Red

I only ever had one dog.

We met when he was a small puppy. His mother was the neighbor's dog, and surely sensing that her master was about to take her litter away, she had decided to relocate them to take care of them in the wild, pushed by her sense of duty to keep them all together for as long as she could, regardless of the risks she was taking for herself or her offspring.

My siblings and I were working in the fields when we spotted her. We were alarmed because other neighbors had big dogs that could be dangerous for us and seeing an animal roaming on our land ( an animal that wasn't our cats) always made us a bit nervous.

We ran to her and she bolted away, abandoning her litter, which we discovered with delight, because puppies, like kittens, are always so immensely cute.

There were three of them, just as there was three of us, and we each spotted the one we loved most, and carried them back to our house, hoping our parents would let us keep them.

My older sister loved an all black one she quickly decided to call : Champion, because he seemed very eager to run around after her and seemed full of energy and delight.

My smaller brother had a furry one with many colors, who seemed to love lounging about and yawning. He called him: "Cutie".

And I picked the last one, a small puppy, the smallest of the litter, white and yellowish, that had a bit of blood on his fur, having been scraped somewhere.

Because of this mark, I named him Red.

Our parents weren't too enthusiastic at adopting 3 puppies, given we kept cats around just to keep the mice population down and they didn't like dogs all that much, having been confronted to dangerous mutts in their youth.

My father had once been bitten on the knee and had needed many stitches to repair the damage, so he did not have a good experience with dogs.

But we pleaded and pleaded and finally they agreed to let us keep them, at least a few days, see if we would get bored with them.

The next day was wonderful, we played with all the puppies every second we could. The mother had come to find her litter but seeing that they were in good hands, she let her offspring go.

Champion followed my sister around everywhere, Cutie lounged and yawned and looked cute and Red, well, he seemed a little sad, I figured he missed his mother.

I tried to talk to him, to get him to play and if he was interested by butterflies and his ears perked up every time Champion let out a small bark, he did not seem to be much excited by anything except moping around.

The next day he was the same, he even refused to eat anything unless I presented it to him next to his mouth, and drank the same, only if I showed him the pot of water.

My brother and sister said he was a boring puppy but I didn't agree, I thought he was just sad, needing someone to show him that he had lost his mother but there was still good things for him in this world.

The day after, he seemed worse, maybe a little sick, but I didn't want to tell my parents because they might use it as a reason to take the puppies to the vet and just get rid of the problem altogether.

I stayed with Red as much as I could, having many farm chores to do, but every time I had a minute, I came back to the basket in the barn and fed him one or two kibbles and making him drink water just to be sure he would not get thirsty.

When I was done with chores I would take him for a walk, carrying him in my arms until we reached a nice spot . Then I would sit in the grass and try to find insects to amuse him and make him forget his sadness. I would always carry some food with me to make sure I gave him some whenever we were together, and water for the same reason.

He liked being outdoors more than in the basket, that much was certain, and I was able to get a few rises out of him every now and again.

When he was tired of playing with strings ( I was used to cats ) he started nestling against me instead of just crashing on the ground.

Every day he got a little better, every time I came to see him he reacted with more and more enthusiasm, until all the sadness was gone from his eyes, until he ate again with as much appetite as his brothers, until he was well again.

Nonetheless I kept bringing him with me for long walks; he followed me everywhere, he never tired, never wanted to go back home, never abandoned me like a cat would, going on its way because it knew better or felt hungry.

Never in my life had I seen such loyalty, and the moments we shared together were always like a ray of sunshine. He followed me in the forest to help me pick wild blueberries, and sometimes we would get caught in a storm and end up soaking wet, but that never dampened his enthusiasm. He got doused by a skunk, curious to discover what that strange animal was, but I wasn't bothered by the smell he carried for a few days after even though I bathed him many times to reduce the smell. He was always curious and was never sad again as long as he was with me.

The kind of loyalty and love money cannot buy; he was my best friend in this world.