Author’s Note
A year after Tuki passed, a little scruffy mutt found his way into my life.
Waylon had been wandering the streets for days before he was caught. Frightened and defensive, he lunged at animal control and several rescue volunteers. Dogs who react that way don’t always get another chance. But the rescue supervisor saw a scared soul worth helping.
Then the call came. She told me his story.
“I’ll be there within the hour,” I said.
She was surprised. I was already on my way.
Almost exactly a year after I brought Waylon home, that same rescue took in 44 little Westie puppies from a puppy mill. Their suffering, the care they received, and the homes they eventually found inspired LilTuki and the Ghost of Briar Hill.
This adventure is imagined, but the love behind it is real. Through these pages, Tuki gets to meet the little soul who came into my life after him—and help bring him home.
If this story touches your heart, perhaps you’ll consider opening your home to a shelter dog when you’re ready for that lifelong promise. Or help a rescue through fostering, volunteering, or giving what you can.
Somewhere, there may be a little Waylon waiting for someone to hear his story and say, “I’m on my way.”
On the night before Halloween, the wind found every crack in the barn.
It whistled beneath the doors, rattled the rafters, and sent rain skittering across the roof. Lil Tuki had tucked himself into a hollow beside the clover hay when he heard something the storm could not explain.
A tiny chattering.
He lifted one silky ear.
There it was again, behind the feed barrels.
Tuki squeezed between an oat sack and a wooden bucket. Two enormous amber eyes stared back at him from a bundle of wet, tangled fur.
“Oh,” Tuki said softly. “You’re having a worse night than I am.”
The puppy tried to retreat, but there was nowhere left to go.
Tuki stopped.
“You don’t have to come out. I can sit here.”
For a while, he did.
Then he tugged a corner of dry burlap within reach of the puppy’s paws.
“My name’s Tuki.”
The little stranger looked at the sack, then at him.
“Waylon.”
“Well, Waylon. This is good burlap. Donkey says it’s terrible eating, but excellent sleeping.”
From the nearest stall came a sleepy snort.
“Both statements are correct.”
The puppy almost smiled.
Then thunder shook the barn, and he folded himself flat against the wall.
Tuki settled beside him until the trembling eased.
Only then did Waylon begin to talk.
The stone house on Briar Hill had a painted sign beside its gate.
FINE PUPPIES. LOVINGLY RAISED.
Waylon knew nothing about the sign. He had never been allowed outside to see it.
He knew the cellar beneath the house.
He knew the scrape of bowls, the slam of doors, and the sound of footsteps that made every dog go quiet.
The man and woman upstairs sold puppies to people who visited the bright front parlor. They tied ribbons around the cleanest ones and carried them up to be admired.
Nobody who came to the front door saw what waited below.
“There are little ones,” Waylon whispered. “And bigger dogs. The mothers stay after the puppies leave.”
Donkey’s ears tipped forward.
Waylon stared at the straw.
“My mother used to push her nose through the wire so I could sleep against it.”
During the storm, a falling branch had broken the cellar’s outer door. When the man hurried outside to inspect the damage, Waylon had wriggled through a loose board in his box.
His mother had watched him.
“She nudged me toward the opening,” he said. “But her latch was too high. I couldn’t…”
His voice disappeared.
Tuki pressed close enough for their shoulders to touch.
Outside, the rain softened.
At last Waylon whispered, “I left her.”
“You got out,” Tuki said gently.
Waylon looked toward the barn door.
After a moment, Tuki looked that way too.
By the following afternoon, the storm had passed, leaving a bright, washed sky and puddles full of yellow leaves.
Derek and Ani had found their unexpected guest at breakfast. There had been warm towels, a full bowl, and careful fingers working burrs from his coat.
But whenever someone opened a door, Waylon stood up.
And whenever he looked toward Briar Hill, Tuki noticed.
That evening, Derek and Ani would help light the lanterns for the village Halloween gathering. The green would be full of neighbors, children, and baskets of treats.
Tuki considered this.
Then he considered Donkey.
Then he considered the enormous white sheet folded beside the barn’s autumn decorations.
“I have an idea.”
Donkey sighed.
“Does it involve me wearing something?”
It did.
With the sheet draped over his back and two long ears poking through the top, Donkey looked like a ghost who had made some unusual decisions.
Tuki wore a scarlet cape from the dress-up trunk. Waylon had a pirate hat that slipped over one eye.
“The hat is optional,” Tuki told him. “So is coming.”
Waylon grew still.
“You can stay here,” Tuki continued. “You’ve already shown us where to go.”
For a moment, there was only the rustle of Donkey’s sheet.
Then Waylon lifted his chin.
“My mother knows my voice.”
Tuki nodded.
They made their plan carefully.
At the fork in the lane, Donkey would go to the village green and fetch Derek and Ani. Tuki and Waylon would go only as far as the broken cellar doorway, where they could watch and wait.
“No charging into trouble,” Donkey said.
“No,” Tuki agreed.
“No heroic nonsense.”
Tuki adjusted his cape.
“Reasonable amounts.”
“Tuki.”
“We’ll wait.”
Briar Hill smelled of wet stone and rotting leaves.
At the house, a lantern burned beside the painted sign. Behind the cellar window, something scraped across the floor.
Tuki and Waylon crept to the broken doorway.
Inside, the man was stacking wooden carriers onto a handcart.
“The back shed tonight,” he said. “We can mend this door tomorrow. Nobody needs to come poking around.”
The woman lifted a lantern.
“And that one?”
In a low cage near the wall lay a small, thin dog with Waylon’s amber eyes.
“Leave her until we’ve moved the sale pups.”
Beside Tuki, Waylon stopped breathing for a moment.
The woman went upstairs. The man wheeled the first load through an inner passage toward the rear yard.
