It was around 11:30 at night when my phone rang. The caller ID said it was my mom. I answered.
She said, “Come here. Now.”
That was it. No hello, no small talk—just those two words. My mom only lived a mile away, so I rushed out the door, my mind racing with fear. What if she was having a heart attack? What if the house was on fire? What if someone had died?
When I got there, I walked through the front door and saw that the living room furniture was pushed around in a strange way. Mom pointed at the floor.
“Look!” she said.
It took me a second to understand what I was seeing. Her paper shredder was tipped over on its side, and her little Maltese, Casper, was lying next to it in a twisted position. He was trapped. I bent down to see how he was caught and felt sick when I realized it wasn’t just his fur stuck—it was his skin, caught in the shredder’s metal teeth.
It was late, and all the regular vets were closed. The only place open was the emergency animal clinic, 40 minutes away. We had no choice. As gently as we could, we picked up Casper, still stuck to the shredder, and rushed to the car.
When we got to the clinic, the vet techs took him back right away. Mom and I sat in the waiting room, shocked and scared, hoping he would be okay. After what felt like forever, someone came out to talk to us.
They had broken the shredder apart and freed him. He had deep cuts, which the vet stitched up, and they put him on fluids and pain medicine. He would have to stay overnight, but it looked like he was going to be okay.
Meanwhile, my sister, who lived with my mom, came home to an empty house. The front door was unlocked, the living room was a mess, and Mom and Casper were gone. She had no idea what had happened.
She turned on all the lights and checked every room. Everything else seemed normal, but where was Mom? She tried calling, but neither of us had cell phones at the time. Worried, she started calling other family members to see if anyone knew where Mom was. No one did.
She finally got my other sister to check my house, but my car was gone too. That made her even more worried. If Mom had left in the middle of the night, and I had too, something had to be wrong.
She started calling all the local hospitals to see if Mom had been admitted. Then, when she still had no answers, she called the police.
As she was on the phone, describing us to the officer, Mom and I walked through the front door.
We explained everything, and then we all tried to figure out how Casper had gotten stuck. The shredder had been turned off, sitting on the floor next to the trash can. In the trash was a biscuit.
Mom guessed that Casper had jumped over the shredder to get to the biscuit and accidentally turned it on when he landed.
This scary night had a happy ending because Casper made a full recovery. And ever since that night, we’ve all been extra careful with paper shredders.
Update: Some people have asked about the reverse button on the shredder. I couldn’t remember if we had tried it, so I asked my mom. She said she had tried pressing it before I arrived, but it didn’t work. I do remember being afraid that if we pulled him free, he might start bleeding badly. Since we were so far from the vet, I didn’t want to risk it.
Here is a picture I painted of Casper a few years ago. This happened in 2007, but I still think about it today.
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