When 83-year-old Grandma Gallo wondered who would care for her very spoiled chihuahua should she predecease him, the only taker she had was my brother Jeffrey.

But as Grandma got to 95, then 97, then 98, we worried she wouldn’t, in fact, die before her beloved Nicky-wicky (named after her deceased husband Nick because, she explained, “Nick was my partner in life and now Nicky will take his place.”)

“What if that damn dog dies first?” we’d wonder in hushed tones to each other.

Grandma had seen all of her close friends die. She was the last one left of her generation. Sure, she had 4 kids, 16 grandkids, and 18 great-grandchildren, most living within a twenty mile radius, but let’s be honest: that dog was there for her as only a life-long companion can be.

Or even moreso.

Because hopefully your lifelong companion has a hobby that gets him out of the house.

Nicky-wicky? He didn’t even leave the house to pee. He just went into the bathroom and used the mat on the floor made specifically for that purpose.

And when he wasn’t taking care of business, he could be found in the recliner chair, on my grandmother’s lap. He wouldn’t leave his post to eat; he’d only eat when she did.

At night, he slept beside her. He didn’t leave the bed until she did. Unless, of course, one of us walked into the apartment. In which case he’d dash off the bed barking non-stop until she, and only she, told him to stop.

Lucky for us, Nicky held on for sixteen years. By the time of Grandma Gallo’s death, on her 99th birthday, Nicky had to be lifted up onto her recliner chair. He was missing most of his teeth. His sight and hearing weren’t that great. But that damn dog—he’d held on.

After Grandma’s death, he was lost. He stopped eating.

And then there was the question of what to do with an ancient chihuahua who liked no one other than the woman he’d spent his entire life with. Jeffrey now had a wife and a two-year-old daughter. And chihuahuas detest children.

In the past, we had joked that Nicky-wicky would have to be buried with Grandma. Then, well, it wasn’t a joke anymore.

It was funny, though. In one of those “can-you-believe-this-is-happening?” kind of ways.

Just days after Grandma’s death, just days before the wake, Nicky was put down. Then my angel of a sister, Meg, drove his body to the home of the guy who would cremate Nicky. He had a crematorium in his garage.

“He’s getting a second one put in so he can cremate horses,” she told us, “I wouldn’t be surprised if he takes care of things for the mob.”

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“What happened to her dog?” people asked us in hushed tones at Grandma Gallo’s wake.

“Did you see the box beside her?” we asked. “The one with the paw prints on it?”

Their eyes grew wide. They tried to hold back their laughter wondering if it was appropriate at a wake. We smiled large. Reassured them that the dog was, in fact, old and ill. If they wanted more details, we told them about the guy who cremates in his garage, the guy who told Meg that, based on the color when he burned, Nicky-wicky was, in fact, “littered with cancer.”

After we all went back to our respective homes, we told friends the story of Nicky. And I thought it was quite unusual until, just two months later, I unexpectedly found myself in a vet’s office in California to put down a cat whose owner had recently died. . .

(To be continued)