I’ve always lived in Upstate New York, but I just moved near the Appalachians when it happened.
I inherited a house from my grandmother. It was impressive with two floors, three bedrooms, and two bathrooms. My girlfriend would stay over frequently.
My favorite part, though, was the big, expansive backyard. I would let my dog, Brooklyn roam wild. Another good part was that I was close to my friend Rodney, someone that my girlfriend introduced me too. He had lived near the Appalachians for years.
Rodney and I would have what we called “dog playdates”, where we would take turns watching the dogs. Sometimes Rodney would have my dog at his house and sometimes I would have his dog, Roadie, over at my house.
Like I said before, I would let my dog run wild in the backyard. Brooklyn and Roadie just loved the big backyard and sometimes they would disappear into the forest. But they would always come back. Until…
There was one hot summer afternoon when my girlfriend and I were watching Brooklyn and Roadie play in the backyard. As usual, they went into the woods surrounding my backyard. My girlfriend and I dipped into the house for some drinks. I didn’t think anything of it as I quite frequently left the dogs alone.
After a little while, my girlfriend and I went back outside. Brooklyn and Roadie were still in the forest. No big deal. Thirty minutes go by. They’re still in the forest. Now she and I begin to wonder where the hell they are.
“You should go and look for them,” my girlfriend said.
“Yeah,” I replied uneasily, now getting a bad feeling. “They’re probably just playing around.”
As soon as I stepped off my back deck, I saw Brooklyn appear from the woods. She looked…forlorn if I didn’t know any better. She and Roadie never came back separately liked this. Usually, Brooklyn came directly to me, but this time she didn’t.
With a lump in my throat, I left Brooklyn with my girlfriend and went out to find Rodney’s dog. I went into the woods, calling out Roadie’s name. Suddenly, as I kept walking, there was a strange and unpleasant smell. I looked all around for the source and what my eyes stumbled on was nothing short of fucking horrifying.
It was Roadie’s corpse.
I didn’t scream despite how much I wanted to. I looked around for who or what could’ve done this but saw nothing. With shaking hands, I picked up the now dead dog.
When I came back to the house, my girlfriend was inside already. I gently put the dog down on the porch, went inside, and told my girlfriend what happened.
“Rodney is gonna kill us,” she said.
We both looked at Brooklyn, silently agreeing that we were glad it wasn’t our dog that died.
When Rodney came to pick up his dog, I sat him down, told him what happened, and took him to the porch where Roadie’s body was. He was in hysterics. He began to yell at me and accuse me and my girlfriend of being bad friends. Rodney took his dog with him when he left, thank God.
That night was spent in silence. Both my girlfriend and I were feeling extremely guilty for what had happened to Roadie. I just couldn’t figure out what had happened. I had always left them alone. It was never a big deal.
Soon after, my girlfriend told me that Rodney was having some type of small service for his dog. I thought it was kinda weird, but she and I went anyway, considering what happened.
While we were there, Rodney kept going on and on about how “that thing” killed his dog. Across the room, he would send my girlfriend and me sharp and cold glances every time he raved about “that thing”. He couldn’t possibly think Brooklyn did it, I thought. No way.
Feeling uncomfortable, my girlfriend and I said our goodbyes and left.
In the days following I noticed that Brooklynn was acting weird. I knew she must miss her friend. I was feeling similar, as Rodney and I had not been talking anymore. My girlfriend told me she was going to apologize to Rodney.
“About what?” I asked her.
“I want to tell him I’m sorry that Brooklyn killed his dog,” she said. “Maybe if we had been watching better…”
This broke out into a huge argument as I did not know why she would ever think our dog was capable of doing anything like that.
After that argument, tensions were high between her and I. What’s worse is that Brooklyn was still acting odd. I tried to put her out to use the bathroom and I could swear she furrowed her brows out at me. I don’t know why, but Brooklyn had started to bury her shits as I could not find any when I went to clean the yard.
