No Such Thing as a Lost Cause by Shelly Fredman Page A

miracle and tried the key again. This time it worked.
    “Give me my God damn dog!” he roared.
    “Bite me!” I stomped on the gas and took off.
    Oh my God. What have I done? I just stole a dog!
I called Janine back. “I just stole a dog.”
    “Oh. Um, congratulations!”
    “Neenie,” I huffed, swerving out of the way of a van, “I could be in real trouble
     here.”
    I glanced in the rear view mirror. The dog kicker appeared out of nowhere and was
     following me in a black Ford pickup. He was about five cars back and gutter sniping
     to close the gap.
    “Oh, shit.”
    “What?”
    “He found me.”
    “Who?”
    “Jeez, Neenie. Keep up. The guy with the dog. I gotta go.”
    He gunned his engine and tried to squeeze in right behind me. Luckily, the friendly
     drivers of Philadelphia didn’t care much for this yahoo bolting the line. They closed
     ranks and locked him out. I took the opportunity to hang a left on South Street and
     prayed he didn’t notice. Unfortunately, he did. Three blocks later he was two cars
     back.
Great. What now?
    I was only a few blocks away from Uncle Frankie’s gym. Now, normally, I don’t like
     to involve my friends and family in my petty problems. But so far, the day really
     sucked, and I was tired of fighting my own battles, even if I
was
the one who’d started them. I hit speed dial and called my uncle.
    “I’m in trouble,” I announced. “Could you meet me outside the gym in about a minute?”
    “You got it, hon,” he said, no questions asked.
    I looked in the rear view mirror again. The guy was practically riding my bumper.
     He looked really mad. “Oh, and Uncle Frankie, you might want to bring some friends.”
    Half a block later, I pulled into South Street Gym’s parking lot, the Ford pick-up
     riding my bumper the entire way. Uncle Frankie was standing there waiting for me,
     flanked by three giant gym rats with muscles to spare. I pulled up next to them and
     jumped out of the car.
    The dog kicker had gotten out of his truck and was headed in my direction. He was
     so focused on me he didn’t seem to notice my steroid enhanced entourage.
    Frankie gave me the once-over. “What happened to your face?” Without waiting for an
     answer, he added, “Did he do this to you?”
    My uncle has a soft spot for me and a short fuse when he thinks someone has done me
     wrong. Before I could set him straight, he broke ranks and was on the guy like Whiz
     on a cheese steak.
    He grabbed him by the front of his shirt, stretching the collar all out of proportion.
     “You’re a real big man, beatin’ up on a girl, aren’t ya?”
    “Whoa,” the guy said, stumbling backwards. “I didn’t lay a hand on this whack job.
     She stole my dog.”
    “Hey, watch your mouth.” Frankie turned to me. “D’jou steal his dog?”
    “I had to. He kicked it.”
    “You swear he didn’t hurt you?”
    I nodded.
    Frankie smoothed down the guy’s tee shirt, and shoved him backwards toward his car.
     “Get the hell outta here, you creep.”
    “What about my dog?”
    Frankie snarled at him. “What dog?”
    “Yeah, what dog?” The gym rats echoed like a Greek chorus.
    He stood there for a minute appearing to weigh his options. “Ah, you’re all nuts.
     You can keep that pain in the ass hound. I’m tired of her pissing on my rug, anyway.”
    We watched him as he drove off. “So, Uncle Frankie, you want a dog?”
    *****
    Halfway home, my breathing began to return to normal. The puppy had settled into the
     back seat and was busy gnawing on a bag of beer pretzels I keep on the floor of the
     car in case I’m ever lost in a snow storm and have resort to cannibalism in order
     to survive—but, wait—no, I don’t, because I had the foresight to pack a bag of pretzels!
    “Don’t make crumbs,” I told her and reached for my phone to call Paul.
    “I found a puppy,” I announced.
    “Yeah? Where?”
    “Right on the street. It followed me home. I put signs up and all, but nobody’s