There have always been jackrabbits in the neighbourhood so Michelle isn’t surprised when she comes home to two of them on her lawn, camouflaged white in the snow. What’s odd is Reginald, the Airedale, and Midge, the Wheaten Terrier, standing so silent on the other side of the living room window. Normally they’re wild at the sight of rabbits and the window’s open a crack—there’s no way Reginald doesn’t notice them, he can smell squirrels from four blocks away.
Michelle steps around a third rabbit to reach the front door. She braces herself before opening it and sure enough Midge leaps into her legs. Michelle kicks herself, yet again, for the $565 plus tax she paid for a certified dog teacher to tell her Midge’s jumping isn’t the problem—it’s Michelle who needs to relax and stop stressing out her dogs.
There are even more rabbits that afternoon at the dog park. Technically, it’s a soccer field, but no one uses it for sports in the winter. It’s where the dog owners from the faceless townhouses congregate. Michelle prefers to avoid it, too many people, but Reginald pulls her there, and Midge, being Midge, goes along. The field is full of rabbits, but today all the dogs are ignoring them. That’s to be expected for the placid Retriever from Crestview Drive and the growing population of Goldendoodles. But not dogs like Reginald or Midge, or Daisy, the Jack Russell.
Daisy’s not barking at a jackrabbit either. There’s one a few feet from her nose, almost taunting her with its hops. Daisy’s a jackrabbit murderer—Michelle’s heard the stories. Squirrels are the most frequent victims, but they say when she sees a rabbit . . .
Daisy’s owner waves. Michelle’s been talking to her for years, probably spent hours hearing about Daisy’s eczema, the special cream she has for her snout, how she once ate the side of a sofa. And Daisy’s owner knows all about Midge’s poo-eating, how cayenne didn’t work, how Reginald just seems to know things. Michelle doesn’t know the woman’s name, but she’s the closest thing she has to a friend.
She waves a second time and Michelle forces a smile. She really should go over. Midge snarls and Michelle realizes she’s doing it again—the dog trainer taught her the signs: clenched jaw, tight leash. She breathes and reminds herself it’s good to be social. She shouldn’t spend all her time by herself with just the dogs for company. Besides, Daisy’s owner might know something about the rabbits. Michelle steps forward, then remembers she spoke to another owner two days ago. It means she’s good on her social quota, besides, she’s dying to watch Still Summer. She waves to Daisy’s owner and heads for home.
There are more jackrabbits at the house. In the fading afternoon light, they blend into the colourless vinyl siding. But Michelle’s not paying attention. Alyssa from Still Summer’s on her mind, she’s in a rough spot—no friends, a dead-end job. She just has to wait it out till the next season. She’ll get popular and find career success if she perseveres. It’s a matter of patience. Sometimes, Michelle imagines she’s Alyssa, even though she’s nearing forty and sure as heck isn’t living in Malibu. She unlocks the front door and Reginald catches her eye, understanding.
Daisy’s owner mentions the jackrabbits when Michelle approaches her, trying to be social, the next week.
“A lot of jackrabbits these days.”
She’s not wrong. There must be fifty of them in the field.
“Almost hit one, on the way to work.”
Michelle wants to ask, doesn’t it seem odd? Shouldn’t the dogs be reacting to them? She’s about to speak, but stops herself. Will it be like at work? Will Daisy’s owner think she’s weird and stop talking to her? By the time she musters the courage, the woman’s talking about Daisy’s eczema.
When Michelle gets home, she pulls up her conspiracy podcast. She feels sneaky when she does it, even though Reginald doesn’t judge her, and Midge just looks out the window. It’s not like she believes it. But it’s fun, it makes the world seem bigger, and that she isn’t alone in being strange.
The latest episode is ridiculous as ever—something about a sea monster and time travellers. Michelle isn’t even paying attention. The last five minutes are listener calls. The first one to come in is a woman with a shrill voice going on about rabbits. The host cuts her off, saying they’re out of time and announces the next episode will be ancient cities.
Three weeks later, the jackrabbits are in the news. Granted, it’s just local news. The suburb shares its weekly with another community—each week, it only gets two columns. One’s on the snow-clearing budget, the other’s on jackrabbits. The article doesn’t say much, just that there’s a lot of them.
