Chapter 7:- The day everything changed
One year & six months ago
Dodger was strutting down Broadway in his usual self confidant style, coming back from a visit from Oliver's. Dodger laughed to himself as he thought about how one of his best friends was a cat, who would have thought it? Defiantly not him.
Suddenly a delightful smell filled Dodgers nostrils, permeating the air, and like a cartoon character in the old cartoons, followed the sent all the way to the source. Turning a corner he laid eyes on it, a hot dog vendor serving all American franks hot dogs, Dodgers favourite kind. His mouth started to water.
Creeping up behind the vendor (a gruff looking man with a baled patch in the top of his hair that he was trying to hide with a bad comb over) and waited for the right time to strike. Finally when he was busy dealing with a customer Dodger nimbly and swiftly weaved around his legs and grabbed the end of a role of hot dogs, then high tailed it out of there with a line of about ten hotdogs; All before the vendor knew what hit him.
Feeling especially proud of himself and with his ego boosted a bit more, he made tracks toward home. Approaching the dingy dock where Fagin's houseboat resided (Barley afloat) Dodger smelt something unusual in the air, fire?
He turned a corner and saw a black, ugly cloud of unending smoke rising up into the air like a plastic bag in the wind, creating a dirty streak across the orangey yellow of the setting sun. Dodger started running toward the smoke, following it like an evil rainbow. Dodger dropped the hotdogs from around his neck, mind racing as he feared the worst. When he came to the entrance of the dock he stopped at the top of some stairs looking on as his fears were confirmed.
At the end of the dock was Fagin's decrepit houseboat engulfed in flames, slowly being eaten away in the hungry clutches of the fire. Dodger was ready to take action, but before he could rush to the boat he felt something smash into him from behind, causing him to fly down the stairs and land with a hard thud on the floor. His head was spinning and before he could get up a he was pinned to the floor.
As his blurred vision slowly cleared he started to take in the fuzzy outline of the dog pinning him down. It was a Doberman, twice the size of Dodger. It had cropped ears, a vicious snarl and a hatred burning clearly in its eyes. Dodger couldn't help but be reminded of someone when looking at this face, but he could pinpoint who.
"Get off me! I need to help my friends!" Dodger shouted at the Doberman as he struggled to break out of her grip. "So you're the famous Dodger then, hu?" she spat out Dodger's name "What a disappointment." Dodger stopped struggling to look her clear in the eyes, with a voice in the back of his head trying to find out why she looked so familiar.
As if reading his mind the Doberman spoke, "Common mutt. Look hard-" she pushed her face right up against Dodger's which he found quite intimidating "-I must remind you of someone? Anyone? You should know, you killed them!" the volume of her voice escalated through the sentence.
Finally the puzzle pieces clicked into place in Dodger mind, and a wave of poisonous memories flooded into his mind; The smell of raw meat on their breath, all the despicable hitting on Rita, the subway chase that almost cost him his life. "You- You look like- like Roscoe and- and Desoto". Dodger was stuttering due to the PTSD from all the memory's he suppressed, clearly shaken by revisiting them.
Dodger visible stress caused the Doberman to smile a crooked evil smile, "That's right Mutt. They were my brothers, the only good thing in my miserable life, and you took them away from me." She pressed he paw down on Dodgers throat, enjoying the sound of his choking and squirming, before releasing the pressure, allowing Dodger to gulp down air now that he could.
After some more coughing Dodger said between laboured breathes "OK. Revenge on me. I get that. But why are you burning my house down?" The Doberman released a scary witch crackle of a laugh that sent a shiver down Dodgers spine. "Tut tut tut. Not everything's about you Mutt. My owners needed to get back at your dear old Fagin. We can't let some tramp with his pack of flea bitten mutts kill a mob boss and not do anything about it. All actions have repercussions, and this is Fagin's."
Dodger eyes widened with panic, "But what about my friends?" The Dobermans smile grew even bigger, "We trapped those other mongrels you call friends in the boat while Fagin was taken outside to watch. But I'm glad you weren't in there, it means I can kill you myself."
