Mystery #7: Dawn and the Disappearing Dogs
Okay, can we talk about the cover for a sec?
Mallory: "Holy shit miniature flying dogs!"
Dawn: "Hush, Mallory, your hair looks like you styled it by sticking your head in one of those cotton candy machines."
Krushers cheerleader: "Am I supposed to be Vanessa Pike or Karen Brewer?"
Dawn: "I have no idea. But 3_foot_6 had EXACTLY those glasses in the third grade and sometimes she still wakes up in a cold sweat about it."
Mallory: "But but! Physics as we know it is ceasing to exist! The ground extends up into the sky!"
Dawn: "Why is it cold enough for you to be wearing a zipped parka while simultaneously warm enough for your sleeves to be rolled up?"
Mallory: "If I take off my coat, everyone will see that I'm wearing the clothing of a poor person."
Krushers cheerleader: "I don't wanna be Vanessa Pike! That means I might end up looking like that fat boy in the purple coat!"
Dan Brown: "Perspective? What's that? I sully the good name of Hodges Soileau!"
...Oh, yeah, there's a book under there too.
“It’s not that I hate animals,” Dawn says by way of introduction. “It’s that I hate everything, because I’m a nasty, abrasive bitch.” I might have made up the second half, though. She likes dogs, she assures us, and cats, and hamsters, “although they are, you have to admit, kind of useless.” ...Uh, as opposed to my multifunctional cat, who provides me with many valuable services such as pissing on my bed, planting herself in the middle of the room to conspicuously bathe her crotch whenever I have company over, and sleeping on my laptop until it overheats and fries itself. You have pets because you love them. You buy appliances because they’re useful. Just shut up, Dawn.
“But” - you knew there was a “but” coming, didn’t you - “I’m not what you’d call an animal lover.” She tells us that she’s a vegetarian, “but it’s not because I feel sorry for the cow or anything. It’s just because I don’t really like the taste of red meat.” Wait, WHAT? She doesn’t...what? I mean...what the fuck is all her bitching, proselytizing, and alienating about, then? Does she go around picketing with big “MEAT IS ETHICALLY OKAY BUT IT TASTES BAD” signs? I mean, she was preachy enough as it was, but at least she STOOD for something. Now she’s just that obnoxious snot who has to stand over your lunch and make gross comments about it for no particular reason, because that’s not unacceptably rude or anything. Shut up, Dawn. Jesus. We’re one paragraph into the book and I hate you so much I’ve got a nosebleed.
Hokay, the train’s back on the tracks now, and Dawn complains about how Mary Anne tries to make her kiss Tigger (“Tigger loves you!” - no he doesn’t; no one loves Dawn). “Blecch. I do not believe in kissing cats,” Dawn snots. Whatever. I do that to everyone. You’re not even allowed to come in my house until you’ve kissed my cat, sometimes. It gives you the warm fuzzies when you set her down and she immediately goes back to bathing her crotch and you realize she was probably doing that before you kissed her too.
“Do I sound like a nut?” Dawn wants to know. No, not like a nut. Like a smug, obnoxious bitch, though. She says she’s a nice, normal 13-year-old who does everything nice, normal 13-year-olds do. Yeah, I know my neighborhood is just overrun with those perfectly normal 13-year-olds who spend all their time forcing children to perform in talent shows and marching bands and winter festivals. (We’re kind of low on children, though. They keep enrolling themselves in boarding school to escape.)
Dawn’s just thinking about animals because she’s outside sitting for the Barretts when she spots Mrs. Mancusi out walking her dogs. To Dawn’s consternation, Mrs. Mancusi is commenting on the beautiful day to Cheryl, her Great Dane, “and then, as if that weren’t enough,” she calls for Jacques, the golden retriever, to fetch his “gloppy, disgusting ball...I just stood there shaking my head.” AS IF THAT WEREN’T ENOUGH. HOW DARE SHE SPEAK ALOUD IN PUBLIC IN THE PRESENCE OF CANINES. HOW DARE THEY FETCH GROSS OLD TENNIS BALLS INSTEAD OF THE GOOD CHINA.
Mrs. Mancusi calls hello to Dawn, who waves back but “didn’t walk any closer because I didn’t really have time to talk. (Not that she’d want to talk to ME. But I had Pow was with me, and I figured she might want to have a long conversation with him.)”
...What a fucking BITCH. Given the choice between talking to Dawn and talking to Pow, I’d pick Pow too, because he doesn’t get snotty about people who have the unmitigated gall to be talking to their dogs. In public! The horror! Seriously, what is the MATTER with Dawn? Aren’t toddlers supposed to develop the ability to understand that other people are not exactly like you and sometimes enjoy things like dogs and hamburgers even when you don’t? Now that I think about it, though, I’m shocked Kristy hasn’t had the Mancusis whacked just for living in Stoneybrook without having children for her to brainwash.
Dawn hurries on her way to take Buddy and Suzi to Krushers practice, and at the mention of Kristy’s cult-in-training my blood pressure drops to dangerously low levels. I think any mention of the Krushers is automatically the most boring part of any BSC book. Probably because I don’t imagine the “reads Baby-sitters Club books” demographic has much overlap with the “reads sports books” demographic. Dawn is going to watch Marnie and Pow while Buddy and Suzi practice, but Suzi is hesitant about leaving Pow with Dawn. Ha. Suzi knows what’s up. I certainly wouldn’t leave my pets with Dawn either. She’d probably try to put them on a vegetarian diet. (“Ew, Whiskers, how can you stand to eat a rotting carcass?”) When Suzi finally tears herself away, she turns around to wave, but Dawn isn’t sure if she’s waving at Pow or at her. I’ll cut the suspense, Dawn. It’s Pow. Also, how hilarious is it that twice in as many pages, Dawn thinks that someone likes an animal more than her? I don’t think that’s a coincidence.
(Lord, you guys. I turned around to pick up the book when I finished writing that paragraph and my cat was busily tearing the cover off. I’d call it irony, but every single book I’ve snarked so far was either been chewed up by my puppy, chewed up by my cat, or had the pages start falling out while I was in the process of snarking. Snark is the kiss of death for my books.)
Kristy teaches hopeless little kids to play softball for three pages. Snooooore.
Dawn starts getting bored too and wanders away to play on the swings. No mention of her taking the dog or the baby with her. Nice baby-sitting technique. She thinks about her family - divorce! high school sweethearts! - until Mary Anne taps her on the shoulder and Dawn exclaims that she was just thinking about her. Do these bitches spend all their time recounting their life histories just for kicks or something? Mary Anne’s excited because she just found a great new store, and Dawn’s excited too until she finds out that it’s a pet store, then her face falls and she’s all disappointed. But she tries to hide it, because “after all, I’d hate to be thought of as Dawn Schafer, the Animal-Hater!” Don’t worry, Dawn. I’m sure people are much more likely to think of you as “Dawn Schafer, Miserable Cow.”
Chapter 2! Kristy’s nervous about the Krushers being ready to play against the kids from New Hope, the next town over. The kid who coaches a softball team over there called Bart to set up a game with a Stoneybrook team, and for the first time, it strikes me how odd this is. Seriously, how many children’s softball teams randomly put together and coached by a teenager ARE there? Aren’t most kids’ teams part of leagues and stuff? Are they just invented so the Krushers will actually have someone to play against? And how come the Krushers are supposed to be Kristy’s great idea when at least two other kids have had the exact same idea? And how did this New Hope kid even know about the Bashers and Krushers? Is there an official Connecticut League of Ragtag, Unaffiliated Softball Teams Coached by Middle Schoolers? Can you believe I’m still only on the second chapter? Am I EVER going to reach the end of this snark?
