Part 9 – The Long Goodbye
The first frost came early to Cedar Falls that year. September had only just begun, but the mornings already held a sharpness that bit the skin. Nina Benson wrapped her shawl tighter as she stepped onto the porch, Pepper trailing slowly behind her.
The dog’s steps were uneven now, her paws dragging slightly across the wood. She no longer barked at passing neighbors, no longer trotted ahead on their walks. But her eyes still found Nina’s with the same devotion, as if nothing else in the world mattered but this—being near.
“Come on, girl,” Nina whispered, guiding her down the steps. “One more sunrise together.”
The eastern sky was washed with pale pink, streaked gold. The cicadas had quieted, giving way to the lonely call of geese overhead. Pepper eased herself down on the grass, her chest rising and falling with effort. Nina knelt beside her, pressing her palm gently to the dog’s side. The beat was faint, irregular, but there.
She closed her eyes. Not yet. Please, not yet.
The children felt the change too. Eli no longer asked to throw the frisbee. Maren carried Pepper’s old clover crown from room to room, setting it gently beside her wherever she lay. Their voices had softened, their play subdued.
One afternoon, they sat on the living room floor with crayons and paper, Pepper curled between them.
“I’m drawing her flying,” Maren announced, sketching Pepper with wings, a frisbee clutched in her teeth.
Eli frowned at his page. “I’m drawing her sleeping. That’s what she does now.”
Maren scowled. “That’s sad.”
“It’s true,” Eli muttered.
Nina, watching from her rocker, saw the truth in both drawings. She rose and fetched Harold’s quilt from the attic—the one sewn from scraps. She spread it across their laps.
“Your grandpa used to say,” she began, “that scraps tell the whole story. The bright colors, the dull ones, the frayed edges. You need them all, or the quilt isn’t complete.”
The children traced the stitches with their fingers. Pepper sighed, laying her head on the fabric.
“So,” Nina continued softly, “we remember her flying and sleeping. The leaps and the rests. All of it matters.”
That night, Pepper struggled again. Harsh coughs wracked her chest, her sides heaving. The children clung to Nina, crying, terrified. Nina held them close, steadying her voice though her own heart cracked.
“It’s okay,” she murmured. “She’s fighting hard. Stay with her.”
They huddled on the rug until the coughing eased. Pepper lay still, spent, eyes half-lidded.
“Is she… going?” Eli whispered.
“Not tonight,” Nina said, though she wasn’t certain. “But soon.”
The word soon landed heavy.
The next day, Nina called Dr. Wallace, the veterinarian. His voice on the phone was kind but blunt. “She’s near the end. Make her comfortable. Surround her with love. When she can’t rise, when she stops eating, that’s when you’ll know.”
After the call, Nina sat at the kitchen table, Harold’s watch ticking steadily on her wrist. She felt the same helplessness she’d felt two winters ago, sitting beside Harold’s hospice bed. The children had been too young then to understand fully. But now—they would live every moment of Pepper’s leaving.
She bowed her head into her hands. “Harold,” she whispered, “tell me how to do this.”
But silence answered. Only the watch ticked on.
That evening, she gathered the children on the porch. Pepper lay at their feet, wrapped in Harold’s quilt. The setting sun stained the sky orange and red, a kind of glory that always hurt with its beauty.
“I have to tell you something,” Nina said, her voice trembling.
The children looked up, eyes wide.
“Pepper doesn’t have much time left,” she said. “Her heart is too weak now. She may only have days.”
Maren burst into tears, clutching Pepper. “No! She can’t leave us.”
Eli’s face twisted, his fists tightening around the cracked frisbee. “It’s not fair. First Grandpa, now her.”
“I know,” Nina whispered, her own tears spilling freely. “It isn’t fair. But love doesn’t end, even when bodies do. We carry it with us.”
The children sobbed, their small bodies shaking. Nina held them close, pressing her cheek to their hair, while Pepper nestled into their laps, tail thumping faintly as if to say: I’m still here. Right now, I’m still here.
The next two days blurred into a vigil. The children barely left Pepper’s side. They carried water bowls to her, whispered stories into her ears, sang to her softly. Eli read aloud from one of Harold’s old adventure novels, his voice breaking on certain lines. Maren braided flowers into Pepper’s fur, whispering, “You’ll be beautiful in heaven.”
Nina moved quietly around them, cooking, tidying, but always circling back to stroke Pepper’s head, to count her breaths. Each one felt borrowed.
On the third night, Pepper refused her food. She lay still on the rug, Harold’s quilt tucked around her. Her eyes were open but distant, her breaths shallow.
Nina gathered the children. “It’s close,” she whispered.
They cried openly, pressing themselves against Pepper’s sides, whispering love into her fur.
Nina stroked the dog’s muzzle, her own tears falling. “Thank you,” she whispered. “For every catch. For every game. For staying as long as you could.”
The children echoed her, their voices a chorus of grief and gratitude.
Pepper closed her eyes, her breathing slow but steady. Still alive, but slipping.
That night, after the children finally fell asleep curled on the rug, Nina sat in her rocker, staring at the cracked frisbee resting on the table. She turned it over and over in her hands, tracing the grooves left by Pepper’s teeth.
She thought of Harold, of Daisy the pony, of the way he’d said, Don’t miss the middle. She thought of all the games, all the laughter, all the love bound up in one dog.
The watch ticked on her wrist. Time was running out, but not yet finished.
She rose, placed the frisbee gently beside Pepper, and whispered into the dark:
“Stay one more night, girl. Let them say goodbye in the morning light.”
Pepper stirred faintly, tail twitching once.
And Nina prayed that would be enough.