At the soccer field, people are talking about them. Michelle lets Reginald pull her toward Daisy’s owner. Reginald sniffs the Jack Russell until she snaps at him; Midge meanwhile, is Midge, huffing and pawing the ground like a bull. There are eight jackrabbits within steps of them, probably eighty in the field. The dogs don’t seem to notice. Daisy’s owner says a jackrabbit followed her home the other night, almost into the house. Daisy didn’t even bark.
Michelle has a vision of a jackrabbit slipping in through an open door. She swallows.
Daisy’s owner continues. “I took Daisy to the vet for an eye test. Her vision’s perfect—her nose too. The vet thinks the jackrabbits don’t smell.”
Another dog owner joins them. She’s heard it’s a rabbit disease, or something in the water. She leans into Michelle, have you noticed the rabbits’ poo?
Michelle’s clenching her jaw again. Reginald’s too smart to eat rabbit poo, and Midge? Now that she thinks of it, Midge hasn’t been interested in the rabbit poo either—Midge who thinks rabbit poo is a food group. Michelle has noticed the jackrabbit poo on their walks, it has a funny grey colour, when she kicks it in the snow, it leaves an oily sheen.
Michelle almost misses the rabbits going viral. It’s one of the dog owners who tells her. She holds up her phone to play the “meme.” It’s a video of a local teen, encircled by jackrabbits. The bland townhouses behind her look familiar. As the video continues, the rabbits creep closer. The teen doesn’t seem to notice until the end, when they’re touching her.
It even makes the podcast. Michelle listens to it twice. They get all sorts of facts wrong—claiming the suburb is in northern Canada, making it out to be some isolated outpost with moose and polar bears; saying the rabbits are turning over cars. The hosts throw out ridiculous theories—that they’re space aliens, or that they’re holograms from the future. Michelle stops the podcast early, God knows what she’d hear in the listener calls.
It’s the crocuses that really spook her. They burst through the snow on schedule, the third week of April. Michelle misses the blooms—she’s been staying in, just taking the dogs outside to pee, trying to avoid all the rabbits. It doesn’t help that the blooms are orange.
Daisy’s owner tells her. “Have you noticed, the rabbits are eating the crocuses?”
She doesn’t wait for Michelle’s answer. “Crocuses are poisonous.”
Michelle didn’t know that.
“They’re also purple.”
Michelle didn’t know that either, but sure enough, she reads it in that week’s newspaper. There’s a standing front page column now on “Living with Jackrabbits.” But this week, it’s overshadowed by a bigger article: “Crocuses are Orange This Year.”
And it’s not just crocuses—the poplars are growing funny too. They’re still springing up everywhere the land allows, and some places it doesn’t—popping up overnight, spindly, crowding other seedlings out. But their leaves aren’t right, they’re narrow, lanceolate, they think they’re willows. The rabbits eat the poplars so fast, you wouldn’t know they were there. Doorbell camera footage is the only proof. People are posting it online, with titles like, wtf?
By May, there’s no more room on the sidewalk, and even the soccer field is crowded. Jackrabbits have appeared in two other suburbs—just like the orange crocuses and crazy poplars. All three are at the same latitude. Scientists and international experts are all over the news, trading theories.
Michelle downloads “21 Ways to Amuse Your Dog When Stuck Indoors.” A few days later, she orders pee pads.
The cries start in July. By then, work is on hold, and there’s a local Emergency Planning Committee. Michelle’s exhausted 20 of the “21 Ways to Amuse Your Dog,” and Reginald has eaten through nine plush toys. Luckily, he still has his green dinosaur. She hasn’t been able to order toilet tissue or canned beans in her grocery delivery for three weeks.
Later, she realizes the TV may have been muffling the noise. She’s been spending her days binge-watching—she tells herself the dog-trainer would approve, it helps with stress. She’s already on Season Thirteen. Things were looking up for Alyssa after that drama in Season Nine, but now things are souring again. And this season is relatively tame, just wait for Season Fourteen.
The first time she hears it, she’s just gone to bed. It sounds like a child screaming. She turns on the light. Reginald and Midge don’t move, but Reginald lets out that groan he’s been doing since he turned eight, when he’s disturbed while sleeping. The noise is coming from outside, somewhere under the bedroom window. Michelle gets up. There’s another cry when she opens the blinds. It’s shrill—definitely not human. Outside, there are only glinting eyes.