Dodger was paralysed while the news sunk in, he momentarily slipped out of this world. His mind tried to reject the idea that his friends, his world, was burning into nothing. However this sudden realisation gave him a surge of adrenalin. He came back with a fierce vengeance. While the Doberman was laughing Dodger scratched her face,claws hitting her just below the right eye.
Momentarily stunned by this attack Dodger took the advantage and sunk his teeth into her left paw. She bought it up in pain un-stabling herself, allowing Dodger to get his two back legs and ram them into her lower thighs, causing the Doberman to scream out as she was catapulted of Dodger and landed in a heap on the floor.
Maybe on a normal day the Doberman would have had a chance, but with an angered Dodger there was none; she wasn't trained as well as her brothers, and it showed. The Doberman was covered in blood, she couldn't stand on her left paw and had no energy to fight. Panting in pain she stared Dodger right in the eye with anger and hatred "Go on then. Do it. Kill me like you killed my brothers."
Dodger stood over her, breathing heavily with rage. The light from the flames behind him casting a silhouette across the floor and over the Doberman. The held eye contact for another couple of seconds, then Dodger backed away and turned to help his friends. With his back to her he said in a dark tone, "Don't follow me". Then he ran in the direction of the flaming house boat hoping he wasn't too late.
When he got there, Dodger heard tires screeching as a black limo drove off into the distance. Obviously the mobsters as there was currently no one by the boat. Then Dodger saw it. The crumpled and burning ashes of what was once his home but now just a pile of floating, burning wood. His entire life reduced to nothing-ness, disappearing in among the dancing flames.
Dodger knew that nothing could survive that. If his friends were in there like the Doberman said they'd be dead by now. Dodger tried to fight the waves of so many different emotions flooding him. Taking one more look around with wet eyes he started to run in the opposite direction to the burning boat. Up the rams, into the city. Dodger didn't have a destination, he just wanted to run. Run as far away as possible. To try and convince himself that none of this was actually happening.
It started to lightly rain as he heard the wailing sirens of the fire department in the distance, but that didn't matter. They were already too late. Dodger just kept running, small drops of water dripping off his fur. It was hard to tell if that was the rain or Dodger. He turned into a small dead end ally as the rain started to come down faster and harder. At the closed end of the ally there were three dustbins knocked down in a pile. Dodger managed to squeeze himself into an open space between them, offering some (but not a lot) of shelter. He curled up into a ball, fur soaking wet, and he cried. For the first time since he was a pup he cried. Dodger couldn't hold it any longer. He was alone, lost, scared. And in that dark, cold ally, he cried himself to sleep.
Present day
Collette sat in silence, looking at Dodger with mouth dropped open in shock. Dodger stared into the distance trying to hid his emotions like he always does, and for the most part it worked, but Collette could have sworn she saw his eyes watering up, although she didn't say anything.
After an uncomfortably long time silent, Collette spoke up in a rather meek voice, "So what did you do next?"
"I did something I never thought I'd do. I left Manhattan. That place just didn't feel like home anymore, not after that. I wondered around, went down to Brooklyn for a while. Then the Bronx, didn't stay there long. Then I ended up in Queens. And it's taken me so long but... but I just need to keep trying to get past what happened. There's no good getting upset about the past."
"Have you ever thought about going back?" Asked Collette. "Yeah. I have. But I could never go back there. I don't want to. I can't explain why." Collette looked him in the eye, "So you're scared right? I know what that's like, I'm scared all the time."
"You're doing a pretty good job of hiding it," Dodger remarked slightly impressed. Collette considered this for a second, "Yeah. I suppose I am, aren't I. It just came out of know where, you know, this courage. Right when we got lost in grand central park. Scamp froze and I just took over, like instincts." Dodger sighed heavily, "Well if you can do it then so can I." And with that they both sat watching the sun rise slowly over Manhattan.
