He won't come inside.

I got a puppy a few weeks ago. Cute little guy, yellow lab. It’s the middle of the summer too, so I set up a doghouse and a plastic pool in the backyard for him to play in while it’s still hot outside.

The problem is, he refuses to come inside the house.

I haven’t lived here too long, I moved into town only a few months ago after graduating from college. It’s small, but after getting a relatively steady job that actually puts my English degree to good use, I don’t care that I it’s in the middle of nowhere. The house is nice too, tiny, but fine for living on my own.

So I decided to get a little friend to keep my company. I’ve never slept well; I get nightmares easily, and figured that having another living thing would be a lot better than trying to sleep alone. So I took the puppy home, named him Charlie, and thought everything would go smoothly.

But he started growling as soon as we walked in the door. He was yelping and struggling, so I let him loose in the garden. He ran to the corner of the fence and trembled for a while, but after playing ball for a bit, he was back to his old self.

I figured he ought to just get used to the place, so I left him in the yard. My initial thoughts were that he just needed to settle down. He was young, after all, and I guess I believed he was just out of his element.

As soon as I went back inside, he began barking, as if begging me to come out. I was stunned. He was perfectly behaved when I got him, I had no idea what could have triggered that behavior. Of course, I disregarded it yet again as nerves, and eventually went inside on my own, leaving my door open in case he decided to come back in on his own.

He never did.

Nighttime around here gets chilly, even though it’s the middle of summer. So even though I had a hard time with it, I brought Charlie inside and kept him in my room that night. He stood rigid, staring at the door to the living room, as if waiting for something.

This continued for the next few days. I work from home, so I was able to watch over him during the day. He would stay in the garden all the time, only coming in if I forced him to. There are two doors to my backyard, one connects directly to my room, and another to the living room. I can only bring him in via the door to my bedroom, because if I try to take him in through the living room, he goes berserk.

I was getting worried for Charlie’s sake after the fourth night. He woke me with sudden barking around two in the morning. I slept with him on my bed, and when I awoke, he was growling and snarling at the door to my garden. I tried to quiet down the fuss, because my neighbors had complained before about his attitude. I was beginning to reconsider adopting him at this point, for both his sake and mine.

I headed to the garden door to see if there was a squirrel or cat, or something that was agitating him, when I saw a dark shadow moving on the stoop. Whatever it was, the creature was big, about the size of Charlie. Shaking slightly, I flipped the switch to the backyard light.

I felt a bit silly; it was just a raccoon. My body relaxed as the fear left me. That was probably what had been spooking Charlie all week, there must be raccoons living under the house. I turned back to look at Charlie. He had stopped barking and whimpering, staring straight outside. Cautiously, I opened the door and nudged the raccoon with my foot. No response I kicked it softly, and it rolled over, limp.

I nearly gagged. The creature was still alive, but its breathing was labored due to the amount of blood in its mouth. The left side of its jaw was unhinged and cracked, and I could hear it wheezing. One eye on the side of its face was glassy, unfocused, and partially out of its socket.

What shocked me the most was the stomach. The intestines spilled out, and large chunks had been taken out, like a larger animal had eaten it and had been interrupted.

Charlie began barking again. Frantically, I slammed the door shut and locked it. Trying to calm him down, I climbed on the bed and held his muzzle while stroking him and holding him close. After a minute or two, he calmed down.

Then I heard it: labored, raspy breathing, right outside my bedroom door. Holding Charlie close, I held my breath in fear. I could feel tears prickling the insides of my eyes.

Charlie’s whimpers perked up, and after quieting him down again, I couldn’t hear anything on the outside of my door.

I was terrified. Frantically, my mind went to all sorts of possibilities, but there was one that kept flashing in my mind. There was someone in my house. There was someone in my house. There was someone in my house. I had left my cell phone on the kitchen table, and would need to go through the living room to get there.

I don’t know how long I sat on my bed in terror. Eventually I broke myself out of it and forced myself to move. I had to get out of there. I put Charlie’s leash on and picked him up, leaving through the door to my backyard. My heart was pounding in my chest, and I had to force myself to keep breathing.

As I crept towards my garden’s gate, my heart stopped for half a second. The door to my living room was wide open, and there was a man staring at me.

He didn’t look like a man, but I knew he must have been. He was gaunt, skinny, with oily black hair and ragged clothes. He was dirty, so, so dirty. There was dried blood caked on his clothes. But the one thing I cannot stop picturing is his smile. He stared at me, unmoving, and wouldn’t stop smiling. I could see fresh blood on his teeth.

I couldn’t move. My mind was screaming to run, but my knees were locked in place. I could feel blood pounding in my ears.

All of a sudden, my legs wouldn’t work and they collapsed. Charlie bolted out of my arms, snarling, and ran towards the man. I screamed and grabbed for his leash, but it slipped from my fingers.

Charlie grabbed onto the man’s leg and bit hard. The man slammed him against the wall. Charlie went limp with a yelp and I screamed.

