Monster and Dog

Lilybeth hummed to herself as she made her way down the path to the fishing hole. her Jack Russell by her side bouncing, along, yipping happily, as if the two were dueting. She sang a made-up song, “The fish will bite today…Hip hip hooray. Hmm hmm hmm hm hm hm hm.” As they passed their neighbor’s home, which was halfway between their own cabin and the river, she fell silent.

Bobbi looked back nervously as well, and slowed, glancing up and forward, back and forth, until given the sign it was safe to sing again. Lilybeth put a slender finger to her lips and went, “shhhhhhh.” But Bobbi J R knew the drill.

Mr. Halloday was a monster. To sing was to poke the beast.

Lilybeth glanced nervously at the dark windows of Halloday’s small but meticulously kept home. Once past the garden at the edge of The Monster’s property, Lilybeth started humming again softly. Bobbi perked up and bounced off ahead to the river’s little cove like a bunny rabbit. Lilybeth sang, “The fish will bite today…yay yay yay…yum yum yum….hmmm hmm hmm…” Her wren brown curls bounced as she skipped, relieved The Monster’s windows were dark. “Whew.”

(In hindsight, she should have welcomed light from the windows.)

Bobbi was sitting by the shore awaiting her arrival, sitting with head cocked as if listening for fish beneath the placid green surface. After a few seconds, the pup’s ADD kicked in and as Lilybeth sat on the log and hooked her first worm, the little white and tan dog ran back through the weeds and bushes to sniff the familiar scents, marvel at the new, and mark new spots.

Lilybeth hummed her little ditty under her breath as she cast her line into the pond. It was her way of shaking off the moody trepidation that had settled in her bones as it always did when she passed that home.

The early spring sun weaved its way through the trees of the woods around her like God’s fingers, touching here and there, and sending out rays like cosmic beams to the pond itself, as they heat the surface, and the mist in the sunlight becomes amplified into a truly ethereal scene. Along the edge of the pond, crocuses were just peeking out- pinks and purples and yellows- the scent of lily of the valley completed her heaven. Well…not quite…about that prayer…’tug tug’

Wow. Just as she knew, the trout were big enough to be hungry enough. She started reeling in her line, eager to see what feast might be caught. Reel reel reel…give a little…reel reel. “Ahhh—"

“What you little waste of sperm are you doing?!” The voice bellowed from the bushes beside her, and she screamed.

The trout shook and released and swam off. Lilybeth scootched against the bank and looked around for her dog.

“Ah yes,” The Monster said. “Your little mutt was digging in my garden…again.”

He was very tall and very thin. Dressed all in black, baggy coat hanging like a cloak, holding a walking stick, he looked like the Grim Reaper himself. Lilybeth set her rod aside and said, “Wh-where is my dog?’

At the sound of her voice, Bobbi suddenly bounded out from the bushes and squared off, growling at the enemy. Lilybeth pulled her dog close; although the pup was her security blanket, she also feared what The Monster might do. Crazy people were unpredictable and one look in this man’s eyes screamed Batshit!

“That mutt has been digging in my garden again,” The Monster growls again. Lilybeth is amazed he can even speak at all. His mouth is sloped to one side and way too full of yellow-ancient-ivory teeth jutting out his lower jaw like tombstones.

“I-I-don’t th-think… um…Mr…”

“Holes in my garden!” He howls over her though his mouth hardly moves, he is magically thunderous. “Next time, I will take action.”

“Um…Bobbi’s a good dog---”

“Quiet! You insolent wee beast! In my garden…I WILL SHOOT IT.” He raised his twisted willow wood cane and aimed it like a rifle at the little white terrier.

Bobbi’s lips pull back in a snarl. Lilybeth placed a hand on her pup’s trembling shoulders, she knows her fearless pup is not shaking in fear but palpitating in anger. She says placatingly, “Bobbi won’t ever enter your yard again…”

“HMF!” The Monster waggled a knobby finger from a milk-white hand veined heavily with blue in front of the girl’s freckled nose. “It just better not.”

The Monster turned to leave and Lilybeth, feeling so badly for her dog said softly, “You don’t have to be so mean…”

The stooped man’s shoulders bunched as he faltered his steps. “Gah!” He continued through the woods, their dark shadows melding with his coat, enveloping him until it seemed he simply vanished. Just as the Grim Reaper would.

