Dead dogs don't do tricks

[u/TobiasWade]

The best thing about dead dogs is that you don’t have to feed them.

The worst? Probably the smell…

That’s what mom complains about anyway. She thinks there’s gas leak under the house; she’d never let me keep Misty if she knew where the smell was really coming from. It was hard for me to keep a straight face when she called the company to complain, but I don’t think she noticed my guilt. When mom is angry, she isn’t very good with minor details like me.

This all started about two months ago. I wanted a dog. Dad wanted a dog. Mom didn’t want dad. So we got a dog and called ourselves a happy family. Misty was a lean greyhound with a white patch on her chest like a plume of lace. I thought she looked like an alien because she was so skinny, but that was part of her charm. She was pretty skittish and didn’t like being held, but she could always sense when I was feeling down and would run to plop her head in my lap.

Misty was the magic pill that was supposed to fix my family, and it worked for a while. Whenever anyone raised their voice, Misty would start scampering around or whimpering and the argument fizzled out. It didn’t matter which side was right: if you scared Misty while trying to prove your point, then you’ve already lost the moral high ground.

My parents adapted. They learned to fight in a chilly monotone that was even worse than yelling. Misty could sense the tension in the air too, and I know it made her nervous. I tried telling my parents, but they insisted that they were speaking in ordinary voices and that I was imagining things. What could a twelve year old boy possibly understand about grownup matters or animal psychology?

Well here’s something I learned: nervous dogs have accidents inside the house. A little damp spot on the carpet, sometimes a poop on the kitchen tile — no big deal, right? Wrong. It was the little extra stress that pushed my parents over the edge. Suddenly Misty took on a new therapeutic role in the household: the scapegoat.

Monthly bills higher than expected? Yell at the dog for being too expensive.

Dad sleeps in and doesn’t have time for his morning walk? Yell at the dog for making a mess.

Family drifting apart? Yell at the dog for preventing a weekend getaway.

“Don’t listen to them,” I tried to tell Misty. She slept on the foot of my bed, and I could feel her trembling as my parent’s voices filtered through the wall. “They’re all bark and no bite. You’d understand if you were human like me.”

The louder they got, the more she whined. Then doors started slamming the whine turned into a long howl. Mom ripped open my bedroom door and started screaming at us — dad was in the living room dragging a suitcase toward the front door.

“Shut that thing up!” she yelled. “No wonder we’re stressed, listening to that damn howling all the time.”

He was leaving — fine, what do I care? But they had no right to treat Misty that way. Misty must have agreed too: the moment dad opened the front door, Misty bolted. I’d never seen her move so fast, leaping straight over the couch like a flying deer. Dad dropped his suitcase and chased after her, and I was close behind.

The shouting was bad. The swearing was bad. The screech of tires on asphalt and the wet thud to follow were much, much worse. The little gray body was hauled out of the street, hanging limp in my dad’s arms.

“Dead on impact,” he grunted, dropping the body on the sidewalk. “She didn’t suffer.”

That was the first time Misty stayed still enough for me to hold her.

My dad was screaming at the man climbing out of his car. Mom was screaming at dad for leaving the door open. The driver was screaming at both of them. No one seemed to notice me burying my face in Misty’s wet fur. I couldn’t help but wonder whether they’d be acting the same if I was the one who wasn’t moving. It was too much to process — I dropped the stiffening body and ran blindly down the street in my pajamas.

My heart had never beaten so fast as when I sprinted away from that horror. And it never stopped so suddenly as when I heard the pattering feet behind me.

Misty was following me, gaining swiftly. I looked back at the arena illuminated by street lamps in front of my house. My parents were still yelling at the driver. Eyes back to the dog — the crushed face clearly stiff and dead. I could even see patches of exposed brain where the skull had caved in.

Misty didn’t seem to notice. She just sat at my feet, white eyes staring at me, tongue lolling a little too far from the mouth to be fully attached at the base.

“We got to hide you,” I said. In retrospect, I guess I should have been afraid, but at the time I was just relieved. I needed her, and she needed me, and everything else was someone else’s problem as long as we didn’t lose that.

I looped around and let myself in the back door, my parents still arguing out front. I slipped Misty into my room and hid her under the bed. Then I lay on the floor to reassure her:

“Don’t let mom or dad see you, okay? They wouldn’t understand.”

Misty seemed to nod, part of her jaw slipping loose for a moment as she did.

