Bella

“What are you doing?” I thought as I shifted my car into park outside Finding Hope Animal Shelter. “You don’t have a job; you just moved into a new place. You shouldn’t be getting a dog. Not now. Not ever. Turn around. Go home,” but I didn’t go home. I took the keys out of the ignition, stepped out into the hot New Mexico sun, and locked my car behind me.

The first thing that hit me upon walking through the front doors was the overwhelming smell of urine and bleach. Although the floors were shiny and polished, I couldn’t help but feel that I was walking over decades of urine and feces that couldn’t be removed from the blue and yellow linoleum tile, no matter how vigorously they cleaned. My skin itched as I took in my surroundings. I debated whether breathing through my nose or mouth was better. The building reverberated with barks and whines, a few solemn howls, and anxious paws battering chain-link cages.

“Hi! Welcome to Finding Hope. What can I help you with?” A large woman with rosy rosacea cheeks and greasy strawberry blond hair said from behind the desk.

For a moment, I didn’t know what to say. I thought about leaving. I was closer to the door than I was to the desk. But I felt my feet move, and before I knew it, I was sitting in a sunken vinyl chair flipping through a binder of adoptable pets. I wasn’t entirely sure what I was looking for. I hadn’t planned to actually look for a dog. I just wanted to pet some sad puppies, maybe wallow in our joint abandonment, donate five dollars to the jar, and go home. But at Finding Hope, you can’t walk along the kennels looking at dogs and sneaking pocket treats to them; you have to request to see a dog, and a volunteer will bring it out to you.

I picked a random porker named Bella. A black and white chunky-doo with an aging face and floppy ears. “She needs to go on a diet, so an active home would be best. Her family surrendered her after entering legal trouble. Bella is a sweet old lady looking for her furever home! Ask to meet Bella today.”

I asked to see her, and the front desk attendant told me to “go out that door and wait in our Meet n’ Greet Yard.”

I clung to the one patch of shade in the corner of the AstroTurf, sweating and thinking about how selfish I was. Here was a dog who desperately wanted a home, and here was I, a freshly broken up with lesbian looking for a little comfort without commitment. But when the handler brought Bella out, everything shifted.

She was salt n’ pepper, spunky, and jiggled from her tail to her nose. She immediately ran up to me, flopped on the ground, and presented her oversized tummy. I kneeled and graciously scratched her belly, gushing over how cute she was and what a pretty, chunky girl she was. She loved me instantly. The realist in me hates to admit it, but I loved her too. I couldn’t bear the thought of her returning to the concrete and chain-link kennels surrounded by miserable howls and anxious barking. It was no place for a little princess.

So, I filled out the necessary paperwork and took her to my car, where I immediately understood the urgency of her weight loss. She couldn’t jump in the car, and lifting her up was going to throw my back out. After much groaning and heaving, and an awkward moment where Bella frantically clawed at the back seat as her butt started to slip out of my arms, I finally got her into the car. I patted her black flank, told her I loved her, and that we were going to get healthy and strong together.

Bella and I started our transformation. Getting up every morning before sunrise so we could go on our walks without the threat of the sun. We changed our diet and stared longingly at the treats on the shelves, counting down the hours until it was cookie time. Slowly, Bella and I began healing. I started sleeping a little better, and the memories of my ex were easier with Bella’s snores there to comfort me. Bella began to show off her zoomies and played with her toys more. I threw away a few post-it notes with sweet nothings written in my ex’s handwriting. Bella gave kisses when the task unexpectedly brought me to tears. Things were going better than I could have hoped.

Until Bella got sick.

One morning, I woke up, ready to start our walk, and called for Bella, who recently had taken to sleeping on the cold tile in the kitchen. When she didn’t come pattering to my bedroom for morning snuggles, I went downstairs to check on her. The smell hit me first. The smell of shit and blood. I flipped on the light and cried out. Bella was lying on her side, panting in the middle of the kitchen. I ran to her. She was slick with blood and bile, a white tongue sticking out of her mouth, eyes staring off into space. I told her to hold on. I was going to get help. I used all my strength to pick her up off the floor got her into my car, and drove to the emergency vet. I ran into the waiting room shoeless, covered in blood, and begged someone to help me.

