We didn’t have a lot when I was a little girl. My mother and father married young and had me when they were eighteen. My brother followed eleven months later. Dad went into the Marines right after high school and Mom worked as a receptionist at a massage parlor. We lived with my great grandmother in her home, a small two story house with a yard that seemed huge in comparison to that of our neighbors.
Both my brother and I had health problems in our earlier years, so most of the money that mom and Dad made went towards medical bills.
My eardrums ruptured when I was a few months old and I had to have tubes put in. There was a good span of time that mom was worried that I was going to end up deaf. She took sign language classes so that if the worst came to pass she would still be able to teach me to communicate. I was constantly suffering from ear infections. I hit two and stopped growing. There were trips to specialists, tests and bloodwork, until I hit four and shot up.
James, my brother, had a hyperactive gag reflex that could be triggered by eating too quickly and was learning disabled. He broke all his front baby teeth with one of those lollipops on a spinning base, and had to go to the dentist to have them pulled.
We didn’t have a lot when I was a little girl, so when Dad bought me a puppy it was a really big deal. I was five then and she was perfect in every way- Dad had made sure of it. Toto was a pure breed Maltese, bred from a line of show dogs. She already had her shots, and had been checked by a vet. Mom gave Dad a long stare when he told her she had cost him one thousand two hundred dollars, but melted and relented when he placed her in my arms and my eyes lit up.
She was perfect, all fluffy white fur and a black nose. I was in love the moment I laid eyes on her and, judging by the kisses she planted on my face, she felt the same way. I named her Toto, after the dog in The Wizard of Oz, and from that moment on she was my constant companion. Mom’s initial worries proved to be false. Despite my young age I took care of my dog. I fed her, bathed her, took her outside to play, and brushed her every night before bed.
I remember getting a really bad ear infection a few months after we got Toto. I was prescribed drops to help with the pain, but the air hurt so bad that mom had to hold me down to give them to me. The whole time Toto sat beside me on the pillows and licked the tears from my cheeks. It hurt worse than anything had ever hurt before, but Toto cried with me the whole time.
I used to sit on the floor beside her food bowl and feed her choice bits from my own plate. Mom had given me a list of things that she was not allowed to have, so she never got sick, and we dewormed her every month. If my dog wanted to share a cup with me I let her. If she kissed me I let her, giggling the whole time. I would put my baby dresses on her and carry her around swaddled in a blanket. I loved my dog.
Every day we would go play together in the yard. James would sit on the old play set that grandma had bought us, or play with a toy truck in the dirt. He always was introverted, a quiet one. He could sit and watch paint dry, pardon the cliché, with a look of utter contentment on his face. The only time he got in trouble was when I goaded him into it. I had a little trampoline in the front yard, the type that are used during aerobics classes that I would bounce up and down on. Toto would run around the trampoline while I jumped around, her tail wagging happily. Sometimes I would sit in the lilac bushes that grew under our front window and play peek-a-boo with her. Our yard wasn’t fenced in, but Toto never left my sight, and mom or grandma always watched us from the front window. Even if Toto was just going out to use the bathroom I would follow her. We were never separated…
Until I started kindergarten at six. The first day Mom had to hold Toto as I got on the bus, sobbing the whole time. I was scared, so very very scared, and I already missed my dog. School was okay, but I didn’t like my teacher, and I was always eager for it to be time to go home. A month or so in there was a presentation about stranger danger. The information was nothing new to me, but I enjoyed the video they showed, and the coloring sheets that they passed out. They had pictures of a cartoon dog that I gave brown eyes and a black nose.
I learned my alphabet, and how to count higher than I had ever counted before, and how to spell simple words. I already knew my colors, and how to spell my name. I played with the other children. Mostly though, I waited. James was in a pre-k program that gave him speech therapy and prepared him for kindergarten, so Toto was alone with Grandma for half the day. She spoiled her as much as I did though, so I didn’t mind. Grandma was a good babysitter.
Still, the most anticipated time of the day was the moment that I stepped off of the bus, and Grandma let her out the front door. She would let a little yip loose and run right to me. I would pick her up and she would turn in circles in my arm before licking my face raw. Once the bus drove off we would run around the front yard, her chasing sticks and me doing cartwheels, all while my Grandma watched from the front window. As long as I was home we were together.