His head snapped towards me. My body wouldn’t stop shaking. I still couldn’t stand.

He stalked towards me. I could see his eyes staring directly into mine. I can’t stip picturing his eyes, even now. They looked so hungry. I could hear his breathing, labored, raspy. He smelled like death. I saw him stroking a bulge in his pants.

I ran.

Tried to bolt past him, but he grabbed my hair and tugged me towards him. I slammed into his chest, and I felt his saliva on my neck. He grabbed one of my breasts with his bony hands. No matter how many times I’ve showered since then, I can’t stop feeling it.

I don’t know how, but I managed to hit him in the balls with one of my fists. That made him let go of me for long enough to run back into the house. I bolted the door shut and looked back into the garden, flipping the outdoor light on.

He was gone.

My blood was on fire. Slowly, I backed away from the window. It was so, so dark but I was afraid to turn the lights back on. I didn’t want him to look through the window and be able to see me. I backed into the kitchen, my eyes peeled to the backyard, and groped around for my cell phone.

“Charlie?” I frantically kept calling for him, not daring to speak louder than a whisper.

He wouldn’t answer. I couldn’t see him. My heart was pounding so hard I couldn’t make a sound.

My hand eventually found my phone. I immediately dialed 911.

“911, what’s your emergency?”

“Please come, please help me.”

“Are you in any immediate danger?”

I started crying. I couldn’t stop it, everything crashed at once, and the words spilled out. “There was a man. He was in my house. There’s so much blood. I don’t know where my dog is. In the garden- he attacked me in the garden. I locked the door-”

“We’re sending someone to you now. Are all of your doors secure?”

I fell silent.

“Ma’am, are all of your doors secured?”

“…my bedroom. I tried to escape, I don’t think I locked the door after I- oh God.”

“Ma’am, we’re about ten minutes away. Can you safely go to your room and shut your door?”

“Yes, I can try.”

The operator continued trying to comfort me as I slowly walked down my hall. The house is so small, and I was able to get to my room in less than ten steps.

My breath hitching, I opened the door. I heard crunching and the sound was sickening.

I peered around the corner. I saw the man, in the light on the porch, kneeling over something. I started panicking, my mind going blank.

Slowly, I walked towards the door. He still hadn’t noticed me. My hand was trembling, but I still managed to latch the door with a soft click.

The sound got his attention. He looked up at me, and I saw what he was eating.

It was the raccoon. At this point, tears I had been holding back began to fall down my face in silent terror.

He stood and pressed his blood-soaked hands against the window. His mouth was so red. He was still smiling. He pressed his forehead against the window. His mouth moved…

“Let me in.”

I screamed. The 911 operator said something but I couldn’t hear her. I saw the man smiling and staring. He just wouldn’t move.

I wanted Charlie. I wanted him so badly; I needed to know that he was okay.

I bolted back into the hallway. I couldn’t see through my tears but I got back into the living room. I was pressing the phone so strongly against my ear, but I couldn’t speak or respond to what the operator was saying, I was blubbering too hard to speak properly.

I know I was acting crazy, but I needed to find Charlie. I groped around the floor, praying and praying, until I felt something soft and fuzzy.

I couldn’t tell if he was breathing. I grabbed him with one hand, still clutching my phone in the other.

There was one closet inside the entire house, though I didn’t use it at all. It was the only place I thought might be safe, so I grabbed the handle and forced my way inside.

It was completely dark. I held Charlie close to my chest.

“We’re five minutes out, just try to stay calm and find someplace safe-”

I flipped on the light. The area was small, holding one rack for coat hangers. But I was terrified, and backed up against the wall.

My heartbeat began to slow down, and I looked down at Charlie. He had a small batch of blood on his head, but I could feel him breathing. I kissed him over and over again.

For the next few minutes I stood there, clutching my little Charlie like a security blanket and feeling him breathe. I still couldn’t speak, just held him in my arms.

I heard the police cruiser and managed to get out of the closet to open the front door. What happened afterwards was a blur; I was crying so hard and couldn’t think. They were able to treat Charlie for his wound and afterwards told me it wasn’t going to kill him. Hearing he would recover made me so, so happy.

Then a few days later, I was called back in. Charlie and I were staying at a co-worker’s house for a little bit – I was too scared to go back to my house. They hadn’t found the man when they rescued me, so I thought it wouldn’t be a good idea.

When I got to the station, they showed me pictures. They said they were developed from a Polaroid they found in my closet.

They were all of me.

Dating back to when I first moved in: pictures of me out of windows, in the garden, while I was asleep. I sat there, in shock.

The police told me they found a small bunk in the closet that I didn’t know existed. It is usually used for storage, but it looked to them like someone had been living there for some time. Apparently they had found a few pairs of panties that I thought had gone missing, but it barely registered with me. I couldn’t stop looking at the last picture they had developed.

It was a small Polaroid, taken from above, on the inside of the closet. It was of me, kissing Charlie while he had blood on his forehead.