When young couple Cheryl and Howard had their first child, they were flabbergasted by their dog’s strange behavior with the baby. When they finally figured out what their pet was doing, they were shaken to the core.
Howard and Cheryl had been together for roughly 10 years when they found out they were pregnant. A few years back, they had begun trying to have children but had encountered some struggles along the way. Cheryl had had a rough time facing the possibility that she might not be able to have children. Howard loved his wife, and it had broken his heart to see her like that, so he had gone out and purchased an adorable, loving dog.
When Howard brought the dog home to Cheryl, she had been enthusiastic. She named the animal Mittens and poured her love into raising and training him. A few years went by, and while the couple enjoyed their life with Mittens, they had never given up on their dream of having a baby together.
One day, Howard noticed something peculiar happening with Mittens. The dog would not leave Cheryl alone and would whine at the door even if she just had to use the bathroom. Howard looked closely at the pup but couldn’t find anything wrong with his health. Perplexed, he went to sit with his wife that night after dinner, but when he got close to the couch, Mittens hopped onto Cheryl’s lap and growled at Howard.
The couple was thoroughly confused. Mittens loved Howard and was usually very happy when he had the chance to share the couch with his owners. So, what was different about this day? Cheryl had a theory, but it was a wild one. Mittens was becoming more and more protective of her, especially when Howard kissed or hugged her. So, she slipped away to the bathroom to test her theory.
Twenty minutes later, she came back into the living room in tears. Howard rushed over to her, and it was only when he hugged her that he saw the positive pregnancy test clutched in her hand. Howard joined his wife in crying happy tears, and then he went and gave Mittens tons of treats for being so loyal to his mom. What a perceptive dog!
Luckily for Cheryl and Howard, their dog continued to try to protect his family well after the end of the pregnancy. After what felt like an eternity, Cheryl finally came to term and delivered a beautiful and healthy baby girl. They named her Sky, a nod to the bright blue hue of Mittens’ eyes. Cheryl came home to find her husband and best friend there, eager to celebrate and help with Sky. She also had someone else to rely on.
Cheryl and her best friend, Wanda, had become friends right around the time she had met Howard. Wanda had been a bridesmaid at their wedding and spent a great deal of time with both of them. She had even helped them find their house. The couple unanimously decided that she would be Auntie Wanda for Sky and were grateful to have the extra pair of hands while they adjusted to this new chapter in their lives.
Oddly, though, while things appeared to be going very well, Mittens did not seem relieved in the slightest. The dog continued to guard both Cheryl and Sky and spent the first night with the baby frantically begging to stay near her the entire time.
Now, this was strange to Cheryl and Howard. They had thought that Mittens would calm down after Sky was born, but if anything, the dog became more agitated than ever. Howard and Cheryl let the behavior slide for a few nights, being so exhausted and overwhelmed themselves. Perhaps the whole house would be discombobulated for a little while as they welcomed Sky into the family.
After about a week, however, Howard began to worry. Mittens was following a new routine where she would guard Sky at night and refuse to go on walks if Cheryl and the baby were not going. Around two months after Sky was born, Howard and Cheryl were both fed up with their dog. It was a difficult situation. They loved Mittens through and through and wanted to keep him, but they were growing more uncomfortable with his recent rebelliousness. Sky’s safety was their highest priority.
The couple had so much to think about and very little downtime to discuss things together — that is, until one night when Howard schemed with Wanda to arrange a date for Cheryl. Wanda was to come over and babysit so that Howard could surprise his wife and take her out to dinner. It was a beautiful gesture, and Cheryl gladly accepted the chance to go out for the first time without Sky.
When the time came to leave the house, Cheryl felt very nervous about leaving her baby. She was so thankful to have her bestie there to help, but even Wanda could not calm Mittens. When Howard and Cheryl walked out the door, Mittens was barking and howling, clearly distressed. Cheryl almost changed her mind about going, but then took a deep breath and left, hoping to show Mittens that it was no big deal to be separated for a while.
The couple had a wonderful date that night. They were able to commiserate about Mittens as well as discuss things from other parts of their lives. Howard was a highly esteemed government worker, and he loved sharing tidbits from his job. Cheryl enjoyed hearing about anything that wasn’t baby-related since her past two months had been full of Sky.
It was very unfortunate, then, that Wanda called halfway through dinner to ask them to come home. Apparently, Mittens had tried to bite her when she put him in his crate. He became inconsolable, and she did not know what to do. Howard and Cheryl cut their date short and went home to help Wanda.
When they got home, Sky was asleep in her crib, and Wanda was watching television in the room with Mittens. They apologized to their friend and made sure she was all right. When Wanda left, Cheryl turned her attention to Mittens. The dog was acting very strange indeed. As the front door closed, he calmed down immediately. Howard opened the crate door to let the dog out. The couple stood in confused silence as they watched their dog happily stride towards Sky’s room. They decided to go to bed and try to figure Mittens out with clear heads in the morning.
Howard awoke, remembering the security cameras he had installed in his house a few months earlier. He rushed to his computer to see what had really happened between Mittens and Wanda. Maybe that would give him a clue as to what had been triggering the poor dog. But Howard was shocked when he saw that the footage from the previous night had been deleted. Perplexed, he searched further through his archives and realized there was a huge amount of deleted files.
Howard felt a chill run down his spine when he figured out the pattern in the deleted files. The footage was only missing from Sky’s room — almost every night since Sky was born, the images had been deleted. So, Howard set up a new hidden camera and backed it up separately from his usual system. He didn’t want to scare Cheryl, so he didn’t tell her about it until the following day when he looked through the video.
Howard ran to show Cheryl immediately, and she started to cry as she ran to phone the police. The couple could not believe what they had seen in the hidden camera footage. The police arrived at the scene to confirm that, indeed, someone was breaking into the house at night. They would climb in the window to Sky’s room and depart the same way.
Howard and Cheryl were horrified to realize that someone was continually sneaking into their baby’s room. This horror only grew when the police informed them that the person in question was a woman named Wanda. It turns out that Wanda was actually a foreign intelligence agent on a job monitoring Howard’s work in government security. She had laid the groundwork almost a decade previously, first becoming the couple’s best friend and then finding them a home with a small secret room built in.
The police knocked down a wall in Sky’s bedroom to find a little nest of research on Howard and equipment for long-range correspondence. They also found a safe with money and passports. The police searched for Wanda but have yet to find her to this day. The parents were horrified at the thought that they had left their helpless baby in the hands of a woman who had only feigned affection toward them. Wanda was probably never going to hurt Sky, but the lies she had told them were enough to make them fear and despise her.
Mittens calmed down significantly from the day Wanda disappeared, and Howard and Cheryl treated her like a hero for the rest of her life, grateful for her protective behavior over their baby girl.
