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When I landed In NYC mid-afternoon yesterday, I listened to the dire voicemail from the vet, so when the car dropped me off at the vet, I was on the people-mover forcing me toward something bad, real bad.

The vet’s receptionist, instant sad eyes when I told her who I was, brought me into a room. The doc followed behind her wearing the same mask of regret and concern. She explained that Eddie was bleeding internally and in extreme pain. And then she carried my boy in along with a polka dotted fleece blanket for the floor.

I laid next time him, doing the familiar rub on his impressive ears, the rub I’ve been doing for twelve years, looking into his eyes and wondering what he saw back. His panting was fast, desperate. And I just talked, saying those same words he knew, over and over, and we didn’t break eye contact. The doc peeked in the window of the room and I nodded.

She laid down with me and two shots later, I held Eddie’s paw for the last time, kissed that beautiful nose, and rubbed his eyes closed.Eddie slept in the same bed with me longer than anyone else in my life ever. Twelve years. My Eddie. Jim’s Eddie. Stephen’s Eddie. He took care of us all. I’ll tell the story of how we met sometime later.

WRITTEN 02/09/2019

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DAYS LATER:

A deep purple shopping bag made of strong stock met me when I opened my apartment door last night. Eddie’s ashes. Jim’s daycare brought them when they dropped off the little girl. I peeked in the bag, looked over at Jim jumping her signature jump, squeaking every time she reached her apex.

After kissing her warm paper-thin pointy ears, I put her running feet onto the floor, she gained purchase and bolted into the kitchen for dinner. I followed leaving that purple bag where it was. After she’d eaten and I put some chicken in the over, she curled up on the beige sofa, the one she shared every night with Eddie.

I opened the bag a little more and saw Eddie’s collar. I just wanted to hold it. I plucked it from the top of the wooden box that anchored the bag. When I did, his dog tag, the one Eddie wore for twelve years with engraving almost completely worn smooth and invisible, tinged. Just twice.

Jim popped up instantly, eyes fixed on the door, her expression of hope and expectation and where-the-hell-have-you-been and well, longing. The longing for her keeper, her best friend, that expression.

I clenched the tags in my fist to quiet them, put them down so they wouldn’t make that sound again, and scooped her up, holding her as tight as I could without breaking bones, her ears righteously kissed, cooing how much I loved her. She was warm; she let me sway her. I put her back onto the couch cushion where immediately she sniffed her butt.

You see, every time Jim receives affection, she sniffs her butt. Don’t ask. I have no idea, either, but it’s the way she came to me and that’s just fine.

WRITTEN 02/14/2019

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I’m not sure Stephen and I even liked each other very much when we first met. My great friend Robyn Zeiger, who’s a brilliant therapist and specializes in pet loss, told me that it’s best not to get the same breed, gender, or color as my Bob Slobbers, the smartest most intuitive dog in the world. Bob was a mighty eighty-plus pounds of black lab mix, a proud boy whose strength held me together when we both lost Billy.

Two years later when I was in a position to get another companion, what did I do? I chose Stephen, a five-year old black lab mix, lankier than Bob, less substantial. He didn’t cuddle, refused eye contact, and he seemed dumb. He was on one couch, I was on the other. We stayed that way until Eddie sauntered into our yard about eight months later and never left.

I always joked that “Of Mice And Men” was playing out in my house–Eddie was “George” to Stephen’s “Lennie.” They were inseparable, yet Stephen grew closer to me, my couch nuzzler, curled up into the size of a large basketball in the crook of my knee.

He was my little big dumb boy, almost special needs, really, but he’d look right into my eyes with his big browns with nothing but love and care.

When I returned from Chicago this past Tuesday, I could tell something was wrong. I feared the antibiotics that scotch-taped him together since last September had stopped working. By Wednesday night, his breathing was labored. I squirmed through Thursday at work and the evening screening I attended, rushed home and took him to the emergency room.

They drained almost three liters of fluid from him, pink viscous bad news surrounding his lungs. We left at two in the morning. He felt a little better, ate a tiny bit. I held him all night long until the morning when we could go to his regular vet.

We were there for hours yesterday as she tried test after test to see if there was a Hail Mary that might work. But it was that damned fluid that was unexplainable, or rather, was the answer I didn’t want to hear.

Stephen’s friend, Dean, called me, asked if he could cover over. He knew. I am so grateful he did. In the fourth hour, our vet, tears in her eyes and syringes in her hand, got down on the floor with Dean and me, and did what we had to do.

I kissed his nose over and over and over, telling him how much I loved him, how Dean loved him, how much Eddie would miss him. And I thanked him for taking such good care of me these past eight years.

Stephen, you could never have been Bob Slobbers, but you were something just as good. You were my Stephen.

WRITTEN 04/19/2014

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