Lilybeth let out her breath. She couldn’t believe she’d dared get her two cents worth in…well, maybe it was just a single cent, not worth dirt nowadays…but still. A tiny smile played around the corners of her lips. She took Bobbi’s face in her hands. “Please stay away from The Monster’s garden. Please. I couldn’t bear to lose you.”

Bobbi whined softly as a way of acknowledging her plea. For the rest of the afternoon, Bobbi stayed by her side, head on paws, ears twitching, hearing a thousand sounds the human girl could not.

As the sun was setting, the dog and girl walked home in silence. The girl glared at The Monster’s home as they passed, sparks of pure yellow hatred flared like sunspots in her eyes. As they passed the fence behind which the meticulously kept garden grew, Lilybeth noticed the fresh mounds of dark loamy earth where the fresh holes were. She whispered, “no more Bob, okay?”

The pup whined softly. Stubby tail bent downward. The pup sighed deeply, as a human would. Lilybeth’s arms spiculed with goosebumps.

The next Saturday, Lilybeth made her way down to the little cove off the river. The Monster’s home was dark like the previous week, but she’d learned (in hindsight) that that meant he could be lurking anywhere, ready to pop out of the shadows like a ghoul with claws raised and blood red eyes. To the best of her knowledge, Bobbi had not gone near the garden. Lilybeth had even tied Bobbi to a rope that made it to the circumference of their own property when the dog needed tio go out. But that flimsy knowledge was usurped by the fact that Jack Russell terriers are smart and sneaky and set in their ways.

After fishing and swimming – it was hot that day- Lilybeth and Bobbi headed home. Bobbi was lagging and sluggish which was unusual and Lilybeth more than a little concerned. She figured the terrier was depressed at being tied in the yard. Better sad than dead.

The dog was putting on some weight as well. ‘I’ve got to get Bobbi back in shape, poor sweet pup,’ she vowed. To Bobbi, she said, “how about tomorrow we go on a nice long hike over Johnson’s peak? Go run around in the meadow?”

Bobbi looked up briefly, eyebrows raised…but The Monster’s cabin loomed in the dusk. The colorful sunset over the trees turned a sour, ominous, grey-tinged hue, as if the place itself sucked the life out of everything surrounding it.

As they passed her unfortunate neighbor’s home, she noticed the garden was …different. More weeds? She’d only ever seen the garden kept up and orderly and thriving. This day, the weeds were taking over, and old grasses had turned yellow. Amidst them was a fresh mound of dark earth. Lilybeth looked at her dog. Bobbi looked back defiantly but humble as only a dog’s stare can look.

As they watched, a small head popped up from the fresh hole, the critter said, “ack!” and ducked out of sight.

Lilybeth had an epiphany then. She summoned up her courage and marched to The Monster’s front door. He did not answer her knock, the home was silent and dark. Then…a faint scuttling noise, a scratching sound, just for two seconds…Bobbi took off like a lightning bolt over the porch deck and around the corner…Lilybeth was about to shout out…but why wake the beast? Instead, she raced after her dog.

Bobbi leapt onto the sill of the open kitchen window as Lilybeth came around the corner. The kitchen door was unlocked, and the cabin was dark.

As her eyes adjusted, she saw the cabin was designed quite a bit like her family’s own: large living space, kitchen a nook off the main high-ceilinged room, perhaps one or two bedrooms (she guessed one here) and a bathroom (hardly anyone had outhouses anymore.)

There was a chittering sound in the dark before her as she approached the bedroom. The bedroom had no door, it was more of an enclave off the main living space, faint light flickered from it. She whirled and Bobbi started growling madly and ferociously but she didn’t bark.

“Bobbi!” Lilybeth cried out in a harsh stage whisper. But try and stop a Jack Russell from setting upon a critter…not gonna happen.

She spied dark shadows slinking around in the corners. ‘His minions’ she thought and froze until the slinking dark shadows went about their business. The dark little bodies morphed out of the shadows, there seemed to be dozens of them! Rats! Minions festering with disease and razor-sharp teeth and voracious appetite!

“GAAAHHHHH!!!!” a voice gargled out from behind her. She whirled. No one there. The Monster was taunting her.

A whine reached her acutely wired ears. “Bobbi!”

