of a pet is a very serious matter. They rarely survive long in the urban wild. They're fair game for any sadist with a switchblade."
I swallowed. My hand slipped, slick on the wheel. "I don't—"
"Most of them end up in dumpsters, cut to pieces," he said. "Did you know that? Others are shot by the police. It's getting to be a real epidemic. No one cares as much as they should."
"Why are you telling me this?" My voice came hoarse and thick.
"When a child is abducted, there's a twenty-four to forty-eight hour window of opportunity. After that, the chances of the victim ever being recovered alive dwindles to nil." Another pause. "It's the same with pets."
I nodded. "So-uh...you stand in the gap, is that it? You help people get their pets back?"
Or was he the sadist with the blade?
"It's up to you." Another chuckle. "They'll be calling you now."
––––––––
He was right about that. No sooner had I pocketed my phone than I received a call from a frantic elderly woman who'd lost her beloved feline.
"He's a housecat, he doesn't know how to fend for himself, he won't know how to eat birds or mice—even if they drop dead right in front of him! Please, please tell me you have him, that you've found him. His name's Chester, he's got a collar with his name—"
"Ma'am—" I winced, holding the phone away from my ear as she rambled on louder than necessary. "I don't have your cat. I'm sorry." I shook my head in the silence of her shattered hope. I let it run on longer than I should have. I couldn't think of anything worth saying. She was obviously distraught, and I couldn’t help her. "I'm sorry."
I powered off my phone and slapped it down on the passenger seat.
How many other worried pet owners would be calling me? How many would I have to disappoint? Worse yet, what if there were other bulletin boards all over town with the same flyers and my number on them?
There was only one thing to be done.
––––––––
After a stop at the local wireless store for a visit that should have taken no more than twenty minutes but ended up consuming nearly an hour, I drove home with a new phone number, no questions asked. I'd spent most of my time there declining data plans and a new contract for the latest smartphone, none of which I needed. My old flip-phone worked fine for making calls, and now I wouldn't be receiving any more late-night interruptions or pleas from desperate pet owners.
I dialed my wife as I pulled into our complex. Heading for the parking lot five buildings down from our unit, I planned to take a circuitous route home on foot. Just in case I'd been followed.
"Sorry I'm late—phone issues, but everything's fixed now." I unbuckled my seatbelt and reached for my briefcase.
"Sweetie..." she trailed off. Was she crying?
I stepped out of my truck and turned to look at our unit on the fourth floor. "Everything okay?"
"The police are here," she whispered.
"What?" I hadn't seen any squad cars parked out front. "I'll be right there."
"Hurry." She caught her breath. "It's...awful."
––––––––
Taking the steps two at a time, I arrived at our floor to find a pair of officers in uniform, one male and one female. The she-cop approached me while the he-cop frowned at the animal tied to the railing outside our unit—the dead dog I mentioned at the start of this sordid tale.
I don't remember the details of what happened next. I'm sure the police started with your standard introductory questions—identification and residence verification—but everything was a blur. The loss of a pet is a very serious matter, the voice on the phone had said. They rarely survive long in the urban wild. They're fair game for every sadist with a switchblade. Had someone killed this poor animal? Who would have done such a thing?
The she-cop handed me a blood-spattered piece of paper, stark white against her blue rubber gloves. "Is this your number?" she said.
One thing I was sure of. If I saw any more of those flyers, I was going to lose it.
"No," I said, staring at the limp German Shepherd mix. Eyes closed. Paws crossed. Jaw clenched shut.
My wife stood framed in our doorway. "Sweetie, that's—"
"No it's not." I retrieved the phone from my pocket. "I...just had it changed."
A stupid thing to admit, considering the circumstances. The police arrive to find a dead dog and a flyer (DID YOU LOSE A PET? I FOUND IT. CALL ME.) with my phone number stapled to the animal's ear. Then I show up telling them that as of an hour ago, my number has conveniently changed. Criminal mastermind? Right, that's me.
"Let me explain..."
I dove in headfirst, and they allowed me to share the whole story from the beginning. About halfway through, the he-cop turned to my wife.
"Can you verify any of this?"
She nodded, watching me. "I was there when he called the guy yesterday." But in her eyes there was more that we would have to discuss later: Why didn't you tell me?
I should have. I know that now—hindsight being what it is and all that. At the time, I wanted to protect her. But marriage is more than filing a joint tax return. It's a partnership. And I'd been wrong to shut her out.
What? Me wrong again? Go figure.
The she-cop finished scribbling notes before I'd finished telling my tale. I guess they didn't care about poor customer service at the local wireless shop. I was probably rambling, anyway. Sometimes I do that when I'm nervous. And being questioned by the police for the first time in my life was a little nerve-wracking. The way they stare at you with those expressionless faces and eyes that have seen everything—you think you've got to be guilty of something.
"Animal control will be out to clean up this mess. It'll have to be entered as evidence. We'll follow up on that number you gave us. He may be a resident here."
"Whoever did this..." I cleared my throat. "They obviously know where we live. Are we safe?"
"Do you have any pets?"
"No." I glanced at my wife. She was doing her best to keep her gaze from wandering back to the German shepherd.
"Then I wouldn't worry."
"For the time being, we'll treat this as an isolated incident. Probably no more than a prank," the he-cop said without humor in his tone. "You've been known to have those around here."
He was right about that. A month or so before, a few of the local teen potheads had smeared excrement all over the steps in the first-floor stairwell. And you don't want to know what they did in the community pool. Gotta love the younger generation.
But I had more than a hunch they weren't to blame for this.
The she-cop shrugged, dismissing us into our unit while they remained outside. "We'll be in touch."
––––––––
The next day, I stood at our complex bulletin board with a ream of fresh-printed flyers: LOST A PET? CALL US. There were tabs cut below, each bearing my new phone number. I pinned one of the flyers to the corkboard and stood back to look it over.
My wife and I both had full-time jobs, but we were willing to squeeze in this new side project. Early morning and evening patrols would have to suffice. We'd already seen what could happen if we did nothing. The lost pets of our community needed protection from the sadists out there.
One of them, in particular.
So we started collecting the loose animals we found around town, and we kept them in our one-bedroom apartment until the owners called to identify them. We discovered an over-the-counter herbal allergy pill that worked well enough for me in spite of our growing menagerie. And we kept in contact with the police. They told us Mr. Hangover had changed his number, and there was no way to trace his old number to an address. Burner phone was the term they'd used. Sounded like something from a cop show. Fitting, I guess.
The killer is still out there, somewhere. I hate stories with loose ends as much as you do, but so far, there haven't been any more nasty surprises left on our doorstep—or any others in the neighborhood, according to the cops.
As long as we keep finding the lost pets before he does, they'll be safe.
Somebody once said that every villain needs a hero. One can't exist without the other. Had that guy with the flyers thrown down the proverbial gauntlet? I have no idea.
I'm no hero.
But I'm pretty sure we'll be keeping the little terrier we found this morning—if the owners don't call, that is. This one won't be going to the humane society. My wife's in love with him already.
And I think he just might be growing on me.