Mom sent pictures of us to dad on base. Whenever he called James would babble, his speech stilted by his missing teeth, about the adventures his toys were involved in. I made him talk to Toto after he talked to me. He listened patiently to all of us.
“I told you.” He would tell my mother. “Hasn’t she been so much happier and calmer since I got her the dog?” It was the truth. I got into a lot less trouble with her around. I hadn’t put pop tarts in the VCR, or convinced James to flush all the paper towels down the toilet, or anything since he gave her to me. I didn’t bite, or kick, or scream when I needed eardrops in. I had fewer nightmares and slept deeper.
“You did good, Erik.” It was always weird when Mom used Dad’s name, but it made me smile. They really loved one another, loved us.
It wasn’t long after I started Kindergarten that I got the worse ear infection I had ever had, on top of the flu. My fever spiked at one hundred and three degrees and Mom brought me to the hospital. They gave me ear drops, again, and a bottle of penicillin. The first dose, there at the hospital, caused me to break out in hives and throw up violently. We spent the night there, my body shaking and shivering, but I was well enough the next day to go home, with a different antibiotic. Still, I was feverish and glassy eyed. Mom tucked me under a thick quilt and sat Toto beside me. I remember shadows dancing in front of my eyes and sweating through my clothes. When mom came to get her, to bring her outside, I stood up to go out too but ended up stumbling to the floor.
The carpet seemed like it was moving under my hands and knees but I was determined to go out. Mom helped me get back in bed, covered my forehead with a damp wash cloth, and took my dog. It was afternoon and the school bus had already dropped off all of the other kids on our street.
“Shh, it’s okay sweetie. We’ll be right back.” My mom whispered. Toto had never gone outside without me when I was home. I nodded my head and fell asleep, exhausted from just getting out of bed.
They weren’t.
Mom took Toto out via the front porch. It was on the left side of the house, by the swings. She sat her down and my baby ran over to the lilac bushes. Mom could just see her as she pranced around, looking for a place to go. She squatted down in the grass. The next thing Mom knew a van was peeling down the road. It braked suddenly and a man in a stocking cap jumped out, and rushed the bushes. He rustled around the area for a few seconds before Mom yelled at the top of her lungs. He noticed her for the first time, grabbed my dog, and ran back to the van with her in his arms. It speed off, tires shrieking. Mom didn’t even manage to get the license plate number.
She called the police but with nothing more than a general description of the van and the thief there was nothing that they could do. They talked to our neighbors but came up with no leads. This was told to me all through tears, me staring at her as if she was a monster. It was hard on her, explaining that someone had taken Toto from me. I cried until my face was red and I was gasping for air, terrified that they were hurting her, that I was going to hear on the news that they had found her dead body. It was three days after my trip to the hospital and my fever was gone. I felt worse than I had in my entire life.
“Sweetie, people don’t kidnap dogs to kill them,” She said stroking my hair. “They must have thought she was a stray. I bet that she’s being taken good care of.” Her lap was warm but it didn’t matter to me. My Grandma made me my favorite cookies, but I refused to eat them. James tried giving me his favorite truck, but I just sat there beside her food bowl and cried. I went to school and came home. I stopped playing outside. Dad called and listened to me crying for half an hour before suggesting to Mom that maybe we could get a new dog. That suggestion did not sit well with me. I screamed myself hoarse. I loved my dog, I didn’t want another.
If the story ended here I wouldn’t be telling you about it. It would be just another tale of a girl losing her dog. Sad, but not terrifying. Maybe if it had ended there, I could have gotten over this. Instead, I am still obsessing over this, even though I am twenty three years old and this happened when I was six.
I never really ‘got over’ Toto being taken. I kept a little picture of her on my desk at school.
“Monsters took my baby,” I would whisper whenever anyone asked what was wrong. I told my teachers and classmates, the school therapist, anyone who would listen that she had been taken by monsters. I scared the other children but I didn’t know another word to describe the men that had taken her. Who else but a monster would have taken my best friend?
The little pink porcelain bowls that she had eaten and drank from were empty, but still on the floor. Moving them was too much of a reminder that she was gone so they just sat there, waiting for her like me. I started dragging James around the house. He sat next to me while I did my puzzles, or watched television. Mom drew the line at me putting him in my old dresses though. We didn’t go outside. I loved James, but he was my brother, not my dog. It wasn’t the same.
