“Hey there. Tucker here! The bulldog who gives a new meaning to DOG-ged determination. Seems the unthinkable’s happened: Pawsburg is ghost-dog city! Tomorrow Daisy and I are suiting up for ghost-hunter duties. Just know this: spinach, shrimp scampi, and supernatural shenanigans won’t stop us from getting our beloved Pawsburg back! The doghouse has spoken! Over and out.”

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“Listen, it all started on a regular Tuesday, a day as crisp as the apple pies Walter made at the bakery. I was sunbathing, in the middle of a rather profound dream involving a never-ending plate of shrimp scampi, when I heard Daisy’s urgent bark. Suddenly, I was wide awake, my ears at a standstill, homing in on the rallying cry.

Now Daisy, she’s a damned charmer – all fluffy flounce and doggy dimples – she had captured my heart, hook, line, and squeaker. But that day, her barks booming across Pawsburg echoed with danger.

I barked back in response, an old English bulldog equivalent of ‘hold on to your leash, I’m on my way’, then I darted off towards the direction of her desperate call.

As I trundled along, I noted Pawsburg appeared somewhat off. It was as if some unseen hand had dipped a paw into the fabric of our town and given a stolid stir. The Dalmatian Desert, usually warm and snug, felt surprisingly chilly, colder than my nose at midnight. Pug Palace was looking sheepish instead of regal, like a pug stuffed into tutus instead of stately armor.

Sprinting past, I reached Ruff-n-Ready where I usually feast on Walter’s ‘special’. But today, it looked as vacant as the underside of my food bowl on a Sunday afternoon. I craved any familiar smell, but all I scented was a cold hint of something… paranormal.

Farm dog that I am, schooled in the art of not caring two daisies about trivial nonsense, I moved on, my pace quickening. As I went past The Canine Cafe, The Dapper Dog Salon, and The Snooty Snout Boutique, I was met with the same inexplicable emptiness, like a party thrown by a bunch of napping felines.

As I waddled my way to Daisy, I noticed she was shivering at the edge of Pawsburg by Lower Dalmatian Desert. Only, the desert shook like it was scared, like chihuahuas in the wake of a bad memory.

I turned to Daisy. ‘Where are they, Daisy?” I asked, missing the usual bickering between us. “Why this damned silence?”

‘Ghosts of past dogs,’ Daisy whimpered, her eyes wider than two full moons. ‘They’ve taken over Pawsburg.’

I looked at her and then at my beloved town shivering under the ghostly air. I buckled up my courage. Tomorrow, I knew, we were going supernaturally ghost hunting.

That night, as I nestled next to Walter, it struck me. Maybe it wasn’t the spinach or the shrimp scampi that filled me. The only things that truly mattered, were my Daisy, Walter and beloved Pawsburg. Ghosts or no ghosts, we weren’t letting go without a barking fight.”

The End.

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