The Shark in My Backyard

by Doug Hiser

The ravenous shark in my backyard gnashes his sharp white teeth at me through the rear window. I never go out there. I can hear him chewing on the fence and the wooden deck like a monstrous termite. I am afraid to look into his eyes. Sometimes, at night, he chews on the back door, trying to scare me or trick me into opening it.

He swims through the grass like an anaconda with a gray fin. He ate both my dogs the first day that he was big enough to jump out of the hot tub. I live alone, in fear of my own backyard. When the shark looks through the rear window of my house, he smiles and his black eyes say, “Come outside and pet me.”

I know he is all lies and trickery. My phone never rings. I think he chomped through the cables. I never feed him. I don’t know how he survives. I think maybe he eats grass, although I have never seen him grazing like a wicked toothy cow.

My rear window has a crack in the glass... it wasn’t there yesterday. I know that shark could get in here if he wanted to. He is playing a weird game, scaring me, teasing me, with that white shining sharp-toothed smile and those dead black eyes.

Each day when I go out the front door to get the mail I can hear crunching teeth chewing on the wooden gate. I haven’t seen the neighbor’s cat in many days... shark food, I guess. Somehow I need to get rid of that shark in the backyard. Somehow...

Last night I got up at two a.m. and opened the refrigerator to get a drink of cold milk. I noticed the big rear window was splintered like a spider web. That hellacious shark was grinning at me through the cracked glass. I couldn’t sleep the rest of the night, thinking about that damn big backyard shark.

I was awake in my bed listening for more broken glass or chewing sounds. I was awake thinking of ways to get rid of that sinister shark. I could buy a shotgun and blast his head off. What if I missed? I could poison some steaks and throw them to him. What if he is immune to the poison? I could hire an animal control specialist, an exterminator of large violent exotic animals. What if he killed the exterminator? I could climb on the roof and drop a grenade on the shark and blow him to smithereens. What if I blew up my house and myself in the explosion? I could sell my house and move. I could live in Montana. Maybe sharks can’t swim in the snow.

My television went black yesterday. The set just turned off and died. That evil shark ate the satellite dish. He swims by my splintered window at least once every few minutes. Every tree I had back there is gone. I quit going to work. I think he is waiting at the front door in the mornings because at night I hear his chewing and gnawing.

I am standing on this chair in the closet. I can hear glass breaking. I kick the chair out from under my feet and my eyes bulge as I swing. The last thing I see is that damn horrible bastard hungry shark watching me from the bedroom doorway. I see all those huge white teeth smiling... just smiling at me while I swing.

Shark looks in through window