What About the Dog?

By Tyler Battaglia

When Louis finds a dog swimming out the bay at night, he rescues it—not realizing that this good deed will change the course of his life, and the lives of others, forever. Life and death are difficult to explain, and sometimes we are helpless to watch them happen to us.

Who rescued who?

"What About the Dog?" is a 5,000 word horror short story about the attempt to save a life and the ripple effect it has on everyone around him.

Please be advised that this is a horror story and may contain upsetting content. It contains the following: death, including but not limited to child death (off-page) and animal death (off-page, not the titular dog); and illness.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Tyler Battaglia
• Release date: Jan 14, 2024
• ISBN: 9781738246106

Book preview

What About the Dog?

Tyler Battaglia

Copyright © 2023 by Tyler Battaglia

All rights reserved.

No portion of this book may be reproduced in any form without written permission from the publisher or author, except as permitted by U.S. copyright law.

Cover created by Tyler Battaglia, using royalty free stock photos from Unsplash.

Scene divider created by Ian Haramaki.

Contents

1.Content Warnings

2.What About the Dog?

3.Acknowledgements

4.About the Author

5.Also by Tyler Battaglia

Content Warnings

What About the Dog? is a horror story and may contain upsetting content. Should you require content warnings, please be advised that the story contains the following:

Death, including but not limited to:

Child death (off-page, ostensibly of natural causes)

Animal death (not the titular dog; off-page, aftermath described)

Illness

What About the Dog?

Down at the bay, in the mid-evening sun, the dog swam. An innocent sight—at first, Louis thought it was a mirage. The beach was empty except for Louis, just bare sand against bare feet as far as the eye could see, so the dog seemed an unlikely thing. No owner, or other point of origin, was discernible. Abandoned, maybe, which would be a tragedy.

After watching in wonder for a moment though, he realized that the dog was struggling, barely keeping its head above water. Louis decided to test his poor swimming skills to rescue the thing out of the water—he couldn’t in good conscience leave the dog to drown.

Louis swore as his feet touched cold water, dancing a little dance to shake off the frigid feeling, and took a deep breath. He dove into the water and swam out to the scraggly dog, struggling the whole way as he tried to keep his head mostly above