The story of a stray that became a part of our family...

Livinglife

Apr 30, 20215 min read

Updated: Oct 26, 2023

It feels like it was only yesterday we brought her home. It's almost 11 years now that she has been a part of our family. Her story is something that still makes the entire family smile.

I was in my 9th grade and my sister was in her 6th grade. We were both day scholars then studying in a local school back in Coimbatore. Both of us always wanted a dog and our parents clearly did not want one because caring for the 2 of us was a problematic task already. My sister one evening told me that her classmate had bought a new Labrador puppy, but he couldn't care for it. One of the reasons we found out after seeing the puppy was that she was a female, hence his family didn't want to deal with the 'complications'. Dogs are subjected to gender based discrimination too :/

Because of this, he had to give it up and was looking for anyone who could possibly give it a loving home and my sister asked me if we should take the pup home. This was the only opportunity we had, and we evil sisters seized it so we could finally make our dream of having a dog come true.

The next day, after school, our uncle came to pick us up as both our parents were caught up with work and stuck in the factory. We told him that we had to go to a friend's house to collect something (we obviously did not tell him that it was a puppy). Our naive uncle fell for our story and took us to our friend's place for the 'collection' to happen. Once we reached, my sister and I asked my uncle to wait by the auto and told him we'll be there in a few minutes. My sister's classmate showed us the puppy and well it wasn't a Labrador. It was a stray dog. I remember giving the poker face to my sister -_-

"I thought you said it was a Lab." "That's what he said.." "Didn't you ask for a picture?" "No. But, I told him we would take it." "Great." -_-

She was a very energetic puppy jumping here and there. We both just envisioned her to be a Labrador. That's all. And she ended up to be a stray. We all fancy a breed of dog right, and for the both of us it was a cute Labrador puppy. So the sight of this small stray dog was not exactly a dream come true, but something close to it. Don't get me wrong, she was cute regardless.

We gave our word, so we had to take her home.

I remember telling my sister, "Act totally normal when you enter the auto. Like nothing happened okay?" "Okay okay." What if he asks if Amma and Appa know about the dog?" "Just say we already told them. We'll figure out the rest okay?" "Okay."

We both went to the auto, with me carrying the puppy. Our uncle was sitting inside the auto, so both of us came and sat inside with him, with me carrying the dog. He looked as us extremely perplexed and waited for an explanation. We didn't say anything and waited for him to ask the questions.

"Whose dog it this? Why are you bringing this home? Do your parents even know about this? Whose idea was this? Is this what you had to collect? You want to take it in an auto?"

My sister and I looked at each other. I was the older one so I had to take the fall if we both get screwed. I replied calmly. "Yes, we are bringing her home. Amma and Appa already know, you can call them and ask if you like". Once I said 'call them', I guess my uncle fell for what we said but still had his doubts. My uncle is not fond of dogs, so throughout the auto ride back home he looked at the 2 of us and the puppy like as if he was trying to say "Wait till your parents find out. I want to see how this ends."

We went home. Luckily our parents were not there. We didn't have anything dog related. No dog collar, dog chain, dog food, utensils for the dogs. Nada. The 2 of us were happy that we successfully achieved phase 1 of bringing the puppy home. Next problem, how to convince the parents.

My dad was the first one to come home. The puppy was roaming in the verandah when my dad saw her. "Whose dog is this? What is it doing here? Veenaa, Lakshmi?!" We both gave my father the puppy eyes and said, "She was roaming in the streets pa, she has no one. She is so small. What if she gets hit by a car?" (We had to obviously state worst case scenario to get more sympathy)

"Whose permission did you get to bring this dog home huh? Who will feed her, take her for walks, bathe her, buy medicines if she falls sick? Will you do everything?". "She is our responsibility, we will take care of her". My father was not buying it and angrily stormed inside the house.

Our mother was our only hope. We know that she had a dog called Tommy when she was young. She still fondly talks about him even today. We could definitely use the emotional card to convince her.

My mom came home after sometime. She saw the puppy. She walked towards it and sat down to actually get a good look of the her. As she sat down, out of no where, the puppy gave its paw to my mother. My mother was not expecting that and was immediately drawn to this little pup. It was just a month or so since we had lost our grandmother and my mother felt that the dog had come to us for a special reason. She was convinced! Thank god. My father was still bickering inside asking us to drop off the dog.

The next morning I woke up at 5 to take her for a walk. I remember opening the door to see the puppy missing. I panicked and searched the house completely. After a good 15 minutes, I see my dad coming with the puppy home. "She was awake and she was whining. So, I took her for a walk." I smiled. Everything after that is history. Her name is Bullet, we called her Bully.

Some pictures of this little rascal...