Last night, I woke up and it was pitch black outside. I wasn’t sure if the glittery Times Square ball had or hadn’t dropped, or if it was or wasn’t my birthday. Was it a new year? Was I a new age: 11 on 1/1?
All I knew for sure was that Taco was 100 percent mine!
I have a pet cat!!!
We brought him home in a cat carrier, but Mom said we had to keep him in the bathroom the first night. That didn’t seem very welcoming, but Mom said that when a cat is not “accustomed to a new environment,” it’s best to take things slowly, and that Taco would feel safest in a “small, confined space.” I was so glad we’d actually adopted him—and bought canned food and pet bowls and kitty litter—that I didn’t object.
Right before I went upstairs, I told Taco that he was the best birthday present in the whole wide world. He still seemed scared (skittish?), so I didn’t pick him up, but I petted him and told him I’d be back first thing in the morning.
Well, this morning, he was curled up on the bathmat. He’d eaten some food and used his litter box and even covered his P-O-O-P with sand, which cats do. Mom said these were all “good signs.” She showed me how to scoop out his dried doodies and shake off the sand and flush the P-O-O-P down the toilet. I told Pip it reminded me of the game we used to play by Nana Ethel’s creek called “Panning for Gold.” Pip said I was crazy, but I knew she remembered Panning for Gold as well as I did. (I like that we have a lot of the same memories.)
Anyway, Mom and Dad had said they’d take me and my friends out for pizza for my birthday, but I didn’t want to leave Taco alone that long. So I called Maybelle and Bea and Carmen and Lucia and invited them to come here instead.
Bea and Ben had just gotten back from vacation, and she said she’d be right over. She’s two years older than me, but we became friends last fall. That’s when she and I came up with the five Pip Pointers to help Pip shake off her shyness.
Well, everyone got to meet my new cat—but not in the way I was hoping.
I’d pictured Taco taking turns climbing onto their laps, purring and kneading. Kneading is what cats do when they press their little paws against you one at a time, left and right, right and left. Mom said that newborn kittens knead and purr when they nurse because that’s how they tell their mother to stay still. Grown cats knead and purr mostly when they are relaxed and happy.
Taco did not knead or purr at all.
What happened was this: We all stood by the bathroom door. Bea and Pip were on tiptoe, Maybelle and I were in the middle, and the twins were crouching down (dressed in matching yellow). The plan was for me to open the door a crack so everyone could peek at Taco, asleep on the bathmat. I did—but Taco dashed out! He made a beeline (cat line?) for the sofa! And he’s been hiding underneath it ever since!
All anyone saw was a flash of fur!
Before I could stop them, Carmen and Lucia raced after him and got on their stomachs and started groping under the sofa. Not only did Taco not come out, he hissed at them! He even grumble-growled! It was a strange, low, unhappy sound.
Mom said we needed to let him get comfortable on his own terms. She also said that adult cats don’t meow to other cats, they meow only to people, usually to “ask for food or water or space.”
Well, we let Taco have some space while I opened birthday presents. Maybelle gave me a rainbow-colored beaded bracelet that she’d made just for me. The twins gave me a gold picture frame (which I like) and a fuzzy pink jewelry box (which I don’t). Bea gave me a book of funny cat photographs from her parents’ shop. Pip gave me a scarf. And everyone sang, “Happy Birthday!” and ate pizza and cake.
Now that I’m eleven, I wonder if I seem a lot older than the twins, who are in fourth grade. I also wonder if I seem a lot younger than Bea and Pip, who are in seventh. Am I growing up at the right speed?
I can hardly believe I’m eleven. I won’t be a palindrome age again until I’m twenty-two!
Ava Wren, Birthday Girl