Song 10: "Lullabye (Goodnight, My Angel)"

Ten seconds ago, the apartment had been as loud as the city outside with Annie's barely-contained screams and the Company's wails of distress. Now it was silent as death.

Fagin sat on his mattress, biting his nails and muttering, "Can't afford the vet… Think it's too late anyways… I'm sorry, fellas." His flashlight had rolled to the floor, giving them little light to see by. The Company had stopped panicking and also muttered.

The dogs gathered around the pillow fort, where blood was pooling. Francis and Tito hung back, holding each other and trembling. Rita and Einstein were closer to her, grief in their eyes. Charlie had instinctively gathered the puppies away from the scene, hushing them gently, letting them burrow in her fur. The gang saw their friend dying before them.

But Dodger saw his mother. His canine heart was beating so fast he feared it might burst out of his chest. "Momma, why?" he choked out. "Ya were fine. Tha pregnancy was fine."

She sputtered. "No, baby… I knew something was wrong. I could feel it."

"Then why didn't ya say anything? We could've… could've done…"

"What could ya have done?" Annie shook her head. "I've been so tired for so long. All of ya are young, ya don't understand, but I… I wanna rest now. So it's all right."

"Don't speak, hon." Rita's jaw trembled. "You're gonna be fine."

"We both know that's a lie," Annie chuckled. She closed her eyes, chest heaving. "After I gave birth, I think I was holding on… until my son and I had… made things right." She inched towards him. "Now I wanna speak to ya… one last time."

Dodger touched noses with her. "Momma, please."

"I want ya to know ya anger and grief… ya had every right to feel that way." Annie gave his muzzle a gentle lick. "I've done wrong by ya. I know I have. Ya deserved a mother who was there, who licked ya wounds and kissed ya before bed. I robbed ya of that."

"I forgive ya, Momma. I ain't angry at ya no more."

"I know ya not… but forgiving myself is tha problem."

Dodger had been holding his tears back, his eyes red and wet, but he finally broke into sobs. He clenched his teeth and shut his eyes to try to stop himself. He laid his head on her back. This couldn't be happening, this had to be a nightmare that he'd wake up from any moment — but his night terrors were never this vivid. Why did he have to lose her when he'd only just forgiven her? He gulped air, his words incoherent. "Ya — Ya can't go, Mom. It's too soon. We haven't had enough — I haven't been a… a good son."

"Well, fair is fair. I haven't been a good mother." Her voice was faint now, so she spoke in his ear. "I'm sorry for every hardship ya faced. If I could take it all back… do it over…"

"Don't blame yaself. Most of my hardships are my own fault." He gurgled a bizarre, tearful laugh. "I'm a really dumb dog." He didn't know why he was laughing, but it brought a smile to Annie's face, and he knew the laughter was good.

Rita approached them and put her nose to Annie's cheek. "I'm so sorry, sister. Ya had such a hard life, and for it to come to this, it's just — "

"Ya stop that right now. I've had a wonderful life… at tha end, anyways." Annie gave a weak laugh. "I found my son again, and I met all of ya… Who could ask for more?" Her gaze turned to the oldest dog in the room. Einstein had moved away from them, but now he hobbled to her side. "I even fell in love again." She licked Einy's cheek.

"I love you, Annie." Einstein had dried his tears. "I'll miss you."

"Right back at ya, big fella." She laid her head on his large paws, smiling softly. "I'm so thankful I met ya, Einy. Ya never asked anything of me, not once. Ya tha kindest dog I know."

Then Annie looked at Rita and winked. "Thank ya for being my friend. If ya hadn't found me in that alley… I don't know where I'd be. Probably woulda died a lot sooner."

"Girl, don't say that." Rita sniffed back tears. "Just don't."

"Hey, it's true, ain't it? I'm not sorry to die. We all gotta go sometime."

She glanced around the room, first at the poor man rocking himself on the mattress, then to Francis and Tito, to Einstein and Rita, then to her son. Finally, her gaze fell on Charlie, the tough girl who was cradling her three puppies. The sight put Annie at ease. "Come here, children. I have to tell ya something." The pups tiptoed towards their mother. "Ya be good for Charlie and Rita, okay? They're gonna have their paws full raising ya… but ya three are gonna take care of each other, understand?"