Mary Anne rushes in then, and oh good, there’s the chapter two that I know and love. It’s pretty standard, and Watson is “a real live millionaire! Truth!” It’s truefax, you guys! And again, I’m suddenly hit by how odd that description is. It’s obvious that Watson’s loaded, but what’s with the “real live millionaire” stuff? First, it’s not that odd. Stoneybrook’s kind of upper-class; I don’t think that people who’ve got a million are THAT out of the blue for that area. Also, I don’t think that his exact net worth is something Watson would be discussing with his stepdaughter’s friends. I don’t even know exactly how much money my OWN parents make.
Oh man, is this the book that’s going to crack me after all these years? I’ve been waiting for this to happen.
I skip over the rest of chapter two to avoid realizing anything else supremely annoying that I’ve ignored for the past 17 years, until Mrs. Mancusi calls needing a pet-sitter while she and the hubby go away for the weekend. Huh? I mean...seriously, if you had THAT many pets, wouldn’t you have some sort of regular provision set up, instead of calling some 13-year-olds you barely know who may or may not have any experience with animals? To prove my point, they give the job to Dawn, of all people, who has never even had any pets except that poor parakeet she drowned in a bowl of mashed potatoes. Dawn sourly comments how funny it is that the job didn’t go to Kristy the dog lover, or Jessi or Mallory the horse nuts, or Mary Anne the wubbler of all things furry. Out of all the animal lovers in the club, she says, it figures that she’d be the only one free. “But it was fine with me. After all, work is work. And besides, as I’ve said before, it’s not as if I hate animals.” I think the bitch doth protest too much.
Chapter 3! Jessi wishes she could have taken the job. “Remember that time you thought their hamster was sick?” Mallory asks. “I’ll never forget it,” says Jessi. “I was so worried about him. But then ‘he’ turned out to be a ‘she,’ and she wasn’t sick at all - she was pregnant.” “That’s how we got Frodo,” Mallory cuts in. “And you guys got Misty.”
Hey, guys, remember that time that Ellen Miles was such a shitty writer that she made all the characters awkwardly narrate the exposition? And then I drank a fourth of vodka? Good times, good times.
As it happens, Jessi got an information sheet about all the animals and how to take care of them, which Mary Anne has been lovingly saving all this time. Okay, there’s “organized,” and there’s “sort of scary.” Do you think she saves Hunter Bruno’s used tissues too? Dawn studies it overnight, so that she’s prepared when she shows up at the Mancusi zoo the next day. Mrs. Mancusi is impressed that Dawn already knows all their names and stuff. So do I, though I’m not proud of it. I can’t remember the Pythagorean Theorem with any degree of accuracy, but if you asked me the names of the Mancusis’ rabbits, I could say, “Cindy, Toto, Robert, and Fluffer-Nut” without hesitating. I don’t even want to KNOW how smart I could be if I didn’t have BSC books clogging up valuable neuron space.
It turns out that I actually know more about the Mancusis’ pets than Mrs. Mancusi does, because when Dawn says, “Powder is Rosie’s mother, right?” Mrs. Mancusi says that’s right, instead of correcting her. It’s the other way around, Ellen Miles. Nice continuity.
...I should be ashamed of myself, shouldn’t I.
After the dogs and cats come the birds, and Dawn thinks it’s charming to tell the story of how her bird met an untimely end in a side dish. This does not seem to worry Mrs. Mancusi as much as it should. Frank the parrot is still spouting off lines from commercials, and Mrs. Mancusi says they tried to break his TV habit, but he loved it too much. Uh, why shouldn’t he watch TV? He’s a bird; it’s not like he’s got anything better to do. We travel quickly through the fish, rabbits, guinea pigs, and hamsters, then out to the sunporch, where they keep the turtles and snake. Jesus, the Mancusis have to be breaking about a dozen zoning laws. I’m technically over my limit, and I’ve just got two cats, one puppy, one hamster, and one fish.
They have one new addition, an iguana named Petie, and when Dawn spots her she shrieks and jumps back all “ASFAGFHLGH WHAT THE FUCK IS THAT.” Seriously? She’s THIRTEEN and doesn’t recognize an iguana? I’ve never owned a reptile, but I could at least recognize one when I see it. Then again, she thinks a tiny, boring, harmless snake is that most horrendous thing she can imagine, so Dawn is not exactly the most mature person ever. She decides that Petie looks friendlier than Barney and is probably harmless, but she still won’t go so far as to touch her or anything. I don’t think I’d leave my animals in the care of someone who considers it an accomplishment to not scream in their presence.
Dawn’s flying solo when she shows up the next morning, but she doesn’t get very far into the routine before Jessi and some kids show up. They’ve arranged it with the Mancusis beforehand, but it still seems sort of unprofessional to me. I don’t want my dog-sitter bringing friends to my house; if they want to see my pets, they can damn well come over when I’m home. I’m kind of weird like that, though. They take the dogs for a walk, and Becca demands to walk Pooh Bear and Charlotte gets Jacques. Again - Un! Professional! My dog could easily jerk an eight-year-old into traffic. She’s dragged my boyfriend down before. I mean, even Jessi wouldn’t let the kids walk the dogs when she pet-sat a million books ago.
On the walk, Dawn notices that a green car seems to be circling the block to stare at them, and she immediately thinks that Becca and Charlotte are in danger. Er...I don’t know, does she think that someone is going to jump out of the car and snatch the kids in broad daylight while she and Jessi are standing right there? I mean, it’s not like a psycho couldn’t grab Dawn and Jessi too, but under those circumstances Becca and Charlotte probably aren’t any safer with Dawn and Jessi than they’d be alone. They drag the kids inside and give them the standard “don’t talk to strangers speech,” even though they’ve heard it before. Man, I used to HAAATE it when people did that to me. Especially considering they’re getting it from an eleven-year-old, which is still kind of young to be conversing with strangers.
The next morning, Dawn jumps out of bed and hurries right over to the Mancusis’, even though she’d rather sleep in on a Sunday, because she knows the animals are waiting for her - “Not because they LIKED me especially, but just because I would be the one feeding them or cleaning their cages or walking them.” At least she realizes that they don’t actually like her. Also, I find it kind of hilarious that she wants a pat on the back just for getting out of bed and doing the job she was hired to do.
The dogs go completely apeshit when she walks in, but she ignores them to handle the other animals first. Dude. DOGS FIRST. The hamsters will not notice if their food is ten minutes late, but the dogs WILL detonate on the carpet. I speak from experience. She also decides to feed the dogs after she walks them, and you guys, I think Dawn must have failed eighth grade health, because surely anyone who understands the basic digestive process can see why that isn’t going to work out so well. Cheryl is still freaking the hell out, so Dawn chains her up outside to wait while she deals with the other animals. They’re all unremarkable, in Dawn’s opinion, and even the bunnies are only “kind of cute, I guess. If you like rabbits.” Which, in case you were wondering, Dawn does not. Put “rabbits” on the list there under “edible food,” “not getting skin cancer at age 15,” and “being likable.”
By the time she finishes up with the other animals, Cheryl has fucking had it with Dawn and run away to a place where people actually feed her. In any case, she’s gone, and doesn’t reappear by the time the Mancusis come home. Ouch. The old “get a new Great Dane and pretend it’s Cheryl” trick must not have worked.
Chapter 5: The Pikes always get two sitters, one of which will be Mallory, because she’s already been sitting for her siblings for “ages.” How long do you think “ages” actually is? One year? Two? Since she was nine or ten, yeah? So why, exactly, do the triplets and Vanessa require a sitter when they’re the same age that Mallory was when she was sitting FOR them? At the very least, aren’t they old enough that they could cut back to one sitter? DAMMIT, I TOLD you this was going to be the book that breaks me.
They head out to Krushers practice, and I fall into a light coma, surfacing long enough to note that every single Krusher has plot-device-ily brought their dog along, while the molester van that was following them on their walk with the Mancusis’ dogs is parked across the street. Subtle, that molester van is. Nobody notices, though, because they’re all caught up in Kristy’s big announcement - the Krushers and the Bashers are going to team up against the New Hope Plot Devices. The only reason this subplot exists is so that Ellen Miles can “wittily” name the new team the Krashers. I notice they still haven’t fixed that errant “K,” though. That may be the only thing Karen and I agree on.
