Chapter 1

Chapter One : The October That Went Quiet

October had always been a month I waited for.

It was my birthday month.

As a child, that was enough to make October feel special. I counted the days without really understanding how quickly they passed. The month carried the excitement of a birthday, the expectation of small celebrations, and the strange happiness that children find in knowing that, for one day, everyone will remember them a little more than usual.

But in 2015, October became something else.

It became a month I would remember for an entirely different reason.

That was the year I learned that a birthday month could contain both happiness and heartbreak.

I was in fifth grade.

At that age, the world still seemed fairly simple to me. School, homework, friends, family, birthdays, holidays—and Rocky.

Rocky was our dog.

He wasn't merely an animal who lived outside the house or a pet we occasionally played with. He was part of our family in the uncomplicated way only a dog can be.

He had his own place in our daily routine.

His own sounds.

His own habits.

His own way of making his presence known.

When he was around, nobody had to wonder whether the house felt alive.

It simply did.

But Rocky had become sick.

Distemper had taken away the playful dog we knew and left behind a tired, suffering one.

The adults in the family were worried.

Even though I was only in fifth grade, I could feel that something was wrong from the way everyone behaved.

People spoke more quietly.

They watched Rocky more carefully.

My mother stayed close to him.

Every little change in his condition seemed important.

For a child, there is something frightening about watching adults become worried.

Children may not understand every medical detail, but they understand expressions.

They understand silence.

They understand when their parents are trying to remain calm.

And I understood that everyone was afraid.

Rocky was crying a lot that night.

His cries filled the house and made it impossible for anyone to pretend everything was normal.

I remember feeling helpless.

I wanted him to stop hurting.

I wanted somebody to make him better.

Most of all, I wanted the next morning to arrive and prove that we had been worrying for nothing.

But the night didn't go the way I wanted.

At one point, my mother moved toward Rocky, intending to pick him up.

Then suddenly, he had a seizure.

Everything happened so quickly that my mind couldn't keep up with it.

I remember seeing him.

I remember my family.

I remember the fear in the room.

And then I remember his eyes.

After that, everything became strangely quiet inside my head.

Rocky was gone.

I had been there.

I had witnessed it.

Yet my mind refused to accept it.

For a few moments, I didn't cry.

I didn't even know what expression I was supposed to make.

I simply stood there.

Blank.

Expressionless.

It was as though someone had taken all the emotions inside me and pressed a pause button.

I remember my mother coming to me.

She didn't need to explain anything.

She knew.

Perhaps mothers understand these things without words.

She hugged me.

And that was when something inside me broke.

My eyes became wet.

One tear rolled down my cheek.

Then another.

Then suddenly, I couldn't stop.

I cried so hard that night.

I cried until my face hurt.

I cried until I became exhausted.

And even when sleep finally came, it didn't give me any escape.

I cried in my sleep too.

For the next several days, I carried that sadness everywhere.

I went through the motions of being a child.

School.

Home.

Meals.

Homework.

But something felt missing.

There had been a presence in our home, and now there was an empty space where that presence used to be.

I began noticing small things.

The places where Rocky used to sit.

The sounds that no longer came.

The little routines that suddenly had no reason to happen anymore.

It was strange.

Nothing about the house had physically changed.

The walls were still there.

The rooms were still there.

The furniture was still there.

But the house felt different.

That was probably my first understanding of grief.

Grief doesn't always arrive like a storm.

Sometimes it arrives as an empty corner.

A quiet room.

A bowl that nobody uses anymore.

A place where someone should be.

And somehow, that absence becomes louder than their presence ever was.

I was too young to understand why losing a dog could hurt so much.

Perhaps I thought adults were supposed to be the ones who experienced serious sadness.

Children were supposed to recover quickly.

At least, that's what I had assumed.

But I didn't recover quickly.

For days, Rocky remained in my thoughts.

Sometimes I would suddenly remember something about him and feel that heaviness again.

Sometimes I would almost expect to see him.

Then reality would return.

He wasn't there.

And there was nothing I could do about it.

My family felt it too.

Everyone had loved Rocky in their own way.

But I think I had experienced his loss differently because I had been standing there when he left.

There are some moments childhood never completely forgets.

That was one of mine.

Still, life continued.

It always does.

School didn't stop because Rocky was gone.

The sun still rose.

People still laughed.

Children still ran around.

Teachers still gave homework.

My birthday month continued moving toward my birthday.

But October no longer felt exactly the same.

I didn't know it then, but something else was already beginning quietly nearby.

Our family knew a neighbour who had a female dog.

And that dog had puppies.

They were Rocky's siblings.

After Rocky's death, my Nani told the neighbours what had happened.

She told them how sick he had become.

She told them how much our family had loved him.

She told them about that terrible night.

The neighbours were deeply touched.

Then they said something that none of us expected.

They told us that when their puppies were old enough, they would give us one.

A puppy.

One of Rocky's siblings.

At first, the thought felt strange to me.

Another dog?

So soon?

A part of me wondered whether bringing another dog home would somehow mean replacing Rocky.

But perhaps love doesn't work that way.

Maybe the heart doesn't replace one person with another.

Maybe it simply makes more space.

I didn't know any of that then.

I only knew that somewhere nearby, a litter of puppies was growing.

Tiny paws.

Tiny noses.

Tiny bodies stumbling over one another.

And among them was one puppy who would eventually walk through our front door.

He had been born on February 18, 2016.

I hadn't met him yet.

I didn't know what he looked like.

I didn't know his personality.

I didn't know that he would grow into one of the most mischievous creatures our family had ever known.

I didn't know that he would make us laugh until our stomachs hurt.

I didn't know that my Nani would secretly teach him tricks.

I didn't know that he would develop an impressive interest in food, money, wool, notebooks, and generally anything he was not supposed to touch.

I knew none of this.

For now, he was simply a tiny puppy among his siblings.

And somewhere between the grief of one October and the arrival of the following spring, my story with him was quietly beginning.

I just didn't know it yet.