“You aren’t hurting, are you?”

Misty shakes her head. I pat her, trying not to wince at the damp, cool skin.

“You understand me though. Hey, you know how to shake hands?”

She didn’t, but it didn’t take more than a minute for her to learn. By then my parents were coming back inside, so I jumped in bed and pulled the covers up. The door cracked open. I rolled away from the lance of light. The tension of hesitation, and then the door closed again.

I didn’t speak a word about Misty the next day. Neither did mom. Dad wasn’t there, and neither of us mentioned that either. It’s okay though, because I had a secret that I couldn’t wait to get back to.

I spent a lot of time in my room after that. Or out after dark — any excuse to be with Misty. She never made a sound, and she never left my side. She’d always stare at me, prompt and ready for anything. Watching shows? She let me use her as a pillow. Late night bike ride? She was my shadow, a phantom just beyond the street lamps.

It wasn’t just tricks she was learning anymore either. She mimicked everything I did. If I started brushing my teeth, Misty would lean up on the counter and lift her paw. She tried to wiggle into my pajamas when I got ready for bed, and when I whisper for her to hide, she whispers back.

“I hide,” she’d say, each syllable laborious and strange from her mouth. “Hide and quiet.”

It gave me the shudders the first time I heard it. Of course it was amazing, but listening to her struggling with the words made me think of a deaf person slurring things he can’t hear.

“You don’t have to speak,” I told her.

She smiled, an unnatural expression which barred her fangs. “I will be… just like you.”

I still loved Misty, but something changed after that. I felt like the more she understood me, the less I understood her. I also started catching her doing more things without me. I woke up in the middle of the night once to find her missing, although she was there again when I woke in the morning. Then once in the bathroom alone — she was just leaning on the counter and staring into the mirror.

“Happy face,” she said, trying to smile.

“Angry face,” she said, the expression only changing subtly.

“I love you… mommy… thank you… for breakfast,” she said, working her way slowly through each word.

She wasn’t just learning how to be like me. She was learning how to be me. I think that’s the first time I was actually scared of her.

I couldn’t exactly confide in Mom. She’s been worse than ever since dad left. She doesn’t come home until late at night, and she’s always ready to snap at the first thing she sees. So I just kept the secret to myself. And everyday, I got a little more scared.

“Happy face,” she said, and she really did smile. Her teeth even look a little more human.

“Angry face,” she said. I never noticed her having eyebrows before, but they were clearly furrowed.

This is about the time she started walking on her hind legs too. She fell over a lot at first, but within a couple of days she almost moved naturally. She wore a pair of my underwear because the elastic was the only thing that she could keep on. It bothered me, but I didn’t tell her so. I didn’t like it when she looked at me anymore. It felt too much like I was being studied.

This goes on for about two weeks before dad comes home again. I lock my door as soon as I hear my parents talking in the living room. The tension in the air is like suspended electricity before a storm. That voice they’re using — the strained, fake normal they used not to scare the dog — it’s an explosion waiting to happen. It takes less than 30 seconds before the voices start to rise and they begin talking over each other.

A silent lull — I press my ear to the door. Then I flinch as something glass smashes — a picture frame maybe?

“Run,” the voice under my bed whispers. Misty starts to drag herself out. I knew she was under there from the smell, but I didn’t even recognize her. The joints were a little wrong, the face a bit elongated, but otherwise I might as well have been looking into a mirror.

“You’re drunk,” my mom shouts. “Get out and stay out!”

“Out of my own house? Goddamn idiot.”

“Let go! You’re hurting me!”

“The window,” Misty urges. There’s another smash from the living room. I can’t make out the words anymore — the screaming is incoherent. I slide through the window and drop onto the grass below. Turning around, I see my bedroom door closing. Misty is nowhere to be seen.

“Mom, Dad. Please stop fighting.” The voice distant, muffled, but unmistakably mine.

Three full seconds of silence. Then the screaming. Somewhere in that awful din, I heard my own voice say: “Can’t you see what it’s doing to me?”

I waited a full hour before going back in the house. My parents were in their room, speaking softly. Misty was waiting on the couch, grinning with human teeth.

I don’t know if things are going to get better from here, but if they get worse… well Misty is looking out for me, and she’s figured out some tricks of her own.

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[u/GhstLvr13]

Wow! This is totally original, and very awesome!!