Short Stories

Dog of the Dead

Everyone treasures their dog. Except Carl, that is. Carl recently moved in with his girlfriend, Tori. Her parents had recently given her a puppy. A Pomeranian, to be exact. The small pooch Tori had named Eddie had the eyes of her brother. He had died of lung cancer merely two months ago, so she named her dog after him. Her parents believed the dog would help her cope with the pain she felt after their loss.

Tori loved the dog dearly, and rarely let him out of her sight. Carl, on the other hand, would prefer to have Tori to himself. The dog gave him a strange, unsettling feeling whenever he looked at it. It's eyes were a deep brown and looked almost human. It also had a strange attachment to Tori, despite their recently developed relationship. Carl had expressed his unhappiness towards the clingy situation, but Tori always brushed him off, saying that he was paranoid and overthinking things.

Carl had a tendency to overthink situations. He looked like someone that would, honestly. He was short and skinny. His face seemed stretched and flat, like the face of a bull terrier. When he was little his friends called him "Target Dog" because of it.

A few weeks after Carl's complaints about the dog Tori got a devastating phone call. Her mother never had the best diet, and old age was wearing at her system, sending her to the hospital being treated for a heart attack. She immediately wished to go to the hospital, but needed someone to look after Eddie. Carl volunteered, for obvious reasons. She gave him a short thank you kiss on the cheek, grabbed her keys, and raced out of the front door. Carl closed the door as she hoped into her car and pulled out of the driveway.

Carl went into their red and grey living room and sat on the dark grey couch. Eddie jumped up onto the cushion beside his human father and laid down with a lonely whine. Eddie didn't mind the man that moved in with his mother, but the man that his mommy called Carl didn't seem to like him very much.

The television clicked on and Carl flipped through channels. He finally landed on a rerun of an old show he watched a while back. He laughed at the memories of watching the show with his father and Eddie drifted off into a light doze.

A few short minutes later Eddie wake with a jolt and jumped off of the couch. Carl payed him no mind and continued to watch the show until Eddie scratched at the front door and whimpered. Carl groaned and walked over to Eddie. Eddie stared up at him with his humanoid eyes and whined loudly. "Do you need to go out boy?" Carl asked.

The fluffy dog stuck its tongue out and began to pant. Carl grabbed a leash and Eddie barked sharply. Eddie sat and waited for Carl to clip the leash to his collar and open the door before mustering all of the energy in his small body and running out of the door. "Eddie!" Carl cried as the leash was pulled out of his hand.

Eddie sped out to the road and Carl raced after him. The leash was a longer one, so he just had to get close enough to step on it. Tori will kill me if she finds out I lost Eddie, Carl thought as he chased the dog down the street.

Carl was fast, but Eddie was faster. He soon began to loose sight of the small dog, but refused to give up. He was panting and his body was screaming for oxygen, but he pushed forward. "I am not loosing this dog!" He told himself.

He finally began to catch up as the fluffy figure slowed down. It had discovered a car crash, and a bad one. The front of one car was smashed, while another was flipped onto it's top. There were sirens in the distance and Carl realized it was a recent wreck.

Carl grabbed the heavily panting dog's leash but froze when he took another look at the flipped car. It was Tori's. He dropped the leash again and slowly walked over to the driver's side in disbelief and fear. Tori was held upside down in her seat by her seatbelt. Deep wounds and shards of glass revealed themselves through blood on her body. Carl choked back a sob and stumbled back in disbelief.

Eddie trotted over to the smashed door and sat as close to the body as he could without touching anything. A heart-shattering howl erupted from his small snout. It rang out among the town, making some turn their heads toward the source. Tori twitched and gasped for breath, but the glass had sliced her windpipe. The sticky red substance ran down her face and she took one last look at the dog before choking out a sigh and going still once again.

Carl suddenly felt an overwhelming amount of fury. She had looked at the dog. The last thing she saw was the horrid small hound. Eddie sensed the man's rage and bared his teeth. "You...you took her from me!" Carl shouted.

Eddie growled and barked back harshly. His eyes began to turn a deep green and saliva collected on it's lower lip. Tori's eyes. It had Tori's eyes. "You beast!" Carl cried.

It snarled and snapped it's teeth. Carl swung a foot toward it as Eddie lunged forward and sank his teeth into Carl's leg. "You made me do this!" Eddie screeched.

Pain coursed throughout Carl's leg as long hair furiously sprouted from his skin. Crackling and an immense amount of tingling overpowered his frightened mind. He fought against the dog until he couldn't move. Eddie opened his mouth and extracted his teeth from Carl's fluffy leg.

Within minutes the police and an ambulance arrived at the crash sight. A few days later a missing persons report is sent to the public for a young man. The boyfriend of the dead woman. Some said he was so devastated that he ran away and killed himself. Others believe he was the cause of the crash. The couple's dog had also gone missing, but no one wanted to look into it.

The file was stored with the rest of them. Inside a file cabinet a strange story that no one could solve rested.

One woman found dead. One male and one female found injured. One dog found dead.

Breed of dead dog: Bull Terrier