She returns to bed, but the dogs have stretched out and left her no room. She finds a narrow space along the mattress edge and turns off the light. Almost immediately, there’s a crunch. It’s coming from the side of the house. A moment later, another thud, followed by a cry. Reginald stirs. After that, there’s just the sound of something being crushed. Michelle covers her ears with her pillows. She doesn’t need to check—there’s only one thing it could be. She tosses and turns and tries not to visualize what she’s hearing, rabbits pressing against the vinyl siding, the pop of skulls.
By August, she couldn’t leave the house if she tried. The front lawn is all rabbits—the driveway and street are too. Some of them are dead, but they’re still standing, propped upright, snug against each other, eyes bulging.
They’re saying on TV, that all that pressing isn’t good for structures. There are videos on YouTube to clear rabbits off houses. Michelle decides to try it. She doesn’t have an electric shovel, like the guy in the video, but she has a snow shovel. She’s also assembled winter boots, gardening knee pads, a kettlebell. The guy in the video recommended a barbell, to fend off the rabbit crush. Michelle doesn’t like the idea. Her kettlebell is light, the kind people laugh at, but still . . .
Reginald gets agitated, watching Michelle’s activity. He knows something’s up. Midge lets out a bark. She doesn’t even know what she’s barking at, just that Reginald’s upset. Michelle puts on her boots and knee pads, followed by a bike helmet. She’s avoiding Reginald’s eyes. She reaches for the doorknob, then pauses. Puts the kettlebell down—it just doesn’t feel right. Then, before the dogs can follow, she steps outside.
She’s hit by summer heat, and the warm, slick weight of jackrabbits pushing on her legs. She should have checked the date of the YouTube video. That guy removing smushed rabbits with the electric shovel—that must have been weeks ago. There aren’t enough electric shovels in the world to remove all the rabbits crushed crimson on the vinyl siding now. Michelle turns back—it’s only thanks to her boots, that she’s able to wade through the heavy bodies. Midge leaps into her legs the moment she opens the door. Reginald is barking, agitated. I know. I won’t leave you again.
By mid-August, Michelle’s taking days to watch a single episode. She keeps pressing pause, turning to the news. No matter the hour, the only thing on TV is jackrabbits. One night, she watches an interview with a biology and ecosystem expert on what he’s calling the “jackrabbit boom.” The expert’s worried about their mass. Jackrabbits, he explains, are not individually heavy. In fact, they’re remarkably light. But even something light, like a jackrabbit, is heavy en masse. And now, the jackrabbits are getting too heavy for the pavement.
It turns out, he’s right. The next day, there’s a sinkhole on King Street. Two days later, there’s one on Crestview. Now the expert’s on every channel. It’s just a matter of time, before there are more sinkholes. By the next week, they’re all over social media. Michelle watches one of the videos. At first, there’s only rabbits. Then, in slow motion, the ground starts to curve. There’s a roar, and a giant chasm opens from below. It’s only visible for seconds—a moment later, it’s full of rabbits.
Now, at night, there’s a new sound—a distant roar, and then sirens. Michelle pulls up Airbnb. All the nearby communities are booked. Farther out, very few accept dogs. Those that do, sound awful—no kitchen, no dogs allowed on furniture. Now that Reginald’s older, he needs proper support. He can’t just lie on the floor. Michelle makes a booking, but it eats at her. Two days later, she watches Reginald groan, trying to get comfortable. She pulls up the booking and cancels it.
A few weeks later, the doorbell rings. It happens at night, Michelle’s paused Still Summer to watch the news. They’re talking about evacuation centres—they opened a few weeks ago, in surrounding communities, outside the “rabbit zone.” Michelle’s barely listening, she’s looking at her phone, doom-scrolling sinkholes. She has another screen open on poplars—scientists don’t even know if they’re still growing willows, there are too many rabbits to tell.
If it weren’t for the dogs, she wouldn’t even hear the sound at the door. She has music going full time now, drowning out the other sounds. But Reginald’s barking, tail erect, and Midge has started her huffing. Not rabbits, then.
Michelle opens the door a crack, to avoid letting in rabbits. The woman outside is in a hockey helmet and full padding.
“I’m your neighbour.” She swishes a goalie stick side to side, pushing away rabbits.
“We’re getting out tomorrow, taking the road to the evacuation centre. Everyone on the street is going.”
Michelle’s heard about it on the news. The authorities are opening the main road for a few hours. They’ve brought in heavy equipment, to clear a path. They’re urging people to get out, leave while you can.
“There’s arrangements for dogs, you know.”
