Garth's Story

My next door neighbor's dog's story.

It was a regular blisterly day in October, and my old next door neighbors knocked on my freshly-bought house door. How did they find us? I wondered to myself opening the door to their smiling faces. Myself, I was still in my pajama's and my mother was already dress and already has been over to our old house getting the rest of our remains of our old house.

My next door nieghbor Chuck, smiled and said "We saw your car in the drive way and we wanted to know if you girls needed any help?" he smiled with his hand on his little nine year old, Sam's shoulder who was also smiling up upon me.

My mother came out of her room and said to them "Yes, thank you. We can go back to my old house and get down the curtians." She let them into the house and showed them around, I hear ooh's and ahh's and comments about how nice this new house was.

While she was doing that I was in the bathroom, quickly getting dressed into skinny jeans and a green button-up shirt, brushing my teeth, and spraying perfume onto my whole body. My hair looked a mess so I wasn't going to even try. I walked back out to the living room and put on flip flops and went outside.

I came outside to see my old nextdoor neighbors and my mother going into their van. I was quite astonished at my mother because our nextdoor neighbors were not the neatest people if I must say. I saw my mom get into the car and I followed getting into the back with the little girl named Sam. The car smelled like garbage and pickles for some reason, I could barely stand to breathe in this car.

We arrived at their house, with our old one right next door, and we got out of the car. Chuck's wife came out of the house, she did not look pleased that he brought us home with him but she looked like something else was bothering her so she didn't pay much attention to us. She said to him "Something's wrong with Garth"

Garth was a two year old yellow golden retreiver mixed with a labrordor and he liked to run around the neighborhood and eat their trash. I befriened Garth and he was a fun playmate, I did not have any dogs, only cats, so he was a fun change. I tried to feed fim, but usually all I had was cat food, he never seemed to mind and usually gobbeled it up in not even one minute.

The next door neighbors were poor and they did not have money for much dog food, but for some reason they had lots of pets like another dog named Sadie who was a black lab puppy, they had a black cat named Jasper, who I loved and fed all of the time, almost every morning, and Jasper's girlfriend, I wanna say her name is Daisy but I am not sure, well Daisy and Jasper almost had kittens like every 5 months, and one of the ones they kept was named Oreo, a black and white kitten, who I also fell in love with and fed, just like his father.

Chuck's wife told us that she was getting the laundry out of the laundry room and she saw Garth. Chuck went to the backyard and came back three mintues later. I asked if he was alright and he shook his head no and told us "Chuck tired to jump over the fence got strangled in his chain and I think he's dead."

I saw my mom's eyes start to water, just like Chuck's wife, and I just stood there slient. My mom and I walked back into their back yard and saw poor Garth on the floor, Chuck got him down and out of his collar, but he was still into the stance that was probablly was when he died. Sadie was barking still inside the fence, and maggots and flies surrounded him and were already getting into his skin, and his feces were already exposed. It was the worst sight ever.

My mom covered her mouth and said to me quietly "They could've stopped this" with watery eyes, she said this because the neighbors said they heard Sadie barking the whole night before, when it must've happened. I patted mom's back and said "I know, I know, but Garth is in a better place now." She shook her head in agreement and walked back to the front yard.

My mom felt so bad for Garth and we went back to our house and got the curtians down with a drill Chuck let us borrow and we got some extra boxes and went to our front porch. My mom told me why she felt bad for Garth and I remembered:

My mom and I were packing and putting stuff into the van and Garth came along, soaking wet and smelling like wet dog. Garth wanted to play but we couldn't because we were busy and that he was soaking wet. "Go home Garth" my mom said giving me a box to put in the van. Garth just sat there, wagging his tail happily. After putting the box inside the van I said "Garth stay here, I'll be right back" and I ran inside, getting a cup of dry chicken and rice cat food for him and running back outside I dumped it onto the pavement. He ate it up so fast and gave my hand a kiss, well kisses. I said "Thank you Garthy" and patted him on the head and rubbing the wet hand on my jeans. Thirty minutes later, Garth was still there, trying to play with me and my mother. My mom and I both said "Go home Garth" and his ears drooped down sadly. I said to him "I'll play with you later or tomorow" and he ran away.

And I never did get to play with him after that. Suddenly I felt like a horrible person. How could I not play with him? Was I turning into all the other neighbors who dispised him for getting into their trash and who would never play with him? I got mad at myself and I saw Chuck drive away in his car. I wondered where Chuck was going and quickly got over that.

Five minutes later, Chuck came back and said to me and my mother "I dumped Garth into a lake." I was suprised, I thought they were going to at least bury him, like a funeral.

Chuck drove my mother and I back to our new house and that day, I learned a lesson "You never know what you got until its gone" and since that day, I always played with all the neighborhood animals, even if it was for only 1 minute.

R.I.P. Garth. October 15,2009