One Last Walk With Frog

The dog doesn't die in this one, but it is already dead. 

Transcript

It took a long time for you to get used to your dog sleeping beside you, but not half as long as it took for you to get used to her being gone. So when you wake up in the middle of the night to a warm body beside you, you think for just a moment that it’s her. But as the world of the waking takes you out of your dream, you come back to reality. You remember quickly who you are and that you live alone. You remember that you don’t have your dog anymore to protect you. You remember everything you know about the terrible things people can do to each other, and you try to come up with a plan but you can’t. So instead you decide to lie there for just a little longer, feel the warmth next to you, and pretend that everything is fine, if only for a few minutes. You stay like that until sunrise, telling yourself you’ll do something soon. But as the room lights up and you crack your eyes open, you finally see that lying in the bed next to you is; The Podcast Inside Your House. 

In any other time period throughout recent human history, during any other week, The Phenomenon would have been front-page news. It would have had scientists scratching their heads and sparked panic the world over. But The Phenomenon started making the news alongside the news that it was quite possible that none of the news at all would matter anymore. Ever. 

I didn’t want to read that news. So instead I read and watched everything I could find about The Phenomenon, as it was most commonly called. Though there were plenty of other names too; ghost rooms, doubling, or most eerie of all ‘The Other Side.’ 

Whatever you called it, it was the same all over the world, and it was spreading fast. All at once, all over the globe, people started to notice walls crumbling in their old buildings. That seemed to be essential for the “doubling” to take place, it had to be somewhere old. The other essential element was that it had to be somewhere out of the way; closets, basements, and bathrooms. A wall would crumble in a closet, or flood in a basement, and when it fell, behind it would be a mostly empty, but exact replica of the room the wall had fallen in. Being strictly in old places, the rational side of the media was trying to explain it away. Perhaps the previous generation had built hidden rooms during the Cold War when everyone was panicking about the end. 

That theory made me jealous of our parents and grandparents, who’d only had to worry about nuclear war. 

But the message boards and YouTubers and the internet masses in general did not buy this. Those who had the time and inclination to dive beyond the apocalyptic front page anyway, which was only a small fraction of the world. The secret rooms would have carpet that matched renovations only done a few years prior. They would have wallpaper or paint that matched a selection in recent memory if not the current choice. Even children's toys or old clothes in closets would sometimes have a matching pair on the other side. I thought it was clear that whatever was happening could not be explained rationally and it was a comfort to see I wasn’t alone. Something so clearly supernatural, so out in the open gave me hope. It made me think that perhaps there was some kind of God out there. 

It made me think that perhaps he was coming to save us all. 

My apartment and all of the places my friends lived were too new to have the phenomenon anywhere I could see it in private. So, like everyone else was doing in these strange and uncertain times, we went drinking. 

We went to all of our favorite spots. Some of us had work tomorrow. None of us were planning on going. The first two bars had nothing, they weren’t old enough or haunted enough, whatever the criteria were. The third was closed down with a note that read “Thanks for everything. We had a good run.” The fourth held our prize and was packed full. 

The bartender was giving away everything for free, and drinking her fair share as well. When we walked in she poured us a round of shots and said cheerfully and drunkenly “To the end of the world!” 

The phenomenon was in the ladies bathroom at this particular bar, and we waited our turn to see it ourselves. Though everyone at the bar was drinking like it was their last night, and it very well might be, we all kept quiet as we got closer, in reverence of the strange thing before us. When the group before us walked out, a girl made the sign of the cross as a boy held the graffiti-stained door open. He wished us luck as we walked in.

The entire back wall was gone. Someone on staff had cleaned up all the debris and cut any crumbling drywall away. The transition into the other room was neat but obvious because it was still painted the cloyingly bright pink that this bar bathroom had been three years ago, before they swapped to turquoise. I’d been inside the ladies' room a handful of times, either because I was shitfaced, or to avoid a fight or flood in the men's room. I remembered reading the graffiti on the back of one of the stalls in between puking my guts out. Black Sharpie over Barbie pink, it was seared into my mind. The secret room had a bit of profanity scribbled on the walls, and a handful of band stickers, but not nearly as much as there had been before the renovations. This was not some walled-off forgotten room from the Cold War, nor was it somehow an exact replica of the old room. This was something else. 

