Zeida

We walked into the shelter looking for a chihuahua-terrier mix named Tinkerbell. My mom had fallen in love with her over PetFinder in an instant. Tinkerbell met every prerequisite that my mom had laid out for their next dog. She was small (more specifically, she was lap-sized), she was already an adult (so my parents got to bypass the puppy stage), and the shelter had listed her as friendly and affectionate (the perfect combination of traits for a mother currently empty nesting).

My mom missed her kids, as most mothers do, and while she vehemently denied my theory of empty-nesting, she didn't mind when I suggested getting a dog to fill the void.

I introduced my mom to the glories of PetFinder and it didn't take long for her to get sucked into the void of puppy-dog eyes and cutesy descriptions. Each day of our COVID-riddled lives had been filled with searching for a new companion. Within a week, we were driving an hour and a half to the shelter that housed Tinkerbell. My mom, dad, and I were ready to meet our new family member.

"Oh, she's been adopted already." The kennel technician said nonchalantly. My mom turned to me, the disappointment clear on her face. Before I could offer my apologies and suggest we take a look at the other dogs anyway, my mom whipped a piece of paper out of her pocket and scanned it.

"What about Zeida? Or Jax? Do you have them still or have they also been adopted?"

I stared at the scrap piece of paper with at least 10 names listed sporadically on the page. I smiled at the idea of my mom being so committed to getting a dog that she made backup plans. And backup plans for those backup plans. I thought about the names Zeida and Jax, but didn't remember seeing them when we had looked through PetFinder together.

The kennel technician led us to the back of the shelter, to rows of outdoor enclosures that were filled with the echoes of excited yips and tails banging against concrete walls. We stopped in front of the second-to-last cage where two puppies huddled in a far back corner on top of a mesh blue mat.

They were somehow sleeping through all the noise, something that made all four of us chuckle. One of the puppies was a light gray and the other was a chocolatey brown. The only characteristics they shared were ears that flopped over their face in a cartoon-like manner, and dark jagged stripes that coated their entire bodies.

Their brindle coats made them look like awkward tigers, and the size o their paws told me they wouldn't be lap dogs for long.

The kennel tech opened the puppies' cage, but only the copper brown one bothered looking up at her, following the glance with a slow and lazy wag. Since she was the only one showing any interest, the kennel tech lifted the copper tiger out of the comfort of her brother's paws and walked her over to us.

"This is Zeida, and that's her brother. Jax," Our kennel tour guide threw a crooked thumb back towards the silver pup without another glance. "They're the last of their litter that hasn't been adopted."

"Zeida!" All three of us called to the puppy resting in the technician's hand, but the hesitant tail wag that followed was more a sign of nervousness and confusion than it was excitement.

My mom held out her arms and pulled Zeida close to her. Even though there were fleas jumping off her as if her skin was a trampoline, my mom still held her close and whispered to her, trying to soothe a racing heartbeat. It was clear Zeida had been through a lot at only two months old, which was evident from the gray scab near the bottom of her back and the overall lethargy, an abnormality for such a young dog.

When we later took Zeida to the vet we found out she not only had mange, which caused severe skin irritation and discomfort, but she also had road rash - the gray scab that we had seen on our first day together. The vet presumed she had some sort of past collision with an unforgiving pavement not too long before the shelter took her in.

But we didn't know that then, through.

We didn't know the separation anxiety that was lingering just below the surface and would emerge two months later in the form of whines and whimpers.

At this moment, she was just a puppy - a puppy that needed us - and my mom had absolutely fallen for her.

All while my mom asked questions about her personality and past behavior (and even momentarily considered adopting Jax to keep the siblings together), I stared at Zeida's paws, which were already the size of a small salad plate. I couldn't help but hyper-fixate on the potential of her size. Considering my mom had come for a lap dog and we would be leaving with a mutt estimated to be 60lbs, I expressed my concern for Zeida's size to my parents.

Before my dad could consider adding his input, my mom brushed off my concern, explaining that we would love her anyway. At only two months old, Zeida was the size we had anticipated a full-grown Tinkerbell to be, so it was no surprise when Zeida reached 40 lbs in her first three months with us and hit 62 lbs (her personal record) by the end of her first year.

I held Zeida while my mom signed paperwork and paid for our new family member (a sentence that now feels strange to write out). For a puppy, she never really squirmed. In fact, within minutes she had fallen asleep in my arms, only peeking through lazy eyes when there was a loud noise or when one of my parents reached a hand out to pat her head or scratch her ears.

Even when we loaded ourselves into the car, Zeida only woke for a moment from the jostling of the car. It wasn't until we reached the highway Zeida began to shake. I knew it was from the road noise and the wind swaying the car on the road.

Her subtle tremors made me realize how small and fragile Zeida actually was. Despite her puppy belly, her ribs were still visible further up. Her ears looked chewed up and irritated as if someone had pinned them to an anthill. I had only looked at her paws before, concerned for the 60 lb dog that was entering our lives. But in doing so I overlooked the petite, shell of a puppy that hadn't had a chance to live her life yet. A baby that needed us now.

THAT is what I somehow ignored.

As Zeida adjusted to the road noise, she curled her paws under herself and fell back asleep in (what appeared to be) an uncomfortable position. I chuckled at the innocence that could only come from the simplicity of a puppy and continued to examine her and learn more about the new addition to our family.

She was ours and I couldn't wait to see what our future held.