"We'll take care of them, sugar. Don't you worry about that," Rita said.

Annie smiled her thanks, then nuzzled her pups. "I gotta leave ya now. But never forget that I love ya. I'll love ya till tha day tha lights go out in New York."

Stud had tears in his eyes. Kitty was sobbing. Billy was silent. It was unclear if they knew what was happening, being so young, but they knew everyone was distressed; that told them all they needed to know. They tucked themselves between their mother and brother.

"There's a saying I always remember... when things get hard. Got me through some tough times on tha streets." Annie spoke to all of them now, all four of her pups. "Keep ya dream alive. Dreaming is still how tha strong survive."

Those words sent a shiver down Dodger's spine. He felt as if he'd heard them before, whispered in the rain. Perhaps every stray animal in the city knew them by heart.

He'd stopped crying now, but his eyes were bloodshot. She licked some dirt off his neck. "My son. My survivor." Annie closed her eyes for the last time. "I love ya."

"I love ya too, Momma. I love ya so much."

The apartment was quiet once again. Einstein whimpered and laid beside her body, and as the warmth disappeared from her, the pups moved to Einy and cried into his gray fur. Everyone else moved to give them space. Dodger trudged to the corner of the room. His friends were all here, whom he'd made up with at last, but he didn't want to be around any of them.

Right now, he was a puppy freezing in the snow, who'd run from alley to alley until he broke through the floorboards of a condemned building to shiver in the basement.

Fagin eventually stood up from the mattress, fumbled through his trenchcoat for a cigarette, and lit it with a shaky hand. He stepped outside the apartment to smoke it. His dogs stayed inside the apartment, huddled together to keep warm.

They watched the world through the window grow brighter as dawn bathed the New York City skyline in rosy-orange. It was three days after Christmas.


The next hours passed in a blur for Rita. She watched as Fagin wrapped Annie's body in a blanket and cleaned the blood with towels and rainwater, but it couldn't be real — yet she knew she had to be strong and face reality. They'd lost a friend. The pups had lost their mom.

And they weren't the only ones, she thought as she watched Dodger. He'd crawled below the window, hadn't said a word for ages. No one knew what to say to him.

After he'd wrapped Annie and placed her still form on the counter, Fagin sat on the floor beside his remaining dogs. "Never lost anyone before, have we?" He rocked himself back and forth. "Sure, some of ya left and came back, but this… this is tha first time…"

Usually his cheeks or hair were his reddest feature, but now it was his eyes. Gray old Einstein put his head in his master's lap, and Fagin cradled him. The man sniffed, rubbed his nose, and raised a half-empty bottle. "Here's to poor, sweet Momma."

When the bottle was drained, Fagin staggered to his mattress and collapsed, snoring within minutes. Einy found room on the mattress beside him, and Francis and Tito squeezed in after him. The latter two, usually so talkative, were quiet as night.

But the night was over. Light poured through the planks that boarded the windows. Even so, they'd all lost sleep last night and decided that a few extra hours wouldn't hurt.

"Come here, guys," Rita called to the puppies. She made a bed in the same pillow fort where their mother had been; they liked the enclosure, and Rita was desperate for anything to comfort them. Stud and Kitty came at once, nuzzling against her, but Billy hung back.

"Billy?" she whispered. The undersized pup was staring at his big brother beneath the window. "Better give him some space, okay?" Billy nodded and joined his siblings.

They were the age that could melt the hardest heart. Not even three weeks old, Rita knew they still needed a mother's warmth; she would do the best she could. Everyone else in the apartment was fast asleep, even Dodger below the window, but then Charlie nudged her with her wet nose. "Look at ya. A natural mother." The collie seemed to be half-asleep, half-awake, that state of honest lucidity that came from too little rest. "Think they'll be okay?"

Rita tucked a paw around the pups. "I can't say," she sighed. "They're barely weaned off milk, and I mean barely. Probably can eat wet food… but I'm scared for them."

"We'll keep our promise to Annie," she said. "We'll raise them right."

