The Rescue

3

Bettina Blazak steers her red Wrangler down Calle Benito Juárez toward the port of entry at San Ysidro. She doesn’t want the policemen from the clinic to see her, but she can’t exactly gun it in the heavy Tijuana traffic. Bettina keeps her eyes on the mirrors and her hands at ten and two. The potholes still hold last night’s rain.

The wait at the border is long and the air is humid and dirty. Vendors weave their way through the waiting cars with churros and foil-wrapped tacos, huge paper flowers, guitars, bright pottery, piñatas, statuary, acrylic blankets with images of pop singers emblazoned on them. Bettina buys a beautiful yellow vase with red roadrunners on it and a large cold bottled water. Gets the dog into the front seat, where he can drink from this morning’s coffee cup.

The dog laps, his tongue rasping on the paper.

“Hey, pooch, what am I going to call you? I wish you could tell me your name. But it’s possible you’ve never had one. The Dog with No Name? Nah. Guten Doggen? Mom called all our dogs that because she was part German. Nah. Can’t believe I came down here for a story and am going home with you. I’m a dog person, don’t get me wrong. When I was a girl, we had Labs and terriers. The Labs were for quail hunting, and the terriers roamed around killing things. We lived in an old house and had a barn and some acres we leased out for grazing.”

Bettina thinks of her mom and dad, still there in Anza Valley — Gene, a water district hydrologist, and Barbara, an English teacher at the high school.

One older brother up in the Bay Area, raising kids; another in Nashville, waiting tables and making music. All living somewhat distant lives but always in touch.

She doesn’t think of her youngest brother right now.

Has to pick her moments for Keith.

“Water?”

She pours the dog a refill, and when he’s done he glances at her, then puts his nose out the window.

“Of course, you’re dying to know something about me,” says Bettina. “But maybe I shouldn’t make ‘dying’ jokes to a dog that’s been shot and almost got euthanized. If someone shot you just for fun, then he’s going to a very hot place in hell. I’m hoping it was an accident. From the narcos going at it again. That big shoot-out last month in Tijuana made the news in California. Were you there?”

Bettina starts the engine, creeps forward, turns it back off. A vendor comes by with a painting of calla lilies that’s really quite pleasant, but the walls of her apartment are already crowded with pictures and paintings and the California Native baskets she collects. The old vendor stops and holds it closer. His face is dark as a roasted almond and he has even white teeth.

She shakes her head no.

“Almost free,” he says.

“It’s very nice but, no, thank you.”

“How much can you pay?”

“No gracias, señor.”

“Fifty dollars? Okay. We have a deal.” He hoists up the painting to give her a better look. “Forty.”

She shakes her head and looks away and the man moves on.

Then she turns to the dog. She always talked to the family dogs when she was a girl and always answered back for them. Gave them words.

“So, pups, my name is Bettina Blazak.”

When he looks at her, she taps her sternum with a forefinger and repeats her first name three times. The dog watches her but his expression doesn’t change.

“I’m Polish-Irish with dabs of French, German, and English — and way back, some Cahuilla Indian. A mutt, like you. I grew up in a small town in California’s desert. As soon as I could, I moved to Laguna Beach. That’s where we’re headed. You’ll love it. I’m twenty-six years old and plan to stay that age forever. Not everyone gets my jokes. I don’t know how old you are, but Dr. Rodríguez said five to seven years.”

Bettina tells the dog about the weekly Laguna Beach newspaper she works for, Coastal Eddy. She writes and photographs for the paper — both print and digital editions — and makes videos that post to Coastal Eddy subscribers through a web page, email, and social media. Coastal Eddy is not a man, she explains to the dog, but a wind pattern that causes cloudy mornings along the coast. The dog curls up on the seat and looks at her, head on his paws, his button ears relaxed.

Bettina likes it when someone — even a dog — listens without interrupting. With three brothers plus Mom and Dad, Bettina, the baby, could hardly get in a word.

“Readers love dog stories,” she says. “And pictures and video of dogs. You will soon be momentarily famous in a small way. I try to do good reporting about things that matter, even if they don’t all happen in Laguna. A story has to matter. Like this one. Millions of dogs that nobody takes care of? That matters. I also want to get myself onto the Los Angeles Times someday. And win a Pulitzer too.”

