Short Stories

Behind The Doghouse

I whistled back to the howling of the dog hounds, which bounced off the walls. The echoes filled the room, the one after that, and the one before it. I did this per routine to alert my companions that it was time to feast. Their supper consisted of vulgar, sylphlike hunks of unprocessed and meaty rations. They were allotted a sort of sludgy grub from the nitty-gritty bottom-of-the-barrel leftovers that Mother had stewed up the night prior. I did not feel the need to grant it on a silver platter considering they would have wolfed it down regardless. Utensils were getting scarcer and I was working to conserve the supplies for as long as possible. Their supper made a wet thunk as it hit the ground. My fingernails had been chewed off to the nail bed, which I took note of as I meagerly wrapped them around the red meat. The flesh felt too fatty to chew, which left me wondering how the canines did it so ravenously. Perhaps I would have been more efficient had it been cooked first, but my resources didn't authorize that type of diet. This diet left me feeling sluggish and lethargic, but I was accustomed to it. I did find myself slightly bothered as to how it left my palms stained a faint reddish hue, though.
One who was unfamiliar with the doghouse would imagine that the space were quieter when the mongrels weren't yapping for something to eat, but I much preferred the sound that the animals made. It was far less unsettling than the subtle breathing of something crawling behind the walls. It was as if it were a living organism. One of which I could hear the workings of every organ functioning internally. I'd put a few holes in the wall but fell short when all I found was insulation and deceased insects. As maddening as it was, I'd come to the conclusion that it was all in my head. The origins of my tendency to hallucinate seemed to lead back to the sacred grounds that this death trap of a home was built on.
It was built by a healer and a preacher in the 1900s with a name that I couldn't really pronounce. He had lived there for a short while with his stranger of a wife, a good man, a mouse, and a painter. He vowed to keep the doghouse neat until his inevitable demise but retracted his promise for an unknown reason. Many rumors had spread that he'd fallen in love with Satan's spawn and gifted her free will over the property, while others gossiped that he had gone a bit off the deep end. Perhaps the residence was truly just cursed. That was precisely the sole purpose as to why I have been plotting my escape since last May.
I would set out at 7:40 PM, rallying the rest of the mutts with me and silencing the rowdy ones with muzzles, beckoning the lot of them. It was undisputed that we would all have to avoid Mother as if she contracted the plague. I was dead set on vacating before midnight to ensure that there was no trouble with the dwelling. I packed a slab of assumed-to-be carcinogenic meat for the pack to ration. It had contaminated my sack with congealed, coagulated blood, but I paid no mind to the potent odor radiating from it. I lifted my feet alongside the pitter-patter in an attempt to minimize the sound so as not to wake Mother. We made good ground and I thought that I could've made a career out of dog walking.
It was like a maze. I would often find myself entering through a door and looking down to see the tile of the room I'd just left. It was found riddled with dirty footprints of paws and a man's shoes that had already passed mere minutes ago. The house itself was filthy. The bathrooms were contaminated with black mold and pink fuzz along the rim of the plaster walls. The kitchens were filthier each time I went inside to take a peek. An offensive odor radiated from the sink, and the trash can hadn't been taken out in months. I wasn't permitted by Mother to touch things in the kitchen. The carpets were a musty brown, but I was certain that they'd been white before we came here. The couch had ugly holes in the arms of it that revealed rotting wood underneath, but I knew i wasn't allowed to touch it unless I'd cleaned myself with bleach and Clorox. The small box TV in the bedroom was a privilege. The remote oftentimes messed up the settings which rendered it unusable, but I found that I had a few DVD discs that I could enjoy. I'd even decorated the box with a pretty paper flower from my youth.
My stressors were increasing and my panic levels rose as the time drifted closer to midnight. It felt as though I was walking in circles and Mother was undoubtedly searching. 11:53 the wall clock ticked incessantly as if it were laughing at my failure. Why was there no exit? Tick, tick, tick. 11:56 the clock mocked me. Wait, wasn't that the clock I just passed? My stress began to settle into the dogs that I carried by my side. Ruff, ruff, ruff! I was wasting time by putting muzzles on the rowdy ones, but I couldn't risk the ruckus. Tick, tick, tick. What time is it? 11:59. Tick, tick tick. I watched as the hand turned one last time.
          I froze at the deadened silence that filled the entrance. Their ruckus slowed into soft whimpers. Their tall and brash stature cowered into meager ones as their paws dug themselves into the tile. Not a single sound. Not from the dogs. Not from the clock. Nothing but the labored and fatigued breathing that I noted was exiting through my mouth instead of my nostrils.
"... Mom?" I broke the emptiness of the room with my voice, but it didn't sound like me. I got a response with a distant, blood-curdling screech. My legs began to move before my brain told them to. All of the signals in my head screamed at me "Run." Run. Run. I tugged on the dozen leashes wrapped around my sweaty palms. Red flags strung across the inside of my skull, the dogs bolting alongside in terror. The wails quickly grew closer behind me, the sound piercing through my eardrums like an explosion. Don't look back. Don't look back.
          I tilted my head to the right and shifted my eyes to the now unfamiliar doorway behind me. I struggled to catch my breath. My heartbeat could be felt in my chest as I watched the scrambling legs peer through the entryway. Bony arms and lanky fingers clasped onto the edges of the frame. The wood began to quickly rot upon being touched. Her toes scrambled back and forth to catch herself from sliding on the slick tile flooring. The floor began to crack under her feet as she snarled with her teeth, riddled with cavities and plaque. Her eyes were bloodshot and puffy. She had what I imagined was wine spilled on her blouse, staring back at me through matted and mangled strands of hair.
           Through the collective tapping of our feet, I could hear the breathing and rumbling of the house. The floor began to warp and cave in. The rooms began to feel smaller as the walls gravitated towards Mother, cracking and overflowing. It was like something was trying to escape. The furniture would slide in front of the entryways that I had planned to run through, forcing me to use a different door. The ceilings began to fall inwards and the light fixtures started to explode as Mother ran underneath them. The floor collapsed behind her as she passed by. She would slam open the shut doors, but they would simply fall off of the hinges the moment she touched them. Wait, why are they closed? Is that not the door I just passed through? I began to watch and saw the door slam shut behind me, just moments before Mother passed through. She seemed as though she was getting irritated. I looked ahead to see a long hallway. At the end of it was a door and a bright red sign that read "exit." It didn't make sense but it did. The light fixtures. The floors. The doorways. The house was helping us escape. The floor under my feet warped upwards, pushing me closer. I pushed through the door with my forearms, stumbling outside and tugging the dogs along with me. Mother screeched and flailed her arms behind us. I watched in terror as the door shut in her face.
          Forest green strands prickled at my old, worn feet. I crumpled to the ground, my hands digging into the grainy earth as blades of grass weaved through the nooks in between my fingers. I could hear nothing but birds chirping in the distance and my shaky, hitched breaths. The dogs were finally calm. The stars in the sky were few and dull, but I thought that they were pretty. I listened in to a faint whistle in the distance and whipped my head around.
"Hello?" I ran and wrapped my hands around the cold metal bars that surrounded the property.
"Hello? Where are you?" What I imagined to be an old man's voice could be heard from afar.
"Behind the doghouse! I'm behind the doghouse!" I chanted as a stern face crept out from the shadows behind the fence.
"Ah... so I see you met the doghouse, too?"