Life with Cocoa

On Christmas day 2009 my sister sat on the ground by the overly decorated tree with one last present left to open. It was a medium sized box that was wrapped in green wrapping paper and had a huge red bow on top of it. I kept noticing that the box would move every now and then, and I was hoping that my sister would't notice it because I wanted her to be extra surprised at the gift when she finally got around to opening it.

You see my sister is only eleven years old and she is very sick. As she sits there beside the tree you would never have guessed that just seven months earlier my sister was 103lbs, athletic, and played many different sports. Now she looks ghostly pale, with sunken in cheeks, and barley weighs 70lbs. On April 13, 2009 my family recieved the most devastating news, we found out that my sister had cancer. She goes to chemo every week and never seems to get better, but worse. My sister never complains or wants anyone to feel sorry for her. In order to reward my sister for all of her bravery my parents finally caved in and got her a puppy for christmas.

I went with my parents to the pound in heath to pick out the puppy. We pulled up and parked outside, then my mother, father, and I walked inside and started looking at all the dogs. They had so many dogs in the pound, it was a little sad seeing all of them that noone wanted or couldn't afford to keep any longer. We walked around the cages and the last one we saw had the cutest puppy in it. When I put my hand up against the cage, the little puppy's body shook all over and his little tail was wagging a mile a minute. He was so cute jumping up against the cage door trying to get petted one more time. We all fell in love with the puppy the first second we saw him and we all knew that my sister would too.

As my sister went to open her last present the box gave a tiny bark and my sisters face lit up just like the lights on the overley decorated christmas tree. She looked at my mother, father, and I, and said, "Thank you, Thank you." Then she lifted the lid of the green box and out popped a tiny brown head. My sister looked at the puppy and said, " Hello there."

She was so happy that before she picked up the little puppy she slowly got up and walked to each of us and gave us a hug. Her hug was meant to be strong, but instead it was weak and I knew that it took her a lot of effort just to be doing the small action of giving a little hug. After she was done hugging everyone she went back and sat down by the green box that still held the little puppy.

She reached her pale fragile hand down into the box and pulled out the cutest puppy. He was all brown except for the tiniest white spot on his chest. He was a husky lab mix. My sister decided to name the puppy Cocoa, due to the fact that his fur color reminded her of the color of cocoa powder.

Cocoa got passed around a lot between the five of us and he was very shy. He didn't move around a lot he just sat quietly on who's ever lap he was sitting on. It didn't take Cocoa very long to warm up to my mom, dad, sister, and me. Soon he was jumping around, wagging his tail, and using those sharp little teeth of his to bite down on what ever he could find, which just happened to usually be someone's hand or other exposed body part. His teeth may have just been puppy teeth, but man were those suckers sharp. When he would bite one of us and we would go to say something to the puppy, my sister would but in and tell us in a stern voice that he was just a puppy and didn't realize what he was doing.

My little sister played with her puppy all day long. She just couldn't seem to get enough of the little puppy. Later that day when it was time to go to bed the little puppy layed right next to my sister, and wouldn't move. He just stayed curled up next to her all night long, just like he would for many nights to come.