I never had pets growing up. I got my first one during the pandemic — a sweet orange tabby cat I named Torshi, whose every movement I quickly became obsessed with. But I also found myself feeling slightly uneasy with the whole arrangement: I live in a one-bedroom apartment, and Torshi stays indoors. He would often spend evenings meowing at the front door, begging to be let out. His happiness felt dependent on me, and every time I left, I felt a sort of ache I hadn’t experienced before. Was Torshi okay? Was he actually a prisoner? How much was I projecting? New York Magazine’s latest cover package sits in the discomfort of that nagging feeling in a series of essays in which writers explore the dynamics of pet ownership that keep them up at night. The goal is to question our standards of what a good life means for an animal and to challenge some of the norms we take for granted around pet care.

There’s no better place to start than Madeline Leung Coleman’s beautiful reported essay on the question of whom end-of-life pet care is really for. Many owners go to major extremes — including chemo — to extend their pets’ lives. But as many vets put it, we’re often delaying euthanizing our pets longer than is kind for the animal just so we can wrap our heads around having to kill them. “We convince ourselves that our pets like the lives we have chosen for them,” Coleman writes. “Sometimes, we convince ourselves that they would want those lives to last forever. But what if they need them to stop?”