Letting the tears that are begging to roll down my face out, I run back to where I came from. I’m careful where I step, watching my surroundings.
I can’t believe I fucking lost him.
I woke up an hour ago, and there was no sign of him. The house was too quiet. I didn’t hear his usual footsteps. I walked over to his doggy bed and found it empty and cold.
My heart completely shattered when I found the back door open. Mom forgot to close the door before she left for work. I checked the house first in hopes that he was hiding somewhere, but nothing. Not believing he was gone, I checked another four times.
I don’t know how I’m going to find him all the way out here. He’s gone. He’s really gone. He was just a puppy. Simba was the sweetest puppy. He was scared of his own shadow and hardly ever barked. How will he survive out in the forest? If he doesn’t get hurt or taken, he’ll die of hunger.
As a sob racks my entire body, I hear my name being called out. My eyes find my boyfriend in only joggers, running up to me. His wavy brown hair blows in the wind wildly. If I wasn’t so panicked right now, I would stop and admire his natural beauty.
“What’s wrong, Trin?” he asks when he sees my distressed face. Gripping my cheeks in both of his palms, he stares at me with concern.
“Simba,” I stutter, panic taking over my body. “He’s gone. He got out of the house. I don’t know where he is.”
His eyes widen. Swallowing tightly, he nods and looks over my shoulder toward the woods. “Are you sure he’s not in the house?”
I nod. Tears fall down my face like a river.
“Go in the house, and I’ll look for him,” he says.
I butt in strongly, “No, I’m not going back. I have to look for him.”
He frowns. “It’s creepy in there. No place for you to be.”
He pushes me toward the house, but I clasp his arm.
“I need to look for him.”
He eyes my face, biting his lip as he nods.
His hand grips my own tightly as we walk back toward the woods I just emerged from.
“Leonidas!” Elijah’s voice screams from his lawn.
He stops and turns toward his brother.
“What’s wrong?” he calls out to both of us.
Amelia emerges from the door a moment later and eyes the two of us.
“Simba’s gone,” Leonidas calls back. His voice trails off at the end in sadness. He looks back at me and pulls me to his side.
In shock, Amelia grabs on to Elijah’s arm as he stares, stunned.
“Do you need an extra pair of eyes?” Elijah yells loudly.
They love Simba as much as I do. He has everyone wrapped around his little paw.
I nod my head, needing as much help as I can get.
Elijah runs toward us while Amelia yells, “I’ll stay here just in case he comes back!”
The three of us make our way back into the gloomy forest. Being in here with Leonidas and Elijah helps. I feel less scared and uneasy.
The bottoms of my feet ache. It feels as if I were being pricked rapidly with tiny knives. Leonidas’s hand is still tightly clenching my own. Glancing over at him, I notice goose bumps cover his entire toned chest due to the strong, cold wind. The poor guy doesn’t even have a shirt on, but he ran out here to help me anyway. He must be freezing—another reason for me to feel guilty.
Elijah wanders through the forest like a madman, looking behind bushes, in streams. He screams out my boy’s name but drops his head in defeat a couple minutes later when we get no results.