She checks her messages, plugs in the phone to charge.

Again, Bettina starts her Jeep and moves into the new gap before her. The dog sits up and looks out, ears erect, tips flapped over. For a while, the line of vehicles creeps along a little faster. She sees the dark clouds to the north.

“Doggen, you listening? I love horses, trapshooting, surfing, cycling, and writing. I’m going to level with you. I like clothes and beauty products and good food too. I’m told my best feature is my hair, which is dark brown, though from what I’ve read, you probably see it as very dark gray. So here I am. Your turn. Tell me about yourself.”

The dog curls into the seat again, muzzle between his front feet, furrows his brow, and closes his eyes.

Bored, Bettina thinks. She wants to talk for him but she can’t. She knows almost nothing about him. No name, no exact age, no breed or parentage, no history, nothing except Tijuana and a bullet.

He’s a mystery, and she loves that about him. She’s a born storyteller, and she wants to tell his story. She’s glad to be part of it now.

Curled up on the front seat, his long saber tail wrapped all the way to his chin, Joe listens to Woman. He understands that she’s talking to him and he likes that. Her voice is pleasant and happy. She sounds excited when she says words he knows — Good, Dog, Water. Other words like Pulitzer and Cahuilla are new to him. Many he’s heard before and doesn’t know, but her emotions register clearly through her voice. Her face is happy but not excited.

He sits up and watches the world go by, and the window goes down but not far. Puts his nose out there, smelling the very different world from his home with his Boy Teddy, and later his home with his Man Aaron, and later his home with his Man Dan.

Different Teams, different places, different smells.

Joe feels sad, but Woman is maybe good like Teddy’s mom was good.

They stop at one of the big pet stores off the interstate, where Bettina is surprised that the dog knows his leash manners perfectly. Limping slightly, he keeps to her left, just a nose length ahead even when cornering the aisles, adjusting to her pace, sitting when she stops. He sits and downs on command. In English! Bettina wonders where a Mexican street dog learned all this. The pet store clerk gives him a treat, which the dog accepts tentatively. Her dog is leery and aloof, not just with strangers — human or canine — but with Bettina too. She doesn’t buy a tag, because she’s not sure what to name him.

Such a funny-looking thing, Bettina thinks as he walks the aisle at her side. A deep street mix, like the doctor said. Curvy, big headed. Slim loins but big thighs. She guesses Lab and whippet in him, Jack Russell, maybe Chihuahua or Xolo. There’s something almost undoglike about him. Wallaby? Jackalope! And those ears, randomly articulating with his senses — one moment they’re button, the next rose, the next gull wing or a combination. She can feel herself falling more in love with him by the minute. It doesn’t really matter what he’s made out of. He’s what he is. She figures a DNA test would be uselessly crowded and inconclusive.

From Laguna Canyon Road, she heads up Stan Oaks Drive, parks in a carport under the Canyon View Apartments. The apartments are affordable on a small-town newspaper reporter’s salary. Pet friendly too. The wood-and-glass building rises from the flank of the canyon on imposing concrete caissons.

Bettina leads the dog up the stairs to her veranda, lugging a collapsible crate in one hand, glad to be home. Looks forward to her windows and good views. Her Canyon View neighbors are sometimes noisy but basically cool, and they look out for each other, observing Canyon Cocktails nightly around the pool and the communal firepit.

Inside, she gets him water, trades out his dirty collar for a new blue one, and tosses him a new chew toy turkey she thinks he’ll like. Then shows the dog her place. Downstairs: the living room, kitchen, breakfast nook, and office/studio where she writes and makes her videos. There’s a beautiful blue six-foot-eight-inch swallowtail surfboard in one corner of the living room. And a sleek white Cannondale road bike she rides with her club, the Biker Chicks, propped against one wall in the office, her helmet dangling from the saddle. Her trap guns are locked in an office gun case that she and her dad made when Bettina was twelve. Upstairs is the bedroom and a bath that has a shower with an eye-level window and an ocean peek, and great views of Laguna Canyon.