Lilybeth looked around the gloomy cabin and saw The Monster’s staff leaning against a willow wicker chair, she snatched it and raced towards her dog. The dog’s white coat was luminous in the gloom. Bobbi’s claws scrabbled along the pine wood planks and Lilybeth raced after the dog with the walking stick held high like Babe Ruth’s bat. Lilybeth found the hearth and a lantern on it. Her small cold fingers pattered along the mantel until she found a small metal box. Matches.

In the light of the lantern, she watched stunned as small black shadows scurried off into the corners remaining in darkness, as if the light would make them melt as the wicked witch did from water.

There was Bobbi. The terrier’s paws were stained red. The blood on the dog’s snout was brilliant as rubies dripping from a patrician’s throat. Lilybeth screamed, “Aaah!” but the surge petered out as she realized the blood was not her dog’s.

Three black furry, wettish bodies lay at the dog’s feet. Bobbi was grinning and then, one by one, picked up the rat bodies and first crunched them like a person eating corn on the cob, until the bones were pulverized…then down her gullet the rat bodies went. Jack Russell’s apparently ate rodents like snakes do. Lilybeth shuddered. She was relieved and confused as she headed towards the light in the alcove-bedroom.

The flickering light of the candle on the nightstand was dying. Just as the thing on the bed was.

Lilybeth blew the candle out and replaced it with the lantern. The body was grey, and its arms curled to its chest like Nostradamus in his coffin. He appeared shriveled and so much smaller than he ever had before. As she looked closer, she saw that his fingertips were bleeding.

Suddenly, The Monster’s open eyes darted towards hers and he again uttered, “gaaahhh!” but his eyes now glistened, and he turned his face away towards the wall. Lilybeth felt a crack in her heart as she realized he was just an old man.

She reached for the old thick quilt on the floor and covered him. As she did, she saw his toes had been chewed on as well.

Lilybeth had to go home for supper. The sun had set and that was her alarm clock. She left Bobbi with Mr. Halloday, to protect him from the rats. After her parents went to bed and she heard her father’s snores, she bundled up in her warm wool cloak and headed back to Mr. Halloday’s. She’d brought with her her mother’s tinctures and a freshly laundered white sheet. At Mr. Halloday’s cabin, she tended to his wounds, using the sheet as bandages and at last forcing the old man’s mouth open to take the aspirin.

When she was done, she looked down at her pup who was licking her paws contentedly. There were six dead rats in the main cabin area. Bobbi was looking very fat indeed and sated.

Lilybeth came to Mr. Halloday’s cabin the next day to check on them.

Mr. Halloday was sitting up in bed reading an old leatherbound book. He didn’t look grey anymore though he was still scary looking. “Come child. Sit by me.” His voice was still a growl, but then, she supposed that’s what happens with age.

She came and sat by him in the bed.

“You saved me.”

“Um. Well….”

“Yes. And the dog of yours, it…well..it---”

“Bobbi is not an it. She’s a she.”

Mr. Halloday’s eyes got wide. They were now clear and deep hazel-brown. He actually started laughing. It was a wheezing, coughing sound…but laughter nonetheless. “Yes yes. Ha. I actually never knew that. Bobbi has eradicated the rats from my home.”

As Lilybeth watched with unbelievibng eyes and a flickering heartbeat, Mr. Halloday patted the bed next to him and Bobbi leapt up, curled into a ball, and whined a little bit.

“I think she wants to stay and protect you.”

“I’ll be fine now, the rats are gone. I’m on the mend but your Bobbi needs to be alone for a little bit. Come back tomorrow…”

“Of course I will. Can I bring you more books?”

“That would always be welcome. Thank you, child.”

Lilybeth came back the next morning. Mr. Halloday was not in his bed and Bobbi was not in the cabin. She began to panic.

Then she heard laughter like never before. She’d never heard an old man’s laughter and especially not a Monster’s. She raced out towards it, wren-brown curls flagging…she came to his cabin, heard the laughter again, and raced towards the garden shed. Along the way, she noticed the garden was again immaculate and flourishing and weed free.

In the shed, she found Bobbi laying in a soft bed of blankets, a water dish nearby, and a food dish with remnants of fresh chicken bones and bits of livers.

There were six tiny puppies nuzzling at her teats.

Mr. Halloday looked up, and he was not scary at all.

 He was happy and hopeful and in love.