The day Maisy left, the world felt quieter. The sky opened gently, and a rainbow stretched far above the house, as if the earth itself was saying goodbye. Everything stood still. The grief hung in the air.
Maisy had been more than a dog. She was Motor the cat’s whole world. A beautiful grey and white pitbull with a beaded collar of soft pink, purple, and white. The image of her sitting in her red and black trolley wearing her favorite sweater is one Marisa, her forever mom, will never forget. That picture stays frozen in time. She looked like she belonged to something far beyond this world.
From the very start, Motor, the camel-colored cat, had loved her. He followed her on walks, stretching his little paws to reach her face. He would lie on his back with his eyes turned up to her, silently asking for her attention. Maisy always answered. She licked his cheeks. She cleaned his fur. She made him feel safe.
Sometimes, she would rest her head on his small belly and drift into sleep. He curled into her arms like she was a warm home. They were family.
Their connection was deep. And when it was time to say goodbye to Maisy, the silence afterward was unbearable. “He was so bonded,” Marisa whispered once. “It was going to be completely life-changing,” she said, voice breaking under the weight of love and grief. Tears fell quietly, the kind that never really stop falling inside.
When she passed, Motor changed. He stopped meeting Marisa at the door. He sat in the backyard with a quiet sadness. His body moved through the house like a ghost. He waited for a friend who wouldn’t return. The loneliness wrapped around him like the cold.
But love has strange ways of returning. Marisa decided to bring home another pittie.
A young pitbull with a black, brown, and white coat. Gentle eyes. A soft presence. Motor passed by her, his eyes wary, his body cautious. But Lottie didn’t even look up. She gave him space. She waited.
Within days, Motor inched closer. They slept close, cheeks resting together like two hearts learning to heal. Lottie, unsure at first, soon learned to love like Maisy had. She began grooming Motor. She began watching the birds with him. They lay together on sunlit floors and in early morning tangles on the bed.
One day, Motor held her arm while sleeping as if to whisper, “Don’t go. I can’t lose you, too.”
A month later, the spark had returned to Motor’s eyes. He ran again. He played. He wagged his tail hard enough for the world to hear. And when Marisa saw them, Lottie wearing Maisy’s sweater, nestled in Maisy’s old trolley, there was no doubt left in her heart.
Maisy had sent her.
Love never disappears. It changes shape. It finds its way home again in the warmth of a new heart.
Because the ones we love never really leave us. They leave love behind.
