Tyson

It was 1999, which sounded like a significant year at the time. Everyone was worried that when Y2K rolled in, most of the world's computer systems would crash in unexpected ways and that the end of civilization as we knew it was near.

For me, it was the year Tyson the Boxer saved my life.

He showed up one day out of nowhere, Sylvian said he needed a place to stay and had nowhere else to go, so she took him home with her and told him he could stay with us.

He was loving and loyal, even in his early adulthood, which in dog years would be considered late teens. His previous owners had snipped off his tail, leaving behind a short stump the length of an index finger, which was apparently the accepted custom for the boxer breed.

He would wiggle the stump when happy or excited, as dogs do, and unsuccessfully try to fold it between his legs when anxious or afraid.

I had grown up with dogs on the farm, in one form or another. Sometimes we owned them, sometimes they were just visitors that we took care of, while their owners from the other farms were away.

I didn't object, but passively accepted; Sylvian wanted this, and if having a dog around could somehow make her happy again, then we would have a dog. I was working freelance, or trying to start on that path, so perhaps I thought I would be able to spend some time on dog walking every day. Most likely, I didn't fully think through what we were committing to.

The flower shop avalanche had recently fallen, and we were still clearing away the mental, emotional, and financial debris from it. Having a dog around that needs you and loves you unconditionally may sound like a dream for those with a hole in their soul, but a dog is a living, breathing creature that needs consistency and responsibility from their owners. 

A dog needs an owner capable of giving it love and taking care of it, even if it loves you regardless.

You can't turn that off during the dark hours when your mind just wants to curl up into a ball, stay all day indoors, and binge-watch your favorite series.

For a while, it worked out; we took him on long walks and played fetch with balls or sticks that he would fetch enthusiastically without tiring. Dogs aren't complicated, but they suffer when the world around them is in chaos. At that time, ours was.

One night, I had been working late in the office downstairs, while Sylvian had been watching TV upstairs. The gloom of late winter was still in the air, and she liked lighting candles in odd places around the room to create a warm atmosphere.

Most of the time, the sprawl of candles wasn't a problem; someone would put them out before they became one.

Not this night, Sylvian had retired some time before I did, and it was so late that I was dead tired and went straight to bed without passing by the TV corner where the candles were still burning and driving away the gloom.

I awoke in the middle of the night, with Tyson barking in a low and strange tone I hadn't heard him use before. I tried to shush him and go back to sleep, but he was relentless. Then I started to smell something in the air. Smoke. I jumped out of bed, ran outside where the smoke was coming from, and came to a halt.

We didn't have any smoke detectors, as those would have gone off by then, as the smoke was thick and black. It was the smoke of burning plastic, the candles on top of the TV hadn't been placed in any candle holder, and the top of the TV had melted under their heat when they had burned down far enough. Then, at some point, the plastic itself started to burn without needing candles to sustain it. Not a single blazing bonfire, but a couple of small isolated flames where candles had been placed.

I reacted instantly without thinking, put out the fires using my hands, which were burned a bit by that, but not seriously.

Tyson had most likely saved our lives; I hugged him gratefully and told him he was a good boy. He licked my face in appreciation.

Weeks later, he was gone from our lives.

I had started to work again, so most of the burden of the daily dog chores had fallen on Sylvian.

She came home agitated one afternoon, storm in her eyes; she'd been visiting her aunt, who had a frisky kid around 3-4 years old, and Tyson had accompanied her. Perhaps they thought that having a dog babysit a kid of that age was fine; most likely, they didn't consider that a child at that age will just think the dog is a stuffed toy it can play with as it pleases.

At some point, Tyson snapped at him, doubtlessly after multiple warning growls that went unheeded, as there weren't any grown-ups who watched them or listened.

A dog that bites a man needs to be put down, Sylvian said. It can't be trusted again after that. I didn't argue.

That afternoon, we took him to the vet; he was scared and didn't know what was happening. How could he? He was given a lethal injection, and I stayed with him for the duration to calm him, stroking his fur and scratching his ears as life slowly faded away from his eyes. It was painful, but the alternative would have been more painful.

Depression kills as slowly as cancer, but cancer at least only kills those who have it.