This Is Where the Dog Comes In

"No, no! We want this one," the older boy proclaimed firmly. At 12 he was already the sort of boy who would protect his younger brother against all comers.

And so this was the one we got, a large, light-brown puppy with amber eyes, half-wolf and half-husky with something mysterious mixed in besides. We were given a box and various instructions about vaccinations, and repaired to a restaurant nearby where we all ate a meal together with unusually good appetite and humor.

After that, of course, the boys quickly reverted to being who they were: my stepsons, with lives and a mother of their own. My own 16-year-old daughter, whose father had also remarried, explained things to me:

"There is absolutely nothing you can do, so don't even try, Mummy," she said, shaking her head at my ignorance. So I stopped trying so hard, and the boys and I gradually established a polite and not unfriendly relationship.

It was I, of course, who walked and cared for the dog obtained to ingratiate myself into the boys' good graces. He was not a particularly good dog. He was big and rambunctious and a barker. He could even be aggressive at times, and once bit the oculist who dared to lean over me and touch my face to adjust a new pair of glasses.

But ultimately he and I, walking and talking together through our solitary days, fell in love, as humans tend to do with their dogs, and we were the ones who became inseparable. The dog sat patiently by my side as I worked the long solitary hours at my desk. We took endless walks together through the New York streets in the evenings, the dog following without a leash.

HE came with us to Italy every summer, traveling half-drugged in the hold of the plane and swimming for miles with us in the calm waters of the Mediterranean. In the water his herding instincts emerged, and he swam in big circles around the family, keeping us all safely together.

My husband and I acquired a new apartment near the park, so the dog would have a place to run, and the three of us took up running, my husband charging ahead and the dog running after him with me, tied with his leash at my waist, dragging me along in his wake.

Ten years after he had been adopted, the dog was found to have a tumor and had to have surgery. After the operation I was told I could come and visit and sit with him for a while. My younger stepson, now a tall teenager, offered, to my surprise, to accompany me.

The two of us sat cross-legged on the floor of the animal hospital with the dog between us for a long while, the tears falling silently down my cheeks. All we could hear was the soft whimpering of the animal in pain.

I said, "I have never heard him cry before."

The younger boy held him and stroked him gently. He looked up at me. "I've never seen you cry before either," he said with a half smile and something like a glimmer of admiration in his dark eyes.

I nodded and reached out and took his hand.