The Rain

“Nothing like a rainy day to reflect on
what a mess your life is, huh?”

JULIE COOPER, THE O.C.

It’s always dicey when a loved one starts dating someone new. You could hate their latest significant other, they could hate you, or even worse…indifference. Indifference is the real sniper from the side, because if you don’t like the person and don’t hate the person, you have little energy to want to make any effort at all to spend time with them. Fortunately, both of my brothers ended up with women I adore like they are my own sisters, but it wasn’t so easy to get where we’re at now.

When Bryan started dating his now wife, I was still living with him. We were a brotherly duo who spent a lot of time together, and being that we were in our twenties, we had a lot of fun being friends as well as family. No matter who he started seeing at the time, it was going to be an adjustment for me and my relationship with him. He slowly started to bring his new girlfriend around more as they got to know each other, and all signs pointed to her being wonderful, so my focus was entirely on making sure that she liked me. This meant buttering her up with compliments, ordering extra food when I got takeout so she would feel included, and warming up to her dog, Teddy.

Teddy was the key to the whole relationship, as all pets are. If you want their owner to like you, just treat the dog like royalty. Easy enough, right? Dogs should be treated as such regardless but particularly when there’s an added layer of impressing their parent. Teddy started to come to our shared condo more and more, just as my brother started falling more and more in love with Teddy’s owner. They would both spend weekends at the house, but typically Teddy would go wherever they went if they left the house. He was a small dog, so he’s easily able to hop on someone’s lap and take a drive, but there was one Friday night they decided to leave him at the condo with me.

Bryan made their date night plans for dinner and a movie, and I offered to hang with the pooch while they were gone. It was an unusually chaotic weather night for northeast Ohio, as there was a hail/rain mix happening outside. I had just bought the first three seasons of Entourage on DVD, so I planned on having a quiet night in with Turtle and the gang, steering clear of the mess outdoors. Before you all judge me, just know that I’m opening my heart to you, and although Entourage is not looked back on very fondly by many today, it was, at that time, a critical HBO darling. We all watched it, so STOP. JUDGING. ME. PLEASE! Anyway, they left for their date, I fired up the DVD player, watched a few eps with some ramen, and enjoyed my low-key evening. Unfortunately, while I was enjoying Vince and Drama’s crazy Hollywood antics, I spilled some soup on my shirt like the dummy I am.

Our washer/dryer was located right by the door that led to the garage, which is where Teddy spent most of his time, waiting for his mama to return from her date. I decided to do a full load of laundry, so I carried my basket of clothes to the area and put them in the machine. At that point, Teddy hadn’t quite warmed up to me yet, constantly barking at my mere presence, and I don’t fault him for it. Without getting into too much detail about his rescue story, he wasn’t a big fan of male energy. Who among us is, really? He was also fiercely protective of his owner, so anytime anyone was near her and he could see them, he would bark and bark and bark. Teddy woofed at me as I put my clothes in the washer, but I did my best to ignore it. My plan was to throw everything into the machine, including my ramen-soaked shirt, and then take a nice, long shower before settling in for some more of Ari and E’s on-screen tension. I took everything off other than my boxer-briefs, ran the wash, and headed to my loft, where I was out of Teddy’s way, hoping he would quit barking.

As I made my way to the shower, I heard three things: Teddy’s barking, the Entourage theme song playing on repeat over the DVD menu—which consisted of a lot of oh yeahs—and the sound of the rain/hail mix inside the garage. I knew that meant my brother forgot to close the garage door when he left, or perhaps the crazy weather got in the way of the censor and stopped it from shutting. Either way, I wanted to make sure it was closed before I got in the shower, so I went back toward the garage door in my underwear to press the button and ensure things were closed.

When I opened the door that led to the garage, Teddy decided to run out, still inside the garage, but no longer inside the house. I freaked out.

“Teddy, come here, boy! Come back inside!” I said, silently praying he would listen.

Instead, he just stood still. I continued to call him, inching my way out the door, closer and closer to him in just my underwear. He wasn’t taking my bait and decided to run out into the yard. It was dark and hailing outside, but I couldn’t let him run away, not on my watch. I grabbed the nearest boots in the garage, an old pair my brother used for construction, and walked toward Teddy. I knew I would get wet, but I figured it was just the front yard and my health wasn’t as concerning as getting this dog inside. Teddy inched farther away from me.

