The Last Speck of Hope in The World

 

 

The golden flicker beckoned me like an enchanted gemstone in a fairy tale or a video game.

Moving closer, I saw paw prints in the dirt, a filthy water bowl, and a chain tied to a railroad spike.

“Mac’s dog Cosmo was a terrier, right?” I said to Tabitha, over my cell.

“Yep,” she said. “Why are you asking me that question?”

“Cosmo is the speck of hope, Tabitha.”

In Peak’s yard I saw a dog that matched the photo on the posters Mac and Tabitha had put up around their neighborhood, a fresh batch of flyers every month or two. Or what was left of him. Cosmo’s black and white fur was dirty and matted, and missing in spots. Bones protruded from his rail-thin body. His leather collar was hooked to the silver chain. The sight of the poor abused terrier busted my heart into a million pieces.

When Cosmo saw me, he started barking. Not a go away kind of bark, but a save me bark. In my phone I heard Tabitha’s breathless shock.

“It is Cosmo. Oh my God, Bertie, he’s so skinny!” She was trying not to bawl. “You are right, this is why my mom sent us here. We have to get Cosmo to Mac. It might help him wake up.”

Tabitha hissed. “This monster had Cosmo for two years. He stole Mac’s dog!”

“And now we are going to steal Cosmo back,” I said. “But I just can’t go and grab him. Peak will see me. Plus, I can’t do much with my left arm. It’s all bruised and weird.”

“So how are we going to get Cosmo?”

Fast as I could, I told her my idea. A ludicrous two-girl plan.

SCRAPE!

Thirty feet away from me, a glass door slid open.

Big Jack Peak stalked onto his deck, his aura blacker than a crow’s wing. I ducked down as he shouted, “Shut up, ya stupid fleabag!” Grabbing a rusty metal garbage can lid, Peak whipped it at Cosmo. The lid clanged against a snowmobile instead. “Not one more bark, hear me?”

Cosmo looked at me like I was his last speck of hope in the world.

Then he barked, as if begging me to take him away from this hellish life. Daggers of red rage shot from Peak’s head as he yelled at the dog. “You done did it now!” Snatching an axe from near the back door, Peak started down the porch steps after the helpless but defiant terrier. “Get ready to catch a beating!”

There was no time to waste. I had to move. I ran off.

Cosmo tried to run away too, as the axeman approached. Snatching Cosmo’s chain, Peak reeled the yelping dog toward him. Cosmo’s paws dug into the dirt, trying to resist. But it was no use, until…

DING-DONG!

Jack Peak stopped tormenting Cosmo. “Who the hell is ringing my doorbell?”

Through grimy windows by the front door, I saw the axe murderer stomping toward me. He still had the axe in his big hands.

It took all of sixty seconds.

The door swung open. The air swirled, and I swallowed a gruesome mouthful of the dark and stormy aura that billowed around the monster.

“Can’t you read, little rat?” he said. “What are you doing on my property?”

Pointing the axe blade at NO SOLICITING and NO TRESPASSING signs posted on his front gate, shadowy tendrils twisted out of Peak’s body and loomed over me.

I did my best to act natural and unafraid. But it was next to impossible.

The only reason I could get past the hideous taste in my mouth and my overwhelming fear of Jack Peak, was because I was a hundred times more afraid of letting down a beaten-down dog, a wonderful, dying eight-year old boy, his ghost mother, my mom, and my better self.

So rather than run for my life, I stuck to my ridiculous plan.

“Hello, Mr. Peak, today is your lucky and delicious day!” I said, digging out four cookie boxes from my backpack. “On behalf of the Girl Scouts of America, I’d like to thank you for your order.”