When Rebecca left him, Frank was left standing in the doorway of their empty bedroom, looking at nothing in particular. He remembered thinking that this was not the worst that had happened to him. No, what the doctor had told him days before the Tokyo Olympics was by far worse.

Frank didn't remember the name of his condition. He just knew that, if he continued lifting weights, he would die. First, he would feel pain. Then, he would become susceptible to internal tears. Finally, he would be likely to die from internal bleeding.

And wasn't that a joke? Frank, one of the USA star weight lifters, not being able to compete in his first Olympics after a ton of sleepless nights worth of training?

To be fair, him overworking himself had been what had brought that on. Nothing else. He had been healthy as a bull, before the sudden back and hip pain.

And Rebecca, his girlfriend of five months, had left him as soon as he had brought the news home. He could sort of understand her. She was with him not out of love, but because of the glamour of being with an athlete. And, that hadn't bothered Frank, until she had left him gaping in their bedroom.

Frank remembered sitting at the foot of the bed and thinking:

Well, now my life really is shit.

Over and over again. What was he going to do now? He didn't have a job anymore. No prospects, since he had finished a school for athletes and that hadn't provided much knowledge about anything but sports and nutrition.

His mother had always told him to enter a college, but Frank had stubbornly focused on his weightlifting training. He couldn't wrap his mind around not being a professional weightlifter anymore.

The Olympics were supposed to be his big break, and now, he couldn't compete. He had a small competition planned for next week that was supposed to pay the bills for the next month. But that was off the table now, too.

Frank slapped his cheeks and stood from the bed. He made the phone calls, informing his coach about his new condition, getting chewed up for not remembering the name, and being told that no, he was not part of the team anymore and his quota for the Olympics was going to be filled by someone else so that he didn't even have to do the tap out before all the people, as few as there were going to be. What with the pandemic.

Frank took his coat and got out. He could wallow in self-pity later. For now, he needed to do something about the very pressing issue of his lack of a job.

He had seen many ads hiring on windows before, and yet, now, the windows of shops were strangely empty of them. Rebecca was an office worker and, although it made Frank's stomach churn imagining himself typing away his days on a keyboard, he needed to find something like that. 

He passed by the animal shelter and saw a poster.

We are now hiring people with minimal experience to help to take care of the animals. Full time and with ten-hour shifts. Please send your resume on...

Frank decided to head on in instead. He knew, from experience with being denied from many a club during his youth, that people couldn't reject you outright if they saw your face.

He was greeted by a cheery woman in a beige uniform.

"Hello, are you here to adopt?" Frank shook his head.

"I am here to apply for the position. I like animals, and," Frank wavered. He knew next to nothing about their care. As his dead tortoise would attest.

"I see. Well, come over here. Show me how you would greet this dog over here," she pointed at a cage with a shaking dog that looked with naked fear out of his cage.

Frank felt bad for the animal. It was obvious that his own worries had nothing on the life of the poor pooch. He bent down so that he was eye level with the dog and looked at its middle. He remembered from his childhood that looking dogs in the eyes unnerved them.

"Hey, buddy. You had it rough, right?" Frank began, placing his fingers next to the bars, but not through them. The dog backed away further into the tiny cage. "I got down on my luck, too, lately. I can't say I can get you out of here, but, if you like, I can come have a heart-to-heart with you from time to time?"

The dog's nose edged closer to the fingers, and it sniffed them. It gave the fingers a tentative lick, and Frank scratched the poor thing behind the ears.

"Normally, Frank whines and shakes when the new candidates coo at him," remarked the attendant, looking thoughtful. Frank looked at the dog, which had the same name as him.

"What will happen to this dog? He is not a puppy," maybe Frank was not the most knowledgeable man about how a shelter ran its business, but he knew that places like this put down their animals.

"We will try to find him a new family. If we can't, then he will have to go to sleep," and it wasn't fair, Frank thought. Because poor Frank, the dog, was licking his fingers gently and looking less scared, when he had only a week left to live.

"I'll get him a family," and if Frank couldn't, then this dog was going to be living in his house.

"That is the spirit. I'll tell the shelter director that you have what it takes to work for us. In the meantime, would you like a picture of him sent to your email? So, you can run a Facebook promotion, or something?" Frank nodded. He told the attendant, Emily, his email and stayed by the skinny dog for another half an hour, talking to it about life, and then he left. Now a man with a mission.