Unfortunately, only the good players are allowed to be on the Krashers team: “For a lot of reasons,” Kristy assures the losers she’s booting off the lineup. I imagine those players know exactly why they’re being cut, though, since she doesn’t name a single one. I consider this to be unspeakably shitty of Kristy considering that she prances around on her high horse telling everyone she formed her team on the premise that every kid should be allowed to play. They have a TWO-YEAR-OLD on their team, for chrissakes. You forfeited the right to pick and choose your players when you handed a bat to a toddler. The chapter closes out with Claire falling to the ground in an absolute shitfit, and I hope she kicks dirt in Kristy’s smug, self-satisfied eyes.
At the meeting the next day, fire is raining from the sky and the horsemen are getting uncomfortably close, because Kristy doesn’t show up on time. Everyone looks hella uncomfortable - they try to reassure themselves that the Junk Bucket probably crapped out, but deep down they know they’re wrong, because Kristy would get out and tow the car with her teeth to get to the meeting on time.
Finally Kristy bursts in, out of breath, with bad news - Shannon’s missing. David Michael tied her up while he went inside to get her ball, and when he came back she was gone. No broken chain, just gone. Dawn muses briefly that it’s funny that Cheryl and Shannon are both missing, yet our intrepid detectives don’t consider it the slightest bit strange that two dogs mysteriously unclip their own leashes without breaking them and run far enough away to not be found during the five minutes the owner’s back was turned. Both also fairly rare and expensive breeds, as well. Hmmm. That is a pickle. They spend the rest of the meeting making “Lost Dog” posters, except Mallory, who doodles pictures of Princess the Horse.
“Mom!” Dawn yells as she runs into the house. “What’s that I smell?” Weed, maybe? Oh, no, it’s tofu and vegetable curry, “made special” for Dawn. Mary Anne follows behind, wrinkling her nose and asking what smells like rank ass, and Sharon assures her she would never make Mary Anne and Richard eat things they hated. Except for that time that she totally did. She made lasagna for them - it’s probably got chocolate chips or bolts or something in it - and blueberry-strawberry pie for everyone. Uh, Dawn, last time I checked pie has TEH EBIL SUGAR in it, you hypocritical chore. (It could theoretically be sugarless, except that the writers always have to give “healthy” food names like “all-natural whole wheat leek root and barley pie” and I doubt Richard and Mary Anne would have touched it.)
After dinner Dawn turns on the news in time to see a report on a rash of dognappings in the area. How strange; Shannon and Cheryl disappeared too! What a coincid - OH WAIT! Dawn tries to recount what happened at the Mancusis’ that day and manages to dredge up a recollection of the molester van. She thinks she could call the police and give them this tip, but stops because they’ll ask for a license plate number and she doesn’t have one. She better spend the next several days trying to spot the car again instead, during which time several more people’s beloved pets might be stolen. Because GOD FORBID she give the police a useful clue until she can take as much credit as possible. “Soon Cheryl would be back with the Mancusis,” Dawn says, “and I’d be able to stop feeling so guilty.” Yeah, the important thing isn’t the safety of an innocent creature or the people who’ve lost a beloved member of their family. IT’S AAAAAALL ABOUT DAWN AND HER POOR FEELINGS. Just shut up, you selfish twatwhistle.
The next day, the BSC is on the case, riding their bikes around and scouting the dog park looking for the molester van. Dawn makes everyone take notes on what they see to give the police, which I imagine will be posted on the precinct’s bulletin board for months just for this Claudia gem: “I licked that one big brown dog that was chassing sticks.” Priceless.
They don’t see anything useful until Friday, though, when Dawn almost rams her bike into the side of the molester van on the way to Claudia’s. Subtle. The driver doesn’t notice, though, since he’s busy hanging out the window with binoculars and a big sign that says I STEAL DOGS. Dawn tiptoes around the side but doesn’t want to get right behind it - “What if the driver suddenly put it in reverse?” All my wildest hopes and dreams would come true? She gets close enough to copy down the plate number anyway, and runs back to Kristy “all bent over to look less conspicuous.” Quiz time! Which of these looks more conspicuous: a) A teenage girl walking by your car, or b) Quasimodo walking by your car? Yeah, that’s what I thought.
They race over to the police station, where Kristy marches right up to the counter to report a crime. Well, not a crime, but a criminal. Well, not exactly a criminal, but a suspicious looking guy. Okay, it’s pretty much just a guy in a car. The policeman rightfully tells them that it’s not a crime to drive a car. Dawn desperately tries to give him all their scouting notes, but I have no idea what she expects the police to figure out from them. I mean, their notes all say things like, “I didn’t see anything suspicious,” so not exactly damning evidence they’ve got there. The officer finally takes the license plate number to get them to bugger off, and it’s clear he has no idea who he’s dealing with here. Sir, you might as well turn in your badge now, because Kristy Thomas has got the lid on this shit.
The next day Kristy is sitting for David Michael, and they piss and mope and exposition about how they got Shannon as they walk together to the Krashers practice. David Michael spots one of their Lost Dog signs and immediately points out that it says, “Mising Dog. Name: Shannun. Breed: Bernaise Mountin Dog.” He wants to know how the hell he’s going to get his dog back if no one can read the damn sign. AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA. Claudia just got her ass handed to her by a seven-year-old AND IT TASTED LIKE VIIIICTORY.
They get to the playground and start setting up and zzzzzzzzzzdrooooooooool. I mean, softball. Mary Anne joins Dawn on the bleachers and says that she just went to the pet store to get a toy for Tigger and it was closed! On a Saturday! Can you imagine? A PET store? Closed on a Saturday? Wouldn’t you expect a PET STORE to be open on a SATURDAY? Because they weren’t! The number of times Mary Anne repeats this gives me a sneaking suspicion that this might be a clue.
The Krushers and Bashers are introducing themselves when suddenly Claire Pike, Myriah Perkins, and Suzi Barrett storm the field with picket signs, protesting their unfair firing from the team. Right, because three FIVE YEAR OLDS could certainly come up with the idea of PROTESTING, make actual picket signs, and show up to march ALL ON THEIR OWN. THIS IS SO BELIEVABLE. Kristy shuts them up by asking them to be Junior Assistant Equipment Managers, because every boy who ever got turned down for the football team happily accepted the job of washing everyone’s jock straps after the game instead. Here’s a hint, coaches: Grunt work is not actually a substitute for playing the game. It is not an honor. They are not a vital part of the team. They did not show up to try out for the position of waterboy. Thank you.
When Dawn gets home, the policeman still hasn’t called her back - because that filthy whore Sharon left the house to go to the hardware store (presumably to get some more bolts to bake into the lasagna). How dare she! Didn’t she know Dawn was waiting for an important call? Sharon awesomely says sorry, but her main ambition in life is not to be Dawn’s answering service. HA. Dawn does not accept this and continues behaving like the spoiled child she is by refusing to eat her dinner. Can’t imagine why that cop didn’t take her seriously.
The next day Dawn won’t so much as go out to the front porch while she waits for the call that doesn’t come (single emo tear) and by Monday, she’s pretty pissed. Pissed enough to get Kristy and Mary Anne to go down to the police station with her and demand to know if he looked up that license plate. He did, he says smugly, and it belongs to Karl Tate, the richest man in Stoneybrook. And it isn’t as though the richest man in Stoneybrook would tool around in a molester van stealing dogs, har har! Right, because rich people are never ever greedy or crooked or clinically insane or anything. The sitters accept this and slink away dejectedly, and Mary Anne suggests going to the pet store to get Tigger’s toy as long as they’re downtown. Dawn doesn’t want to, of course, and continues to whine and act bored as Kristy and Mary Anne pet the puppies and coo over the kittens. Dawn shudders to think what will happen when they grow up and can have all the pets they want - “Their houses will be like the Mancusis’, only more so!” I fail to see how anyone could be “more so” than the Mancusis. Hoarders show more restraint than those people.
