It was the most incomprehensibly unnatural experience. My greatest love and biggest (only) success at any relationship, the one I spent every moment of my life with, just vanishing on some random Wednesday morning, some random April 16th. I was brought back to a room for what I thought would be our reunion, after waiting in the lobby for barely half an hour, but then an exasperated doctor stumbled into the room, took a deep breath, and said out of nowhere, "We lost him." I fell back against the wall and started to slide down, unable to stand. We weren't even there to see this particular doctor, we were only there to see a veterinary technician for something relatively minor that wasn't life threatening. Something routine.
To be sure, he was old and his heart was in trouble. I knew this, I knew this, I knew this every day for nearly five years. Five years of daily medications for something they called "mitral valve disease." But there was supposed to be more time? I was told by his cardiologist just one week earlier that he could have nine to twelve more months, thanks to the medication? Could. Best laid plans...
They did CPR on him for 20 minutes after he suddenly went into cardiopulmonary arrest, but there was no bringing back that 15-year-old heart, which had been keeping both of us alive for so much longer than expected. Without him, I would've definitely been dead in 2016. Or maybe sooner. Or maybe later. 2021? Maybe so many times.
It was the most incomprehensibly unnatural thing to have the best part of me die like that, and yet there I was, collapsed on the floor, still so stupidly alive? It was the most unnatural thing to hear, "We lost him," and yet, I've been told that there's nothing more natural than to die. And yet, and yet, and yet...I've yet to accept any of it.
While driving, I see people walking their dogs on the street and I insist upon slowing down to look at each and every one of them to make sure they aren't walking him. It could be him. He was 24 pounds and tan, but I stop to look even if the dog is 80 pounds and black. Need to make sure. I'll always look for him because there could've been some sort of tragic mistake. Or, maybe it was intentional. He was stolen. They stole him for an experiment and gave him a sedative that only made it appear he was dead temporarily. I grew up on soap operas where people came back from the dead and people were buried alive and nothing is ever as it seems, especially something as unnatural as this. One hour before he "died," he was eating a treat and taking his medication and kissing my face in our kitchen. I'll never stop looking for him.
I'm told to accept that the unnatural is natural, and that enough time has passed, but time means nothing when one year ago feels like yesterday. And yet, he feels farther away from me than ever. All that's left now are these flustered juxtapositions, and how I can remember exactly what the top of his soft head felt like nuzzling against the side of my face that random morning, and every morning.
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