The Last Dog Standing
My first enemy was a dog.
There was a time when I was younger, and my grandmother had five Miniature Pinschers. They loved to run and roam, bark and growl. My mother, grandparents, and I all had our favorites out of the bunch. Grandpa preferred Fritz and Duke, the youngest and oldest brothers of the three puppies, and the two biggest. It sometimes felt like an injustice to refer to Fritz as a ‘mini’ anything as he was twice the size of any of the other dogs. My mother took a liking to Mitzi, the mom of the three pups. I sometimes think it was mostly because her collar was blue, her favorite color, that my mother liked Mitzi most. I see now it might have been Mitzi’s gentle disposition that had drawn my mother to her; they had much in common. I adored the middle brother, Tiny. His name suited him in that he was indeed the smallest height-wise. However, it also betrayed him because he was the chubbiest of all the dogs. I liked his jolly nature, never one to bite or snarl at anyone. I swear he used to smile, front teeth crooked and tongue haphazardly slung on his bottom lip, eyes glossy and admiring.
Then there was Coco, my first foe. He was a mean thing, always snarling at me when I approached and never seeming to warm up, even as we grew together. My grandmother loved that dog like he was the son she never had. Coco was the father of the three pups and the first of the ‘Min Pins,’ as they were referred to by us, to come into the family. I cannot recall when I encountered Coco for the first time, nor when my disdain for him blossomed. It could have been the time he bit me. Then there was the time he tripped me. The times he stole food off my plate when I wasn’t looking. That last one happened so often that I started walking around the house with my food, never leaving it unattended again.
What I do know for certain is I spent an entire childhood hating that dog.
Gradually, over the years, the poor pups began to pass. The first to go was Fritz. He died in 2015, and we all mourned him like we had lost a family member because, in some ways, we had. My grandfather cried; my grandmother held him. I understood love for a few seconds. Then it started to rain, and we all went inside the house, where all but one dog stayed uncharacteristically silent as the door slammed behind me.
“Shut up!” my grandfather screamed at Coco as he yapped until my grandmother picked him up and held him like he was a baby in need of consoling. I understood fear. I could see it in my grandmother’s eyes that stayed fixed on my grandfather as he fumed. There was the time he had kicked Coco in a rage over his barking, and my grandmother never forgave him. I could see it in the distrust creasing on her face as she stared at her husband, glasses glinting off the overhead light, making her eyes unreadable.
He turned on me.
“And hold that damn door next time!” With that, my grandfather stormed off, down into the depths of the basement where he goes to grieve. Or drink. I never saw him cry again.
All the dogs have died but one. My mother called a week ago to inform me Tiny had passed away. It was a dull pain, what I felt when she told me, like the ache in your back that grows steadily after you’ve been slouching for too long. I inquired about Coco.
Alive and doing better than when you visited. I sighed, and we hung up.
There was the time after my grandmother passed away on a dreary fall afternoon in 2018 when we thought for sure that Coco would be the first of the four Min Pins left, to go. I had supposed he’d be unable to live without her and die of a broken heart, assumptions not solely reserved for the dog. We were wrong. Though I hated him in my youth, that ornery old hound means a great deal to me in my adulthood. He’s a decrepit and crusty reminder of the persistence and perseverance of love. Coco cannot see, he cannot hear, and he can barely walk. But he can feel. He can bark. He can smell. Despite his losses, he finds a reason to wake up and live another day. He’s been doing a lot better as of late.