Suddenly, a plot device! Karl Tate the Richest Man in Stoneybrook is right there in the back of the store, having an argument with the owners! Dawn can’t hear what he’s saying, but she just knows he’s in on this. It’s like she’s got a third sense.
Karl Tate the Richest Man in Stoneybrook is on the BSC agenda at the next meeting - they all agree that something’s off about him, but why? Why steal dogs when he could buy a zillion of them? Kristy says it would be like if Watson started shoplifting or something. Yeah, crazy rich people! Like if Winona Ryder started shoplifting or something! Jessi is, as always, the voice of sanity by saying that he could have some sort of psychological problem, but everyone dismisses her because black people don’t have good ideas. They decide to tail Karl Tate the Richest Man in Stoneybrook, meaning we’re subjected to another few pages of notes in awful handwriting. They’re pretty much useless, because even when they get a clue they’re too busy scratching their asses and DURRRRing to realize what they’ve got: Mary Anne and Dawn see the molester van pulling out from the pet store, and it wasn’t being driven by Karl Tate the Richest Man in Stoneybrook - it was being driven by the owner of the pet store. “So really, we’re back to square one,” Dawn concludes. Um, the fact that a car supposedly owned by Karl Tate the Richest Man in Stoneybrook is being driven by someone else isn’t the slightest bit fishy? The fact that a man running a pet store has plenty of motive to steal dogs and said man has now been spotted driving the very same car from the scene of the crime isn’t a clue? My god. Maybe you guys should call Claire, Suzi, and Myriah to help you out.
The next day Dawn gets an idea, studies some books at the library, and enlists Mary Anne and Kristy to go to the pet store with her. When they get there, she enthusiastically points out every puppy and rattles off the breed, temperament, size, and favorite food while Kristy and Mary Anne memorize them - a beagle, Samoyed, Shar Pei, Rottweiler, Airedale, and Scottish terrier, respectively. They ask Dawn how the hell she knows so much about dog breeds all of the sudden and she says that’s what she was looking up at the library. Not one of those breeds is exactly obscure; she really needed an encyclopedia to recognize a beagle? Dawn really is an idiot.
She thinks for a minute to come up with a dog breed that isn’t a beagle, Samoyed, Shar Pei, Rottweiler, Airedale, or Scottish terrier, then heads up to the counter and asks for a Saint Bernard. Uh…wouldn’t it have been faster to just think of a dog breed she knew and then glanced around to make sure it wasn’t there before she asked, rather than studying for hours to recognize every possible breed they might have? The pet store guy - who I am going to call Chester the Molester because I want to - says they don’t have one right now, but they could steal one. Uh, get one. It would be very expensive, though. Dawn chirps that she’ll ask her parents and Quasimodos inconspicuously away. They don’t get two steps out the door before Chester comes screeching out of the lot in the molester van in search of a Saint Bernard. Dawn “feels encouraged.” I doubt the owners of a Saint Bernard are going to feel quite as good about it.
Chapter 12! Stacey’s sitting for Charlotte, who won’t stop wailing about how scared she is that Carrot will get stolen because he’s a purebred schnauzer. See, this is why I have a mutt I got from the pound. Nobody steals a mutt from the pound. In fact, if you wanted to punish me, you would drop off another mutt from the pound at my house, not steal the one I’ve got. Charlotte finally agrees to leave Carrot home while she cheers at the Krashers practice, on the condition that she duct-tape him into the room. Thieves have opposable thumbs, Charlotte.
As Stacey hustles Charlotte off to practice, she sees it - someone reaching out, grabbing something, and pulling it into their car. “It all happened so fast,” she says once she meets Dawn at the playground, that she isn’t totally sure what she saw, but she thinks it was a dognapping. How the hell could you pick up a dog and yank it into a car so fast that the human eye can’t comprehend it? It takes me an hour just to get mine loaded up to go to the vet and it usually involves bungee cords and sedatives. Chester’s got mad skills. Dawn wants to run right off and catch him in the act, but Stacey won’t let her just abandon her sitting charges. Dawn stomps her feet “like a two-year-old.” At least she’s becoming a little self-aware.
Chapter 13 - It’s the day of the big game, Krashers vs. Plot Devices! Dawn and Mary Anne get up early to ride over to New Hope with the Pikes, who are their usual charming selves. When they get there, the Plot Devices are wearing professional uniforms and have mustaches and date supermodels, so obviously the Krashers are going to win. I can’t tell you how disappointed I was when I played fifth-grade basketball and it turned out that our team of clumsy but lovable misfits did not actually win the championship. Dawn doesn’t have time to watch the game, though, because she spies a woman jogging by the game and dragging Cheryl along with her. Dawn jumps up, spilling soda and popcorn and dragging Mary Anne to give chase, and somehow I imagine Dawn hears the Baywatch theme in her head as she runs. (In my head it’s more like bassoons honking.)
They catch up to the woman playing ball with Cheryl in a field and calling her Cleo. They decide to call the cops, and Dawn leaves Mary Anne to stall the woman while she runs for a pay phone. Awesomely, Dawn trips over a root and eats it in the dirt on her way. Thank you, Ellen Miles. I’m sorry about saying you were a hack, even though you are.
On the phone, Dawn tells the police officer that she just spotted a woman with a dog she happens to know was stolen. The cop sneers that maybe the dog was returned safely and the woman is the dog’s owner. Uh, if she knows the dog, she probably knows the owner, idiot. And if you’re working a stolen dog case, you should probably know whether the dog was returned safely, shouldn’t you? Not one of Stoneybrook’s finest, I’m guessing. He finally manages to send a New Hope cop over at Dawn’s insistence, and they confront the owner.
The woman says she just bought “Cleo” at a pet store in Stoneybrook and that she “cost the earth, but she’s worth it.” Dawn blurts out that the pet store stole her, and the owner is immediately shocked and apologetic. Okay, not that I wouldn’t be really sympathetic to someone whose pet was stolen, but if I paid a fortune for a dog, I’m going to at least ask for some proof that it was stolen before I hand it over. We’re spared the legal boring stuff, though, because a scream goes up from the playground. Either the Krashers just won or Jackie Rodowsky accidentally decapitated someone.
The Pikes drop off Dawn and Mary Anne at the police station on the way home, and it’s pretty much the end of 101 Dalmatians in there. How did they manage to round up all the missing dogs so fast? And why do I even let these things bother me anymore? Mrs. Mancusi comes to get Cheryl and gushes about Dawn and how they never thought it was her fault. Let’s just keep saying it was, though. She asks the police officer who stole Cheryl, and he says it was Karl Tate. “The richest man in Stoneybrook?” she says disbelievingly. What the hell, did the guy take out an ad in the paper announcing his net worth or something?
The officer tells us the whole story: Karl Tate the Richest Man in Stoneybrook was losing a bunch of money in real estate, so he came up with some schemes and shopped them around. Chester was the first one to take him up on it and began stealing purebred dogs to order instead of buying them from an expensive breeder. It’s not exactly explained how Karl Tate the Richest Man in Stoneybrook profited from this scheme, though, since Chester stole the dogs and sold them at his own store. The problem with giving a person a crooked idea is that if they’re the kind of person who’s going to take you up on it, they’re probably the kind of person that isn’t going to give you credit. It’s also not adequately explained how the police managed to find all this out in the time it took them to drive home from New Hope - Chester must have just confessed everything, because the cops even know that the reason they weren’t open on Saturday is because dognapping was so lucrative they didn’t even bother to open the store. Subtle. Nothing screams “This is a legitimate business” like “We’re not even open most of the time.”
Touchingly, Kristy gets Shannon back, the BSC gets their picture in the paper for just being in the right place at the right time, and Dawn stops off on the way home to get a treat for Tigger - “And I might even let him kiss me!” RUN, TIGGER. RUN FOR YOUR LIIIIIIIIFE.
