Creeptober Horror Spree: Volume One

The Dog Next Door

There was something wrong with it. I knew that much. Honestly, the whole family was a bit off, and the neighborhood shrouded in uneasiness the day they moved in—pale people, with sunken eyes and sullen faces, and that goddamned dog. His eyes were too close together. I know, that's generally something funny, but they were close together in a human sense. The entire animal's skull structure didn't follow canine rules. He was tall and lanky, a shaggy black mutt, whose shadow stretched too far behind him.

I don't know. Maybe I'm insane. The dog was just...not right. But, neither were the people.

We barely ever saw them. Their dog, though; he was always in the back yard. They had a chain-link fence, so I got to enjoy having to look at the creepy bastard every time I wanted to relax on my back porch. Now, I love dogs. I'm a dog person. I have a dog. But I'm telling you, I can't adequately describe it; there was something really wrong with that dog. He would lock eyes with you, and you'd just get this awful feeling in your gut. You'd remember everything wrong with your day, your life, your relationships. I maintain, to this day, that it wasn't a dog at all. Like I said, maybe I'm crazy.

So, anyway, the neighbors themselves. Weird people. The Addams Family, but not endearing. Black hair, pale skin, black clothes, black car, creepy-ass black dog-

Anyway...

They left once. Since they kept to themselves, nobody on the street even noticed, much less myself, because that damn dog was still in the back yard. It wasn't until Steve, who lived on the corner, told me that he saw them pack up their car and drive off two days before—leaving the dog behind. At that point, I started to feel kind of sorry for him. It wasn't his fault he was creepy looking, and I reasoned with myself to stop being such a little bitch and toss some food over the fence for him. So I did. I took a massive scoop of my own dog's food and shoveled it nicely through the chain link, piling it on the ground.

The dog never touched the food. Over the day, random wildlife helped themselves to it, but never the dog. The next day, he was pacing along the fence, staring into my yard. I figured maybe he was picky. Perhaps he didn't like the food I gave my dog. So, feeling generous, I chucked a steak over the fence before I left for work. I genuinely have no idea if he ate that or not, but I never saw it in the grass. I never saw this dog pee or poop anywhere in the yard, either. That's weird, right? He was left alone out there every day while his family did who knows what. I never even saw him do regular dog things, let alone relieve himself.

He just existed there, occasionally wandering the perimeter, staring at me while I did my gardening, and often, he just stood there. Not once did I hear him howl, bark, or growl. So, the dog's left alone out there, and I decide to walk my dog past the fence. Lyla is a good girl. She has zero aggression problems, so I knew she wouldn't provoke him. I just wanted him to once act like a dog, even if he decided to be an asshole through the fence. It was the strangest thing. Lyla was afraid of him. Instantly. She wouldn't even walk towards him. He stood there, staring at her, and I fucking swear to you, he smiled.

Not the cute anxious dog smile. He smiled. He smiled as you or I would smile. Lyla's hackles went straight up, and she pulled the leash so hard I almost fell over. She yelped and cried out and dragged me around to the front of the house, summoning strength I didn't even know she had. Lyla was freaked out for hours. To be frank, so was I, because both of us had seen a dog smile like a person would, and not a friendly "Hey, how are you?" smile either. It was the way the weird guy on the bus would smile at you or your kid; the way that makes you feel so uneasy, you don't even want to be there anymore.

And that's the other thing - every time I saw that dog, I would find myself overwhelmed with an urge to move. That feeling always followed up with an immediate fear that the dog would follow me no matter where I went. Another day passed, and the neighbors decided that maybe the Creep Family weren't coming back. One of them, not knowing about the dog the way I knew about the dog, did the good samaritan thing and called animal control to report an abandonment. I watched from my window as the truck pulled up.

I saw the dog stand to attention in the back yard, and it felt like I shouldn't have been watching. Like a horny teenager with binoculars in a tree, I knew in my gut I was doing something wrong, but I couldn't look away. The animal control officer knocked on the door a few times, then walked around the back to the fence. He gestured to the dog, and to my surprise, it approached him. I'd never seen the dog wag his tail before, and for a minute or two, he was acting normal to the point where I began to question everything I thought I saw about him.

The officer crouched down, probably assessing the animal. He had always been skinny, but he probably had lost weight with nobody around to feed him. I thought to myself, Well, hopefully, the dog is in bad shape. Then they'll take him away, and I won't have to keep feeling so uneasy about him.

But then, the dog's eyes...misaligned. Like, they suddenly went in different directions. It was cartoonish but horrifying. He smiled that weird smile and licked the officer through the fence. His tongue was too long. I have to stress what I mean by that: his tongue was maybe a foot long. That's not normal for a dog, right? The officer shot upright, looked around, and walked calmly back to his truck. For some reason, I was terrified to go outside, but I forced myself to do so. I briskly jogged down the sidewalk and to the truck. "Aren't you going to take the dog?" I asked.

The officer shrugged, updating something on his console computer. "There ain't a dog there. Maybe the owners came back for him."

I was too stunned to refute what he'd said, glancing over my shoulder at the back yard. There he was, staring at me. He stared the way you'd look at someone you hated, and a chill ran down my spine. I quickly went back into my home, and for the next week, I only left for work. Lyla stopped wanting to go outside, so I had to invest in potty pads, but I can't say I blamed her. Then, one day, after months of being gone, the people came back. The neighbor who'd called animal control walked over to give them a piece of his mind - braver than I am - and they didn't seem to argue with him.

The last time I ever saw that dog was the week before I moved. I just couldn't take it there anymore. Regularly cleaning up after Lyla because she was terrified to go outside, catching their creepy dog staring at me when I walked past windows: I was done with it. Someone else could have this problem. I woke up to a tapping sound that at first made me think Lyla was coming into my room to snuggle. The more I came out of my sleep, the more I realized it was coming from outside. I glanced over to the window, expecting to see a squirrel or something, and I almost screamed.

It was that dog. He was upside down, looking into my window, wet nose pressed to the glass. His eyes were crooked again, but he wasn't smiling. No, I don't think I could describe the face he was making, but it wasn't any kind of face a dog should be able to make. He chuffed and huffed on the glass, breath lingering in a fog for a few seconds in a rhythm. I sat frozen in my bed. Somehow I felt like if I tried to move, he would come in after me, but to this day, I don't know why I thought that. For one thing, my window locked from the inside. We stared at each other for God knows how long before he slowly pulled away out of sight.

The thing is, my window didn't have an awning or anything for him to stand on, to peek down the way he was. And my room was on the second floor.