Michelle tells her neighbour she’ll consider. It’s the sensible thing to do, now that the grocery store’s stopped delivering. But when she closes the door, she’s thinking of the crowded cots in the videos, the people sitting in clusters. They’re all with their people, spouses, children, parents. No sign of dogs—they’re putting them in crates and sending them to shelters. Is Daisy in a shelter? Reginald looks at her. I know.
When the doorbell rings the next day, Michelle is ready with the lights off and the dogs quieted in the laundry room. Her neighbour rings again, then knocks. Michelle watches, hunched in the window, while she plods in her goalie suit to the car, pushing rabbits from her path. She climbs into a packed sedan, and joins a line of cars inching forward, bumper-to-bumper, toward the main road. For the first night in weeks, there are no sirens. Instead, there’s only crunches and the distant roars of sinkholes.
One week later, authorities announce the final evacuation. It’s the only thing on the news—on every channel, talking heads opine on how to get the last stragglers to leave. They warn that food will run out, that municipal services will wind down. Michelle keeps clenching her teeth. She’s already tried Airbnb. Of course, it and every other option is booked. And it’s not like she has friends to stay with. Or parents, after the accident. She’s pausing her show more often now. One night, there’s an expert on TV saying the rabbits will asphyxiate each other. It’s just a matter of waiting them out—that and clean-up.
Michelle decides, she can do it. She’s not about to send Reginald and Midge to some faraway shelter. What if they get separated? Or worst yet, lost? She’s seen the reports in the news—dogs escaping from their crates, getting lost en route, not getting water in hot weather. That terrible story about the truck carrying dogs flipping over . . . Michelle gets sick just thinking about it. Besides, things always look bad before they get better. Isn’t that what Alyssa learns in Seasons Nine and Fourteen? No matter how bleak things seem, how dire they’re about to get—you just have to sit tight. The next season is just around the corner.
It all seems sensible during the day. Michelle finds a website with 17 new dog activities. She considers teaching Reginald to put away his toys. Been meaning to do that for years—every time she puts that stupid green dinosaur in its place, Reginald’s right behind her, grabbing it. She starts yoga again, and digs out the crock-pot, cooks beans, reads up on fermenting. In some ways, it’s nice—no pressure to be social, no work colleagues giving each other looks. There’s just the dogs to interact with, and with them, it’s easy, she doesn’t get flustered, she and Reginald look each other in the eye, they say in their silent language, I know.
The nights are more difficult. The crunches are constant, and every few minutes, a sinkhole rumbles. One evening, she swears the earth moves. Some nights, she can’t fall asleep. What if the world can’t hold all the rabbits? Will they keep pushing, knock down her house? Cause a sinkhole under it? What if they breathe up all the air? Even if they don’t, what happens when the municipal services stop, when the food runs out?
The day before the evacuation, Michelle starts Season Fourteen. Alyssa’s been through a lot in this show, but her real test is just beginning. The first time Michelle watched Season Fourteen, she had to pause half-way. She only got the courage to watch the rest, after googling the ending. The next few episodes will be rough, but Alyssa’s going to be fine. She’ll get her happy ending. She only has to make it through the season.
Michelle’s trying to watch her episode, but Reginald won’t stop staring at her. She unclenches her jaw. Reginald doesn’t move. She focuses on the screen—Reginald’s still looking. Finally, she concedes the point. Yes, I know Alyssa never faced jackrabbits. She presses pause and Reginald barks. Then she starts packing.
It’s show-time before she knows it. She’s only allowed one bag, according to the TV. She’s packed a yoga mat, a meditation journal she’s never used, a tablet to continue her show. Everything else is the dogs.’ The first challenge will be the garage door. The moment she opens it, the rabbits will move in. Once she backs out, there will be no coming back—the garage will be full of rabbits.
She puts Reginald and Midge in the back of the Honda. Reginald looks at her, eyes expectant, in the rearview.
“Let’s do this.” She presses the garage door opener.
The door groans and struggles to rise. Michelle soon sees why. Rabbit carcasses lift up, dangling from the garage door. From the driveway, rabbits surge forward. There’s no sign of the street, or the asphalt. She reverses, and the car crunches. Rabbits hanging off the garage door brush against the sun-roof, like a car wash, but leaving red smears.
It reminds Michelle of driving through thick snow. All well and good, until you stop. The moment you slow, lose momentum . . . before you know it, you’re stuck. When she thinks she’s to the road, she changes gears and hits the gas, not letting the SUV lose speed. Even so, she can barely move forward. It’s like driving over dangerously high speed bumps. There are thunks under her car. Some are rabbits, some might be her muffler, her drive shaft. Reginald looks at her. Michelle realizes she’s not breathing. She thinks of the dog-trainer and tries to relax.
