I scamper through the house after the man, who has just recently gained himself a wheelchair and is having immense fun chasing his numerous grandchildren around the foyer.

I give up my chase and sit on the sidelines, watching and waiting for him to tire and return to the silence of his office.

His grandchildren are things to behold. At first there was one, but then she disappeared and came back with five in tow, then seven, then thirteen. There are a lot of them; all dressed in the finest clothes and jewellery, but yet, all so unruly and ruggedly wild. I watch my master wheel after a particularly young child, squealing his head off like a piglet in a slaughterhouse. There is pink delight- pure delight- on the children's cheeks as they scream around and out manoeuvre their grandfather.

Sometimes the master gets the need to sit out in the gardens and bask in the sun. We will sit together out under the cherry trees and overlook the stables and pastures. Here I see the grandchildren, here is how I know they are unruly and ruggedly wild, and for they are out there, down in the creek netting bait fish and up in the trees looking for bird's nests, upon horses that are huge and enormous.

These wild children, how Annette longs to join their fun like the estate hounds have. But she, right now, is Brodie. She is not a simple children's dog, she is a service dog. She is the master's dog. She's the master's nurse; she's his life support system before machines made their medical entrance.

Those months of excessive richness were full of boredom, but at the same time, wonder. A kennel official would sometimes come to check that I had no become faulty.

I had to bark at him five times, generally on the busy days full of visitors and grandchildren. He fell and I needed to help him up three times and since he got his wheel chair, I've needed to turn all the lights on and open all the doors for him since.

One night, he was dressed up smart and I as well had been brushed to perfection by the maids. We rode in a more polished and lavish carriage than usual with the two finest horses on the farm.

It was an event. An awards night that went for hours, full of small entrees and glove muffled clapping, women in glittering, door jamming gowns and energetic hosts. I sat like a statue beside by master's chair. Many people were curious, and upon seeing my behaviour, were impressed. Why do you have a dog there man? Who trained your dog good fellow?

Half a year later my master was admitted to hospital with chest pain. He died over night and I was collected by the service dogs association, ready for the next person on the list. The kennel masters ticked under their breath a bit, a dog was meant to only have one master, I was not meant to be passing through hands this quickly.

For two days I was put in the kennels, but in the "trained" part of the facility. The floor was coated in newspapers and the dogs next to me were old. There is a radio down the end that is always on, playing its melodies to us throughout the day and dawns.

While I was stirring to be back in these kennels, it was unsettling and my gut just seemed to know that this was not where I belonged. It was a house, not a home.

One day, I woke up and saw my dead master. In the newspapers, he was smiling from his wheelchair with me at his side. He was in the suit that he had been in during the dinner and on his lap sat all the awards he had won over the night. He had been a presence in life, the man everyone wanted to be around, kind and generous to all in such unbelievable amounts. But he was not a man who had the empathy to understand or spare a thought for a dog. He had been taken with me, a new toy, but after I was just an ignore presence; I was just the dog who had seldom got a pat for her efforts. He was not a dog person, nor even an animal person; he had been a people person through and through.

My next master was also a man, one who smelled of clipboard and antiseptic.

He was a doctor; he was the best doctor in the state supposedly. He had a wife and two young, baby children which loved me very much. He had a home that screamed cosy and modest. They already had a pet before me, a bulldog named Boo who was the most charming dog I had ever met.

It was Sunday; the wife was digging in the vegetable patch, the children in the summer rain mud and the master reading the newspaper on the deck. I sat with Boo in the seasonal flower bed, enjoying the delicate feel of their petals under our ribs.

"The Lady took me out to the markets yesterday while you were with the master at work." Boo told me in his slurred, splatted voice. "I meet someone who recognised you scent on me." I waited for him to go on, was it family? Was it the fat dog from the kennels? Was it Little Jean or Dizzy?

"He said his name was Oscar, and to tell you that little Jeans and Tizzy became police dogs in the end." Boo shook himself out as bees started to crawl over his coat, sending drool flying.

"Really?" I hadn't expected such a gesture of kindness. "Did he say if he made it as well?" I ask in curiosity.

"Well," Boo chuckled once, "he was wearing a police harness and leading a policing man around."

"Ah," I tilted my head politely to him, "well thank you for telling me Boo."

"Sur' right malady."

For a brief, wild moment in time, I considered the thought of escaping the yard and taking Oscar down. Now half way through my life, I seriously considered matching up to this dog and demanding some pups right now thanks.

This life, of me sitting under my masters desk in half-sleep, hidden from his patients so that they never know, resting in the ladies well-loved gardens, playing with the young but growing children and finding fine company in Boo, went on for the rest of my life unbroken by visits.

And my little litter of dark children.

Until the end, when it was a Visit of Death.

But it's okay, really.

I didn't need to have found them all like I wanted to. I didn't need to reunite with Danielle like I promised her. I did not need to search for the fat dog's pups out to tell them stories of a mother who most assuredly was put to sleep while they were still young. I did not need to have romance, I did not need to have a proper lover, I did not need to see my cinnamon lady or meet for one last time with my bread and wine man. I did not need to see my first home and first family again, I did not need these things to be happy.

It was a brief life, but I had lived it fully.

Some part of me knows I am lying, but the rest of me refuse to agree. I try to be humble about it like every dog should, but I had always dreamed of more, always knew I had the capability to do just as much as the masters.

Some part of be wanted to climb Everest, become a teacher and cure cancer.