I’ve seen him say goodbye before to other puppies after the training and it’s always painful, but Didar was special to us for more than one reason: not only he is the only dog that actually lived with Axe, but he’s also a puppy whose life my husband had to fight for, not to mention, he’s the one that brought us together and finally made us forget about all our silly preconceived notions and confess our love to each other.
Fortunately, I happen to have just found out the perfect thing to cheer my tender-hearted husband up.
We reach the car and as usual he opens the door for me, buckles me up himself and then kisses my lips and forehead before closing the door and getting in.
Yeah, I am one lucky cat-lady, there’s no doubt about it.
“Love?”
“Hmm?” he mutters, turning the key in the ignition.
I reach out to grab his hand. “I was thinking we should really get a dog now.”
He smiles. “Yeah? Why now, babe?”
I play with his fingers, smiling. “Well, for many reasons really, but mostly, because I’ve been told dogs make better childminders than three fastidious cats and a crabby tortoise could ever be.”
It takes him a second to register what I said and then he’s stopping the jeep again and unbuckling both his seat belt and mine.
He pulls me in his lap, a huge grin on his kissable lips. “You mean…?”
I nod, smiling up at him.
“We’re having a baby?” he asks in wonder, his voice low and moved.
I giggle, throwing my arms around his neck. “We are having a baby.”
He squeezes me hard, his arms around my back. “Oh, love… I… a baby! I’m so, so happy… I… I love you so much, Tess. So so much…”
I pull back and I can barely see his beloved face through the screen of tears covering my eyes as I cry and laugh at the same time, happier than I’ve ever been in my life.
“I love you too, sweetie,” I breathe on his lips and then we’re kissing and kissing and kissing and the world around us just fades away.
Epilogue 2
PART 1
AXE
Five years later…
I throw a ball to Sami –the eighteen-months-old choc Labrador I’m training- and he shoots out to retrieve it, running at full speed.
He brings me back the ball, his long pink tongue lolling out in a happy ‘smile’ as he sits down and wags his tail impatiently waiting for me to send him to fetch again.
This is only the second training session that I do with both Sami and his future little owner so that the child can familiarize himself with the pet, but I can already see they will be doing great together when Sami will be ready to go home with him in another four months.
Labradors have the finest hearing amongst dogs, and I called this furry ball of energy here ‘Sami’ just for this purpose since the name means ‘all hearing’.
I knew from the start that he would make a wonderful service dog for children, in a lot of ways he reminds me of Didar: they share the same brave spirit and they are both fun-loving troublemakers, but when he knows it’s important, Sami has a calm and peaceful quality to his ways that I knew would make him a perfect life-long friend, particularly for a little kid like Max.
One year ago he was walking back from kindergarten hand-in-hand with his mom, Kelly, when they were both ran over by a driver who was heavily under the influence.
Kelly’s husband, John, was the one who told me their story and it chilled me to my bones.
He could barely speak even after almost six months, when both his wife and kid were safe.
I’m a father as well and I love my wife and kids so dearly, I can only imagine his fear, pain and rage.
Kelly got off easy, she ‘only’ broke a few bones but wasn’t permanently injured.
Little Maxwell, who was five-year-old at the time, wasn’t so lucky.
He was badly hurt, he broke an arm and a shoulder, his vocal cords were damaged, and his hearing and balance were seriously compromised because of traumas to both of his ears.
He is ninety-six percent deaf from one year and seventy-nine percent deaf from the other.
His issues with balance have been treated by a physiotherapist and his mom tells me he is doing way better nowadays, though he is still prone to falling sometimes.
For his hearing impairment, nothing could be done short of surgery for cochlear implants and he is being presently assessed by an expert in the field for that, so we all thought he could do nothing but benefit from the friendship and assistance of a service dog, not only to help him compensate his lack of hearing and to have someone that always watches over him to prevent his falls, but also to help him feel more secure and confident.
John tells me he was a very outgoing and happy child before the accident, but the silence in which he is forced to live now has made him withdraw a little into himself.
But like I said, only two lessons in and I can already see progress in this tough little fighter. It’s been a year and even as young as he is he hasn’t stop fighting a single day, learning ASL and how to read lips, now what he needs is a little bit of joy and a friend who would never betray him.
I feel a light tap on my side and I look down at Maxwell.
He has a big grin on his lips, his cerulean eyes shining with happiness.
“Sami’s having a lot of fun, don’t you think?” I mouth slowly, tapping the side of my nose with two fingers and then touching the same fingers on my other hand to sign ‘fun’.
Max smiles even bigger and nods then he puts his middle and index fingers together and uses them as if to brush something off his nose signing back to me: ‘yes, funny’.
I offer him the ball and he shakes his head.
I smile at him encouragingly and push the fuzzy yellow tennis ball in his hands again.
He takes it and looks down at it, just staring at it and breaking eye-contact with me.
I tap his shoulder and he looks up at me.
I close both of my hands into fists and place my thumbs between my middle and index fingers and then I rotate both fists in small circles away from my body to sign ‘try’.
Max crooks the first two fingers of both little hands and then taps them against each other signing ‘difficult’.
I shake my head and smile at him.
“Not at all, man.”
I sign ‘easy’ brushing my right hand twice against the fingers of my left one.
“Come on, buddy, Sami is waiting…”
The kid takes a big breath and throws the ball across the lawn.
When Sami takes off like a flash, Max laughs and claps his hands, jumping up and down in place when the dog comes back and drops the ball at his feet.
Max throws the ball again, smiling and once more Sami runs off to chase it.
I see Max’s mom and dad cheering him from where they’re standing at the edge of the training pen, directly in their child’s line of vision, and I wave at them. They both wave back, smiling.