Anomalies (re-write)

Chapter 1

All of this weird hysterically psychedelic stuff started because a random dog came into my life. I blame it on the dog, and my best friend Avery, who I started to reconsider if she was even a friend in the first place after all that happened. Avery had a tendency to be too nonchalant. She could play off a math final by just chilling at home, causing her to be held back by a year. Yes, that happened I'm sad to say. Still, she was lucky. Her parents owned a small no-kill animal shelter, and they often needed help with fostering and dog care. Avery had been pestering me for months to take in a dog “temporarily” so we could help with their little no-profit business. I gave in eventually, for no reason really. I didn’t really realize how much work it was to take care of a dog until Avery had dropped off the dog in her dad’s pickup truck and then ghosted me for the whole day. I had sat the big goofy-looking slobbery dog in our living room next to my little sister Cay. I stood up on top of a table. “We are gathered here to temporarily accept this ‘thing’ into our family.” Cay pet the dog. It licked her hand. “CAY! Don’t touch it without my permission. “Bella is a good dog. I want to keep her.” I rolled my eyes. “We can’t keep a dog, Cay. The only reason I’m doing this is because Avery practically forced me to do it. There is no place for a stupid dog in this distinguished household” “You’re not Mommy!” Cay stormed away crying. I was still on the table in all of my mediocrity. I looked towards the carpet where the dog was a few moments ago. It wasn't there. I started to panic. As much as I didn’t like the dog, I knew Avery would kill me if it somehow disappeared. I searched the rest of the living room to no avail, then I headed to the kitchen. The dog was sitting on my chair. MY. CHAIR. I stormed

off towards it like I did with Cay when she was being a little disastrous child. “You gross little-” I noticed the thing in the dog’s mouth. It was an open bottle of my allergy medicine--the one that had a million different warnings on it to not take it unless it was doctor-prescribed (it was). I wanted to reach out and grab it from the dog’s mouth, but I couldn’t bring myself to do it in fear of my hand getting slobber all over it. All I could do was repeatedly say, “Don't do it. Don't do it. Don't do it.” while crossing my fingers. In ignorance of my feeble protests, the dog swallowed the whole pill bottle, along with every single pill while smiling happily and wagging its tail. I wish this dog could've gotten adopted already.

Two minutes later the dog was no longer sitting steadily on my chair. It was on the floor breathing heavily as it lay on its side. I crouched down. As much as I hated the simple existence of this weird dog, I still didn’t want it to pass away. It wouldn't be such a bad thing other than it causing Avery to sever her ties with me forever. She was a messy crier, and I didn’t want to feel pity for her because of something I did. I took my phone out of my pocket and called her. Unfortunately, she didn't pick up after I rang her eight times and sent her a few frantic text messages. Why did she have to ghost me now? As far as I know, this dog was on its deathbed because I may have forgotten to seal the lid on my pills. I have no responsibility over this dog, I decided. I took a step away from it. It stopped breathing. My heart pulsed. I peered into its lifeless eyes. Yep, it was dead. It’s not like I could've done anything to prevent it.

“What happened to Bella?” Cay cried, entering the kitchen. I put my hands up. “I had nothing to do with this.”

“Liar!”

“I swear. Everything is fine now. We can just get rid of it”

“Bella! Wake up! Please wake up…”

I just stood there, watching as Cay cried over the corpse of the dog we had only gotten an hour ago.

The rest of the day was somehow more chaotic than the first part. As a respectful individual of our fine society, I couldn’t bring myself to pick up a dead dog, so I made Cay do it. She was scowling at me the whole time she dragged the dog across the floor to my car, leaving dots of her tears on the ground. I tossed her an old towel to wrap the dog in, and together we heaved it into the trunk of the car.

“Shouldn’t we tell Mommy… or Avery?” she whimpered.

“Maybe… But we can take care of it. I’ll tell Avery whenever she stops ignoring me, and the dog will be long gone at that point so there’s no use in her making a fuss about it.”

TBC