Part 10 – The Last Catch
The dawn came soft and gray. Mist clung to the grass in the Benson yard, and the first sound Nina heard was the quiet sob of her granddaughter.
“Grandma,” Maren whispered from the rug where she had slept, cheek pressed to Harold’s quilt. “Pepper won’t get up.”
Nina’s heart clenched. She hurried to kneel beside them. Pepper lay still beneath the quilt, her chest rising faintly, each breath shallow and labored. Her eyes opened, searching weakly, and when they found Nina’s, her tail gave the faintest thump.
“I’m here,” Nina whispered. She stroked Pepper’s head, tears slipping freely. “We’re all here.”
Eli rubbed his eyes with his fists, then crouched low, clutching the cracked frisbee to his chest. “She’s leaving us,” he said in a flat, trembling voice.
Nina gathered them close, her arms around both children. “Yes,” she said softly. “But she’s not leaving the love. That stays.”
They spent the morning in vigil. The children sang songs, whispered stories, pressed their faces against Pepper’s fur. Nina held Harold’s watch in her palm, the ticking loud in the quiet house.
Just before noon, Pepper stirred. She lifted her head slightly, her gaze moving toward the back door, toward the sunlight spilling through the screen.
“She wants to go outside,” Maren whispered.
Carefully, tenderly, Nina wrapped the quilt around Pepper and carried her to the porch. The children followed, clutching the frisbee and the crown of clover. They laid her gently in the grass beneath the old cottonwood, where she had once flown higher than anyone thought possible.
The air was cool, the geese calling overhead. Pepper’s eyes brightened for a moment, her nose twitching at the breeze.
“Let’s give her one last game,” Nina said, her voice breaking.
The children nodded, tears streaming. They placed the frisbee gently at her paws. Maren set the clover crown on her head. Eli whispered, “You’re still the best catcher in the world.”
Nina stroked her side. “You don’t have to leap anymore, girl. You’ve already caught everything that matters.”
Pepper’s eyes softened. Her breaths came slower, steadier. The children leaned close, whispering love, their small hands tangled in her fur.
And then, quietly, with the sun warm on her face, Pepper exhaled one final time.
Her chest stilled.
The world held its breath.
“Grandma…” Maren sobbed, burying her face against the quilt.
“She’s gone,” Eli whispered, clutching the frisbee tighter, his tears falling hard.
Nina drew them close, holding them as tightly as she could, her own sobs shaking her. “Yes,” she whispered, rocking them. “She’s gone. But listen to me—love doesn’t end. It just changes shape. She’s with us still.”
They clung to her, the three of them woven together by grief and love.
The burial was simple. In the far corner of the yard, beneath the lilac bush Harold had planted long ago, they dug a small grave. The children helped, their hands dirty with soil, their tears falling into the earth.
They laid Pepper to rest wrapped in Harold’s quilt, the cracked frisbee beside her, the crown of clover atop her head.
Nina spoke through her tears. “Thank you, Pepper, for every game, every lesson, every moment. You taught us to leap when we could, and to walk slow when we must. You taught us love means staying close, no matter the pace.”
Maren placed her drawing of Pepper with wings into the grave. Eli added his drawing of her sleeping. “So she has both,” he whispered. “Flying and resting.”
Nina’s chest ached with pride and sorrow. They covered the grave with soil, their hands trembling, then placed smooth stones in a circle.
When it was done, they stood together, arms wrapped around each other, staring at the fresh mound beneath the lilac.
The days that followed were quiet. The house felt emptier, the silence heavy. At night, Nina sometimes reached out her foot beneath the bed, expecting to find Pepper’s warm body there, only to feel the cold rug.
The children grieved in their own ways. Maren carried Pepper’s collar everywhere, rubbing it between her fingers. Eli sat for long hours on the porch, the cracked frisbee in his lap.
One evening, Nina found him there, eyes red but dry. She sat beside him, watching the fireflies flicker.
“It feels wrong,” Eli muttered. “Like everything stopped.”
Nina nodded. “It does. But the truth is, life keeps moving. And we carry her with us as we go.”
He turned the frisbee over in his hands. “Do you think she knows how much we loved her?”
Nina smiled faintly through her tears. “Oh yes. Dogs always know. That’s their gift to us.”
A week later, they returned to Greenridge Park. The children carried the frisbee, though they held it differently now—more reverently.
The field was empty, the cottonwoods swaying gently. For a moment, the memory of Pepper soaring through the air was so vivid Nina almost expected to see her again, paws outstretched, catching the wind.
Instead, she placed a hand on each child’s shoulder. “Let’s play the slow game,” she said.
So they rolled the frisbee back and forth across the grass. Not leaping, not racing—just rolling, nudging, laughing softly through their tears. It felt like a prayer, a way of honoring what Pepper had taught them.
Afterward, they lay on the blanket, staring up at the sky. Maren pointed at a cloud shaped like wings. “Look,” she whispered. “It’s her.”
Eli smiled, clutching the frisbee. “She caught the sky.”
Nina closed her eyes, Harold’s watch ticking steady on her wrist. For the first time in weeks, she felt peace.
That night, as the cicadas sang and the house settled into quiet, Nina sat by the window. The cracked frisbee rested on the table beside her, the collar looped around it. She thought of Harold, of Daisy the pony, of Pepper, of every love that had asked her to slow down.
She whispered into the night: “Sometimes love means slowing down, so no one gets left behind.”
The words felt like both a farewell and a promise.
And as the stars shimmered above Cedar Falls, Nina knew the lesson would remain—woven into her heart, carried in her grandchildren, stitched into every sunrise still to come.
Pepper was gone. But love was not.
Love had simply changed its pace.