I’ll never forget the day I brought Hades home from the shelter. He was a rescued mill puppy. Specifically, a purebred Labrador.
I taught him a whole lot, such as making sure not to piss inside the house and to keep the excreting outside. I also taught the little guy how to play fetch, using a snowball because I did not want to lose all my tennis balls after he’d mauled most of them. Every time, he would gather all the snow in the area and bring it back.
What has been happening to me today, I’ll never forget.
This morning, Hades made me feed him and then as I was getting out to go to work at the office, he kept pleading with me to let him come with me with those eyes.
I kept remembering something about the shelter guy saying he wasn’t really a dog. Then again, the guy caring for all those dogs at the shelter was a total crackpot.
I always lived minimal, knowing that having too many things was a bad idea. Now that I have Hades, I’m kind of glad for my lifestyle.
At work, one of the coworkers spread a rumor that I’d brought home a strange dog. Gossip spreads fast in the accounting department. It took about 3 seconds for the entire office building to hear about me and Hades.
One of my coworkers whispered into my ear while I was typing some shit down,
“Les, why’d you bring home that dog everybody’s been avoiding from the Little Hills Animal Shelter?”
I whispered back to her,
“I don’t know, I just needed a companion.”
“Look, Les, I wanted that dog, too, but the man at the shelter…”
“Just a fucking drunk, Grace! Drunk if he thinks the lab isn’t a dog!”
“The police have checked him after being called to him for saying it about him. He’s completely sober, and every time they check him, he’s completely sober.”
“Well then, he’s schizo or something!”
“Psychologists have said he is completely normal!”
“He just fakes being normal, that’s what he does! Maybe he’s too good at lying for his own good!”
… … …
After work, I finally decided I had to take Hades to the vet to prove he was indeed a dog once and for all. I made an appointment, and then I told the vet that Hades needed a physical.
This wasn’t unusual for the vet to have pets taken in for physicals. But in the waiting room, people looked at each other, then at me, wide-eyed like I was acting drunk.
When my turn finally came, I went in, and the vet looked at me like I was crazy.
Eventually, once the results of the physical came back, I was completely shocked.
The heartbeat came back unreadable. The blood flow was faster than normal. The brain was larger than any dog’s was. There was no blood pressure.
Hades then broke out of his kennel and growled angrily at the vets. He then spoke like a human in a voice that sounded like Vincent Price’s,
“So I’m busted, huh?! C’mon, gimme some! I’m not afraid of your euthanizers!”
Hades then shapeshifted into something more bipedal. His head still remained like that of the Labrador, but his teeth were a whole lot sharper.
He went wild on the others and I couldn’t bear to see what was going on. Right as one of his claws was about to slash me, I blocked it and hit him on the head.
He didn’t appear fazed by it, but acted seriously hurt.
“Les, how could you?”
“I-I-I’m sorry… I was in fight-or-flight mode… the oldest human instinct. I love you, Hades. I really do. I didn’t meant to, I didn’t think before…”
“Huh. I should have expected to hear that excuse.”
After the whole thing, he came back to me as the Labrador he is.
The fact that he still behaves as if he loves me might be Hades showing mercy to me for being his caretaker. I’m glad I can record this on my cellphone and hopefully what happened doesn’t come back to haunt me…