The bathroom only had three stalls, so the ghost room was small as well, but my friends studied every inch of graffiti. The girls remarked that they swore they remembered some of it, while the other guys tried in vain to lighten the mood by reading off some of the sillier scribblings. I went up to the sink to see if the water worked. I turned the tap and heard creaking and grumbling, but nothing came out. I wiped off the grimy mirror above it with my hand and studied my reflection. I’d been wearing my old cross necklace lately, the one I’d kept around just in case. I hated how it looked on me, but given everything going on I wanted to hedge my bets. 

My friends, some of whom I’d only just met days before at other bars were growing more quiet, in awe of the mystery before us. One girl, Cindy broke the silence. I watched in the mirror as she pointed to a childlike drawing of a dog, which had an arrow pointing to it and was helpfully labeled with the word ‘dog.’

“I drew this.” Cindy said, “Five years ago, while Stevie was fixing her eyeliner.”

That was it then. The proof in my head that whatever was happening was supernatural. There was something out there, something bigger than us. 

That enraged me. 

I punched the mirror in front of me, and the tap turned on at last. As glass shards fell into the sink, the blood from my hand mixed with a fresh red waterfall of something coming from the tap. I don’t know why, but I cupped my hands under the red liquid and drank.

It tasted like blood, but it was also the sweetest thing I’d ever sipped in my life.  

I closed my eyes, taking in as much as I could, and when I opened them again I was somewhere new. Well, somewhere old I guess. 

I still had on my stained jeans, and my boots, and my hands and mouth were still red and wet. But I’d been transported somehow to the backyard of my childhood home. It was sunny and warm and looked the way it had when I was very young. The paint was still new, and the trees in the back were still small. Most unbelievable of all, waiting for me on the back steps was my childhood dog named Frog. He was a small black lab, with white socks, and he had a notch in his right ear. Though I knew it wasn’t really Frog because he was off his leash but not running around like an asshole, and because his grey beard was gone, he looked young. Most damning of all though, Frog had been dead for over a decade now. 

Then he spoke to me, and trying to be open to whatever was happening, I listened. 

“We don’t have much time.” He said. Only he didn’t open his mouth and speak, it was more like he projected his thoughts straight to me. “I need to get you ready for what’s to come.” He walked over to me, and he moved as Frog had, but more purposefully, older somehow despite his youthful form. 

“Walk with me,” he said. We both knew the route. 

It was back towards the old grey shed first, where Frog used to pee on the vines that climbed the sides or look for bees to eat in the summer. But the bee hive was gone, in fact, I saw only a few insects buzzing around this strange vision or journey, whatever it was. There was a lack of birdsong too, just a few cries here and there. 

Frog pawed at the flowers and vines along the back of the shed to reveal a tiny black and white kitten. I recognized it instantly, though it had been years. I’d been just twenty years old and learning how to drive. It was only my second time behind the wheel and the kitten ran out in front of me. I’d gotten out to check, hoping there was a chance I’d missed it, but I hadn’t. I’d always wondered who he belonged to, how one kitten so young ended up all alone on the road. I patted him on the head, which was mercifully intact in this strange place. 

“In this place,” Frog said, “Is every creature you’ve ever killed.”

I did not know how to respond to that, so instead I kept walking and I kept listening. That was what I’d always done in unfamiliar or stressful or violent situations. Listen and observe until I had no other choice. 

Frog walked with a calmness that was not like him. He led me to the brush where the woods started. “There are fourteen birds, two opossums, a handful of mice, and another cat in there. Those are just the roadkill. They’re all very nice when you get to know them, but you don’t remember them all do you?” He asked me. 

“No,” I said, following him into the trees. He nudged a spot in the grass, just inside the treeline to reveal a nest of baby bunnies. I winced, I remembered that one well, a gruesome lawnmower accident when I was just ten years old. 

