Chapter 10

EDITH SITS DOWN

Stick Cat pushed up as hard as he could a second time.

And a third time.

The piano lid did not move at all.

Realizing it was no use, Stick Cat withdrew himself from the piano. His back hurt terribly for a moment. He twisted and stretched to try to loosen his muscles.

“I can’t lift it,” Stick Cat whispered. He was exhausted from the effort. “We’re going to have to think of something else.”

“Are you sure an inspirational song by yours truly wouldn’t help?” asked Edith. “I promise to sing as loud as I possibly can.”

“No,” Stick Cat said quickly. The stretching had helped. He started to feel better. “Even something as unique as that sound wouldn’t be able to make a difference. It’s just too heavy.”

“It almost seemed like you were trying to help me,” Mr. Music said to Stick Cat. He looked weary from standing so long in one position. His eyes were sad and tired. And his voice sounded weak and raspy. “Is that what you were doing? Or am I starting to hallucinate from all of this? You are real, aren’t you?”

Stick Cat came closer and rubbed his side against Mr. Music’s right bicep.

“Good,” Mr. Music said, and smiled at Stick Cat. “I don’t know if you were trying to lift that lid or not, but it’s no use. That thing weighs over two hundred pounds. I can barely prop it up myself sometimes.”

Stick Cat moved to Mr. Music’s other arm and rubbed against the left bicep.

“That feels really good,” said Mr. Music. “I think I’m beginning to lose the circulation in my arms. I figured someone at the piano shop would wonder where I was by now. But I’m starting to think that maybe they won’t. I called Tony and left a message saying I’d be a little late. I don’t even know if he got it. I came straight up here instead of stopping in the shop first. Nobody knows I’m here, little kitty.”

Stick Cat gave each of Mr. Music’s arms another gentle rub with his side and jumped down to the bench and then down to the floor.

“He’s such a nice man,” Stick Cat said to Edith. He paced back and forth near the bench. “We just have to think of another way.”

“Maybe the problem is the direction in which we’re trying to get him out,” suggested Edith.

Stick Cat was willing to listen to any idea—mainly because he was having trouble coming up with one of his own. “What do you mean?”

“Well, we’re thinking that he has to get his arms out the way they went in,” Edith started to explain. “But maybe we could push him farther and farther into the piano until he is all the way inside.”

Stick Cat said nothing—primarily because he could think of nothing to say. This prompted Edith to continue explaining her idea.

“Once he’s all the way inside the piano, then we can go underneath and scratch and chew a hole through the bottom. Then he’d just fall out. End of problem.”

“You think we could chew and scratch a human-size hole in the bottom of a piano?”

“Sure, why not?”

Stick Cat nodded. “Okay, let’s keep that plan in mind, and we’ll use it if we don’t come up with something better.”

“Do you honestly think we can come up with something better than chewing a hole through the bottom of the piano?”

Stick Cat paused a moment. Then he said, “I’m just saying maybe we can.”

Edith nodded. And Stick Cat began to think even harder.

It was not long before Edith spoke again. “Okay, if we’re not going to chew him out from the bottom, maybe we could break the lid from the top.”

“Excuse me?” asked Stick Cat. You couldn’t really tell if he was so deep in thought himself that he didn’t hear Edith—or if he couldn’t believe what he just heard.

“We break the lid from the top. It shatters, and he gets his arms out. Simple.”

“And how do we break the lid?”

“Any number of ways,” Edith answered casually. This all seemed quite obvious to her, you could tell. “We find a way to drop a really heavy object on it. Or we get up there and jump up and down as high as we can. Or we find a sledgehammer and bash on the lid until it breaks. Whatever. There are a million ways.”

“But wouldn’t that crush Mr. Music’s arms?” Stick Cat asked.

Edith sort of pulled her head back. Again, she seemed astonished at Stick Cat’s question. She said, “Well, of course it would crush his arms.”

“I don’t want to do that!”

“Look, Stick Cat,” Edith said calmly. “You asked me for ideas to help Mr. Music out of the piano. You didn’t ask me for ideas to get him out without shattering his bones to bits.”

Stick Cat looked down to the concrete floor and shook his head back and forth ever so slightly. Eventually he lifted his head and said, “I guess I should have mentioned that.”

“Umm, ye—ee—ah,” Edith said. “I guess you should have.”

“We’ll keep that plan in mind too,” Stick Cat told Edith.

Now, you could tell Edith didn’t like it when Stick Cat refused to adopt her most excellent plans. She sighed a lot and shook her head every now and then. Her frustration seemed to grow and grow while Stick Cat continued to pace and think.

Edith finally stopped sighing long enough to say, “Well, if you aren’t going to use any of my great ideas, then I’m just going to sit down and wait for you to come up with one of your own.”

She plopped down in frustration.

Stick Cat continued to pace. Mr. Music sighed low and deep a couple of times. Edith shifted her weight trying to get more comfortable as she waited for Stick Cat to come up with a better idea than one of her own. She doubted he could.

This pacing and sighing and sitting went on for about thirty seconds more.

That’s when Edith did a most peculiar thing. And she screamed the strangest thing Stick Cat had ever heard anyone—cat or human—say.

Edith jumped up from where she sat. She ran in circles and stretched her head back to look at her tail.

She screamed, “My butt is talking! My butt is talking!! MY BUTT IS TALKING!!!”