My dog died a few months ago during a day of heavy storms in Melbourne, you may have seen the pictures of flash flooding. It was raining, just pounding down so hard, hailing all day, I was at work doing dishes. When it came time to knock off it was still hailing so hard I couldn't get out the door.

I ended up waiting it out at one of my dad's friend's cafe on the corner where I could see more of what was going on. It's down at a railway crossing, right up next to it so I could see down the tracks, I use the word 'see' fairly loosely because the leaves on all the trees that lined the tracks had pretty much blown off and were forming a wall of thick spray and tree matter. It looked like it was raining sideways, the wind was strong, the world felt like it was shaking.

After about two hours and a coffee the hail settled, it was still pissing down but the wind had stopped, three trams sat scared on the other side of the tracks, which had flooded to about knee height. I ran up the hill for the tram, trembling with the energy of the storm I'd seen, it was exhilarating.

I got in the door, completely soaked to the bone, my parents were panicking, well my mum was, she always panicks when stuff happens it's how she copes, the roof was leaking and the contents of a cupboard were damp. Dad was walking back and forth grabbing towels and piling them in. No one was paying attention to poor old Ruby, Ruby the pug who we had noticed had been growing a lump on her side over the last three weeks.

Three weeks and she went from being a perfectly sprightly and excitable pug to being an old, weary ten year old dog. Over the first week I thought it was just my mind playing tricks, the lump was tiny and I thought maybe she's just getting old. The next fortnight it grew, and grew, it consumed her. She couldn't sleep on the side of her it was on. The vets said that any operation we could do on it would be invasive, it wouldn't be worth it she'd have an open wound covered by a gauze mesh for a while, that the therapy would be very expensive and would only prolong her life.

We'd been discussing the night before whether or not we should get her put down while my dad was still at work. Neither of us used the word, even when I thought it I'd look in her eyes and feel my stomach drop like a stone from my chest. We thought we'd see how she did that night.

So, when the rain started at work that afternoon I thought nothing of it, it distracted me, so when I got home, sat down at the computer while my parents still panicked packing towels into cupboards over a few drops of water I thought nothing of my dog standing there, staring at me, tail between her legs.

I looked at her, something about the way her eyes didn't glisten, I don't know, I knew something was wrong. I called out to my mum, told her something was up. The wind picked up again, it shook walls and rattled the doors. She was struggling to breathe, it was subtle, the way a pug breathes is no beautiful thing but between each breath I could feel the labour of it, the real conceited effort to pull each lungful.

This is fucked, I thought, I told mum that we had to get our dog to the vet, our ruby, our little rubykins. She was suffering. Dad walks in to see us sitting down with her, her tail wags feebly as I'm patting her. I pick her up, real gently like I always do, one hand under her chest, I hold her underarm and wait for her to pull her hind legs up to be cradled by my off arm. She doesn't lift her legs. I don't think she had the strength, I had to get her to the car so I cradled her underside with my off arm as I walked down the corridor.

Her breath catches. It catches again. It's been weeks coming, I've been thinking about this exact moment over the last few weeks, hell, ever since I've had animals this is the thought that has plagued me the most during sleepless nights. You'll never know, you will absolutely never know the time or circumstances of something's death, you only know it's coming, or if you find yourself in my position, you'll know it is immediate, staring you square in the face.

Her breath caught for the third time, I put her down softly on her feet, I was so gentle with that dog, I'll have you know I always was, she was so kind, so soft, so floppy. I put her down and her breath kept catching, she couldn't break one breath. I called out "It's happening!" My mum's pace quickened, she ran out to the car, dad was somewhere doing something, I had tunnel vision.

I watched Ruby collapse, still convulsing, I pick her up like a bundle and run to the car, dad comes out of a side room, he gives me a towel which I wrap her up in as I'm running. I don't know why he gave me the towel, the rain had stopped, the wind blew hard, leaves danced across the slick road. Mum was hooking up the battery, I hopped in the car with Ruby on my lap, she was still convulsing, about once every three seconds. Four seconds.

We pulled out with dad in the back seat, he was reassuring my mum, I didn't look up from little Ruby's face sticking out of that little bundle. She made one last attempt for breath as we rounded the corner at the end of our street, she looked like she was yawning, her eyes were closed. She lay there, so peacefully the entire ride there.

The vet was about a five minute's drive, about half way there at a stoplight mum asked me how she was, I said "It's over, I think she's gone." It hadn't really sunk into any of us, I felt dad's hand on my shoulder, I turned around to see him, bleary eyed, he told me that this is how thing's are. We pulled up at the vet and I handed the little bundle to my dad. He didn't rush to the door, I understood.

The vets snatched her from us immediately, a vet came back out of the room they'd rushed her to and asked if we wanted her resuscitated, both my parents looked to me. I had tears streaming down my face, now the vet was looking at me, too. To this day I have no idea why they left it to me, I said no, that she had been in sufferance and there's nothing we could do. She nodded and ran back to the little back room. I gave my mum a hug and walked back to the car.

I walked back out the automatic door and found it was completely still. I wasn't wearing shoes, the ground was freezing underfoot but the air was welcoming. The sun was partially filtered by clouds, blades of sunlight were flitting through, the black clouds had passed.

I went out to the car, got in the back seat and I cried, I really, really did cry. The sadness had been building up over the week but it had really happened, ripples before a tidal wave of grief. But soon the grief passed, the sun kept shining right up till sunset. Our other pug, Puglsey, he slept in my bed that night and was very grateful for the privilege.

That's just the little story of the storm that took my dog away, point is that the storm passed and about a month later the fond memories began to outshine the loss of it all. Even Pugsley sniffs her leash every night before bed, but his tail is still high in the air, despite being a year older than her.

TL;DR fuck cancer