They took her to the back on a stretcher and left me standing staring at the swinging doors. Someone told me to wait. Someone gave me blue surgical shoe covers for my feet. I couldn’t feel my body. I sat in the waiting room chair. People came and went, I was acutely aware of their stares. I must have looked like death sitting there in my blood-soaked pajamas and bare feet.

My baby girl was all alone, scared, and in pain. There was nothing I could do for her. I had never felt so helpless. At some point, I got up and walked shakily to the desk to ask for an update, but they told me they would let me know as soon as they heard something. Six hours later, a doctor came out and called my name. She took me quietly to an examination room and asked me to sit down.

“Bella is stable now,” she said.

I breathed a sigh of relief, “Can I see her?”

“Soon, but first we need to go over a few things.”

I nodded. The doctor said a lot of things I didn’t understand, rattled off expensive treatments, and medications. The thing I understood was terminal.

“Bella’s cancer is terminal.”

I couldn’t breathe or hold it together any longer. I let out a long wail of pain. The doctor was patient and professional. She let me cry before continuing with the diagnosis. I asked her how long we had. She wasn’t sure, but didn’t think it would be more than a month.

“I just got her,” I whimpered. “She’s my best friend.”

“I know this is hard.” Hard? Hard! This is unbearable. I never should have gone to that stupid shelter. I never should have taken her home. Why did I think this was a good idea? The doctor prescribed Bella some pain medication “to make her comfortable.”

They brought my Bella girl to me, weak and moving slowly, but happy to see me. She rested her head on my shoulder as I hugged her. At home, I cleaned up the mess in the kitchen. Bella watched me from her dog bed, sniffing the air. I assured her it was okay and that I didn’t mind cleaning it, but every wipe of the mop felt like I was wiping away part of her. I didn’t know what to do with the bucket of bloody water. I couldn’t bring myself to dump it down the drain, so I brought it outside and dumped it by the tree where Bella liked to nap. That’s when I decided that I would do everything in my power to make her last days the best ones of her life.

I started by decorating the tree with little trinkets, squeakers from disemboweled stuffy toys, laminated pictures of her and me, a handmade pawprint garland I ordered from Etsy, string lights, crystals, and windchimes. I bought a lilac bush, planted it, and placed the shovel ceremoniously against the trunk of the tree for the day when I would dig her grave.

We ate McDonald’s and slept on an air mattress in the living room, so she didn’t have to walk up the stairs. We didn’t go on walks anymore, but we did drive to the park to watch the squirrels and let strangers feed her cookies. We stopped caring about getting better and focused on loving every moment—completely, deeply, and without fear.

The morning Bella died, I woke up with an immense sense of peace. I rolled over, knowing that she was gone, but for a moment I looked at her lying by the back door like she was sleeping and let her be.

She was the greatest thing to ever happen to me. Although brief and painful, I was thankful for every moment I had with her. Slowly, I got out of bed, walked over to her, and ruffled her ears. “Good job, Bella girl,” I whispered. “Good job.”

I carried her out to the yard and laid her under the tree. The sky was just starting to lighten with the sunrise. Venus hung brightly in the dusk sky. I dug out the space I had marked for her. By the time I was finished, the sky was bright with oranges and pinks. I sat under the tree with Bella to enjoy one last sunrise, listening to the songbirds wake up. The slow dampening of the earth as color and warmth returned.

I took off her collar and laid her gently in the grave. Once the earth settled over her, I sank to my knees and prayed for her. I didn’t know to whom or what I was praying, but someone had to be waiting for her. They were responsible for her care now. They were responsible for my heart.