I met Petra* in the Parc des Buttes Chaumont shortly after moving to Belleville just over a year ago. I had discovered that the park—one of the few in Paris that allows dogs, even on leash—had a huge dog population. There’s a WhatsApp group with 331 participants. (It’s mainly used to warn the others of approaching policemen, giving enough time to grab dogs and put them on-leash, avoiding 30 euro fines.)
Every day, an elegant woman in her late 50s was there with her black and white hound mix named Burrow. We began chatting, and in her near-perfect English (slight German accent), Petra told me she’d been living in Paris for five years but hadn’t tried hard enough to learn French, since she spoke English with her partner, Maurice. My dog, Sirius, got along well with hers (dogs are like kids - you can’t influence who you want them to like just because you want to hang out with the parents) and we visited the park at the same time, so our chats became regular.
One day I invited her to coffee. We sat at a gorgeous little place at the north end of the park with our dogs snoozing at our feet, and I brought up something she had mentioned in previous conversations. “You said you were sick last spring. If I can ask, what was wrong?”
She looked hesitant, so I said, “We don’t have to talk about this.”
“No, no,” she said. “I usually don’t talk about it because I don’t want people to pity me, but I can tell that you won’t.” And she told me she had had breast cancer that had then spread to her bones. She was in remission, but it wouldn’t last forever.
I told her I was sorry. That a good friend had died of cancer a few years ago. And another friend, who I taken care of during her chemo, was cancer-free now.
“That isn’t my case. It’s just a matter of time,” she said.
“I’m sorry to hear that,” I replied.
And we went on to talk about other things. It was in a later conversation that she told me that, following an argument, she and her partner no longer spoke to each other. They lived like flatmates now, that is…flatmates who don’t speak.
“It’s depressing,” she confessed.
“Petra, you can’t stay in that situation,” I said. “I’ll help you find somewhere else.”
“No, no,” she replied. “I can’t even imagine undertaking a move. I don’t have the strength for that kind of drama. Besides, when I moved here to be with him, I left my job as a nurse. I don’t have money of my own. He pays for everything.”
I hated the thought that she had to live with what sounded like a surly, irritable man who expressed his frustration with life by snapping at her. So the next time I left town, I asked if she wanted to stay at my place. “I need someone to dog sit, and you and Burrow can both stay. It will give you a couple of nights away.”
She ended up stayed only one of the two nights. Maurice’s temper had been so bad that it wasn’t even worth the nice, quiet time she spent reading at my house, alone with the dogs. His reaction had upset her, and it was here (confirmed by future conversations) that I understood she still loves him and wishes things were like they were before he became this grinch-like character. It sounded like, even though he acted like he didn’t want her “under foot,” when she wasn’t around, he threw a fit.
One thing I’ve learned in life is not to interfere in people’s codependent relationships. Maurice is not a violent man, just extremely disagreeable. So I stopped trying to fix the situation.
A few weeks later, my dogwalker passed her bar exam and became a lawyer. Funnily enough, she no longer needed the job. “I need to find a walker for lunchtime the three days a week I’m at the office,” I told Petra. She shared the names of the dog walkers she knew from the park, then said, “You know…I could do it.”
“Oh, Petra, I couldn’t ask you to do that. You’re my friend,” I said. But she insisted.
Then I said something awkward about paying. She refused. I agreed to give it a try, then went home and thought, “This is an awful idea. What if she can’t come or misses days and I have to insist on getting a paid walker? That will make things weird between us.”
But the next day she showed up, I gave her the key, and that was that. She took Sirius for a walk at lunchtime on my office days. She told me how much she enjoyed sticking around afterwards for an hour or two and reading while the dogs played and Burrow (who is 14) rested. She read the printed versions of my old blog, which told the stories of my life in the French countryside. Later, when I would mention something from my past, she would say, “I know. I read about that in your book.” She began referring to my ex by his name, and knew everything about him and my kids.
And after a few months I thought, “What the fuck am I doing? There is this person who has keys to my house, hangs out there when I’m gone, knows a lot about me, and none of my friends have ever seen her or know who she is.”
And my writer’s brain said, “She could easily let herself in one night, kill you in your sleep, and no one would have a clue who did it.”
And my heart said, “This is a good woman, you can trust her.”
Then my writer’s brain said, “Maybe she doesn’t even have cancer. Maybe nothing she’s told you is true. She could be a fugitive from the law, and you can’t even look her up because you don’t even know her last name, if her first name is even Petra.”
Then my heart said, “You are insane. Yes, people have lied to you before and you swallowed it hook line and sinker, but this person is good.”
And so I made sure to tell a couple of friends about her, just in case she did come kill me in my sleep, so at least the police would have a lead on a German woman with a black and white dog who lived across the street from the park.