Back in the kitchen, Bettina pours a cup of premium salmon kibble into a bowl and sets it on the floor. The dog sniffs it, then goes under the breakfast nook table and lies down, resting his unhappy face on his front paws. Gets his furrowed expression again, eyes looking up at her as if she has taken away everything that ever mattered to him. Offers him the chew toy turkey again and he ignores it again.

That evening she takes him to Canyon Cocktails, introduces him to the neighbors. He’s standoffish and draws mixed reviews. Bettina tells them about his close call on the streets of Tijuana, his recovery, and her falling in love with him pretty much on sight. Of course, they’ve got name ideas:

Lucky.

Ears.

Bullet.

Dodger.

Spots.

Coastal Eddy.

How about just Eddy?

Bettina tells them she’ll think it over. She sees by the dog’s face that he’s unhappy here, doesn’t want to be looked at by strangers.

Later she invites him into her office where she starts her story about the Saint Francis animal clinic and shelter in Mexico. “The Story of Shot Dog” by Bettina Blazak. He curls up on a rug and is soon asleep. She pours the last of her bourbon into an old-fashioned rocks glass, adds an ice cube and a splash of water.

One page in, Bettina realizes that she needs more medical details on the operation, and whatever else the vet can tell her about the dog’s condition that night. And she could use some background on what life on the street had been like for him.

She calls the clinic, and, predictably, it’s closed.

But Rodríguez gave her his home number, and Bettina gets his wife, Señora María Lucero Obregón. She is very upset. She says the doctor was taken away by the police for questioning and allegedly released from custody only three hours ago. But Félix has not come home.

“He loves his home,” she says in rapid Spanish. “He is not with our children. He does not have a lover. The police said he walked out of the station, turned right on Cristóbal Colón, which is the direction home. They haven’t seen him since. I walked and drove the streets from the Zona Norte all the way home, for two hours, and there is no sign of him.”

Bettina’s Spanish is college-good, but it’s still hard to get her own tone right with a native speaker. It’s hard to be subtle.

“I’m sure he’s fine, señora,” she says. “Maybe he got lost. Or stopped for a drink.” An awkward pause, then: “I need some more information on my dog.”

“How is he?”

“He’s sad and a little afraid of strangers.”

“Have you named him?”

“Not yet. Señora Lucero, while I have you on the phone, can you answer some questions about the dog?”

“Of course. I am a veterinary doctor myself, and I helped with the procedure. But it’s Félix who has the gift of surgery, not me.”

She goes on to describe the abdominal entry wound of the bullet and its exit through the muscle high on his left thigh. It had broken open his intestine and nicked an artery, and the bleeding would not have stopped without a repair, which her husband did beautifully. The intestine was leaking waste fluids and had to be tightly sutured and drained as well. The muscle damage was substantial for just one bullet, and the doctor speculates that it may have bounced off the street and expanded up and through the dog. Tremendous doses of antibiotics were required.

“Do you know if he was shot for sport?”

“I think it was an accident. That night there was a large shoot-out between rival Tijuana cartels. It is a war between the New Generation Cartel and the Sinaloa Cartel. Everyone in Mexico knows this. It has been going on for many years. The Sinaloans are trying to hold their plaza in our city, and the New Generation is trying to take it. They were made brave when El Chapo was arrested. This battle took place in a furniture factory. Many shots were fired and six men died.”

Bettina’s fingers fly across her keyboard as she makes notes. She can type almost as fast as Dr. Lucero talks, though the translating slows her down as her memory struggles for the words.

“Did you know that the dog is almost perfect on leash, and knows his basic commands by voice? Not only in Spanish but in English as well?”

“No. That is unusual. But we noticed he was obedient off the leash, which is unusual, too, for a street dog.”

“Can you tell me who brought him to the clinic?”

“A boy from downtown, where the gunfighting took place. He knew of our clinic.”

Bettina’s head is spinning with a great new story idea about the boy who took the shot dog to the clinic. Thereby saving the dog’s life.

“Do you know the boy’s name?” she asks the doctor.

