Sister Meagan Underwood was fine, thankyouverymuch. She paid tithing and a generous fast. She checked on her ministering sisters and finished work assignments on time. Her kids were relatively well-behaved. Tim tucked in his shirt, and Tayla looked lovely in all her many selfies.
Yes, Meagan was doing fine, even if sometimes it felt like something was missing. That was probably Satan talking. Or a bit of undigested beef.
“Mom!” Tim yelled as he crashed through the door after school. “We need to celebrate! Tomorrow!” Tim said everything in exclamation points.
Meagan looked at the calendar. She hadn’t forgotten a birthday. Thanksgiving wasn’t till next week. “Celebrate what?”
“Wolfenoot! It’s this awesome holiday Sammy told me about! You eat moon cakes and howl at the moon and play with dogs and everything is dogs!”
“Are you sure Sammy didn’t make this up?”
“Of course not! We need mooncakes!”
She looked at the clock and sighed. “Maybe I can look for some tomorrow.”
“So... can we do it?”
She thought of all the tasks she’d planned. There was always so much. “We’ll see.”
Tim deflated.
It’s not that she didn’t want to, but what could she take off the list?
She tucked Tim into bed that night as usual, and when she went to check on Tayla—and stare pointedly at Tayla’s cell phone, which she wasn’t supposed to use past 8—Meagan suddenly remembered. She’d heard of Wolfenoot once, years ago. She’d planned to celebrate it, but they never had.
She sighed again. Bedtime. And no doomscrolling.
###
Meagan opened her eyes to the dim light of her phone lying on the pillow. Whoops. But it wasn’t the light that woke her. It was... howling?
She sat up.
The howl came again, and a fluffy white dog jumped onto her bed.
She stared at it. “Sir Barksalot?” The dog looked just like her childhood husky. Except... it was transparent.
He barked, and somehow she knew what he said. “I’ve come to warn you.”
She shook her head to clear it. Maybe she had food poisoning.
“It’s not food poisoning,” Transparent-Sir-Barksalot barked. “It’s your chance to change.”
Meagan grimaced.
“You wear a leash,” he barked urgently. “Beware, or your leash will be eternal! And too short to run around the yard!” Sir Barksalot had always been overdramatic.
She started to protest.
Sir Barksalot ignored her. “You will be visited by the Two Dogs of Wolfenoot. You must listen, and learn.”
Meagan stared at him. Two somehow didn’t seem right. “Just two?”
He nodded and gave her a doggie look of embarrassment. “It was supposed to be four. But Furdinand is napping, and Waffles is”—he glanced around furtively and lowered his voice—“wearing the cone of shame.”
Poor Waffles.
Suddenly a stick appeared in Sir Barksalot’s mouth, and he looked at Meagan with begging eyes. “Playtime!” he tried to bark around the stick.
She threw it across the room.
This wasn’t making a lot of sense.
He ran to grab it then jumped back onto the bed. “Again!” he barked.
Meagan threw the stick again, and as it flew through the air, she remembered. Running around on the grass with Tayla. Kicking autumn leaves. Going on an adventure together.
She’d loved all of that.
She had friends who didn’t enjoy play, and they were gorgeous, incredible women in other ways. But Meagan? Play had filled her soul.
Tim’s face tonight popped into her memory, the way he’d deflated when she said, “We’ll see.” She felt that sadness too.
Apparently tired of her inattention, Transparent-Sir-Barksalot bumped the stick against her knee. “Again!”
She nodded. “Again,” she whispered, and she threw the stick.
Sir Barksalot took an incredible leap to catch the stick, then disappeared.
Plop.
A spaniel with a glossy coat flopped into her lap. It nuzzled under her hand. “Cuddles,” it demanded. Automatically she began to pet it. As she did, her muscles—always filled with doing—began to relax.
Soon other memories flooded through her.
Snuggling under a comforter with her kids on Friday nights, watching movies. Long hugs just before bedtime, every night. Stroking Tayla’s hair as she cried over a crush.
Where had it all gone?
They were busy. Always doing something good, something important... but it never filled their souls the way snuggles did.
The spaniel’s head nuzzled against her, warm and soft—which was weird, because generally dead things are not warm. She breathed a big sigh and wrapped her arms around the dog’s body, gathering it closer to her, and—
It disappeared.
Meagan sighed, her arms empty.
Well, that was two dogs. She guessed she was supposed to have learned something? How to throw sticks and hug dogs?
Or maybe the lesson should have come from poor Waffles. Don’t... scratch yourself? That didn’t seem quite right.
She thought of Furdinand then, the other, napping ghost dog. Maybe she just needed to sleep. Maybe in the morning everything would make sense.
But sleep did not come. She thought of all the good things that filled her days and nights. PTA, soccer games, service projects. Cooking homemade meals, keeping her house immaculate. All such good things.
And yet... they weren’t her things. A Relief Society sister once told her how beautiful her playful spirit was. How much the sisters loved her sense of fun, how much she brought the light of Christ.
She’d felt that before.
And then she’d forgotten. Everything else had seemed so much more important.
But it isn’t, she thought, her eyes growing heavier. It’s just different.
Playing, snuggles, and naps, she thought as she fell asleep. And no scratching.
###
“Awooo!”
Meagan’s eyes popped open. Tim stood beside her bed, staring at her and howling.
“Awooooooooooo!” he said again. “It’s Wolfenoot!”
Meagan sat up, memories of last night filling her. “It’s still Wolfenoot?”
Tim squinted. “Yes, Mom.” It sounded like “duh,” with no exclamation points.
“Hooray!!!" she said. "We’re going to have so much fun! We’re having roast, and mooncakes, and... I don’t know, but it’ll be great! Let’s wake up Tayla.” She wasn’t sure what she would cut from her day, but it didn’t matter. There would be time for the most important things. God would make a way.
Tim’s eyes lit up. “Really?!” The exclamation points were back.
“Yes!”
He jumped up and down, barking for good measure. “And can we get a puppy?”
A puppy? “Only if it’s a ghost.”
This piece was published in 2024 as part of the Holiday Lit Blitz by the Mormon Lit Lab. Sign up for our newsletter for future updates.
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