But the more time I spent with her, the quieter my writer’s brain got, and little by little she told me more about herself, but not without my digging. The first few times we spoke, she spoke haltingly and apologized for her rusty conversation skills. “I haven’t spoken to anyone in so long.” She was humble, didn’t expect me to take an interest in her life, and was happy to talk only about her dog and the other dogs in the park.
Eventually, I learned that her mother died giving birth to her brother when she was a couple of years old. Her father married her mother’s younger sister, who never had children herself. There was a falling out years ago, and she hadn’t been in touch with them since.
After years working as a nurse (with periods of traveling, living abroad, and dancing tango all over the world) she came down with a severe case of depression. Disillusioned with her life, she went on sick leave. She lost touch with all of her friends, moved to Paris to be with a man she had met through tango, then realized that a change of location was not going to cure her sadness. Then came whatever fight happened between her and Maurice, she moved into her own bedroom, and discovered she had cancer.
The previous spring she had gone through chemo and radiation. One of the dog owners told me she had disappeared from the park for several months, and they only saw Burrow with Maurice, but no one knew why.
After a couple of months of walking my dog 2-3 lunchtimes per week, she saw how I was barely holding together between full-time work and motherhood, and offered to pick up Sirius on Saturday mornings so I could sleep in. On these occasions, I would wake up as they were coming back, fix her a tea, and sit and talk while our dogs played in the living room.
I invited her to do things, accompany me to movies or restaurants or literary events. Each time she demurred. Said she didn’t like to go out much. It was too tiring.
One day while I was telling her about the hormones I was taking, after finally finding a good gynecologist, she confessed she had wondered if menopause had been at the root of her depression. She wished she had identified it in time and wondered if it could have changed her life. I was about to say that she could still talk to someone about it, but she read my mind and said cheerfully, “Ah well, too late.”
A couple of weeks into walking Sirius, she began dropping off little containers of food. She’s a vegetarian, and cooks for herself since Maurice likes meat and they don’t eat together anyway. So when she makes too much, she brings me a serving. Or a little piece of cobbler. Or ripe persimmons, which she discovered that I love.
In July, the kids and I took the entire month to go to Croatia, bringing Sirius with us and renting out my apartment. I sent Petra a couple of photos during the month, and she came over the day after we returned to walk Sirius. She confessed she had missed the walks with Sirius and chats with me. “It was a quiet month,” she said. And then I noticed she was limping.
Sirius left a few days later to go with my kids to their father’s house in the countryside, and I went back to work. The month away had made it clear to me that I was on the verge of burning out. I gave my notice, meaning I had three months left at the office. So, with less stress and a lightened August workload, I had the time to meet Petra a couple of times in our neighborhood’s cafés. I got her to talk about the pain, which she referred to as, “very annoying.”
As we sat, sipping café crèmes and eating mini pain au chocolats, I said, “Petra, you can talk about your cancer. It’s not going to scare me away. Yes, I was devastated when my friend died, but that’s because I had known her for a couple of decades in good health. You told me you had cancer when we met, so I began this friendship knowing you were ill. I have different expectations. I want you to be able to talk about it. And I want to know how you are doing.”
She sighed. “My cancer is back. I’m taking morphine because I have a lot of pain in my hip and leg bones. Even so, lying down for too long hurts. My doctor made me meet the palliative care team at the hospital. They tried to make me see a palliative psychologist, but I said no. They asked about my home situation, and I told them Maurice wasn’t helpful. I told them about you.” She touched my hand and smiled. “They are very happy I have you.”
I told her to put my name down as an emergency contact. At first, she refused. “I don’t want to burden you.” But when I said I was already emergency contact for a single friend with a child, she agreed. If something happened, I wanted to be able to help, and I wasn’t sure Maurice would contact me.
I had met him once, out walking Burrow. And though he was polite, I could tell he didn’t like me. He had told Petra that she was stupid to be helping me out. I had a job. I could pay someone to help.
Which was true. And, to tell the truth, I was starting to feel bad that Petra was giving so much and I was giving so little. When I told her that, she said, “Now stop right there. Before meeting you, the only joy in my life was walking my dog. You have opened up my world. I look forward to our talks. I look forward to hearing what you have done. And I love walking my little Siri-bär (her pet name for Sirius). It is all a joy.”
I thought about it. I tried to absorb the fact that I was a joy to her, just being there and talking and giving her a place away from home to read and rest. And I tried to accept her benevolence without feeling guilty.
Summer ended and school began, and everyone returned to work after their August holiday. My client found out I was leaving and made me uncomfortable and even more stressed. So I did a very French thing and told my doctor about it, and she put me on sick leave until the end of my three-month notice.
