From Dirt We Come, To Dirt We Return

Part 1 of 1

     The client is very dirty when Elavo welcomes them and their dog into their home, but Elavo has seen worse. They need the money, and the meet and greet goes alright, so they accept the job. The client seems strange, asks a lot of strange questions, but they seem eager to hire Elavo, who answers the questions honestly, and quickly befriends the dog, an entirely brown golden retriever sized mutt. Elavo has recently turned to pet sitting, a low-stakes safe job, as they had an unfortunate accident at their last job, an accident that almost cost them their life. Elavo has been playing it safe ever since.

The job starts out fine and normal. A few days in, Elavo gets a call from their friend, asking if they want to hang out for a few hours at an amusement park. Elavo thinks of a hundred ways the day could go wrong, a hundred different ways they could die, falling out of a roller coaster, the cart flying off the tracks, Elavo tripping and falling onto the tracks of a coaster... they decline. Their friend tries to convince them, to remind Elavo of how much they love roller coasters, but Elavo insists. They want to stay inside, where its safe.

Elavo's house seems to get dirtier and dirtier by the day. The dog isn't much hassle, but seems to somehow be tracking in an incredible amount of dirt. Elavo checks their fenced in backyard for holes, but there are none. They decide to supervise the dog closely after they've cleaned up a little.

They start with the bathroom. They scrub every inch of it. They think about their mortality. They scrub harder, pushing the thoughts aside. Finally, it is clean. They close the door and realize they've gotten quite a lot of dirt on them in the process. They resolve to take a shower later, and keep cleaning. They manage to clean half the house in a few hours. They notice the hall seems a bit smaller now, but it must just be their imagination. As they step back to take in their work, the dog comes trotting along, tracking a visible path of dirt along behind it across the newly cleaned floor.

Alright, Elavo decides. The dog must have a bath. They lure the dog into the yet cleaned bathroom with treats and get to work. The dog does not want a bath. The dog nearly turns violent, but Elavo has had experience with unruly dogs in the past. Never before have they encountered an animal so opposed to baths, however. They do their best to clean the dog quickly. They pause, however, when they realize the dog is much smaller than before, now just barely the size of a terrier. The tub and Elavo are both caked in dirt. They must have washed off pounds of dirt, but still the dog is dirty.

Using Elavo's surprise, the dog escapes and darts out of the bathroom. Elavo scowls at the tub and leaves it for now. They pursue the dog.

The dog has somehow tracked what has become mud all over the place. The entire hall has been dirtied once again, from the walls to the doors to the floor, even the ceiling somehow has dirt on it. Elavo is grateful they at least closed all the doors, so the dog cant dirty all the rooms. Elavo manages to wrestle the dog into a towel, drying the dog off, though the towel is entirely brown with dirt when they're done. The dog is dry, but still so dirty.

Elavo cleans the tub and the bathroom. They clean every room in the house that has a door to close off from the dog. The dog is definitely smaller now. Elavo is baffled, and too worried to try bathing the dog again. Instead, they take a break from cleaning and go to take a shower in the first bathroom. They text the client about the dog, but the client hasn't been responding to any messages this whole time.

They enter the bathroom to see, somehow, incredulously, even though the door has been shut since they cleaned the room, the room is dirty again. Not as dirty as before, but its as if the dirt had crept in under the gap at the bottom of the door and spread from there across the floor and slowly up the baseboards.

Elavo is filthy. Almost as filthy as the dog. They clean the room again, then step into the shower. They start to scrub away the dirt, reaching up and angling the shower head to pour directly over them. They scrub and scrub and scrub. They just cant seem to get all the dirt off.

Elavo reaches up to angle the shower head away... to find they can no longer reach it. They wipe the water from their face to see that either the shower and the bathroom are suddenly much bigger, or they have shrunk in size. Panicked, Elavo turns off the water. They step out into the bathroom, noticing it is once again dirty. There is dirt in the tub. Elavo dries off. They dirty another towel. They are still covered in dirt.

Elavo gets dressed and checks the rooms they cleaned. All dirty. Somehow, impossibly, everything is dirty. Not only that... everything is becoming dirt. As Elavo washes away layers of dirt, they are washing away the thing itself. Elavo doesn't know what to do. They try to go to bed. Maybe once they're rested they can figure this out. They must just be tired, imagining things.

Elavo can't sleep. Their sheets are dirty. The pillow, the walls, the floor, Elavo themself, everything is so dirty. Elavo moves their thumb over their arm, scraping away layer after layer of dirt, hoping to find their skin somewhere underneath. They dig a sizable hole, somehow never finding skin.

Elavo tears out of bed. They pull on dirty clothes. They leave the room, and they find the dog in the hall. The dog is sitting there waiting for them. The dog is sitting on a pile of dirt. Elavo stares as the dirt shifts below the dog. The pile is slowly getting bigger.

It's the dog. Somehow, the dog is doing this. The dog is the source of the dirt.

The dog speaks.

"From dirt we come, to dirt we return."

Elavo, at this point, is not surprised at the dog's apparent capacity for human speech. They're pretty sure they're not looking at a dog, at this point.

"You're right. And I guess that's not something I can control." Elavo looks at the house around them, at themself, the world beyond, all out of their control. They're having trouble speaking. Their throat is so dry, their mouth a desert. They can taste dirt. They know the dirt is inside them now. They speak regardless. "But that doesn't mean I'm going to roll over and let this happen to me."

Stunned by the horrible pun, the dog is taken by surprise as Elavo tackles them, managing to lift them. Elavo carries the dog to the bathroom. The dog fights, biting and scratching, but all the dog is able to tear at is dirt. Elavo turns on the water. They scrub, and scrub, and scrub. It is a battle to see who will outlast the other. They are both shrinking, both crumbling away down the drain.

Finally, Elavo manages to gain the upper hand. They scrub away the rest of the dog. There, in the mud at the bottom of the tub, the only thing that's left, is a small brown stone shaped like a dog's head. Elavo picks it up, and cleans it off. It seems so harmless now. They stand up, dizzy at their new (old?) height. They scrape a layer of dirt off their arm, and find skin underneath.

Elavo takes the longest shower of their life. Then, they clean their house once more. Things stay clean this time. Elavo pockets the rock and tries to text the client once more.

'I don't quite know how to tell you this. But you don't have a dog anymore.'

Elavo explains in detail what happened, takes pictures of the stone, and hopes the client believes them. They wonder how much trouble they're in, because they certainly wouldn't believe them if they were the client.

The client arrives at the end of the day. They smile when they see Elavo. Elavo begins to explain, but the client says they received the messages. Elavo tries to hand over the stone. The client says that since Elavo vanquished this demon, they can keep the token. The client pays Elavo, and tips them generously, doubling what they'd originally agreed upon. The client thanks them, then leaves.

Elavo is dumbfounded and confused, but they feel, inexplicably, better. A lesson has been learned. Their mortality is certain, but there are other things that are not. How they live their finite life is up to them entirely. Elavo does not want to spend it afraid. They text their friend, asking if they still want to go to that amusement park. Elavo gets a speedy and enthusiastic reply, and they make plans to meet tomorrow. Elavo sets their strange new stone on the living room mantle. They unwind and have a well deserved, relaxing evening.

It isn't until late that night, when Elavo is emptying out their pockets to deposit their clothes in the hamper, that they realize their pocket, the one that they'd carried the stone in, is full of dirt.