On Sunday, the anniversary of Evan's death, I went on a quiet walk with Aidan and when I got back, I realized the necklace I was wearing, with the locket of Evan's white curls and his ashes, was gone. I've retraced steps in vain. It's gone. Just like him. To lose it on the first anniversary was stinging.
But perhaps it was as it should be, sent off into the trails, where he loved to be. I'd never been able to bring myself to release any of his ashes, and now I have.
On Monday, Bob sent me a link to a one year old border collie, named Buddy. After seeing how much Aidan loved having Scotty as a companion for a few days, and remembering how long I had hemmed and hawed over getting Evan a little brother, until we ran out of time, I decided to jump.
But Buddy's link went offline, meaning someone else had adopted him. I looked around Monday evening at other rescue sites, still pulled to adopt from the same shelter where Evan and Aidan had come from. To my surprise, there was "Buddy"'s photo, but he was now named "Leo" and his intake date was that day, April 2. Someone brought him back.
So Bob, who could take the day off, agreed to go down and see him.
Tuesday morning, just to check, I reloaded the shelter page. Leo was still there. But now, too, was another border collie, an older one, not neutered, named Jake.
I showed Bob. Seven. The number of years I'd had Evan. And that face. Those eyes.
Bob, of course, was now flummoxed. "I can't bring home two dogs."
I know.
Well, which one do you want me to meet?
Meet them both. Go with your gut.
He was THIS close to calling it off at that moment, I could tell.
But he went.
He got there and asked about Leo first. Leo was out on a walk, but the volunteer pulled his paperwork. He was a stray, no history, and had been adopted and returned yesterday, with notes saying he was too aggressive with "some" dogs. Reading between the lines, someone took a shelter-shocked young pup home and let him mix with more than one dog immediately. Not good.
The volunteer then says, "He only has one more shot. If he's adopted again and returned, he will be euthanized."
Well crap. No pressure.
"Was there any other dog you wanted to meet?"
So he asked about Jake.
And that's when we learned that Jake had been left at the shelter by his family of seven years, a family with kids and cats, all of whom Jake was wonderful with, because they were moving overseas and weren't taking him with them.
I've spent the past days turning this over in my mind. I'm horrified. All I can think of at first is how scared and confused and heartbroken Evan would have been if, after seven years, he gets left behind. How can you do that? How? It's a kill shelter.
Of course, Bob wants to meet him.
"Oh, well, you can't meet him at the moment, either."
Turns out, he was taken that morning to get neutered. (yet another question mark: he's SEVEN.)
But Bob has already gone with his gut. He's not spending another night in that place.
So luckily Mom and Dad are home and he can hang out at their house until 5:00 when Jake would be ready for pickup after his surgery.
He's got to be so confused.
After meeting in the front yard and checking out the back yard, this is Aidan and Jake sitting for their first photo together (okay, let's be honest, they're sitting for cheese) in the first fifteen minutes.
We are trying to keep things pretty low key since Jake is recovering from surgery, but you'd never know it. He was raring to go from the minute he came home.
Last night they ended up both sleeping on the bed, and then both moving to the floor near one another.
This morning, on our first walk:
So I'm going to think the kindest things I can think about the family that left him behind. Perhaps they were military and caught off guard at a new assignment. (The volunteer said they were moving to a country in Africa.) Perhaps they knew he was too good a dog to ever be in danger of being euthanized. Whatever their thought process, it was him being at THIS shelter that led him to us.
Welcome home, Jake. You'll figure it out pretty soon.
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