{ PROLOGUE }
My name is Bailey. I have had many names and many lives, but Bailey is what I am called now. It is a good name. I am a good dog.
I have lived in many places and of all of those, the farm was the most wonderful—until I arrived here. This place has no name, but there are golden shores to run along, and sticks and balls with flawless mouth-fit, and toys that squeak, and everyone who has ever loved me is here—and they all love me still. There are also, of course, many, many dogs, because it wouldn’t be a perfect place without them.
I am loved by so many people because I have lived many lives with many different names. I’ve been Toby and Molly and Ellie and Max, I’ve been Buddy and I’ve been Bailey. With each name came a life with a different purpose. My purpose now is a simple one—to be with my people, and to love them. Perhaps that was my ultimate purpose from the start.
There is no pain here, only the joy that comes from being surrounded by love.
Time was unmarked, passing in serenity, until my boy Ethan and my girl CJ came to talk to me. CJ is Ethan’s child. I sat up alertly when they appeared, because of all the people I had ever cared about, these two had the most important role in my lives, and they were carrying themselves the way people behave when they want a dog to do something.
“Hello, Bailey, you good dog,” Ethan greeted me. CJ ran a smoothing hand over my fur.
For a moment or two we just shared our love with each other.
“I know you understand that you have lived before, Bailey. I know you had a very special purpose, that you saved me,” Ethan said.
“And you saved me, too, Bailey, my Molly girl, my Max,” CJ added.
When CJ said those names, I remembered how I had accompanied her on her life’s journey. I wagged at the memories. She put her arms around me. “There’s nothing like a dog’s love,” she murmured to Ethan.
“It’s unconditional,” Ethan agreed, patting my forehead.
I closed my eyes with pleasure at being cuddled by the two of them.
“We have to ask you to do something now, Bailey. Something so very important, only you can do it,” Ethan told me.
“But if you fail, it will be okay. We will love you, and you can come back here and be with us,” CJ said.
“He won’t fail. Not our Bailey,” Ethan replied, grinning. He held my head in his hands, hands that once smelled like the farm but now just smelled like Ethan. I gazed at him with a rapt focus, because when my boy speaks to me, I can feel his love pouring out like warmth. “I need you to go back, Bailey. Back to fulfill a promise. I wouldn’t ask you if it weren’t necessary.”
His tone was serious, but he wasn’t mad at me. Humans can be happy, sad, loving, angry, and many other things, and usually I can tell by their voices how they feel. Dogs are pretty much just happy, which might be why we don’t need to talk.
“This time will be different, Bailey,” CJ advised. I looked to her and she, too, was loving and kind. I sensed, though, an anxiety in her, a worry, and leaned into her so that she could hug me more tightly and feel better.
“You won’t remember anything.” Ethan was speaking softly now. “None of your lives. Not me, not the farm, not this place.”
“Well,” CJ objected, her voice as quiet as Ethan’s. “Maybe not remember, exactly, but you have been through so much, you will be a wise dog now, Bailey. An old soul.”
“Here’s the tough part, Buddy. You won’t even remember me. CJ and I will fade from your mind.”
Ethan was sad. I gave his hand a lick. Sadness in people is the reason there are dogs.
CJ petted me. “Not forever, though.”
Ethan nodded. “That’s right, Bailey. Not forever. The next time you see me, I won’t look like this, but you’ll recognize me, and when you do, you will remember everything. All of your lives. It will all come back. And maybe then you’ll also understand that you are an angel dog who helped fulfill a very important promise.”
CJ stirred and Ethan looked up at her. “He won’t fail,” Ethan insisted. “Not my Bailey.”
{ ONE }
At first I knew only my mother’s nourishing milk, and the sheltering warmth of her teats as I fed. It wasn’t until I had become much more aware of my surroundings that I realized I had brothers and sisters with whom to compete for Mother’s attentions, that as they wiggled and squirmed against me they were trying to shove me to the side. But Mother loved me, I could feel it when she nuzzled me, when she cleaned me with her tongue. And I loved my mother dog.
Our den was formed of metal floors and walls, but Mother had arranged a soft roll of cloth into a warm bed up against the back side. Once my siblings and I could see and move well enough to explore, we discovered that the surface beneath our pads was not only hard and slick but cold. Life was much better on the blanket. The roof over our heads was a brittle tarp that flapped in the wind with a crisp rattling chatter.
None of this was as interesting to us as the alluring, empty rectangular hole at the front of the den, through which light and outdoor smells poured in an intoxicating blend. The floor of the den jutted out past the roof at that point. Mother often went to this window to the unknown, her nails clicking on the metal shelf that thrust out into the world, and then she … vanished.
Mother would leap out into the light and be gone. We puppies would huddle together for warmth in the chill of her absence, squeaking comfort to each other, and then collapse into sleep. I could feel that my brothers and sisters were as distraught and anxious as I was that she might never return, but she always came back to us, appearing in the middle of the rectangular hole as swiftly as she had departed.
When our vision and coordination improved, we pooled our collective courage and followed her scent out onto the ledge, but it was terrifying. The world, dizzying in its compelling possibilities, was open to us there below the shelf, but to access it meant a free fall of impossible distance. Our den was literally off the ground. How did Mother jump down and then back up?
I had a brother I thought of as Heavy Boy. My siblings and I spent most of our time trying to shove him out of our way. When he would climb up over me to sleep on the pile it felt like he was trying to flatten my head, but extracting myself from the compression was not easy, especially with my brothers and sisters pushing back. He sported the same white muzzle and chest, with the same mottled white, gray-and-black body as the rest of us, but his bones and flesh were just somehow heavier. When Mother needed a respite from feeding us and stood up, Heavy Boy always complained the longest, and he was always seeking to nurse, even when the other puppies were satiated and wanting to play. I couldn’t help but be irritated with him—Mother was so thin that her bones were visible through her skin, and her breath carried a rancid, sick odor, while Heavy Boy was plump and round and yet still always demanded more from her.
It was Heavy Boy who strayed too close to the lip of the ledge, his nose sniffing at something in the air, maybe eager for our mother to return so he could continue to try to drain the life out of her. One moment he was precariously stretched out at the very edge, and the next he was gone, falling, an audible thump reaching our ears.
I wasn’t sure this was a bad thing.