I read the sign on the door.
"Euthanasia Area."
"Do you want to see one?" he asked.
Before I could decline, he interjected, "You really
should. You can't tell the whole story unless you
experience the end." I reluctantly agreed. "Good." He
said "I already cleared it and Peggy is expecting
you." He knocked firmly
on the door. It was opened immediately by a middle
aged woman in a white lab coat. "Here's the girl I
was telling you about," Ron explained. Peggy looked
me over. "Well, I'll leave you here with Peggy and
meet you in the reception area in about fifteen
minutes. I'll have the puppy ready." With that Ron
departed, leaving me standing in front of the
stern-looking Peggy.
Peggy motioned me in. As I walked into the room, I
gave an audible gasp. The room was small and spartan.
There were a couple of cages on the wall and a
cabinet with syringes and vials of a clear liquid. In
the middle of the room
was an examining table with a rubber mat on top.
There were two doors other than the one I had
entered.
Both were closed. One said to incinerator room, and
the other had no sign, but I could hear various
animals noises coming from behind the closed door. In
the back of the room, near the door that was marked
incinerator were the objects that caused my distress:
two wheelbarrows, filled with the bodies of dead
kittens and puppies. I stared in horror. Nothing had
prepared me for this. I felt my legs grow weak and my
breathing become rapid and shallow. I
wanted to run from that room, screaming. Peggy seemed
not to notice my state of shock. She started talking
about the euthanasia process, but I wasn't hearing
her. I could not tear my gaze away from the
wheelbarrows and those dozens of pathetic little
bodies.
Finally, Peggy seemed to notice that I was not paying
attention to her. "Are you listening?" she asked
irritably. "I'm only going to go through this once."
I tore my gaze from the back of the room and looked
at her. I opened
my mouth to say something, but nothing would come
out, so I nodded. She told me that behind the
unmarked door were the animals that were scheduled
for euthanasia that day. She picked up a chart that
was hanging from the wall. "One fifty-three is next,"
she said as she looked at the chart. "I'll go get
him." She laid down the chart on the examining table
and
started for the unmarked door. Before she got to the
door she stopped and turned around. "You aren't going
to get hysterical, are you?" she asked, "Because that
will only upset the animals." I shook my head. I had
not said a
word since I walked into that room. I still felt
unsure if I would be able to without breaking down
into tears.
As Peggy opened the unmarked door I peered into the
room beyond. It was a small room, but the walls were
lined and stacked with cages. It looked like they
were all occupied. Peggy opened the door of one of
the lower cages and removed the occupant. From what I
could see it looked like a medium-sized dog. She
attached a leash and ushered the dog into the room in
which I stood.
As Peggy brought the dog into the room I could see
that the dog was no more than a puppy, maybe five or
six months old. The pup looked to be a cross between
a Lab and a German shepherd. He was mostly black,
with a small amount of tan above his eyes and on his
feet. He was very excited and bouncing up and down,
trying to sniff everything in this new environment.
Peggy lifted the pup onto the table. She had a card
in her hand, which she laid on the table next to me.
I read the card. It said that number one fifty-three
was a mixed Shepherd, six months old. He was
surrendered two days ago by a family. Reason of
surrender was given as "jumps on children." At the
bottom was a note that said "Name: Sam."
Peggy was
quick and efficient, from lots of practice, I
guessed. She laid one fifty-three down on his side
and tied a rubber tourniquet around his front leg.
She turned to fill the syringe from the vial of clear
liquid.
All this
time I was standing at the head of the table. I could
see the moment that one fifty-three went from a
curious puppy to a terrified puppy. He did not like
being held down and he started to struggle. It was
then that I finally found my voice. I bent over the
struggling puppy and whispered, "Sam. Your name is
Sam." At the sound of his name Sam quit struggling.
He wagged his tail tentatively and his soft pink
tongue darted out and licked my hand. And that is how
he spent his last moment. I watched his eyes fade
from hopefulness to nothingness. It was over very
quickly. I had never even seen Peggy give the lethal
shot. The tears could not be contained any longer. I
kept my head down so as not to embarrass myself in
front of the stoic Peggy. My tears fell onto the
still body on the table.
"Now you know," Peggy said softly. Then she turned
away. "Ron will be waiting for you."
I left the room. Although it seemed like it had been
hours, only fifteen minutes had gone by since Ron had
left me at the door. I made my way back to the
reception area. True to his word, Ron had the puppy
all ready to go.
After giving me some instructions about what to feed
the puppy, he handed the carrying cage over to me and
wished me good luck on my speech.
That night I
went home and spent many hours playing with the
orphan puppy. I went to bed that night but I could
not sleep. After a while I got up and looked at my
speech notes with their numbers and statistics.
Without a second thought, I tore them up and threw
them away. I went back to bed. Sometime during the
night I finally fell asleep.
The next morning I arrived at my Speech class with
Puppy Doe. When my turn came, I held the puppy in my
arms, I took a deep breath, and I told the class
about the life and death of Sam. When I finished my
speech I became aware that I was crying.
I apologized to the class and took my seat. After
class the teacher handed out a critique with our
grades. I got an "A." His comments said "Very moving
and persuasive."
Two days later, on the last day
of class, one of my classmates came up to me. She was
an older lady that I had never spoken to in class.
She stopped me on our way out of the class room. "I
want you to know that I adopted the puppy you brought
to class," she said.
"His name is Sam."
by Chris Benton
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