Rita laughed low. "Since when are you and me a we?"

Charlie looked around at the others, to make sure they were truly asleep. When she was satisfied, the collie leaned forward and touched noses. She licked Rita's cheek. "I'm no good at tha mushy stuff," Charlie chuckled, brusque as ever, "so I'm just gonna say it."

Rita's heart froze over like a car in the morning, joy and fear rumbling inside her.

"I love ya, girl. I loved ya back way back on tha houseboat, but for all my tough talk… I was afraid. Thought ya didn't feel tha same. Heck, maybe ya still don't. But all that time we were apart made me realize how much ya mean to me."

"You were afraid?" Rita's breath was visible. "I never knew."

"Sure was," the collie sighed. "Afraid ya liked Dodger more than me. Afraid ya didn't want anything serious. Afraid ya couldn't love a girl." She turned her eyes towards the kitchen counter. "But Annie dying makes me realize life is short. Too short to be afraid."

"Know what?" Rita whispered. "You're not too bad at the mushy stuff." Then she licked Charlie's cheek and nuzzled her. "I love you, too. If you can say it, so can I."

The collie laid beside the saluki with the puppies between them. Rita still feared for them, but Charlie's stupid grin made it hard to feel anything but exasperation and affection. "Think they won't care that we're not, ya know, their real mom?" Charlie whispered.

"What's real, anyways? Everything's make-believe."

Rita laid her head on her love's chest, listening to it thumping faster and faster, and it was all her fault; the guilt made her giddy. Charlie nestled her head in her bushy hair. "I believe it." They fell asleep at sunrise, listening to their pups' heartbeats. It was a new day.

She'd always thought no one could love a girl with an attitude problem. Turns out all she had to do was find a girl even worse than herself.


Dodger was surrounded by friends. It was the middle of the night when the Company had finally dried their eyes and followed Fagin out of the apartment complex, into the buggy of his shopping cart-scooter, and driven across town. He'd carried Annie in his lap. Now they were shivering in a small, fenced-in park with a few shrubs and benches in the East Bronx, a forgettable enclosure that New Yorkers passed every day and never noticed.

Dodger was a million miles away. He liked the park, thought Fagin found a nice spot, but right now he felt like he was below the waves of the East again, struggling to surface.

They'd buried his mom behind a bench. Fagin shook hands with the park groundskeeper, a grizzled man who'd grunted, shut the gate, and helped them dig the hole. Dodger figured when someone died, you put them under and everyone mourned, figured that's what humans did, but he couldn't wrap his head around it. "I miss ya already, Momma."

There was a rock marking the spot, but Dodger wasn't sure he'd be able to remember which one when he came back. There were many benches and many rocks.

Fagin loitered at the park entrance with Einstein, Tito, and Francis, while Rita and Charlie hovered over the pups. They all eyed him with definite pity, and Dodger hated being pitied. At least they weren't talking to him. He couldn't have handled that.

"I know ya forgave me for being mean, but Mom… I was so mean to ya. Why'd ya never give up on me?" He shuffled his paws. Icicles hung off the bench and the leaves were tinged with frost. "I woulda given up on me."

It was nighttime in the city, but that never stopped the constant flood of headlights and car horns in the background, the honky cars he chased as a pup. Dodger hung his head. "I only ask cause, honestly, I'm having a hard time forgiving myself."

He hoped none of the Company could hear him. This was a private conversation.

"I wasted our time, Mom. I was angry, I blamed ya… but we were fine, weren't we? Both survived tha streets. That was all that mattered, but I… I wasted our time with a grudge."

He remembered how it felt to have tears slide down his cheek and freeze in his fur. Right now he wanted to run away, to dash headfirst into an alley or some basement and be alone. "We just made up, Mom, and now ya gone? It's too soon." His ears drooped, his tail hung low.

But he was done running and hiding from his problems.

"Gotta figure out how to be okay with myself, huh? Too bad I ain't tha smartest dog on tha block." His mother would've laughed at that. He smiled to think so.

He turned to leave, but lingered one moment more. "Thanks for never giving up." Dodger would remember which stone under which bench. Somehow he would.