Suddenly I had six weeks off. I saw a career coach and decided to go back to freelancing so I could write again. I began working on my copywriting portfolio and contacting potential clients, and actually writing fiction again. I no longer needed a dog walker, which was a good thing because Petra was going through a rough patch.
By now her limp was severe. She was on a lot of morphine. Walking up or down hills was hard, so she had swallowed her pride and accepted my arm the couple of times we walked our dogs together in the park.
She had talked about wanting to pick up some ingredients from an Indian neighborhood. I said, “Why don’t we go together, and we can have lunch while we’re there?” So we began preparing our “trip to India.”
She was wobbly during our walk through India, all three blocks of it, but her smile was beatific. She had traveled to the country several times, and had fond memories. After picking up a few food items (including ginger snaps, which we both love) we sat down at an Indian restaurant and I let her choose my meal for me. It was delicious and she told me stories from India and laughed a lot.
After that, we walked to a fabric shop because I wanted to find silk for a scarf. While we were there she got a pained look on her face and said she needed to go outside. I dropped what I was looking at and followed her out. She said she needed to go home.
We waited a few minutes for the bus, and on the way back she told me about the massive amount of morphine she was taking. She said she’d decided not to do any more chemo, but that she would do one round of radiation.
She stopped talking then, and I could tell she was holding back. “Petra,” I said. “I once made a mistake that I still regret. I had an elderly client in New York named Tony, who always wheeled an oxygen tank with him ‘in case.’ One day he took me to lunch and wanted to talk about death, and I wouldn’t let him. I said, ‘Tony, you’re fine! I’m sure you’ll live ‘til you’re a hundred!’ He looked sad and changed the subject, and I realized later that I had stopped him from doing something he needed just because it made me uncomfortable. I’m not going to do that again. You can talk about death with me.”
She told me nothing would cure her now. The radiation was just to help with the pain. Her goal was to live as long as Burrow because she didn’t trust Maurice to treat him as well as she did. And then she said that when the pain got too bad, she would end things.
I asked if she wanted to die at home, and she said no. She would go to a palliative care center.
I made space for that in my mind, and then in my heart.
A couple of weeks later, I decided to give a small Thanksgiving dinner. I invited Petra and was stunned and delighted when she accepted. She had never done Thanksgiving, and insisted on bringing something. I appointed her with the green beans with shaved almonds.
This was the first time Petra had met anyone besides my kids. She sat on my left, and though she was quiet, took part in conversation. I had my daughter pick her up at her house, saying she could help carry things, then had my son walk her back after dinner. She was unsteady and was grateful for their arms to lean on.
The next week she had one round of radiation. I offered to go with her, but she declined. She had begun to take Oxy, since the morphine she was on wasn’t working. The day after radiation, when I texted to see how she was doing, things were bad. The pain was awful, unbearable, and the meds weren’t helping.
But a day later, it was like a magic wand had been waved and— boom! — she was better than she had been for months. No more pain. No more wobbliness. “It worked,” she said. “I don’t hurt. Let me take Sirius again.” I argued against this, but she insisted until I gave in. She seemed so happy when they got back to the house for a play-and-chat session that I accepted her proposal to begin walking him again. She said she needed it.
The kids and Sirius and I went away for the couple weeks of Christmas vacation. When I returned, she said she had missed us. I had missed her. And we went back to texting every couple of days, ostensibly about the dog walks, but also so I could ask if she slept. How she’s feeling.
Her pain is returning. She decided to do one more round of chemotherapy pills, which are making her nauseous. But just when I think things are looking bad, she starts talking about what kind of flowers we should plant in our window boxes for the next couple of years.
She has turned her focus to helping me. She researches any problem I mention. When I got sick she told me to drink thyme tea. When I hurt my foot, she insisted that I get an MRI, then brought me pain pills. When I told her that Sirius wasn’t letting me write because he sits there and stares at me and whines because he’s bored, she came back with several activities for bored dogs that she found on TikTok.
I feel bad about a woman who is dying coming up with activities for my Labrador and bringing me food. Though I’m always offering, she rarely lets me do anything for her, besides phoning the vet in French and helping her clip Burrow’s claws. It feels out of balance, the amount of her giving and my taking.
But she has told me several times how blessed she feels to have me in her life. “You’ve given my life more purpose,” she says. I’m trying to accept the fact that I am giving to her just by being here. And I know when things get worse, I will be the one who is visiting her and bringing the treats, though I know she doesn’t let herself think ahead that far.
My friendship with Petra has made me question the nature of relationships. I don’t like asking people for things. So this is triggering, accepting benevolence when I’m not able to balance the scales. It is a moment of learning and accepting and loving. But it’s just a moment. Not years. It’s a friendship with limits that neither of us can do a thing about. And for me, this friendship has become a meditation on what it means to be human.
*not her real name.