We all knew Zachary had mast cell tumours on his back. I know the signs — the tiny swellings, the quiet signs that the body gives when it’s fighting something deeper. I also knew I didn’t want to put him through invasive surgeries or chemotherapy. He’s twelve now — he crossed that milestone on the 21st of September — and at this age, peace matters more than intervention.

Recently, we found two new lumps on his throat and another big one on his shoulder. The biopsy was done — it could be a goitre from the thyroid gland, or it could be metastasis. We don’t know yet. I’ve taken it in my stride, because Zach has already defied time. He’s the first boxer who’s lived this long with me.

I lost Rolfe at six. Diana at ten. Zoe at eleven. But Zachary — my Zacho Whacko — has crossed twelve. He still eats well, plays with his ball, and his eyes still light up when we go down together.

This morning felt ordinary. I went hunting for tiles and granite for the new home — the kind of simple domestic errands that keep life moving. When I returned, Anand casually mentioned he’d cancelled his trip to Delhi. A small thing, really — but it hit me with unexpected force. Because somehow, it made everything suddenly real.

I went to take a bath and ended up crying — the kind of quiet, unstoppable crying that comes from a place deeper than thought. Because loss is loss. It doesn’t matter how many times you experience it; it never gets easier.

I don’t even have the biopsy results yet, but I know. He’s old. And I’ve always prepared myself for the worst — I’ve always been that kind of person. Still, it hurts. Zach and Xena are the last of my dogs who ever met my aunts — Munni pua, Goodie pua, Cecilia. They’re the only ones who’ve seen that part of my life, that chapter when everything was still whole.

Zoe belonged to the Amruttara years.

Zach and Xena belong to Raj Mahal — the home where I was truly happy.

And now, as time shifts again, I feel that ache of knowing that endings are near, even when love continues.

I’m fifty now. My body reminds me of it — the aches, the stiffness, the quiet hum of age that settles into the bones. And yet, I carry all of it with me — not just the years, but the memories.

Most of those I’ve loved have gone — except for my mother, my sister, Anand, and Atif. But I’ve lost so many others — people and dogs alike. Now I have Zuri, the youngest in our home, but she’s never known my aunts. And it reminds me that everything comes with a time limit — even memory.

Because memory lives only as long as those who share it do. And when they’re gone, even the memory begins to fade. I like to think it doesn’t die, though. Maybe it goes somewhere — into a kind of galaxy of memories, where all our shared moments turn into light. Coiling and floating together — brilliant stars in a quiet Milky Way of remembrance.

When I look at Zachary now — slower, softer, but still full of heart — I realise that grief is just love with nowhere to go. Every wag of his tail, every breath he takes, feels like a reminder that life isn’t measured in years but in moments of trust and togetherness. One day, when he’s no longer beside me, I’ll still feel him — in the walk in the evening, in the sound of glomping that he brought in quiet places, in the stains of his saliva that dab all our walls and all of the memory that becomes love. And maybe that’s what love really is — the part of us that refuses to die, even when everything else must.