COMPANION

It was a chilly, rainy afternoon; terrible weather that day in Jammu. School over, we as kids were enjoying the walk back from the bus stop to home, making splashes in the small puddles of water and laughing gleefully. Maa was waiting for us near the gate anxious as the bus was a little late that day. Her volley of questions over, we entered & to our utter disbelief on the stairs sat this beautiful salt & pepper Lhasa with a hurt & sad look in his small beady eyes.
"Arre, what happened to you?" I asked the dog& turning to Maa asked, “Who got him here?” as I knelt down & sat beside him.
“Your Dad got him. He found him enroute to the office near the canal garden. Some stray dogs were chasing him & he’s wounded too. He left him at home because he had a collar & has lodged a report to locate his owner. You don’t trouble him” was an anxious mother’s tone as she turned to the kitchen to serve us lunch.
He looked a little nervous & suspicious. He whined and put his head down on his hurt paw. He had a red collar on with small little bells.
"Maa!" I shouted as I ran inside the house. Both I & my brother were actually looking First Aid kit. I went inside & got the doctor set my Bua ( aunt) had gifted me , which we played with ( at that time I always dreamt of growing up to be a Doctor) but it had real stuff like my Maa's FA Kit, like iodine, bandages, cotton. Dettol etc.
Lunch forgotten (big time animal lovers that both brother & sister were) with a few biscuits & my medical set, we started our mission of nursing the small wounded ball of fur sitting before us. My brother lovingly fondled his coat, bent down & asked, "What's your name?", as if to familiarise the animal with the humans around.
He was upset, with signs of separation anxiety, but seemed to understand us & with a small wag just whined a little as I took his paw. I nursed the dog's paw & all his wounds cleaning them with dettol & applying antiseptic etc.as best I could. Thankfully he ate from our hands the few biscuits that we offered because the bowl of milk Maa had offered him lay aside as it is, untouched.
We both, my brother & me, sat down next to him and started petting his head & cuddling him , whispering soothing words because he seemed kind of sad ( children always have this wonderful ability to understand the pain & loneliness of animals & humans & also soothing them) . Soon he dozed off under the effect of the pain killer Maa gave him.
Lunch session was a kind of question hour with both of us siblings hurling question after question. Maa how did he get hurt? Where did he live? How did he get lost? His owner must be feeling sad & looking for him. How did he come to the garden? How did Papa save him?
Didi let’s call him Jimmy( we had another salt & pepper dog by the same name). I nodded.
"Can we keep him, Maa?" The next day being a holiday studies were forgotten & we got involved in Jimmy, as if trying to share his grief & pain & making him understand that all is not lost.” We are there to care for you.”
Maa took a look at him & uttered a stern No.
But why? I questioned back
“His owner must be looking for him; He belongs to someone, dear. I don’t know how he separated from his master. We need to find his owner. Will you like it if you were made to separate or go away from your dear ones?"
I understood, what she was saying was right. My heart sank.
"But if Papa doesn’t find the owner, then he's ours."
Papa put a notice in the paper & lodged a report at the police station stating that we have found a lost dog & anybody looking for a dog matching the description may be directed to us.
We waited, and we waited. It was the longest wait of our life. Jimmy was recovering fast, and picked up health every day. His wounds healed & he was now more agile, alert & active. He was friendly, intelligent, lively & spirited. He had taken to our family like a fish to water. He was a very smart dog, and knew commands & responded to them. Very obedient & affectionate he loved his walks & would start dancing, even wanting to go with Maa on her veggie & grocery shopping trips. Jimmy was a very affectionate animal the only problem being that he refused to eat out of his bowl & would eat out of our hands only, but we loved him too much to mind that.
Jimmy had even begun to act like our dog. He followed us to the bus stop, played with us, went for his walks with Maa & Papa & happily responded to our commands.
As days passed & Jimmy getting closer to us the feeling of Jimmy being ours was getting stronger day by day. As no one showed up to claim him it made me relax. Secretly, I was glad. I wanted Jimmy to be Our Dog. Maa even got a new collar, leash & brush for him. She also kind of started getting more close to him & loving him.

I think Jimmy is ours now, she said one evening as she walked in with a big pack of dog biscuits for him.
"Yay! Hurray!" both of us kids started jumping up and down, dancing & hugging Maa, Jimmy joining in with glee with his paws & small tugs at Maa’s sari with his teeth.
I still remember that day. It is still registered as one of the saddest days of my life. We came home after school to find an old man, very smart, with a walking stick sitting inside with Jimmy on his lap. As soon as he saw us he came down running to us as if wanting us to share his happiness. Something inside my heart cracked & sank & my entire self seemed to be engulfed by a cloud of grief.

Jimmy was barking, wagging his tail running between us and the old man. He must have been very confused then, torn between two worlds with no intentions of leaving either.

"Moti!" the old man called him lovingly & Our Jimmy ran into his lap again, wagging his tail, licking & whining with joy & excitement. They looked so happy to be reunited, to be together.
I looked at Maa tears streaming down my eyes which I was trying very hard to fight & wiping away with the back of my palm. Maa too was in a similar emotional situation.

So He was Moti. Jimmy was not Jimmy actually. He was the old uncle’s Moti. His partner with whom he walked & shared his life with after his wife left him (this explained Jimmy’s love for walks). His companion. The old uncle had been hospitalised for some time and the rest of his family could not care for Moti & somehow, someday Moti just walked out of the house, lost way & got separated.
The old man happened to be a relative of our grocer, who incidentally came to know of the lost dog and with great hesitation that morning had asked Maa about Jimmy & said that may be Jimmy is his relative’s lost companion Moti. Maa asked him to visit us, so that he could check, clearly mentioning that if Jimmy did not respond to him she will not hand him over to his relative.

The old man repeatedly thanked both my parents for keeping his Companion with such love & care. Seeing us cry & Jimmy continuously trying his best to uplift our spirits with wags & soft little licks on our faces, he got up, walked with a limp & hugged us said , “ Thank you children. I know you love him a lot, that’s why you have taken such good care of him. I would have loved to leave him here, be with you all, but I am being selfish & can’t. I have a son, his wife & servants in my family who do not care for me or for Moti. It’s just the two of us together. We two are a small family. He is my companion, my child, my everything. He is the one who inspires me to live life. I think you are too small to understand all this but when you grow up you will.” I saw tears welling up in his eyes, I started to cry too due to a sense of loss, the feeling of losing my friend, a family member, Our Jimmy.
I looked at Uncle (the old man). I didn't want to give Jimmy up, but somewhere in my heart, with whatever maturity as a 9-10 year old I had, I understood the Companionship & Camaraderie that both the man & the dog shared. I knew that both of them needed each other. Jimmy really belonged to him, not us. We were just a temporary phase. He was the old man’s Moti. They were very happy together.
“You can always come & visit him whenever you want’”
I smiled & gave him an affirmative nod.
It was very, very difficult watching Jimmy go, but I know it would have been harder keeping him with the guilt of snatching him away from his owner, his comrade, his partner.
I knew what Maa & Papa did was the only right thing to do.
Both of us, brother & sister wanted Jimmy to be happy & seeing him happy & playfully going with his Companion brought cheer & smiles on our faces too.
I know he must have lived on to be a happy & cheerful dog & a good partner to his owner.
This is just a tribute to the love we shared & a big salute to the happy bonding between Us, Humans & Dogs & my own way of saying I Still Love You Jimmy...