scout

the original nephew decides to come with us the second time we go to the shelter. he is a lover of dogs, surely, but there are also only so many days we are in the same town. he is excited to have us all to himself and so we take him with us to walk through the crates of dogs of all sizes. most are in cages alone but some are two or three to a cage, whole families of animals waiting. the place is suffocating and the nephew is uncomfortable, asking why the cages are so small, why the smell is so overwhelming. he knows his own great grandmother helped start this place along with a friend, two women in heels and fancy hats who were not above stealing a dog staked out in a yard without food or water. he knows very little about my own grandmother except that she stole dogs. and picked up wounded owls from the side of the road. that is enough for him. he knows where he comes from and why we are here right now.

the dogs whimper and bark and leap at the bars of the cages. i want them all. the sweetie points out several and the nephew points out most but when we go to a room of dogs off to the side, i see the dog i saw the first time we went to the shelter. she is small and white with black ears. she is alone and silent but her eyes are everywhere. the barking of all the other dogs spreads out into her cage and she sits. this is the one, i say. she is not the one i really wanted the first time we visited, but that dog, a black hound with a wing and claw where a front paw should be, is already spoken for. she is a second choice. but just like the sullen brown dog waiting at home, a runt and a leftover, i know she is mine before i even pick her up.

someone from the shelter hands me the dog and takes us all- me, the sweetie, the nephew and the dog, to a small room with a chair and a table and a tennis ball. the dog curls up into me and when i put her on the floor she is so unsteady on her legs she looks like a newborn cow. the sweetie is already worried. maybe she is sick. it looks like she is broken. there is something not quite right. she is just too small. but he can tell already there is nothing we can do but take her home so he goes to the front desk to put our names on papers and make her ours.

the nephew and i stay with the dog. she gets her bearings and begins to understand her legs. she picks up the tennis ball, nearly the same size as her head, and brings it right to me. she wants to be held. she wants to play. she goes so fast her back end legs go past her front end legs several times. she rolls over herself. she slides. the nephew says to me, several times, this is the right dog. he knows things like this. you made the right choice, he tells me and then, holding the dog close, he promises her that she's part of our family, that we're taking her home. he is reassuring all three of us. she believes him and so do i.

the sweetie is gone a long time and the nephew starts to get restless, to get worried. he heads out of the small room and to the front desk to find out what's holding things up. he wants to be out of this place. he wants this dog to start her new life right now. he comes back and holds the dog. he gets very quiet, scratches her ears, then asks me what will happen when we go to new york. i do not understand the question the way he means it and i say something about the car ride back or about house training, but that is not what he means. he knows these are her first moments as part of a family and he wants to know how she will feel when he stays where he is and we go home. i tell him she will miss him, but that it won't be like where she is now. i tell him we will all visit, that she will know who he is.

when the sweetie comes back and motions us to the front desk, the nephew is relieved. we sit on chairs by the window out front and a man takes the tiny dog to put a chip in her. in case she's without us ever again she can be scanned like a can of corn and people will know where she belongs.

it seems to take forever and the nephew wanders around the front of the shelter, looking at plaques and photos. he is still worried and cannot stop fidgeting until we walk through the door. but then she is ours, all ribs and sharpsharp teeth and shining eyes. we take her to the nephew's vet who scans her for us to see, then weighs all five pounds of her. and that is it. she will meet the small brown curmudgeonly dog. she will ride in a car all the way to brooklyn. she will listen to honky-tonk music like the rest of us.