Mallory: "Holy shit miniature flying dogs!"
Dawn: "Hush, Mallory, your hair looks like you styled it by sticking your head in one of those cotton candy machines."
Krushers cheerleader: "Am I supposed to be Vanessa Pike or Karen Brewer?"
Dawn: "I have no idea. But 3_foot_6 had EXACTLY those glasses in the third grade and sometimes she still wakes up in a cold sweat about it."
Mallory: "But but! Physics as we know it is ceasing to exist! The ground extends up into the sky!"
Dawn: "Why is it cold enough for you to be wearing a zipped parka while simultaneously warm enough for your sleeves to be rolled up?"
Mallory: "If I take off my coat, everyone will see that I'm wearing the clothing of a poor person."
Krushers cheerleader: "I don't wanna be Vanessa Pike! That means I might end up looking like that fat boy in the purple coat!"
Dan Brown: "Perspective? What's that? I sully the good name of Hodges Soileau!"
...Oh, yeah, there's a book under there too.
“It’s not that I hate animals,” Dawn says by way of introduction. “It’s that I hate everything, because I’m a nasty, abrasive bitch.” I might have made up the second half, though. She likes dogs, she assures us, and cats, and hamsters, “although they are, you have to admit, kind of useless.” ...Uh, as opposed to my multifunctional cat, who provides me with many valuable services such as pissing on my bed, planting herself in the middle of the room to conspicuously bathe her crotch whenever I have company over, and sleeping on my laptop until it overheats and fries itself. You have pets because you love them. You buy appliances because they’re useful. Just shut up, Dawn.
“But” - you knew there was a “but” coming, didn’t you - “I’m not what you’d call an animal lover.” She tells us that she’s a vegetarian, “but it’s not because I feel sorry for the cow or anything. It’s just because I don’t really like the taste of red meat.” Wait, WHAT? She doesn’t...what? I mean...what the fuck is all her bitching, proselytizing, and alienating about, then? Does she go around picketing with big “MEAT IS ETHICALLY OKAY BUT IT TASTES BAD” signs? I mean, she was preachy enough as it was, but at least she STOOD for something. Now she’s just that obnoxious snot who has to stand over your lunch and make gross comments about it for no particular reason, because that’s not unacceptably rude or anything. Shut up, Dawn. Jesus. We’re one paragraph into the book and I hate you so much I’ve got a nosebleed.
Hokay, the train’s back on the tracks now, and Dawn complains about how Mary Anne tries to make her kiss Tigger (“Tigger loves you!” - no he doesn’t; no one loves Dawn). “Blecch. I do not believe in kissing cats,” Dawn snots. Whatever. I do that to everyone. You’re not even allowed to come in my house until you’ve kissed my cat, sometimes. It gives you the warm fuzzies when you set her down and she immediately goes back to bathing her crotch and you realize she was probably doing that before you kissed her too.
“Do I sound like a nut?” Dawn wants to know. No, not like a nut. Like a smug, obnoxious bitch, though. She says she’s a nice, normal 13-year-old who does everything nice, normal 13-year-olds do. Yeah, I know my neighborhood is just overrun with those perfectly normal 13-year-olds who spend all their time forcing children to perform in talent shows and marching bands and winter festivals. (We’re kind of low on children, though. They keep enrolling themselves in boarding school to escape.)
Dawn’s just thinking about animals because she’s outside sitting for the Barretts when she spots Mrs. Mancusi out walking her dogs. To Dawn’s consternation, Mrs. Mancusi is commenting on the beautiful day to Cheryl, her Great Dane, “and then, as if that weren’t enough,” she calls for Jacques, the golden retriever, to fetch his “gloppy, disgusting ball...I just stood there shaking my head.” AS IF THAT WEREN’T ENOUGH. HOW DARE SHE SPEAK ALOUD IN PUBLIC IN THE PRESENCE OF CANINES. HOW DARE THEY FETCH GROSS OLD TENNIS BALLS INSTEAD OF THE GOOD CHINA.
Mrs. Mancusi calls hello to Dawn, who waves back but “didn’t walk any closer because I didn’t really have time to talk. (Not that she’d want to talk to ME. But I had Pow was with me, and I figured she might want to have a long conversation with him.)”
...What a fucking BITCH. Given the choice between talking to Dawn and talking to Pow, I’d pick Pow too, because he doesn’t get snotty about people who have the unmitigated gall to be talking to their dogs. In public! The horror! Seriously, what is the MATTER with Dawn? Aren’t toddlers supposed to develop the ability to understand that other people are not exactly like you and sometimes enjoy things like dogs and hamburgers even when you don’t? Now that I think about it, though, I’m shocked Kristy hasn’t had the Mancusis whacked just for living in Stoneybrook without having children for her to brainwash.
Dawn hurries on her way to take Buddy and Suzi to Krushers practice, and at the mention of Kristy’s cult-in-training my blood pressure drops to dangerously low levels. I think any mention of the Krushers is automatically the most boring part of any BSC book. Probably because I don’t imagine the “reads Baby-sitters Club books” demographic has much overlap with the “reads sports books” demographic. Dawn is going to watch Marnie and Pow while Buddy and Suzi practice, but Suzi is hesitant about leaving Pow with Dawn. Ha. Suzi knows what’s up. I certainly wouldn’t leave my pets with Dawn either. She’d probably try to put them on a vegetarian diet. (“Ew, Whiskers, how can you stand to eat a rotting carcass?”) When Suzi finally tears herself away, she turns around to wave, but Dawn isn’t sure if she’s waving at Pow or at her. I’ll cut the suspense, Dawn. It’s Pow. Also, how hilarious is it that twice in as many pages, Dawn thinks that someone likes an animal more than her? I don’t think that’s a coincidence.
(Lord, you guys. I turned around to pick up the book when I finished writing that paragraph and my cat was busily tearing the cover off. I’d call it irony, but every single book I’ve snarked so far was either been chewed up by my puppy, chewed up by my cat, or had the pages start falling out while I was in the process of snarking. Snark is the kiss of death for my books.)
Kristy teaches hopeless little kids to play softball for three pages. Snooooore.
Dawn starts getting bored too and wanders away to play on the swings. No mention of her taking the dog or the baby with her. Nice baby-sitting technique. She thinks about her family - divorce! high school sweethearts! - until Mary Anne taps her on the shoulder and Dawn exclaims that she was just thinking about her. Do these bitches spend all their time recounting their life histories just for kicks or something? Mary Anne’s excited because she just found a great new store, and Dawn’s excited too until she finds out that it’s a pet store, then her face falls and she’s all disappointed. But she tries to hide it, because “after all, I’d hate to be thought of as Dawn Schafer, the Animal-Hater!” Don’t worry, Dawn. I’m sure people are much more likely to think of you as “Dawn Schafer, Miserable Cow.”
Chapter 2! Kristy’s nervous about the Krushers being ready to play against the kids from New Hope, the next town over. The kid who coaches a softball team over there called Bart to set up a game with a Stoneybrook team, and for the first time, it strikes me how odd this is. Seriously, how many children’s softball teams randomly put together and coached by a teenager ARE there? Aren’t most kids’ teams part of leagues and stuff? Are they just invented so the Krushers will actually have someone to play against? And how come the Krushers are supposed to be Kristy’s great idea when at least two other kids have had the exact same idea? And how did this New Hope kid even know about the Bashers and Krushers? Is there an official Connecticut League of Ragtag, Unaffiliated Softball Teams Coached by Middle Schoolers? Can you believe I’m still only on the second chapter? Am I EVER going to reach the end of this snark?
Mary Anne rushes in then, and oh good, there’s the chapter two that I know and love. It’s pretty standard, and Watson is “a real live millionaire! Truth!” It’s truefax, you guys! And again, I’m suddenly hit by how odd that description is. It’s obvious that Watson’s loaded, but what’s with the “real live millionaire” stuff? First, it’s not that odd. Stoneybrook’s kind of upper-class; I don’t think that people who’ve got a million are THAT out of the blue for that area. Also, I don’t think that his exact net worth is something Watson would be discussing with his stepdaughter’s friends. I don’t even know exactly how much money my OWN parents make.
