The girl did lots of baby-sitting and since it was the holidays she was trying to do all she could for money to buy her family and friends presents.

This couple that she had worked for before were going to an office Christmas party and asked her to watch their little boy, he was seven, in second grade. The house was on the edge of town. You could see the mountains and wildlife refuge real clearly because there weren’t very many houses on the other side of the street.

The police announced that a wild dog must have jumped the elderly woman and mauled her right in her living room. They figured nobody heard her scream because houses were closed up due to the cold weather. She was found the next day by a neighbor who saw that the front door was open. She said she could hardly recognize what was left of the poor old woman.

No one had a clue though how the vicious animal had gotten in. Had the woman opened her door for some reason? After dark?

A few people though, thought it wasn’t a dog at all – but a wolf. There hadn’t been any wolves around here for years, decades. But the government had a program to re-introduce them on the refuge. The story goes, they didn’t have enough of the natural gray wolves, so they also brought in a few European wolves, from Romania mostly. They were bigger, some say more dangerous, but it was thought they would stand a better chance of helping the pack survive. People who lived closest to the refuge did not like it.

On this night, it was dark early, but with a full moon shining down on the new snow, it was pretty bright outside. The girl thought about lighting a few logs in the fireplace, but decided to be more cautious. Instead she put a blanket across her and the little boy’s laps and she started to read him a story.

“No!” she yelled. “See who it is first.”

He peeked through the thick beveled glass by the door. “It’s a dog,” he said.

Puzzled, the teenager got to the door, and checking the locks, asked, “Who is it?”

“Special delivery,” came the reply.

It seemed late to her for packages to arrive, but it was the holidays. She unlocked the top deadbolt. Then thought she’d check for herself. She looked out. She could see a uniform jacket okay and a cap. The delivery man had turned away so she couldn’t see his face. His head was tilted and nodding like he was sniffing the air. Where was his truck?

Suddenly he turned. Lowering his face level to hers, with only the glass between them, two red eyes glowed at her. Then he bared long, sharp, sharp teeth. She froze. She couldn’t move, she couldn’t scream, she could only stare back.

It was the bang against the door and the trying of the knob that brought her around.

She jumped back, grabbed up the little boy and ran to the back door. She opened it and stepped out onto the back porch. But instead of crashing through the front door, she saw him coming around the corner of the house, straight at them. But, he wasn’t running upright, like a man, he was leaping on all fours.

She stepped back inside and locked the door just as he reached the porch. The door rattled and rattled. He went to every window, scratching, banging, trying to get in.

By the time the boy’s parents arrived home, they were nearly panicked. The phone call. The confusion. Watching the flashing emergency vehicle lights in front of their house for the last block raced, rather than reassured their hearts.

Once inside, they all hugged. Are you sure you’re okay, the mother asked over and over. Unharmed, said the teenager. “But, I know what I saw,” she said angrily to a policeman who had stopped taking notes.

The officer took the parents aside.

“It was gone by the time we got here, but we think it was the same animal that got your neighbor,” the officer said. “Understandably, it scared the kids. Look what they were reading, ‘Little Red Riding Hood.’ The girl says it was a man at the door and that he ran to the back. But all we found around the whole house were paw prints. No shoe prints. Just big paw prints in the snow.”