“Nicole! It’s time to put the dogs back!” my mom shouted upstairs. When I heard her voice, I sighed, rolled off my bed, and trudged downstairs. Putting Marcie and Croutie (the adorable beagles from next door) back in their crates was always a huge pain. I sighed and slid open the door.
As I plodded down the steps, I called for the beagles. Marseilles, hearing her name, bounced to meet me at the bottom of the stairs, tail a-waggin’. Crouton was nowhere to be seen, but that wasn’t a huge surprise. I assumed he was under a bush somewhere, digging, blissfully ignorant that someone was calling his name.
“Crouton!” I called again as I started combing the yard, wondering if he had made one of his giant holes, deep as the Mariana Trench. Hopefully it was under a bush, or someone would roll an ankle in it. And it was likely to be me. Lost in thought, I didn’t realize I had searched the whole yard until I finished my circle and arrived back at the steps.
But where was Crouton?
I strained my ears, knowing he would start barking eventually. He was a beagle, after all. Before long I heard his distinctive woofing, as long and deep as a drawn out note on the tuba, coming from a mossy stone outcropping in the back corner of the yard (under one of the many forsythia bushes that were slowly taking over the world).  This stone was typically unimportant, but today it was all I needed to know to find Crouton. Because this particular outcropping had a hole that led to the sewer.
With a sinking heart, I ran back inside and explained to my family that Croutie was in the sewer, and likely stuck there. Panic ensued. I waited by the hole for Crouton. My sister biked to where the pipe came out. My mom called the fire department. And my dad changed into old jeans and work boots, preparing to enter the sewer. Before long, my mother got ahold of someone at the fire station down the road. As she spoke frantically to the person on the other end of the line, Crouton’s barking suddenly started getting louder and louder and louder, until he suddenly popped out of the sewer, with a grin on his little furry face.