Oh man, is this the book that’s going to crack me after all these years? I’ve been waiting for this to happen.
I skip over the rest of chapter two to avoid realizing anything else supremely annoying that I’ve ignored for the past 17 years, until Mrs. Mancusi calls needing a pet-sitter while she and the hubby go away for the weekend. Huh? I mean...seriously, if you had THAT many pets, wouldn’t you have some sort of regular provision set up, instead of calling some 13-year-olds you barely know who may or may not have any experience with animals? To prove my point, they give the job to Dawn, of all people, who has never even had any pets except that poor parakeet she drowned in a bowl of mashed potatoes. Dawn sourly comments how funny it is that the job didn’t go to Kristy the dog lover, or Jessi or Mallory the horse nuts, or Mary Anne the wubbler of all things furry. Out of all the animal lovers in the club, she says, it figures that she’d be the only one free. “But it was fine with me. After all, work is work. And besides, as I’ve said before, it’s not as if I hate animals.” I think the bitch doth protest too much.
Chapter 3! Jessi wishes she could have taken the job. “Remember that time you thought their hamster was sick?” Mallory asks. “I’ll never forget it,” says Jessi. “I was so worried about him. But then ‘he’ turned out to be a ‘she,’ and she wasn’t sick at all - she was pregnant.” “That’s how we got Frodo,” Mallory cuts in. “And you guys got Misty.”
Hey, guys, remember that time that Ellen Miles was such a shitty writer that she made all the characters awkwardly narrate the exposition? And then I drank a fourth of vodka? Good times, good times.
As it happens, Jessi got an information sheet about all the animals and how to take care of them, which Mary Anne has been lovingly saving all this time. Okay, there’s “organized,” and there’s “sort of scary.” Do you think she saves Hunter Bruno’s used tissues too? Dawn studies it overnight, so that she’s prepared when she shows up at the Mancusi zoo the next day. Mrs. Mancusi is impressed that Dawn already knows all their names and stuff. So do I, though I’m not proud of it. I can’t remember the Pythagorean Theorem with any degree of accuracy, but if you asked me the names of the Mancusis’ rabbits, I could say, “Cindy, Toto, Robert, and Fluffer-Nut” without hesitating. I don’t even want to KNOW how smart I could be if I didn’t have BSC books clogging up valuable neuron space.
It turns out that I actually know more about the Mancusis’ pets than Mrs. Mancusi does, because when Dawn says, “Powder is Rosie’s mother, right?” Mrs. Mancusi says that’s right, instead of correcting her. It’s the other way around, Ellen Miles. Nice continuity.
...I should be ashamed of myself, shouldn’t I.
After the dogs and cats come the birds, and Dawn thinks it’s charming to tell the story of how her bird met an untimely end in a side dish. This does not seem to worry Mrs. Mancusi as much as it should. Frank the parrot is still spouting off lines from commercials, and Mrs. Mancusi says they tried to break his TV habit, but he loved it too much. Uh, why shouldn’t he watch TV? He’s a bird; it’s not like he’s got anything better to do. We travel quickly through the fish, rabbits, guinea pigs, and hamsters, then out to the sunporch, where they keep the turtles and snake. Jesus, the Mancusis have to be breaking about a dozen zoning laws. I’m technically over my limit, and I’ve just got two cats, one puppy, one hamster, and one fish.
They have one new addition, an iguana named Petie, and when Dawn spots her she shrieks and jumps back all “ASFAGFHLGH WHAT THE FUCK IS THAT.” Seriously? She’s THIRTEEN and doesn’t recognize an iguana? I’ve never owned a reptile, but I could at least recognize one when I see it. Then again, she thinks a tiny, boring, harmless snake is that most horrendous thing she can imagine, so Dawn is not exactly the most mature person ever. She decides that Petie looks friendlier than Barney and is probably harmless, but she still won’t go so far as to touch her or anything. I don’t think I’d leave my animals in the care of someone who considers it an accomplishment to not scream in their presence.
Dawn’s flying solo when she shows up the next morning, but she doesn’t get very far into the routine before Jessi and some kids show up. They’ve arranged it with the Mancusis beforehand, but it still seems sort of unprofessional to me. I don’t want my dog-sitter bringing friends to my house; if they want to see my pets, they can damn well come over when I’m home. I’m kind of weird like that, though. They take the dogs for a walk, and Becca demands to walk Pooh Bear and Charlotte gets Jacques. Again - Un! Professional! My dog could easily jerk an eight-year-old into traffic. She’s dragged my boyfriend down before. I mean, even Jessi wouldn’t let the kids walk the dogs when she pet-sat a million books ago.
On the walk, Dawn notices that a green car seems to be circling the block to stare at them, and she immediately thinks that Becca and Charlotte are in danger. Er...I don’t know, does she think that someone is going to jump out of the car and snatch the kids in broad daylight while she and Jessi are standing right there? I mean, it’s not like a psycho couldn’t grab Dawn and Jessi too, but under those circumstances Becca and Charlotte probably aren’t any safer with Dawn and Jessi than they’d be alone. They drag the kids inside and give them the standard “don’t talk to strangers speech,” even though they’ve heard it before. Man, I used to HAAATE it when people did that to me. Especially considering they’re getting it from an eleven-year-old, which is still kind of young to be conversing with strangers.
The next morning, Dawn jumps out of bed and hurries right over to the Mancusis’, even though she’d rather sleep in on a Sunday, because she knows the animals are waiting for her - “Not because they LIKED me especially, but just because I would be the one feeding them or cleaning their cages or walking them.” At least she realizes that they don’t actually like her. Also, I find it kind of hilarious that she wants a pat on the back just for getting out of bed and doing the job she was hired to do.
The dogs go completely apeshit when she walks in, but she ignores them to handle the other animals first. Dude. DOGS FIRST. The hamsters will not notice if their food is ten minutes late, but the dogs WILL detonate on the carpet. I speak from experience. She also decides to feed the dogs after she walks them, and you guys, I think Dawn must have failed eighth grade health, because surely anyone who understands the basic digestive process can see why that isn’t going to work out so well. Cheryl is still freaking the hell out, so Dawn chains her up outside to wait while she deals with the other animals. They’re all unremarkable, in Dawn’s opinion, and even the bunnies are only “kind of cute, I guess. If you like rabbits.” Which, in case you were wondering, Dawn does not. Put “rabbits” on the list there under “edible food,” “not getting skin cancer at age 15,” and “being likable.”
By the time she finishes up with the other animals, Cheryl has fucking had it with Dawn and run away to a place where people actually feed her. In any case, she’s gone, and doesn’t reappear by the time the Mancusis come home. Ouch. The old “get a new Great Dane and pretend it’s Cheryl” trick must not have worked.
Chapter 5: The Pikes always get two sitters, one of which will be Mallory, because she’s already been sitting for her siblings for “ages.” How long do you think “ages” actually is? One year? Two? Since she was nine or ten, yeah? So why, exactly, do the triplets and Vanessa require a sitter when they’re the same age that Mallory was when she was sitting FOR them? At the very least, aren’t they old enough that they could cut back to one sitter? DAMMIT, I TOLD you this was going to be the book that breaks me.
They head out to Krushers practice, and I fall into a light coma, surfacing long enough to note that every single Krusher has plot-device-ily brought their dog along, while the molester van that was following them on their walk with the Mancusis’ dogs is parked across the street. Subtle, that molester van is. Nobody notices, though, because they’re all caught up in Kristy’s big announcement - the Krushers and the Bashers are going to team up against the New Hope Plot Devices. The only reason this subplot exists is so that Ellen Miles can “wittily” name the new team the Krashers. I notice they still haven’t fixed that errant “K,” though. That may be the only thing Karen and I agree on.
