The grim inspiration behind my story, “Spineless”

One thing you could say about Lloyd: he loved his dogs. I learned this back on his weekly bar visits when I worked as a bartender. He was a genteel kind of guy, a retiree in his late 60s with lots of free time on his hands. Mostly he kept to himself. But get a couple of Glenlivets in him and those dogs were all he wanted to talk about. He had two schnauzers, black-haired sisters named Betty and Veronica. “His gals,” he called them. They lived with him in his luxury apartment over in Highland Park. The gals got their daily walks in front of massive homes that sat on sprawling lots with perfectly manicured lawns. He used to tell me how the dogs spent hours at training so they could learn commands like “sit”, “heel” and “sashay”. How they cuddled in bed with him at night. How they got the finest dog food he could find — basically brands I’d never heard of. Mostly Lloyd came in alone. Sometimes he brought this friend or that, other well-to-do folks like himself. I guess those kind of people run in packs. I’d always have an ear for Lloyd, even as I weaved myself in and out of conversations with other patrons, smiling at their stories, filling up their beer mugs, keeping that money streaming in for the bar.

There wasn’t much to not like about good old Lloyd. He was kind and respectful. He ran up a decent tab and tipped well. Physically, he was a big guy, sort of plump, the kind whose rump drooped over the side of bar stool. He ate what he wanted and drank what he wanted and exercise be damned. You got the feeling Lloyd was sitting pretty in life, enjoying his retirement to the max.

Then he didn’t come in for a whole week. Or the next. Or the one after.

One of his friends came in a couple of days later. He told me Lloyd had died of a heart attack. He’d been in his apartment when it happened. None of his friends had been expecting him anywhere, so nobody realized he was missing. The manager got suspicious when she noticed a smell coming out of his apartment. When she finally unlocked the door, she found Lloyd alone. Well, mostly alone. His gals had been cooped up with him. After a few days without anyone slopping overpriced food into their dishes, those doggos had to eat something. And I’m betting by then, Lloyd’s ripe, rotting body had been nigh irresistible.

To their credit, they didn’t eat much. They were small dogs after all. But they’d gone for the softest parts. The pieces of him that were easiest to nibble on.

Let’s just say the funeral was closed casket.

All these years later, I can’t quit thinking about what happened to Lloyd. It was one of those wild, horrible things you just can’t predict. The heart attack. The dogs. Their hunger.

I would never wish what happened to Lloyd on anyone. But there it is anyway, serving as the inspiration for my latest horror story, “Spineless”.  Why, you ask, did I felt compelled to write about something so horrible? I’m a goddamn weirdo, I guess. By the way, it’s now available for purchase in the pages of Dark Moon Digest #47. Give it a try, why don’t you?

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