One day, when she and I were playing outside. She had started for the woods. Brooklyn was always a fast dog, but now she was completely uncatchable. I didn’t know where any of this was coming from. When I finally did catch up to her to get her out of the woods, she just looked up at me with this cold, lifeless gaze.
I know that Brooklyn was missing her friend. I hated that I couldn’t explain what happened to Roadie to her. I hated that I didn’t even know in the first place. I hated that I had gone inside when I did.
A few days later was when the bubble of tensions between my girlfriend and I finally popped.
We were sitting in the living room, just existing in each other’s company, when Brooklyn came into the room from the hallway. She positioned herself in front of both of us, and her eyes began darting back and forth between my girlfriend and me. This, like every other weird new trait that Brooklyn had adopted, left me very unsettled. It just didn’t look right, it looked too human. Shaking it off, I tried to see the positive side in this; this was the first time in days that things had seemed normal.
My momentary relaxation was cut short, though, because I began to catch my girlfriend shooting glances at my dog. These piercing daggers were thrown with hatred at an animal that we were so fond of. I began to see my girlfriend breathing heavier as if she was amping herself up with internal dialogue. Finally, she snapped her head at me. The bubble popped
“How can you just fucking sit there and be comfortable with that thing just staring at us?” She yelled.
I jumped, startled due to the sudden change in volume. Brooklyn stood indifferent, now focusing her attention on my girlfriend.
“I don’t understand what you mean. Why are you yelling? She’s just sitting there.” I fired back in defense.
“Do I need to state the obvious? Again? She killed that fucking dog! That thing killed Roadie!”
I think it was the fact that she called Brooklyn “that thing”. Or maybe it was just the fact that I didn’t like her yelling at me like that. Either way, I lost it.
“You sound just like Rodney! He has no idea what he’s talking about! How could Brooklyn have done something like that?”
“What else could have done it?”
“Any other animal in the woods! Why would Brooklyn just suddenly get violent like that?”
My girlfriend calmed down for a bit. She heaved a sigh and looked at me.
“Just apologize to Rodney,” she said. “Enough of this. I want my friend back. Please.”
“I did apologize already. I will not apologize for something our dog didn’t do.”
My girlfriend made an aggravated, strangled sound. She rose to her feet, looming over me.
“Why won’t you just apologize? It isn’t as if Rodney is saying you killed his dog. Enough already!”
“No,” I said quietly. “I’m not apologizing.”
“I’ve had enough of this! I’m staying at my mother’s!”
At this point, I really didn’t care. I looked at Brooklyn, who was still sitting there by our feet. It enraged me to think my girlfriend could think that Brooklyn would do something so awful.
I stayed seated as my girlfriend grabbed something to leave. She took a small bag and once again asked me to apologize to Rodney. I declined. She stormed off.
It was thundering like crazy that night. I could tell Brooklyn had to use the bathroom but she refused to go outside. I figured she was just really nervous, so I set up some paper towels on the ground for her to go and went to bed, figuring I could just clean it in the morning.
A little while later, the loud thundering jolted me awake. I left to use the bathroom but first checked the floor in the kitchen to see if Brooklyn went to the bathroom. I didn’t see anything or smell anything from anywhere else.
When I tried to use the bathroom on the first floor, I noticed that the bulb was out. So, I instead went up the second-floor bathroom, which I almost never use as my bedroom is on the first floor.
As I walked up the stairs, I could not have prepared myself for what my gaze fell upon. Weirdly, the light was already on. I didn’t think much of it. As I said, I never used it so someone probably just forgot to turn it off.
I took the knob into my hand, and open the door. The door whined as it opened slowly. There, sitting completely upright, was Brooklyn. She was holding a newspaper in both hands the way a human would and it appeared she was using the toilet the way a human would.
Any scream or shout was stuck in my throat. I couldn’t make a noise.
To my horror, Brooklyn noticed I was there. She lowered her newspaper and turned her head slowly, so slowly, towards me. She opened her mouth and in perfect English said the words:
“No one’s going to believe you.”