Unfortunately, only the good players are allowed to be on the Krashers team: “For a lot of reasons,” Kristy assures the losers she’s booting off the lineup. I imagine those players know exactly why they’re being cut, though, since she doesn’t name a single one. I consider this to be unspeakably shitty of Kristy considering that she prances around on her high horse telling everyone she formed her team on the premise that every kid should be allowed to play. They have a TWO-YEAR-OLD on their team, for chrissakes. You forfeited the right to pick and choose your players when you handed a bat to a toddler. The chapter closes out with Claire falling to the ground in an absolute shitfit, and I hope she kicks dirt in Kristy’s smug, self-satisfied eyes.
At the meeting the next day, fire is raining from the sky and the horsemen are getting uncomfortably close, because Kristy doesn’t show up on time. Everyone looks hella uncomfortable - they try to reassure themselves that the Junk Bucket probably crapped out, but deep down they know they’re wrong, because Kristy would get out and tow the car with her teeth to get to the meeting on time.
Finally Kristy bursts in, out of breath, with bad news - Shannon’s missing. David Michael tied her up while he went inside to get her ball, and when he came back she was gone. No broken chain, just gone. Dawn muses briefly that it’s funny that Cheryl and Shannon are both missing, yet our intrepid detectives don’t consider it the slightest bit strange that two dogs mysteriously unclip their own leashes without breaking them and run far enough away to not be found during the five minutes the owner’s back was turned. Both also fairly rare and expensive breeds, as well. Hmmm. That is a pickle. They spend the rest of the meeting making “Lost Dog” posters, except Mallory, who doodles pictures of Princess the Horse.
“Mom!” Dawn yells as she runs into the house. “What’s that I smell?” Weed, maybe? Oh, no, it’s tofu and vegetable curry, “made special” for Dawn. Mary Anne follows behind, wrinkling her nose and asking what smells like rank ass, and Sharon assures her she would never make Mary Anne and Richard eat things they hated. Except for that time that she totally did. She made lasagna for them - it’s probably got chocolate chips or bolts or something in it - and blueberry-strawberry pie for everyone. Uh, Dawn, last time I checked pie has TEH EBIL SUGAR in it, you hypocritical chore. (It could theoretically be sugarless, except that the writers always have to give “healthy” food names like “all-natural whole wheat leek root and barley pie” and I doubt Richard and Mary Anne would have touched it.)
After dinner Dawn turns on the news in time to see a report on a rash of dognappings in the area. How strange; Shannon and Cheryl disappeared too! What a coincid - OH WAIT! Dawn tries to recount what happened at the Mancusis’ that day and manages to dredge up a recollection of the molester van. She thinks she could call the police and give them this tip, but stops because they’ll ask for a license plate number and she doesn’t have one. She better spend the next several days trying to spot the car again instead, during which time several more people’s beloved pets might be stolen. Because GOD FORBID she give the police a useful clue until she can take as much credit as possible. “Soon Cheryl would be back with the Mancusis,” Dawn says, “and I’d be able to stop feeling so guilty.” Yeah, the important thing isn’t the safety of an innocent creature or the people who’ve lost a beloved member of their family. IT’S AAAAAALL ABOUT DAWN AND HER POOR FEELINGS. Just shut up, you selfish twatwhistle.
The next day, the BSC is on the case, riding their bikes around and scouting the dog park looking for the molester van. Dawn makes everyone take notes on what they see to give the police, which I imagine will be posted on the precinct’s bulletin board for months just for this Claudia gem: “I licked that one big brown dog that was chassing sticks.” Priceless.
They don’t see anything useful until Friday, though, when Dawn almost rams her bike into the side of the molester van on the way to Claudia’s. Subtle. The driver doesn’t notice, though, since he’s busy hanging out the window with binoculars and a big sign that says I STEAL DOGS. Dawn tiptoes around the side but doesn’t want to get right behind it - “What if the driver suddenly put it in reverse?” All my wildest hopes and dreams would come true? She gets close enough to copy down the plate number anyway, and runs back to Kristy “all bent over to look less conspicuous.” Quiz time! Which of these looks more conspicuous: a) A teenage girl walking by your car, or b) Quasimodo walking by your car? Yeah, that’s what I thought.
They race over to the police station, where Kristy marches right up to the counter to report a crime. Well, not a crime, but a criminal. Well, not exactly a criminal, but a suspicious looking guy. Okay, it’s pretty much just a guy in a car. The policeman rightfully tells them that it’s not a crime to drive a car. Dawn desperately tries to give him all their scouting notes, but I have no idea what she expects the police to figure out from them. I mean, their notes all say things like, “I didn’t see anything suspicious,” so not exactly damning evidence they’ve got there. The officer finally takes the license plate number to get them to bugger off, and it’s clear he has no idea who he’s dealing with here. Sir, you might as well turn in your badge now, because Kristy Thomas has got the lid on this shit.
The next day Kristy is sitting for David Michael, and they piss and mope and exposition about how they got Shannon as they walk together to the Krashers practice. David Michael spots one of their Lost Dog signs and immediately points out that it says, “Mising Dog. Name: Shannun. Breed: Bernaise Mountin Dog.” He wants to know how the hell he’s going to get his dog back if no one can read the damn sign. AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA. Claudia just got her ass handed to her by a seven-year-old AND IT TASTED LIKE VIIIICTORY.
They get to the playground and start setting up and zzzzzzzzzzdrooooooooool. I mean, softball. Mary Anne joins Dawn on the bleachers and says that she just went to the pet store to get a toy for Tigger and it was closed! On a Saturday! Can you imagine? A PET store? Closed on a Saturday? Wouldn’t you expect a PET STORE to be open on a SATURDAY? Because they weren’t! The number of times Mary Anne repeats this gives me a sneaking suspicion that this might be a clue.
The Krushers and Bashers are introducing themselves when suddenly Claire Pike, Myriah Perkins, and Suzi Barrett storm the field with picket signs, protesting their unfair firing from the team. Right, because three FIVE YEAR OLDS could certainly come up with the idea of PROTESTING, make actual picket signs, and show up to march ALL ON THEIR OWN. THIS IS SO BELIEVABLE. Kristy shuts them up by asking them to be Junior Assistant Equipment Managers, because every boy who ever got turned down for the football team happily accepted the job of washing everyone’s jock straps after the game instead. Here’s a hint, coaches: Grunt work is not actually a substitute for playing the game. It is not an honor. They are not a vital part of the team. They did not show up to try out for the position of waterboy. Thank you.
When Dawn gets home, the policeman still hasn’t called her back - because that filthy whore Sharon left the house to go to the hardware store (presumably to get some more bolts to bake into the lasagna). How dare she! Didn’t she know Dawn was waiting for an important call? Sharon awesomely says sorry, but her main ambition in life is not to be Dawn’s answering service. HA. Dawn does not accept this and continues behaving like the spoiled child she is by refusing to eat her dinner. Can’t imagine why that cop didn’t take her seriously.
The next day Dawn won’t so much as go out to the front porch while she waits for the call that doesn’t come (single emo tear) and by Monday, she’s pretty pissed. Pissed enough to get Kristy and Mary Anne to go down to the police station with her and demand to know if he looked up that license plate. He did, he says smugly, and it belongs to Karl Tate, the richest man in Stoneybrook. And it isn’t as though the richest man in Stoneybrook would tool around in a molester van stealing dogs, har har! Right, because rich people are never ever greedy or crooked or clinically insane or anything. The sitters accept this and slink away dejectedly, and Mary Anne suggests going to the pet store to get Tigger’s toy as long as they’re downtown. Dawn doesn’t want to, of course, and continues to whine and act bored as Kristy and Mary Anne pet the puppies and coo over the kittens. Dawn shudders to think what will happen when they grow up and can have all the pets they want - “Their houses will be like the Mancusis’, only more so!” I fail to see how anyone could be “more so” than the Mancusis. Hoarders show more restraint than those people.
