The following is inspired by a now-defunct logline generator that randomly spit out weird, hilarious one-line synopses of stories that provided great prompts for creative writing exercises. I and some others wrote a few for fun.
Jesse loved dogs ever since he was a kid. And he had a way with them; everyone said so. When he was ten, he’d trained Skipper, his Jack Russel Terrier, to shake hands, roll over, hop on his hind legs like a kangaroo, and play dead when he pointed his finger like a gun and said “bang.” People never made a lot of sense to him, but dogs he understood. He always said if he could work with dogs instead of people he’d be a happy man. So, he started a dog-training business.
It did alright at first. But then all those stupid reality shows with celebrity dog trainers inundated the airwaves and suddenly everyone was an “expert.” His business suffered. Things were slow and he was starting to get desperate. To fill the gaps, he offered his services as a dog-walker and sitter. It was better than nothing. But he needed a backup plan.
His appointment with Rex Forbes, Financial Adviser at Lycos Strategies, was at 10am on a humid Tuesday morning. His sinuses were giving him hell, and he stopped in the men’s room to blow his nose and wash his face before his meeting so he didn’t come off like some coke fiend. The office where he would meet Mr. Forbes was one of those open plan nightmares where all the desks were jumbled together with no dividers, no peace, no privacy. The cross-talk and din washed over him as he stood at the receptionist’s desk, making his stomach rumble dangerously.
A man in a well-fitted but tatty blue suit approached. With dark, slicked-back hair and a toothy grin, he dutifully shook Jesse’s hand and led him to a desk toward the back. It was like wading into a mosh pit. He tried to drown out the noise, but his head was still foggy, his senses overwhelmed. He didn’t see it. The strip on the floor to manage all the cables that crisscrossed the office. Hooked his toe on it and dove headfirst right into the corner of Forbes’s shiny laminate desk. Everything went dark.
When he blinked his eyes open, he was face-down on that low-pile gray carpet, surrounded by a pool of blood. Either he’d gone deaf, or the room had gone silent. More than the screaming pain in his skull, he felt the awful sting of embarrassment now as he realized he’d have to climb from under Forbes’s desk and clean up some of this blood. What was the etiquette for bleeding out on a stranger’s desk, anyway? A fruit basket? He wasn’t a corporate guy. He had no clue.
Slowly, he pushed himself up from the bloody carpet onto his hands and knees, pausing for a minute to brace himself for the humiliation to come. Then he grabbed the edge of the desk and hoisted himself to his feet, turned around, and forced himself to look at Forbes.
But the Rex Forbes he had met only moments ago—worn suit and slicked-back hair—was gone. Only the toothy grin remained. The man had somehow transformed, the old suit fallen away, and a wolfish creature stood in his stead, licking his chops at the sight of Jesse’s blood.
Some of the staff had fled. Others froze. A few took out their phones to film. The rest cowered behind their desks with nowhere else to hide, but unable to look away. And they were waiting for something to happen—for Jesse to do something. Most likely to finish what he started—to die.
But in all his years as a dog trainer, Jesse had never been bitten by a dog, not even an aggressive one. So, why should today be any different?
The slavering creature before him snarled and showed his teeth, but Jesse remained calm. Forbes may have been a money maestro and a wizard of warzone office spaces, but Jesse was the Jedi Master of mutts. He’d have Rex rolling over in no time.
Glancing around the sterile office, he could spot no snacks to use as food rewards. Figured. That was the fastest way to work it. Praise was great so long as the animal was not trying to eat you. Then he thought, it was the blood that did it; I could use that. Grabbing a box of tissues from the desk, he sopped up some of the blood from his head and the puddle from the floor and tore the tissue into strips like jerky. He’d use these tidbits to train the lycanthropic Rex.
As the other financial advisers looked on, Jesse summoned all his skills to divert the lunges and attacks of the wolfish form of Forbes. Exploited his desire for blood to condition cooperation from him, turning predatory beast into polite partner as he lapped up the gore. The astonished staff watched as, with a dwindling stash of tissues, Jesse finally coaxed Rex to lay on the floor and roll over, rubbing his furry belly. Instantly, Rex transformed again into the co-worker they knew, minus some pants.
Forbes leapt up and quickly pulled on his white briefs, perturbed—but not surprised. Clearly, this wasn’t his first time. The staff, warily at first, crowded around them, their phones out for selfies with the lycanthrope, and most of all with the man who could speak to him—Jesse, the werewolf whisperer. He wasn’t a dog trainer—he was a prophet, a guru, a god.
The receptionist spoke Jesse’s name reverently and touched her finger to the trickle of blood dribbling down his brow, smearing it across her own forehead. Twenty other suit-wearing workers pressed in, attempting to do the same. The mosh pit was re-forming, and Jesse briefly envisioned ducking under the desk for refuge. But, now was no time to be timid. He had the upper hand, after all.
He climbed on the desk. As the eyes of the pack raised to him, he pointed, and in a stern voice commanded them all: “sit!”
A while back, we started a fun weekly writing challenge involving an online logline generator (sadly, no longer active), a 1000 word limit, and wild, carefree stories. The randomly generated logline responsible for this piece:
AN ACCIDENT-PRONE ANIMAL TRAINER AND A LYCANTHROPIC FINANCIAL ADVISOR FORM A CULT.
Very cool!
Werewolf whisperer. Wow. It seems like such an obvious evolution from dog whisperer, especially since some stories (admittedly the more comedic ones) treat werewolves like they're just massive dog-men. But I don't think I've ever read a story that's done something like this before. A very unique concept! It's too bad the logline generator doesn't exist anymore. It seemed like fun.