Blog-o-ween 2023: "The Dog Park" by Dennis Etchison

As I’ve mentioned before, I live in Los Angeles, and if you’ve ever been to La La Land, then you know that it’s a dog town. (And as a cat person, it pains me to say that, but there you have it.) Dogs accompany their owners everywhere (or is it the other way around?) — to restaurants, to the grocery store, to the beach. There are dogs of all shapes, all sizes, all breeds. I’ve probably seen more dogs riding in strollers than I’ve seen children — and I’ve probably seen more children on the ends of a leash than I’ve seen dogs. Go figure.

One place that you are sure to encounter a dog off its lead is on the countless hiking paths that wind their ways through the canyons of the Santa Monica, Santa Susana, and San Gabriel Mountains. I’ve lost track of the number of times I’ve been reassured by a fellow hiker that their dog is friendly and they just wanted to get off their leash and have the same freedom as everyone else. Why not just let them run wild in one of the many dog parks in the city, I wonder. Then, I remember this story by Dennis Etchison, and I figure ol’ Fido is safer here with us on the path. God only knows what goes on in the canyon when the sun goes down there in...“The Dog Park.”

“Madding heard the dogs before he saw them.

“They were snarling at each other through the hurricane fence, gums wet and incisors bared, as if about to snap the chain links that held them apart. A barrel-chested boxer reared and slobbered, driving a much smaller Australian kelpie away from the outside of the gate. Spittle flew and links vibrated and rang.

“A few seconds later their owners came running, barking commands and waving leashes like whips.

“‘Easy, boy,’ Madding said, reaching one hand out to the seat next to him. Then he remembered that he no longer had a dog of his own. There was nothing to worry about.”

Madding, a writer in Los Angeles, takes a trip to one of the many dog parks that the city offers. This one happens to be off Mulholland Drive, at a place where the homes of the rich, attached precariously to the canyon walls, overlook everything. It is one that he used to take his own dog to. Only now, he no longer has it. At the park, he meets Stacey and her dog Greta. Stacey is also a writer. She asks Madding where his dog is, and he hints at the canyon beyond the park. “Down there,” he tells her, “I hope.”

Uh-oh.

As they talk, Madding reveals that his dog (who never had a name — Madding hadn’t gotten around to it yet) went missing the month before at this very park. He took off running and never returned. Madding tells Stacey that he is leaving the city for good, but that he thought he would give it one more chance.

Soon, Stacey’s dog Greta goes missing, as well. And as she panics, and Madding tries to calm her, the people in their balconies above seem to go quiet, watchful. It is as if they are waiting for something to happen. But what? Where did Greta go? What awaits Madding as he slips into the dark and verdant canyon?

“The Dog Park” is not a story of out-and-out horror. There is no monster (well, maybe) and no outward violence. There is only the setting sun, the dark of the canyon, and the tinkling of ice in the glasses of those watching the scene below them. Etchison’s story would probably be best described as “quiet horror” (though not, thank god as “elevated horror,” whatever is meant by that backhanded compliment), though its horror may be so quiet that many miss it the first time through. I know I did. After going back to the story again and again and experiencing Madding’s sad desperation, his disgust with life in Hollywood, his decision to go into the canyon and look for Greta, and his hope (however lost) of finding his dog again, the horror of all this happening under the watchful eyes of the people in their canyon homes grew. I’ve been in those canyons, seen those houses, and you just wonder if they are like the boxes at the opera. Merely there to watch the play of life being performed below.

Dennis Etchison was a California native, born in Stockton in 1943. While still in high school. Etchison wrote the short story “Odd Boy Out.” She submitted it to many science-fiction magazines without any luck. Finally, taking a page from the book of his hero Ray Bradbury, who said that a writer should submit their stories to the least likely market, Etchison sent the story to Escapade, one of many “gentlemen’s magazines” that were being published at the time. It was accepted, and Etchison earned himself a $125.00 check.

Etchison has written in many fields, including novels, short stories, screenplays, and movie tie-in novels. Under the pseudonym “Jack Martin,” he wrote the novelization for Halloween II, Halloween III: Season of the Witch (which includes an explanation of just what it is that is happening beneath the mask of the young boy exposed to Conal Cochran’s Halloween commercial — chilling stuff!), and Videodrome.

He’s written screenplays, teleplays, and radio scripts for numerous outlets, including HBO’s series The Hitchhiker, the CBS radio series The Twilight Zone, and Fangoria’s Dreadtime Stories. He teamed up with John Carpenter to produce a script for Halloween IV: The Return of Michael Myers. Said script was rejected by movie producer Moustaoha Akkad as being “too cerebral.” As Etchison himself described the story:

“Halloween was banned in Haddonfield and I think that the basic idea was that if you tried to suppress something, it would only rear its head more strongly. By the very [attempt] of trying to erase the memory of Michael Myers, [the teenagers] were going to ironically bring him back into existence.”

Ah, what if...what if...

Dennis Etchison died in May, 2019, after a bout with cancer.

“The Dog Park” was originally published in 1993 in the anthology Dark Voices 5: The Pan Book of Horror. Later, it was included in Ellen Datlow and Terri Windling’s The Year’s Best Fantasy and Horror: Seventh Annual Collection. Etchison included the story in his own collections The Death Artist, Talking in the Dark: Selected Stories, and Fine Cuts. “The Dog Park” is another story I’ve chosen from the excellent anthology My Favorite Horror Story, edited by Mike Baker and Martin H. Greenberg.

There you have it, folks. Another day, another Blog-o-ween 2023 entry. If you, like our friend Madding, find yourself alone in the canyons at night calling for your dog to come back, be sure to ask one of those nice people on the balcony of their home for their help. I’m sure they’ve seen exactly where your dog went and are more than willing to point you in the right direction. Well...in a direction, at any rate. What are neighbors for, after all?

In the meantime...pleasant dreams? Hmmmm? Heh-heh-heh!