Suddenly, a plot device! Karl Tate the Richest Man in Stoneybrook is right there in the back of the store, having an argument with the owners! Dawn can’t hear what he’s saying, but she just knows he’s in on this. It’s like she’s got a third sense.
Karl Tate the Richest Man in Stoneybrook is on the BSC agenda at the next meeting - they all agree that something’s off about him, but why? Why steal dogs when he could buy a zillion of them? Kristy says it would be like if Watson started shoplifting or something. Yeah, crazy rich people! Like if Winona Ryder started shoplifting or something! Jessi is, as always, the voice of sanity by saying that he could have some sort of psychological problem, but everyone dismisses her because black people don’t have good ideas. They decide to tail Karl Tate the Richest Man in Stoneybrook, meaning we’re subjected to another few pages of notes in awful handwriting. They’re pretty much useless, because even when they get a clue they’re too busy scratching their asses and DURRRRing to realize what they’ve got: Mary Anne and Dawn see the molester van pulling out from the pet store, and it wasn’t being driven by Karl Tate the Richest Man in Stoneybrook - it was being driven by the owner of the pet store. “So really, we’re back to square one,” Dawn concludes. Um, the fact that a car supposedly owned by Karl Tate the Richest Man in Stoneybrook is being driven by someone else isn’t the slightest bit fishy? The fact that a man running a pet store has plenty of motive to steal dogs and said man has now been spotted driving the very same car from the scene of the crime isn’t a clue? My god. Maybe you guys should call Claire, Suzi, and Myriah to help you out.
The next day Dawn gets an idea, studies some books at the library, and enlists Mary Anne and Kristy to go to the pet store with her. When they get there, she enthusiastically points out every puppy and rattles off the breed, temperament, size, and favorite food while Kristy and Mary Anne memorize them - a beagle, Samoyed, Shar Pei, Rottweiler, Airedale, and Scottish terrier, respectively. They ask Dawn how the hell she knows so much about dog breeds all of the sudden and she says that’s what she was looking up at the library. Not one of those breeds is exactly obscure; she really needed an encyclopedia to recognize a beagle? Dawn really is an idiot.
She thinks for a minute to come up with a dog breed that isn’t a beagle, Samoyed, Shar Pei, Rottweiler, Airedale, or Scottish terrier, then heads up to the counter and asks for a Saint Bernard. Uh…wouldn’t it have been faster to just think of a dog breed she knew and then glanced around to make sure it wasn’t there before she asked, rather than studying for hours to recognize every possible breed they might have? The pet store guy - who I am going to call Chester the Molester because I want to - says they don’t have one right now, but they could steal one. Uh, get one. It would be very expensive, though. Dawn chirps that she’ll ask her parents and Quasimodos inconspicuously away. They don’t get two steps out the door before Chester comes screeching out of the lot in the molester van in search of a Saint Bernard. Dawn “feels encouraged.” I doubt the owners of a Saint Bernard are going to feel quite as good about it.
Chapter 12! Stacey’s sitting for Charlotte, who won’t stop wailing about how scared she is that Carrot will get stolen because he’s a purebred schnauzer. See, this is why I have a mutt I got from the pound. Nobody steals a mutt from the pound. In fact, if you wanted to punish me, you would drop off another mutt from the pound at my house, not steal the one I’ve got. Charlotte finally agrees to leave Carrot home while she cheers at the Krashers practice, on the condition that she duct-tape him into the room. Thieves have opposable thumbs, Charlotte.
As Stacey hustles Charlotte off to practice, she sees it - someone reaching out, grabbing something, and pulling it into their car. “It all happened so fast,” she says once she meets Dawn at the playground, that she isn’t totally sure what she saw, but she thinks it was a dognapping. How the hell could you pick up a dog and yank it into a car so fast that the human eye can’t comprehend it? It takes me an hour just to get mine loaded up to go to the vet and it usually involves bungee cords and sedatives. Chester’s got mad skills. Dawn wants to run right off and catch him in the act, but Stacey won’t let her just abandon her sitting charges. Dawn stomps her feet “like a two-year-old.” At least she’s becoming a little self-aware.
Chapter 13 - It’s the day of the big game, Krashers vs. Plot Devices! Dawn and Mary Anne get up early to ride over to New Hope with the Pikes, who are their usual charming selves. When they get there, the Plot Devices are wearing professional uniforms and have mustaches and date supermodels, so obviously the Krashers are going to win. I can’t tell you how disappointed I was when I played fifth-grade basketball and it turned out that our team of clumsy but lovable misfits did not actually win the championship. Dawn doesn’t have time to watch the game, though, because she spies a woman jogging by the game and dragging Cheryl along with her. Dawn jumps up, spilling soda and popcorn and dragging Mary Anne to give chase, and somehow I imagine Dawn hears the Baywatch theme in her head as she runs. (In my head it’s more like bassoons honking.)
They catch up to the woman playing ball with Cheryl in a field and calling her Cleo. They decide to call the cops, and Dawn leaves Mary Anne to stall the woman while she runs for a pay phone. Awesomely, Dawn trips over a root and eats it in the dirt on her way. Thank you, Ellen Miles. I’m sorry about saying you were a hack, even though you are.
On the phone, Dawn tells the police officer that she just spotted a woman with a dog she happens to know was stolen. The cop sneers that maybe the dog was returned safely and the woman is the dog’s owner. Uh, if she knows the dog, she probably knows the owner, idiot. And if you’re working a stolen dog case, you should probably know whether the dog was returned safely, shouldn’t you? Not one of Stoneybrook’s finest, I’m guessing. He finally manages to send a New Hope cop over at Dawn’s insistence, and they confront the owner.
The woman says she just bought “Cleo” at a pet store in Stoneybrook and that she “cost the earth, but she’s worth it.” Dawn blurts out that the pet store stole her, and the owner is immediately shocked and apologetic. Okay, not that I wouldn’t be really sympathetic to someone whose pet was stolen, but if I paid a fortune for a dog, I’m going to at least ask for some proof that it was stolen before I hand it over. We’re spared the legal boring stuff, though, because a scream goes up from the playground. Either the Krashers just won or Jackie Rodowsky accidentally decapitated someone.
The Pikes drop off Dawn and Mary Anne at the police station on the way home, and it’s pretty much the end of 101 Dalmatians in there. How did they manage to round up all the missing dogs so fast? And why do I even let these things bother me anymore? Mrs. Mancusi comes to get Cheryl and gushes about Dawn and how they never thought it was her fault. Let’s just keep saying it was, though. She asks the police officer who stole Cheryl, and he says it was Karl Tate. “The richest man in Stoneybrook?” she says disbelievingly. What the hell, did the guy take out an ad in the paper announcing his net worth or something?
The officer tells us the whole story: Karl Tate the Richest Man in Stoneybrook was losing a bunch of money in real estate, so he came up with some schemes and shopped them around. Chester was the first one to take him up on it and began stealing purebred dogs to order instead of buying them from an expensive breeder. It’s not exactly explained how Karl Tate the Richest Man in Stoneybrook profited from this scheme, though, since Chester stole the dogs and sold them at his own store. The problem with giving a person a crooked idea is that if they’re the kind of person who’s going to take you up on it, they’re probably the kind of person that isn’t going to give you credit. It’s also not adequately explained how the police managed to find all this out in the time it took them to drive home from New Hope - Chester must have just confessed everything, because the cops even know that the reason they weren’t open on Saturday is because dognapping was so lucrative they didn’t even bother to open the store. Subtle. Nothing screams “This is a legitimate business” like “We’re not even open most of the time.”
Touchingly, Kristy gets Shannon back, the BSC gets their picture in the paper for just being in the right place at the right time, and Dawn stops off on the way home to get a treat for Tigger - “And I might even let him kiss me!” RUN, TIGGER. RUN FOR YOUR LIIIIIIIIFE.