The entire relationship with my future sister-in-law flashed before my eyes. She would never forgive me if I was responsible for something happening to her baby, and how could she? The problem is, every time I got closer to Teddy, he scurried, and he was a quick little doggie. I’m no speed racer, and the oversize work boots I had on weren’t helping, but I did my best. Pretty soon I was in the next-door neighbor’s yard, then I was down the street, then the next street over, and finally in the woods somewhere, yards away from our home. Teddy was so fast that I couldn’t catch up, and although I was able to keep my eye on him for a long stretch, I just couldn’t seem to get him to stop or come to me. He was probably terrified that a grown man in underwear and clown shoes was chasing after him in the rain, but I had no choice!

When we got into the woods, I didn’t have the assistance of the streetlamps to help me see him. It was too dark and too late; Teddy was officially lost. Since I ran out of the house without any clothes, it also meant I didn’t have my phone. This was during my cell phone belt clip era, so when I didn’t have a waistline, I didn’t have my Nokia. Flashbacks of my sixth-grade slumber party debacle came rushing in my head. I’ve been through some shit in my life, but this moment was truly one of the worst because I had no idea what to do. My only glimmer of hope was that I’ve watched Homeward Bound and Homeward Bound II: Lost in San Francisco so many times that I knew if Sassy the cat could survive a waterfall and the West Coast, Teddy could maybe make it through the Ohio rain. I wasn’t sure if I should stay in the forest, trembling and almost naked and hope to find Teddy, or if I should go back home to call for backup, put on some clothes, and find him that way. Neither one seemed all that great, but I opted to head back to the condo.

On the way, I walked through the streets yelling his name in case he started to head that way too. He didn’t show up, but the headlights on a familiar car did. I squinted behind me at the vehicle driving my way; it was my brother. They decided to skip the movie and come home after dinner. He slowed as he drove close and opened the window.

“What the fuck?” he asked. Actually, I’m not sure that those were his exact words, but it was something like that. There was a “what the fuck” energy to the moment, for sure. I honestly looked crazy, almost naked and soaking wet, but not like in a sexy way. This wasn’t Britney’s “Stronger” video—I was a hot mess, and now I had to deliver the bad news to the happy couple.

“I opened the garage door and Teddy ran out. I tried to run after him, but he—” The words shook out of me, my body in fight-or-flight mode from the cold night. Seeing their faces left me even colder. There’s no easy way to tell someone you lost their dog. I got in the car and they drove me home, telling me to go inside and call my parents to come help look for Teddy, and also to put on some clothes, while they drove the car back to the wooded area in the neighborhood to look for him.

Walking back into the empty house made me wish Teddy were there barking at me. What I would’ve given to hear the sound of that little doggie instead of the still-playing oh yeahs of disc one of season 3B of Entourage.

My parents lived close by, so they immediately came to help, and so did my other brother and his wife. We all scoured the neighborhood with flashlights, looking for the scared pooch in the pouring rain. As much as I was worried about what this would mean for my relationship with my brother’s new girlfriend, I was even more terrified for Teddy being out there all alone at night. I thought about the asshole previous owner who conditioned this beautiful little dog to be so scared of other people. Animal abuse is a larger issue than we have time for here, but it’s truly abhorrent that people could treat creatures that way.

As our search party perused the streets, I kept apologizing. With fresh clothes on, I was doing my best to focus on our rescue, and eventually, thank God (Mariah Carey), that my dad found Teddy underneath a parked car, shivering close to the back left tire. He was scared, and although he would usually run from men, Teddy this time sat still, allowing my dad to wrap him up and bring him home. I have never felt such relief. He was safe.

My brother eventually asked Teddy’s mom to move into the condo when I moved off to Chicago. They got married, had three kids, and lived happily ever after. Teddy is still around and has calmed down a bit, but not so much with me. When I see him, my energy is completely off, and I think he can sense that. I try my best, bringing him treats for the holidays and petting him as much as he’ll let me, but our relationship has been tainted. The memories of that night come flooding back when I see his sweet face, and I’m sure it’s the same for him. He barks and I shudder, feeling like I’m back in my underwear running through the sleet-filled street, the sound of the Entourage theme song playing in my head.

“Oh yeah,” I think to myself in the singsong way of the DVD menu.

A few days after Teddy ran away, my brother and I received a flier in the mail that had gone out to every mailbox in the neighborhood. It was a grainy image of me that looked like it was taken with a Razr phone, the word WARNING in big, bold letters above the photo. “A man was seen running through the neighborhood in his underwear, yelling at the top of his lungs. Please report if seen again,” the flier said.

Turns out whoever saw me didn’t see Teddy that night either. They simply saw a lunatic on the brink of a breakdown. They saw me for exactly who I was.