Waylon slipped through the broken door.
Tuki followed him with a very small sigh.
So much for waiting.
Down on the village green, Donkey arrived in the middle of the costume procession.
For three splendid seconds, everyone admired him.
“What a wonderful ghost!” someone called.
Then Donkey took a deep breath and delivered a bray that nearly shook the candles out of the turnip lanterns.
Ani turned at once.
“Donkey?”
He caught the loose edge of her shawl gently between his lips, tugged, and stepped toward the lane.
Derek was already looking behind him.
“Where’s Tuki?”
Donkey brayed again.
There was nothing festive about it this time.
Ani’s smile vanished.
“Something’s wrong.”
They followed him past the last lantern. At the fork, Donkey turned toward Briar Hill, hurried a few steps, then looked back.
Derek called to the village constable, who was helping a child retrieve a dropped basket.
“Bring your lantern, would you?”
The constable came.
So did the local animal doctor.
And because a ghostly donkey leading people away from a Halloween gathering was considerably more interesting than standing still, several neighbors followed.
In the cellar, Waylon pressed his nose through the wire.
“Mama?”
The little dog lifted her head.
Then she was on her feet, making a soft, broken sound as she touched his face through the bars.
“I came back,” he whispered.
Tuki rose onto his hind paws beneath the latch.
Too high.
He glanced around, found an overturned feeding pan, and shoved it against the cage. Standing on that, he could just reach the wooden catch.
He pushed.
Nothing.
He braced his back feet and pushed again.
The catch turned.
Waylon’s mother stepped out slowly, as though the open doorway might change its mind.
Then a puppy whimpered behind them.
Another answered.
Tuki looked down the rows.
“Oh, dear,” he murmured.
He started on the next latch.
They had opened three cages when the cart wheels stopped outside.
The man stood in the passage.
For a moment, he simply stared.
Then he seized an empty carrier.
“You again.”
Waylon shrank back.
His mother moved in front of him.
The man advanced, holding the box with its open end toward them.
Tuki stepped into the aisle.
He was small enough to fit beneath the man’s boot, and he knew it.
He barked anyway.
The woman appeared on the stairs.
“Catch the loose ones,” she snapped. “We’ve wasted enough time.”
She reached for Waylon’s mother.
Waylon darted toward the broken doorway. Beyond it lay the dark garden, the lane, and freedom.
He stopped on the threshold.
Behind him, his mother cried out.
Waylon turned.
His pirate hat fell unnoticed to the floor.
He planted all four paws beside Tuki and barked.
It was not a large bark.
But another dog answered.
Then another.
The cellar filled with the voices that had always fallen silent at the sound of footsteps.
And from outside came a thunderous reply.
Donkey.
Lantern light swept across the broken doorway.
“Tuki!”
Derek entered first. He saw the raised carrier, the cornered dogs, and the rows along the wall.
“Put it down.”
The man lowered the box halfway.
“These animals are ours.”
The constable stepped in behind Derek.
“Then you can explain their condition to me.”
Ani knelt beside Waylon and his mother. The animal doctor moved straight to a cage where a dog had not risen with the others.
Behind them, the neighbors gathered in the doorway.
The woman drew herself upright.
“This is a private property. We run a respectable business.”
A woman holding a child’s pumpkin lantern looked from the filthy cages to the ribbons hanging beside the stairs.
“I bought a puppy here,” she said. “You told me his mother was sleeping by your kitchen fire.”
No one spoke.
Then the animal doctor looked up.
“These dogs need water, warmth, and care. All of them.”
The constable opened the inner door wide and called for another lantern.
The couple began talking at once—about expenses, misunderstandings, and what the dogs were worth.
But the neighbors were already taking off their coats to wrap around the shivering animals.
The rescue lasted long after the village candles burned low.
People returned with blankets, baskets, and a wagon padded with clean straw. The animal doctor examined each dog before it was moved. The constable recorded what he found and kept the couple aside to answer for it.
No one was allowed to hurry the frightened dogs.
No cage was passed over because its occupant was old, quiet, or no longer a puppy.
Donkey stood patiently beside the wagon.
When they ran short of bedding, Ani glanced at his costume.
“May we?”
He bowed his head.
His ghost sheet made several excellent blankets.
As the last dogs were carried out, Waylon noticed his mother watching the cellar doorway.
He pressed against her leg.
“You don’t have to go back.”
She lowered her nose to his head.
Together, they walked down the hill.
For the first few nights, the rescued dogs slept in warm rooms and borrowed stalls throughout the village.
Healing took longer.
Some hid when a bowl was set down. Some did not know how to play. Some needed many quiet afternoons before they trusted an offered hand.
The neighbors learned to wait.
In time, homes were found with people willing to love the dogs through all of that.
At the stone house, the painted sign came down. The cellar cages stood empty, and the couple could no longer hide their cruelty behind a ribbon and a polished front door.
At Tuki’s farmhouse, two beds were placed beside the hearth.
Waylon lay in one. His mother lay in the other, close enough that he could touch her without getting up.
Ani had washed his bandana and set his pirate hat to dry.
Derek added a log to the fire.
Tuki was nearly asleep when Waylon whispered, “Do we have to leave tomorrow?”
Ani could not understand the words.
But when he lifted his head, she reached down and rested her hand beside him.
“You’re home, little fellow,” she said.
Waylon studied her face.
Then, slowly, he settled.
Outside, Donkey crunched a well-earned apple. Inside, the fire warmed two small dogs who had spent far too long being cold.
Tuki stretched across the rug, his scarlet cape folded nearby.
He woke once before morning.
Waylon had left his own bed and curled beside his mother. Both were sleeping deeply.
And for the first time in his life, Waylon was not sleeping with his nose pointed toward a way out.
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