"I don’t think we buried Little Chef deep enough," I said.

But wait. I'm starting in the middle of the story. I just couldn't help getting to the best part first. Let me back up.

Over the weekend, as I was mowing the lawn and pondering the fact that half my grass looks like overcooked toast, I came across a strange-looking hole in the yard. I didn’t think much of it at first, because my yard is to groundskeeping as bloodthirsty undead hordes are to beauty pageants. I’m always finding weird stuff out there. Unexplained holes, weeds that look like they germinated on alien worlds, large slabs of raw bacon, whatever. As a result, when I see something weird in my yard, I mostly just ignore it. It’s the best way to prevent feeling the need to deal with it. Sooner or later everything rots or gets carted away by animals or goes poof in the ever-approaching Armageddon, right? Right.

When I spotted that strange-looking hole, I didn’t give it any thought. As I mowed near it the second time, though, it more fully caught my attention. It was, after all, a rather large hole – about four or five inches across. If a critter had dug that hole, it would have to be a somewhat substantial critter. Different from the little snake holes and spider holes I usually ignore and walk in a wide circle around.

I pushed the mower closer to the hole, approaching carefully, should anything lunge out toward my delicious, blood-filled neck. Nothing did, which was good. As much as I wouldn’t have minded a couple days off work, spending them in the hospital would have kinda defeated the purpose.

I noticed something unusual about the hole. The outer edge of it was a perfect octagon. An octagon? I wondered if perhaps a critter had unearthed some kind of tubing. Worse, I wondered if perhaps a critter had unearthed some kind of very-expensive-to-repair tubing.

As I eyeballed that very odd hole, trying to figure out what the heck I was actually seeing, I spotted a silk flower next to it. And then the light bulb went on in my head. I knew exactly what the hole was. And I sort of threw up in my mouth just a little.

The silk flower had been left there by my stepdaughter, Melon Ball (not her real name), when we had buried Little Chef, her dwarf hamster. We had buried Little Chef in a small decorative box, which had been octagonal. I wasn’t looking into a critter-hole. I was looking into a critter casket. An open critter casket, at that.

I noticed all the other evidence pretty quickly after that. The tossed-around dirt. The lid to the box, which lay a couple feet away, half-covered by some leaves. Something had gotten hungry and apparently had smelled interesting flavors buried a little too close to the surface. And it had, after a modicum of effort, uncovered a decorative box full of dead snack.

Gross.

Gross gross gross.

I went inside and found Colette. "I don’t think we buried Little Chef deep enough," I said.

"What do you mean?" she asked.

"I just found the box dug up in the yard. Something opened it and…well, and I don’t know what."

She shushed me and looked toward the kids’ rooms, where they were playing. "Quiet down with that," she said. "The kids might not handle that very well. Is he, um, no longer in the box?"

"I don't know," I said, more quietly. "I didn't look. I guess I should."

"Gross," Colette said.

I realized that I indeed should go see if Little Chef was still in his resting place or not. If he was, I probably owed it to him to rebury him, a little deeper this time. After all, Little Chef lived with me in my office at work for a while, and in fact, had even had his final days there. (It’s a long story, which I covered in a column a while back, if you’re curious.)

I really didn’t want to. Moving Little Chef’s fuzzy little remains out of his cage and into the critter casket had been downright creepy. The idea of peering at him after six months in the ground was, I’m not gonna lie, freaking me out. I didn’t want to look. I certainly didn’t want to have to touch or move anything. Just thinking about it was giving me the willies. But Little Chef had been a good pet. I owed it to him. Plus, on the off chance that Little Chef had perchance become a member of the undead horde and had clawed his own way out of his box, I owed it to humanity to cut off his head, because really that’s the only way to stop a zombie hamster. Out I went.

I approached the hole again, really not wanting to see what I might have to see, and picked up the silk flower that still lay near the lil’ hamster casket. I used the long fake stem as a poking device and moved a couple of leaves off of the box. And I saw…you know, to be honest, I don’t know what I saw. A lot of dirt. A clump of some kind. And that was it. The clump might have been something gross. It might have been dirt. I decided that I really didn’t want to know. I put the lid back on top of the box and kicked a little dirt over the top. Then I got the hell out of there, shaking with the willies the whole way.

Sorry, Little Chef. If that was you in there, well, I’m real sorry. But you’re gross now and I really want no part of you. Don’t blame yourself. It’s not you, it’s me.

Oh, and if you’re a member of the undead horde, and you see me approaching you tonight with garden shears in my hand, I’d appreciate it if you’d hold really still. Thanks.

Bob Rybarczyk (brybarczyk@sbcglobal.net) writes stuff. He is fairly certain that his DNA tastes like peanut butter and chocolate. Look for his novel, “Acoustic Kitty,” at area Borders stores and Amazon.com. Coming this fall: a collection of his favorite Suburban Fringe columns. W00t!