Your grandmother's dog has always bothered you. It's small and white, rather prim, and always sits and stares at you with its unblinking eyes. It's been around since you were a kid, and you feel as if it should have died years ago, but it keeps on living to your dismay. When your grandmother passes on, her dog becomes yours. You begrudgingly take it to your suburban home and, despite your displeasure, realize it really isn't too bad of a house guest. Until the night of the full moon, that is. You wake up to a horrible growling noise and rush downstairs. In place of the dog sits an old man. He wears a nicely pressed white suit and has a thinning patch of curly hair on his head. He smiles at you and introduces himself as your grandfather, who was cursed years ago by your grandmother. She did it to keep the family safe, he tells you with a wicked grin. And with that, he vanishes. When you tell this story to your friends and family, they think you're crazy. Surely the old man was just a thief and your grandfather is probably rotting in prison somewhere. But this is not the case. The old man was your grandfather. The dog was your grandmother. The full moon was the key. And you were the victim.
This story is the work of a very talented writer, and he will be giving a talk at Carnegie Mellon in January about the experiment he did to write this story. You can read more about that here.
You can also read the full story below. This is not an edited version, but is pretty close.
Every night when you get home from work, your grandmother's dog has always been waiting in the doorways of your apartment building. It's small and white and always sits and stares at you with its unblinking eyes. It's been around since you were a kid, and you feel as if it should have died years ago, but it keeps on living to your dismay.
One day you come back home to find your grandmother's dog waiting at the doorway of your apartment building instead. On the floor in front of the creature lays an envelope with your name scrawled across it in your grandmother's handwriting. You open the letter and find that it has tells you to take her dog when she dies.
You reluctantly take her dog to your suburban home, and despite your dislike of it, realize that it really isn't too bad of a house guest.
The next full moon comes and you have to walk your grandmother's dog, who lets out small growls as you walk it. But as you walk you hear a much bigger growl come from behind you. You turn around to find your grandmother's dog has grown to the height of a man. It is still white, but it has a drooling mouth with sharp teeth and it's hair is wild. The creature leads you up to the high school you attended. Inside, the science teacher, Mr. Blumier, finds you almost immediately as you make your way up the stairs.
"Oh, it's you. I thought you had already left!" Mr. Blumier chuckles, covering his mouth. He leads you into his office and the two of you sit down. You tell him all about the strange things you've been experiencing with your grandmother's dog. "I don't know, it sounds a bit nuts," he tells you, "but most things written in the books are exaggerated. I'll see if I can find anything in the old libraries. You just wait here, alright?" Mr. Blumier gets up and walks out the door. You hear him shuffling through the stacks for a few minutes before he comes back carrying a few books. "Well, here's a few of the best books on curses and such," he says, placing the books on the table, "I'll go through 'em and see if I can find anything. But first, how about I give you a tour of the school? It's nighttime, after all, no one's here." You nod and follow Mr. Blumier down the stairs and through the empty halls.
