Let me be clear: I was not a dog person.

I only agreed to foster two puppies because my sister guilt-tripped me into it. My plan was simple: they stay in a crate, I feed them for a couple of weeks, someone adopts them, and my life goes back to normal.

Easy.

Or at least… that’s what I thought.

The puppies were Moose and Goose, two 8-week-old Pitbull mixes surrendered because their owner claimed they “didn’t know the dog was pregnant.” The shelter just needed someone to keep them for two weeks until they were old enough for their surgeries.

When I saw the word “Pitbull” on the intake form, I’ll admit something I’m not proud of.

I judged them.

I thought about my security deposit.
My neighbors.
Every scary headline I’d ever seen about big dogs.

Then I opened the crate.

Moose immediately peed on my shoe from excitement.

Goose ran off and came back proudly carrying one of my socks from the laundry basket like it was some kind of peace offering. The two of them had absolutely no coordination and kept bumping into each other, the walls, and basically anything within reach.

Chaos.

But weirdly… kind of adorable.

The shelter warned me that bonded pairs rarely get adopted together. Most people want one puppy—not two. And definitely not two Pitbulls that will eventually weigh over 60 pounds each.

“Prepare yourself,” the coordinator told me. “They’ll probably end up separated.”

I told myself it didn’t matter.

They weren’t my dogs.

I wasn’t a dog person.

Then Goose got sick.

Some kind of puppy bug. She stopped eating and just lay there, limp and quiet. Moose refused to leave her side. He brought her toys one by one and placed them next to her. He licked her face and curled around her like a tiny guard dog.

Watching him protect her broke something in me.

I rushed Goose to the emergency vet and paid $400 of my own money for treatment.

For dogs that weren’t even mine.

When Goose finally started feeling better, the first thing she did wasn’t run to her food bowl.

She ran to me.

She climbed into my lap, all 12 pounds of her, and fell asleep like that was exactly where she belonged.

That night I called my sister crying.

“I think I’m keeping them,” I told her.

She laughed immediately.

“I know,” she said. “I knew the second you sent me that picture of them in matching bandanas.”

So yeah.

I wasn’t a dog person.

Now I’m a two-Pitbull person.

And apparently, that’s how life changes when you least expect it.