Recess at school was no longer as fun as it once was. We had this wooden playground with all these little hiding places. It was shaped like a castle. When I had first started school my favorite thing to do was wiggle into those secret places, like the platform under the draw bridge. I would make noises to startle the other kids, and the teacher’s aide always had the hardest time finding me.
My depression made me a miserable companion. I didn’t want to play. I would go to the big tire swing, made out of a tractor tire suspended by three chains, and mold myself into the opening in the tire. Everyone knew that I was there. The other kids would sit and swing on it, their feet careful not to hit me, and I would let the movement lull me into a relaxed state. Sometimes they would stay all recess, just swinging around. Other times, they would be over at the monkey bars, or the carriage, or high in the castle. I never moved from the swings by the hill, not until one of the teachers or staff came to get me.
It was a warm blue sky day, a month since Toto had been kidnapped, when it happened.
“Nicole? Nicole Nicholas?” I heard my name spoken by a deep voice. I figured I had fallen asleep at some point, because it didn’t feel like recess should be over yet. I carefully extracted myself from my hiding place only to come face to face with a man I didn’t know. I was getting ready to scream for a teacher when he said something that stopped me in my tracks. “I found your dog, Toto? She’s with my friend in our van, if you want to come get her.”
It was like the first breath of spring after a particularly long winter. I brightened instantly.
“She’s okay?” I asked looking up at him. He had a scruffy beard and dark hair, and a smile on his face.
“Yes, she’s okay. I’m sorry we took her, we thought she was a stray or had gotten out of someone’s house. By the time we had noticed her tags we couldn’t find our way back to your house, so we went looking for you. She’s missed you just as much as you’ve missed her, I think.” He offered me his hand and I took it as we began to walk down the hill and towards the road. I nodded my head, because his explanation was similar to the one my Mom had given me. I could hear the other kids far behind me, in the front part of the castle where all of the teachers sat and talked while we played. They didn’t matter. Toto was coming home.
At the bottom of the hill there was an old dirt road that cut through the forest. It was pot hole ridden and uneven, so most people didn’t drive on it. The black van was parked there with its back door ajar. It felt like it took forever to reach it. When we were ten feet away the man let go of my hand.
She was there, a leash latched on her harness, and tied to the door handle on the other side of the van. Someone had tied a pink ribbon in a bow around her neck. The moment she saw me she made the same high pitched yip that she had made every time I got off of the bus. Her white paws skittered across the floor of the van but the leash kept her in place.
“Go ahead and grab her. We just didn’t want her to get loose.” He encouraged. I took slow, careful, steps terrified that I was going to wake up and find out that I was dreaming. I was so close to Toto. All I had to do was take a few more steps and then I could crawl into the van and untie her.
The next thing I knew someone had grabbed me under the arms and yanked me back. The man swore, jumped into the van, and took off. A cloud of dust trailed behind them leaving me, dangling from my armpits, sobbing. I had lost her, again. Once they were out of sight I was carried back to the playground before I was placed back on solid ground.
“Are you okay? Did they hurt you?” The teacher’s aide for the classroom beside ours asked me. It was her who had grabbed me before I could get in the van.
The police were called first, and then my mother. They didn’t get anything meaningful out of me, just the words ‘my dog’ over and over again like a mantra. The aide had gotten the license plate number though, and a description of both the van and the man who had walked me down the hill.
“It was a black Dodge van, a Ram, I think.” She told the officers. At that description, my mother lost all color in her face. I didn’t understand why at the time. They never found the men in the black van. The license plate was from a car that had been stolen two towns over.
I never saw my dog again.
I still think about what could have happened after that. Did they hurt her, my baby with her big eyes and soft fur, out of anger? Or did they keep her, that pink bow on her collar, and use her to lure in another little girl? I didn’t understand back then, what had almost happened to me. But now…now I just keep imagining another child, her hair in ribbons, her eyes wide with fear while Toto made that little whimpering noise in the back of her throat. Trying to comfort a child that she had unintentionally lured into harm.
I loved my dog. Whatever happened after they sped away in that black van, it wasn’t her fault.
The monsters didn’t want my dog.
The monsters wanted me.
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Credits to: photofreecreepypasta
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