It takes fifty-seven minutes to do the five minute drive to the main road. The streets look different—looming, boarded-up buildings, rabbits concealing all the landmarks. She’s grateful for her GPS. At one point, there’s a sound like thunder and a building half a block up vanishes. By the time Michelle gets there, there’s no sign of the structure, you wouldn’t know there was a sinkhole. When Michelle reaches the main road, her wheels can barely turn, they’re so full of rabbits. Lucky she still has her snow-tires.
The authorities are using construction vehicles to push jackrabbits away from the roadway. Even with their efforts, rabbits are getting through. Someone waves to Michelle and she joins a throng of cars, inching north, to a different latitude.
The drive takes 8 hours. It’s dark when Michelle pulls into the evacuation centre. When she parks, there’s a man with a clipboard, waiting. Midge starts huffing, and Reginald lets out a growl.
“Have you registered online?”
Yes, Michelle tells him. She gives him her registration code. He gives her a cot number, tells her where to take the dogs. Michelle’s never seen anything so crowded. The main building is full, they’ve set up cots outside, under big tarps. There’s less than a foot on each side of her assigned cot, families to the left and to the right. They give her looks, not friendly. Everyone’s with someone. Michelle’s the only one alone.
At the end of the hall, there’s a giant buffet. Michelle’s stomach grumbles, but there’s only potato chips and juice boxes. Nothing healthy. Reginald gives her a look. I know.
The next building is dog registration. The dogs are being taken to whatever shelters have room. They might be 1,000km away, a woman tells her. She gives Michelle a form to grant temporary custody, to waive all liability in case of injury, illness, or “loss.” Michelle doesn’t want to think about what that means. She’s clenching her jaw again. The shelter won’t have Midge’s special diet, and Reginald will definitely lose his dinosaur.
“Well?”
The woman waits for the signed form. She’s crowding into Michelle’s space, breathing on her. She’s already taken the dogs’ leashes. Reginald gives Michelle a look. Someone behind her clears their throat.
Michelle takes back the leash, and says the dogs need a pee-break. When she reaches the parking lot, she tells the man with the clipboard she left something in her car.
“You’re not allowed to go back for valuables.”
“It’s my medication.” The lie works.
She checks hotels and Airbnbs again—of course everything within 1500km is booked. She pulls up the news on her phone—another story about lost dogs. Reginald catches her eye.
It’s decided. She puts the dogs back in the Honda, and starts the engine. Authorities wave, but they’re busy with the crush of arrivals, no one has time to stop her.
The drive back is easier than she expects—the route is still open, but the main press of evacuees has passed. She lip-synchs to the Still Summer soundtrack, pretending she’s Alyssa. The drive from the main road to her house is rougher. She drives in the grooves of her previous tracks. New rabbits have moved in, but at least, there’s only one layer. Her garage, of course, is a lost cause. She’ll have to park and make a run for it. And once the car stops . . . Reginald gives her a look, understanding.
She stops the car, and immediately feels the press of rabbits on metal. Not much time before it gives. She grabs the dogs leashes, her backpack, and runs.
It’s like running through quicksand, or swimming in clothes. For a moment, she fumbles with the lock, and thinks they’ll be crushed against the house. But just in time, the lock gives, and she and the dogs fly in. She barely closes the door again. As it is, five rabbits come in with them. Michelle shoos them into the closet. She leans against the door, catches her breath.
They have a nice evening. Music on loud, to drown out the other sounds, a nice, hot dinner—rice and beans, so much healthier than potato chips. They watch two episodes of Season Fourteen and Michelle drinks a can of beer. She sleeps through all the night’s crunches and sinkholes. Reginald doesn’t groan once, he sleeps with his head on his dinosaur. Midge snores, happy, beside him.
In the morning, she checks the pantry. Two big bags of dog food, 2kg of dried lentils. 2kg of rice, two six-packs. At least, she’s prepared. When she opens the closet, there are ten rabbits. She closes the door fast. Midge watches her, hopeful, while she makes breakfast. She puts on Still Summer. More thunks come from the closet. Reginald looks outside, searching for a scent, but there’s only rabbits.
Originally published in Cosmic Horror Monthly, Issue 58, April 2025.
