At first, it seemed like a normal day. The sun was shining, and the sky was blue. I waited patiently for Betty to get up and take me out to pee. We trotted along quite normally. I met my friends, the brown dog who always had a ball in her mouth and the golden dog who I think had a crush on me, but was too shy to make his move, at least when our owners were around.

 But when we got home, Joe had the weird box with the funny lights that dogs occasionally barked at me out of on. And I could tell by the way he spoke that something unusual was happening.

One thing you should know about us dogs, we don’t understand the conversations that you have. But we do understand your mood. We can sense when you are sad and angry and happy and calm. We can hear it in your voice. We can see changes in your body language. And, believe it or not, you smell differently when you are stressed because that makes you sweat. 

And that was what I remember about that day. Betty and Joe were nervous and tense all the rest of the day. They were crying and speaking on what I now, in doggy heaven, know was the telephone. Once, Joe shouted at Betty, which was very unusual, then he went away for two hours. Sometimes, I’d go up to one of them and nestle my head on their lap. They’d pet me and scratch me behind my ears, which made me happy because that’s how I knew it wasn’t me they were mad at. After a few hours, I just decided to let them be and I curled up in my basket and took a nap.

But the next day, Betty woke me up before it was light, which I couldn’t remember ever having happened before. She said, “Come on Lottie!”

She put on my lead and took me to the car, and we set off. This was so strange. We dogs, we like routine. We like things to be the same every day. So, my tail was thumping, and I was whining because I was nervous as we drove through the city that day.

Looking out of the window, I saw that there were many flashing lights and a lot of people around. One strange thing was that many of those people had very oddly shaped heads, flat around the edge and wide. Some of them even had noses that pointed out like mine, and many of them wore the same jackets and coats.

When I told them up here in heaven about that, they laughed and said, “Lottie, those weren’t their heads…they were helmets! Those noses were gas masks. And the coats were uniforms!”

Which, I guess, made sense, although as I wear the same fur every day, I don’t really understand why people wear different things all the time.

Betty took me to meet a bunch of other dogs. There must have been twenty or thirty of us. And Charlie was there! I sure was happy to see him amongst all this weird stuff going on. While we caught up, the people did lots of talking. And then they led us in a line up a slope that was hard on my paws. It was obvious something unusual had happened, even to a dog. The world didn’t look or smell like this normally, all that metal and twisted stuff and dust.

The smell was pretty bad, too. It was just like it had been when the family had barbeques and fires out in the garden in my first year, but much, much worse than that. Everything had that smoky smell about it.

They let me off the leash and told me to look around. So, I did. I hurried around, smelling and listening. I looked for people who were buried in the rubble, sniffing all over. The problem was, the smell of all the burnt stuff was making it very hard to tell what was human, what was alive, and what was not.

Sometimes, Betty would call me over and make me drink, or have me lie down for a while, but most of the day, I was scurrying about. A few times, men who looked tired and sad would see me and call me over. They’d ruffle my fur and say,

“Hello! What’s your name?” Somehow, they always managed to find it when they pulled at my collar, although I don’t know how. But they always seemed a little happier, which made me feel better too.

But after hours and hours of work, I got frustrated. Where was everyone? When they sent me to look for people in the training centre, I always found them eventually. But here, nobody was moving. I began to feel sad and anxious. No-one was petting me and saying, “Good girl, Lottie!”, at least not in the way they used to when I succeeded in finding a person.

I decided to try harder, and I raced around. I jumped over girders and I squeezed into crevices. I walked along beams, and I dug in the weird black and grey stuff that I think was called ash. And still, I didn’t find one person. I was a bit scared now. Why couldn’t I do my job?

When that day finished, I was so exhausted and confused that I didn’t even want to see Charlie. I just curled up and went to sleep angrily.

The next day was a bit better. After two hours, I found a man alive. But the strange thing was, I recognized his scent. In fact, I thought I recalled seeing him standing and walking about the previous day, although I wasn’t sure.   

It was nice to find someone, and everyone praised me, but there was no one else. Halfway through that day, I took a nap, and I just didn’t want to go out there again. What was the point? Betty gave me treats and was very nice to me, but I just couldn’t go back out there. I curled up and closed my eyes.

Later that day, I left that awful place with my tail between my legs.

In doggy heaven, they explained what had happened that day in September of 2001.

They told me it hadn’t been my fault that I hadn’t found anybody alive and even let me in on their secret.

“Lottie, the man you ‘found’ was only pretending to need help. They put him there so you could find him and feel better.” But I kind of wish they hadn’t told me.

Turned out, though, I was able to help some folks that week, just in a very different way from how I’d imagined.