The mutt trudged back to the others, who were waiting at the gate of the little park. They greeted him warmly, but thankfully, didn't say anything. Frankie and Tito gave him silly grins, and he appreciated them. Einy smiled, a mutual loss between them; he was glad the old dog loved his mother, glad they'd had each other. Then there was Rita and Charlie together, his siblings between them… and it clicked in Dodger's brain that there was more than friendship between the girls. He didn't know how he hadn't realized before. Dodger gave a knowing wink.

"You coming back with us, Dodge?" Rita asked gently.

With the Company together again, Dodger felt the strong urge to make a plan of action, steal wallets and watches, then run off together and hop a few taxis, just like the old days. But he wasn't the president anymore. And he was okay with that.

"Nah, guys. I'll visit again real soon, but now I… I gotta go."

He put his nose in Fagin's outstretched palm; he'd forgotten how rough the man's skin was. Fagin knelt down and wiped the cold tears from Dodger's eye ducts. He readjusted the dog's navy bandana, straightened his collar, and sighed a smile. "Ya ain't alone no more, boy, hear me? Ya got us, and ya got ya new family. I know ya mom's gone, but ya ain't alone." Fagin embraced him and sniffed back his own tears. "Don't forget about us."

Dodger licked his unshaven cheek. It was a promise. Fagin patted his head, stood up, and reached into his pocket for a smoke. To his amazement, the mutt growled. "Okay, smart aleck!" Fagin had a wheezy laugh. "Ya right. Bad habit." He threw the cigarette in a trash can.

He looked at the gang once more, his gaze lingering on his three siblings — he almost stayed for them. But they had two mothers, and he trusted them. Dodger left the Company behind, ran to the sidewalk, and leapt onto a passing taxi in one smooth stroke.

The car zoomed through traffic, and the air was freezing but it made him feel awake and alive. The city lights and shop windows blurred around them, and soon they'd crossed the bridge and were in Manhattan proper. He loved the rush; always had, always would.

Sure, he hadn't slept in way too long, but NYC never slept, so why should he?

The snow that had fallen on Christmas was beginning to melt away, leaving slush and ice on the roads. Most drove carefully, but Dodger was on a New York taxi: they didn't know the meaning of slow. The speed put a smile on his face.

When they finally hit a red light, Dodger leapt to the next car over, whose roof he slid down to the fright of the driver inside. Their scream of surprise made him laugh maniacally. "Man, I forgot how much fun this was." He jumped onto the sidewalk and skeeted across an icy patch, sliding into a pose like Elvis, all hips. He was just missing the shades.

"That's what I'm talking about." Dodger couldn't remember the last time he'd played in traffic — a habit parents usually warned their children against — but he was having the time of his life. Dodger looked to the sky. He'd wound up near Midtown.

He saw skyscrapers and street lamps, smelled gas spewing from pipes, and heard construction and car horns and cooing pigeons. "Just what I needed." He couldn't replace the aching in his heart with smoke and streets and sounds, but he came close.


The Company trotted up the steps after Fagin, careful not to slip on the ice. They caught a glimpse of a neighbor in a second-floor apartment, a man with an ugly scowl who had knocked on his door once to complain about barking dogs, peeping through the window blinds. He wasn't the only tenant to complain. "Like I'm really tha worst guy here," Fagin grumbled.

They walked slow, the energy zapped from all of them. Three flights of stairs felt like a climb to the top of the Empire State Building. They had never buried a member of the gang before — sure, they knew life wasn't forever, but this was the first time, the first shock — and no one was in the mood for jokes.

When they reached the third flight of stairs, Rita paused to look out at the low-lying rooftops, fire escapes, street lamps, and alleyways of the Bronx. Charlie sat with her, remembering their night out a few weeks back, when they'd watched the city together. "Must've been tough for Dodge to grow up here, huh?" Rita mumbled.

Charlie frowned. "Were ya hoping he'd stick around full-time again?"

"No, I didn't expect him to, but we… we have a lotta history." Rita rolled her eyes at her mate's expression. "Oh, you think you're the only dog I've ever had feelings for?"

"I know I'm not. That'd be so boring," she laughed. They stood a little ways from the others for privacy. "I don't care about our pasts. I love ya just tha way ya are."

The tenderness was interrupted by a sharp intake of breath, a gasp that Fagin tried his best to stifle. He ushered the puppies, Tito, and Frankie inside the apartment through the doggy door, but Rita, Charlie, and Einstein lingered outside with him. They knew their old man. Knew when he needed a smoke. Knew when something was wrong.

Fagin was holding a folded piece of paper that had been slid between the door and frame. His eyes scanned the words, then they glazed over. His hand fell open and the paper fluttered to the floor. Fagin went to sit on the top of the steps.

"Go inside, guys," he muttered when they approached. Rita and Charlie did so obediently. Einstein wouldn't leave his side, and the Great Dane laid beside him.

If any of them could read, they would've seen the words EVICTION NOTICE.


Two hours before midnight, the Foxworth family was gathered in the living room of their mansion, dressed in their nicest casual wear and ready to go out the door. Winston would be accompanying them tonight, just to keep an extra pair of eyes on Jenny in the crowded Times Square — they didn't think their daughter would run off, but ever since the incident last spring, they could never be too careful. Their fears aside, the family wanted to have a good time that New Year's Eve as they left 1988 behind and welcomed in 1989.

"Ready to see the ball drop, Jen?" Her father wrapped a scarf around her neck and kissed her forehead. "If we don't hurry, we'll never get a good spot. The Square will be packed."

Jenny smiled for her dad, not wanting to let him know she wouldn't mind if they stayed inside tonight. She had the strangest feeling that going out was a bad idea, but fiddling with her woolen mitts, she said nothing. Jenny knew there was nothing to fear.

Mrs. Foxworth had sprayed and tousled extra volume into her blonde hair like a true queen of the Eighties, despite all her socialite friends telling her the look was going out of style. She was a devout follower of Sandra Dee Olsson and determined to look youthful. "Be a good girl, Georgette darling," she cooed to her prize poodle.

Georgette simpered and whined and tilted her ahead to look affronted. In truth, she loved the woman — despite what her jealous boyfriends said, she didn't only love herself.

Dutiful Winston held the door for Mr. Foxworth, his wife, and Jenny to wait on the sidewalk while he went around back to pull the limousine around. They weren't the sort of people to take a taxi. The father looked back at the pets in the window — it was only Oliver and Georgette, unless you counted Bubbles the goldfish, which they never did.

"I hope Dodger returns soon," Mr. Foxworth sighed. His wife put her arm around his.

"He will, Dad," Jenny insisted. "He's visiting his friends, but he'll be back."

He squeezed his daughter's hand and prayed she was right. He thought bathing and collaring the dog meant he'd remain indoors from then on, but he supposed he underestimated Dodger's free spirit. Jenny had kept him from putting up "lost dog" posters.

Inside the mansion, Oliver watched the family pack into the limousine and drive off down Fifth Avenue. He couldn't help frowning. Georgette saw his concern and sighed dramatically. "Don't worry yourself, kitty. They do this every New Year's."

"What do you do while they're gone? Go to bed early?"

The poodle laughed. "Bed early? Goodness, how innocent you are. I have a date with Rex, the three-time Westminster Kennel Club Dog Show gold medal winner." She eyes her nails casually. "Of course, it would've been four times, but he lost to yours truly."

Oliver rolled his eyes and left her to brag aloud to herself about all the boyfriends she'd defeated, and how she never dated anyone below silver. He went instead to the far end of the mansion, snuck into the enclosure out back, and waited. She wasn't the only one with a date.

He waited for what felt like hours, the night getting darker, the air getting colder. Oliver considered going back inside, certain she'd forgotten, when he heard a rustle and a jump. He looked atop the enclosure wall, and there was the calico. "You came!"

"What did I tell you?" Adena grinned down at him like a Cheshire. "This is my first New Year's, too." She was so beautiful he forgot to breathe. "You coming or what?"

Oliver wiggled his ginger butt and leapt onto the glass table, and from there to the top of the wall. He pranced over and puffed up his chest. "Absitively posolutely."

"We'll make an alley cat out of you yet," Adena giggled. "Let's go."