Brandon brings his laughter down to a few chuckles and refocuses on his game. He lines up the shot and just when he is about to swing, Stacy’s piercing accusation sends his golf club slamming to the ground just behind the ball. The ball hops forward a few feet carrying a chunk of turf with it.
“What have you done with my brother?” She starts towards him but loses her footing at the edge of a small hole on the fairway. Nancy manages to hook her arm around Stacy’s and drag her to safety, albeit with green skid marks all over the front of her white golf shirt.
“Karma.” Brandon stands at the edge of the hole, tilts his head down, and makes a megaphone with his hands. “I said Karma!”
Well, that was enough to make Stacy lunge for him and tackle him to the ground. It all happened so fast that everyone was taken by surprise, even Stacy. She pins Bradon down and barely stops herself from breaking his nose. Instead, she crawls over to the edge of the sinkhole and squeals.
“Rog! Rog! Can you hear me?” Stacy looks up at Nancy helping her husband to his feet and slowly picking off the grass from his custom Bermuda shorts.
“Right you are, honey bunny,” Nancy coos over her “Brandy Baby”. She then turns to Stacy and asks indignantly: “I suppose you want me to call in the frou-frou dogs, eh? ” shedding her southern drawl for an added insult.
Now hang a sec here. Shouldn’t the Florida couple show a little more sense of urgency? They are acting as if human meat is part of the daily lawn care regimen with their when-it’s-time-for-you-to-go attitude.
Stacy is furious. She rolls onto her back and scouls at Nancy, not only because her hosts are so cavalier about her brother’s plight but also because she sees the mirror of her own indifference reflecting right back on her.
You see, the driver of the car who fell into the sinkhole directly behind her on the highway today was likely someone’s brother or at the very least someone’s son. Perhaps this is karma after all— Stacy’s karma.
Nancy smiles, takes out her cellphone, and makes the call. A few moments later the well camouflaged speaker system peppered throughout the golf course sounds the alarm.
“Poodle patrol to fairway 6. Poodle patrol to fairway 6. Code red. Code red.”
And out come the “caninery” to the rescue at a speed that would make a cheetah blush.
The dog driver, Mani, jumps off the basket and detaches it from the pack. He then unhooks the lead dog, attaches her harness to a long tether which he clips to the back of the pack, throws her the end of a second tow rope, and slowly lowers the poodle into the hole. He waits for her signal that she has reached the bottom.
“Woof !Woof!” barks Daisy.
“Daisy, dig!” Mani readies the dogs and they wait.
The tension on the rope is loose. Nothing is happening. Stacy leans back over the hole and watches as the rescue dog digs and digs. Finally, the wet earth gives way to the top of Rogers’s head and then his baseball cap protecting his face. The dog keeps digging. The scene gets muddled behind Stacy’s tears. Roger is not moving.
Suddenly, an arm reaches for the rope in Daisy’s mouth, twirls it a couple of times around the palm of the hand, then the next arm latches on. Daisy barks four times, tugs on her rope, and Mani gives the command.
“Hike!”
The poodle party give it their all and out pops a poodle from the hole closely followed by Roger, heaving and coughing yet alive, with Daisy sitting proud beside him as if to say:
“Take that for frou-frou! Woof!”