“I’m sorry. We were in such a rush to save the dog, we hardly thanked him.”

“Doctor, what is life like for a street dog in Tijuana?”

“Hunger, dehydration, disease, ticks. Violence from men and other dogs, and coyotes. Giving birth in alleys and gutters. No love. No kindness. It’s a terrible life.”

A cold shudder issues down Bettina’s back as she considers the former life of the dog she has rescued. He’s looking at her doubtfully. She hasn’t realized until now what a miracle she’s performed for the dog. What a miracle the boy who carried him to the clinic has performed. Most of all, what a miracle that doctors Drs. Félix Rodríguez and María Lucero have performed.

She gets a sudden inspiration and takes a deep breath. “Señora, I want to name the dog Felix. For the man who saved him.”

“Félix is a good name. It means ‘lucky’ and ‘happy.’ My husband, Félix, and the shot dog are both those things.”

Bettina thanks María Lucero and tells her that her husband will be home soon. “I’m going to call the Tijuana Police right now and get to the bottom of this.” She hears the worry in her own voice.

The desk sergeant says that Rodríguez voluntarily came in for an interview about possible irregularities at his veterinary clinic.

“What irregularities?”

“Oh, I cannot answer this. But it was routine. He talked to our detectives and left the station at approximately four in the afternoon.”

“Were you on duty?”

“I was right here at this desk. I watched him go.”

“Which way did he turn on Cristóbal Colón?” Bettina asks.

A pause: “A la izquierda.”

To the left, notes Bettina.

“Are you sure?”

“Surely, yes.”

“Thank you for your time.”

The cops can’t even get their directions right, thinks Bettina, reading through her notes on the monitor. Do they not agree on what they saw, or are they hiding something? There’s something ominous in the doctor not coming home.

Later that night, Bettina almost finishes the story. She’ll write that last graf in the office tomorrow morning. She’s a fast writer, tries to be clear and accurate rather than stylish or poetic. She thinks her editor at Coastal Eddy will love it, and be glad she let Bettina wander so far from Laguna for the story. The pictures and video she took with her smartphone are good.

Then she edits and over-voices her video, “Felix: The Rescue of a Mexican Street Dog.” Her viewers will learn some of Felix’s misery on the street and get a real feel for his cold, lonely Clínica Veterinaria San Francisco de Asís days. They’ll be delighted that his name is now Felix, not simply, gruesomely, Shot Dog. There’s a lot more to him than just getting shot, Bettina thinks.

She edits and retouches the video so Tijuana looks cold and forbidding, and the poor dog looks miserable. Not hard to do. But her viewers will also see that Dr. Rodríguez is a good soul, and how lucky the dog is to have survived possible cartel violence. She makes sure they know that Felix was one of twelve million dogs living on the streets and beaches of Mexico. She loves it when her stories point out a problem that people can do something about. In the video, Bettina thinks that she looks composed, capable, and borderline pretty. She’s never done a story this personal. It’s a little weird to be reporting on yourself.

She sends the story and video to her Coastal Eddy editor, Jean Rose.

And later sits cross-legged on the bedroom floor in her robe and slippers, with Felix lying against one thigh. She strokes his face and neck and ears. Rubs her thumb gently inside the warm triangular flaps, feels the raised bump of what must be an old wound. A street fighter’s scar, thinks Bettina.

She tosses and turns some of the night, patting the mattress for Felix to come join her, but he stays in his new crate beside the bed.

She’s exhausted, but she can’t stop her thoughts.

Typical, she thinks, and of course the bourbon’s gone.

Always the story hound, Bettina Blazak wonders as she begins to drift off how a Mexican street dog has not only been obedience-trained but trained in English besides. Has he spent some of his years not living on the streets of Mexico? And she wonders if the bullet that almost killed him was no accident but happened during the cartel shoot-out — and for a reason. The timing sure looks right. Why were the Mexican police looking for a shot dog? Why interrogate the veterinarian who saved him? Why couldn’t they agree on which direction Rodríguez went when he left their station in the Zona Norte? And where is the doctor now?

The boy, she thinks: I need to talk to the boy who carried a dying dog half a mile through the rain.

He should be next: