Hey Mom,

Just saved Nikita from a pack of coyotes using my trusty tennis ball! Spencerville’s never dull with me, Grim, your four-legged hero. Stories for days and chicken treats always await. Life’s ruff, but someone’s gotta live it – tail wags and all!

Hugs & slobbers,
Bubbies 🐾😉

Listen to the story here

So there I was, Grim, the yin-yang pup, sitting on a creaky wooden porch that overlooked a dusty stretch in Spencerville, that town born from a whisper of immortality and a lick of canine comradeship. Yes, sir, Spencerville was my beat, my endless summer, my “once upon a time” in the high noon of the afterlife.

The sun arched its back, stretching across the sky as lazily as a tabby in a sunbeam. Poodle Pond shimmered like a mirage, and over by Husky Hill, a new litter of pups was learning the art of the howl – a regular hootenanny of barks and yips. Life here was one grand adventure day after the next, but today, well, today was going to be a horse of a different color.

I strolled down Main Street, my paws kicking up little tufts of cloud dust, heading towards The Wagging Tail Bookstore. The owner, a hound with spectacles thicker than a steak at Furrific Fried Chicken, greeted me with a wag that could’ve powered a windmill.

“Grim,” he barked, “there’s trouble brewing at South Siberian Summit. Your pal Nikita got all tangled up with a real ornery pack of coyotes – the no-good varmints looking to cheat at a game of hide and seek.”

Now, a Border Collie might not look like much next to the likes of a Weimaraner, especially one as stoic and hefty as Nikita, but I’ll let you in on a little secret: size and strength ain’t the sum total of a dog’s metal. There’s heart, there’s wit, and, let’s not forget, there’s an old tennis ball.

I thanked the hound and hit the trail faster than a jackrabbit in a hot pepper patch. As I bolted past Yappy Yogurt, scents both sweet and tangy wafted through the air – a reminder of simpler pleasures – but I had no time for dalliance. Nikita was out there, and she’d no sooner roll over for those yapping coyotes than I’d volunteer for a bath on a mud-puddle day.

When I reached the Summit, a thin mist hung low, curling around my legs like lingering ghosts. There they were, the coyotes, with eyes like flint and grins wide as the Rio Grande, circling Nikita, who stood in the middle, defiant, the last of her patience fraying like an old man’s suspenders.

Midst the commotion, I caught her eye, gave the slyest of winks – true varmints communicate without so much as a yap – and whipped out my trusty tennis ball from its hidden pocket. Now, friends, there’s something you should know about coyotes: you throw something, they cannot, for the life of them, not chase it. It’s philosophical, like.

With all the might in my hind legs, I sent that old ball up the misty outlines of the Siberian, a remnant of my earthly days, now a ticket to diversion. Well, those coyotes took off like bats out of a belfry, tripping over themselves and howling something fierce, chasing that ball like it was their last meal.

Nikita trotted over, relief plain as day on her muzzle. Together, we watched the coyotes disappear, our sides brushing, breathing in victory and the perfume of the wildflowers.

“And what now?” Nikita asked, eyes gleaming with gratitude and the reflection of the setting sun.

I glanced back at Spencerville, a patchwork of stories and dreams under a velvet sky. “Now,” I said, “we mosey on back, tell the tale, and maybe get ourselves a bite of that grilled chicken. A dog’s work is never done, especially when there are coyotes afoot and the taste of adventure is as rich as pan-fried steak after a hard day’s roam.”

And with hearts light and bellies soon to be full, we ambled home, two legends in the making, paws dancing to the unique rhythm of Spencerville’s forever frontier.

The End.

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