The Lost Puppy
A short story about a puppy who made it on its own
On a dark cold night at the beginning of December, a lonely girl was sitting in her bedroom, overthinking her choices and regretting her fears. She is falling into a spiral of depression, wondering when her life will get better. She heard a crying scream coming from the side yard of her building. Although she finds it hard to fit in with people, animals make her feel like she is at home. So she immediately recognized that an animal was crying for help. She defeated the winter breeze and opened her window, her eyes followed the voice in the bushes till she saw something moving — “Oh! it’s a puppy”. A cute little brownish puppy with a big white dot on his back.
The girl wore her superwomen's cape and ran to rescue the little puppy. Did she think it through? No! But in her depressed mind, it made her feel worthy of staying around on this earth for a little longer. So she ran downstairs and started to climb down the hill to the sideyard, but the puppy freaked out and parked — howling like the internal wolf he is! Even though she wanted to help him, he didn’t want her help. But the girl insisted so she walked around the hill all the way to the bottom to get to him. Again, he seemed to dislike the girl. She didn’t know what to do and was scared that his mom will magically appear and bit her head off, or if she is lucky, the wild pigs will show up instead. So she leaves some food for the puppy, wished him good luck, and went back home.
The girl took off the cape, as she knew she finished her task with disappointment. She tried to comfort herself “oh well, at least I tried”. Once again, the puppy started to cry, she heard it, and broke her heart “I wish I can help him!”. This time, she decided to cheer him from the window instead “Go little puppy! you can do it, climb up that hill!” Surprisingly, the puppy exceeded all of her expectations. He was whimpering the entire time, fell down, got stuck for a couple of minutes, took a break every 2–3 steps he took, and had to go down to come back up again. The girl was amazed by the little puppy. A small creature alone in a dark yard away from his mother, surrounded by wild foxes, snakes, pigs, street dogs, and mean cats — yet still managed to get himself out of danger. She thought “Wow! If he did that then I can do great things too!”
The girl didn’t wear her cape this time but went down to offer shelter and food for the little puppy. He appreciated some milk and leftovers but refused to stay in the shelter. This puppy was made for the wild, and he is strong enough to handle it. While the girl thought he needed help, it turned out he is the one who helped her. The puppy left the girl knowing that she’ll be there one day to help him if he needed it.
