Dog Gone

Anna Rollins

Word Count 692

The day after my husband left, the dog dug out. She was known for her escapes. I’d tried to keep watch from the back kitchen window. One eye on the baby, one eye on the toddler, one eye on the dog. There wasn’t enough of me to keep us all safe at home.

It was unseasonably warm, ground thawed with daffodils poking from the earth. The type of spring day that could give you hope. Or make you manic.

“If you love me, you’ll let me get a dog,” my husband said years before. I didn’t want a dog. I wanted a baby. But each month, my period kept arriving. So, I nodded my head, and said “yes” to the dog.

At first, she was so easy to hold. She fit in the palm of my hand. Months passed. The dog grew. She ate shoes, books, a pair of my underwear. Eventually, her appetites turned to the outdoors. She found all the weaknesses in our back fence.

Years later, we had a baby. Now another. And the dog? We could hardly contain her. We patched holes, dug wire into the soil. We bought expensive accessories I found buried under shrubbery.

I looked out the back window, past the line of pill bottles, prenatal vitamins, blood pressure medication, Seroquel, lithium. I searched for black and white amongst the violets and green grass. Then the hole in the back corner, a pile of freshly dug brown dirt.

“That damn dog,” I growled.

“That damn dog,” my toddler repeated.

I swallowed some pills and strapped the baby into the portable car seat.

Eleven days old, the baby hated motion. Solid ground, a firm mattress – yes. But not a moving vehicle.

We drove slowly through our tree-lined neighborhood, windows of the SUV down.

“I saw your dog,” a neighbor called. “Y’all can’t seem to keep her fenced in, can you?”

I can’t keep anyone, I wanted to reply. “Which way did she go?” I said instead. He pointed toward the trees.

The baby’s whining grew louder. “Everybody leaves me, everybody leaves me,” I sang to the tune of “Ring Around the Rosie” to drown out the cries.

“Everybody leaves you, everybody leaves you,” my toddler sang in response.

“Where’s Daddy?” my toddler asked after a pause. “I miss Daddy.”

“Daddy’s on a trip,” I said.

“No. He’s not.”

“He’s not?”

“He’s in the host-el. You told Mimi on the phone that he’s in the host-el.”

“The hospital.”

“Yeah -- the host-el.”

I paused. “Yes. Daddy’s on a trip to the hospital.”

“Oh.” He blinked his eyes a few times, tugged on the sleeve of his shirt. “When will he be back?”

“I don’t know, bud. Soon.”

“How soon?”

“Hopefully soon.”

“I miss him. I like Daddy more than I like you.”

 A flash of black and white darted across the road. “Look!” I yelled. “There she is. Come here, Addie!”

But rather than turning toward my voice, she ran in the opposite direction. I placed my foot to the pedal and pressed the gas hard. She continued to run, faster, no longer in the road, now in a neighbor’s lawn, brushing past bushes, trampling newly bloomed tulips. I slammed on the breaks and shifted to park. The baby began to scream. I looked around for traffic or neighbors, anyone, but it was a quiet Sunday morning. Everyone at church.

“Just a minute,” I said to my toddler, hopping out of the car and slamming the door. The ground was damp, the fabric of my shoes soaked. The dog was sniffing at deer droppings.

I sprinted toward her. I will get you, you bitch! I felt my bladder dropping, a bulge in my vagina, and I ran faster, blood on my sweatpants now. I dove at her, catching the flesh of her neck with one hand.

“Gotcha!” I yelled as I moved to hold tight to her collar.

An elderly woman stood at the corner, glancing at me, then to the car, to the muffled screams of my baby.

“Good morning,” I called.

“Beautiful day!” she said.

“Oh yes. Perfect day to get out of the house.”

Anna is a writer living in Huntington, WV with her husband and children. She teaches English and directs the Writing Center at Marshall University. Her work has appeared in The New York Times, Slate, Salon, Electric Literature, Joyland, and in other outlets. Her forthcoming memoir, Famished, explores the intersection of purity culture and diet culture. Follow her on Instagram or Substack @annajrollins