“You don’t think about the bugs here, the mice, the fish swimming in the creek. Those were easy, yes?” He asked me. 

“They were.” I said, “They’re all here too?” 

“All of them,” Frog said. We were walking along the game trail now, making our way to the creek in sun-dappled light. The birds were all in the trees, fluttering from branch to branch. Worms came out of the ground, and ants collected on the path behind us. The kitten, the bunnies, and a small army of animals all started following behind us.

“You’re here too,” I said. It felt wrong to pet Frog with his newfound sentience but I couldn’t help myself. I leaned down to pat his back, which turned into crumpling on the ground, which turned into hugging him close and telling him “I’m sorry” over and over and over. 

And there it was again, the memory that came to me so often when I was trying to sleep, or anytime someone asked some kind of innocent question about my childhood. The blood splatter, and guilt and fucking shame that lived in my head when I was just trying to live my life. I think everyone has a memory like that, that reminds you that there is blood and filth and evil in the world. 

I’d had to do it myself you see. Frog was sick, and my parents only believed in one kind of medicine; prayer. When he was losing weight and vomiting they told me I needed to pray harder. When his back legs stopped working and he howled all the time they scolded me for my lack of faith. They told me it was my fault, and that God was punishing me. When I took Frog outside and ended his suffering myself they told me I would burn in hell. Maybe that’s where I was now, all of the creatures I’d killed ready to have their vengeance. 

Frog licked my face bringing me out of it. He lapped up the blood and water and tears and said “It wasn’t your fault.” He nudged me with his nose. ”I’ve missed you too, but we don’t have time for a reunion.” 

“Why am I here Frog?” I asked, “What are you trying to show me?” 

“I needed to show you your army.” He said, gesturing back at the creatures following us, his velvety ears flopping. “I need you to see how small it is.” 

“My army?” I asked, “What do you mean?” 

Frog straightened suddenly and perked up his ears like he was hearing something I couldn’t. “We’re almost out of time. I need you to trust me. I need you to listen.”

“I’m listening, buddy.” 

He started taking faster now “Your family was right about there being a God.” He said, “But it’s not what you think, it’s not what anyone thinks.” 

The creatures got closer to me, some of the mice licking my shoes “This God, it doesn’t want prayer or songs or love. It wants blood.”

I touched my cross necklace instinctively.

“This God will reward you well for it. Whatever you kill has to serve you here, in this place. Our worlds are about to merge, and you need a bigger army to protect yourself, or you’ll end up in someone else’s army.” I was still holding him, still shaking. “You need to harden your heart.” He said. “You need to be ready for what’s coming. You need to build your army.” 

“What the fuck are you talking about Frog? I’m not going to kill people.” I said. 

“You have to,” he said. “It’ll get easier. If you do it enough, soon it won’t be any different from killing the bugs or the mice. You can do it.” 

I had so many questions, but we were cut off by the sound of my alarm clock. As I started to pull from the edge of sleep, and the vision dissolved Frog yelled “You have to be ready for what’s coming. Please!” 

I woke up in my bed, vomit on my clothes and my phone blaring out an alarm on five percent battery. But even louder than the sound of my alarm was the sound of sirens in the distance, and even louder than that, the sounds of screams. If the end was upon us anyway, maybe I should listen to Frog. My parents' nursing home was only a few blocks away so I knew right away where I’d start. It wasn’t like I hadn’t thought about it before. After all, what were two more bodies at the end of the world? And really, if I was wrong, their God would protect them if they just prayed hard enough, wouldn’t He? 

As I opened the door to the fire and the wailing and the gunshots I repeated Frog’s mantra in my head. Harden your heart. Build your army.

Thank you for tuning in to this episode of the podcast inside your house! To hear every tale of terror as they are released, subscribe to our show on your podcast app or on Youtube or follow us on Facebook and X. And Until next time; remember to hug your pets and cherish them, and, if they’ve been really good, appease their demands for a blood sacrifice. We all deserve a treat now and then.