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I tried to put aside my gloomy thoughts for a few hours and get through class and homework and dinner. Don was off tonight, so didn’t ask me to watch Bridger for him. He’d suggested watching a movie, but I needed to study and I needed to think. The whole thing with the dreams and Wilton was doing a real number on my head and I thought maybe, if I could have one quiet hour with no interruptions, I could reach some kind of clarity. Or take a nap. I’d settle for either at this point.
I had just settled into a corner of the sofa with a notepad and a pencil when I heard a scratching at the door. I had been thinking about knife-wielding maniacs all day, so my initial response was a squeak and my pencil flew across the room.
There was about a one-inch gap between the bottom of the door and the floor, and I could see a shadow there. Moving as quietly as I could, I crossed the room, then crouched down to look under the door. A bright green eye looked back at me, surrounded by black fur. A cat. I tried to remember whether any of my neighbors had a black cat, but came up blank. It was still looking at me, and then it stuck one of its front legs under the door, straining towards me, and meowed.
“You want in, kitty?” I asked.
Another meow. I guessed that was a yes. I decided a cat was probably harmless compared to a knife-wielding maniac, and stood to open the door.
When I opened the door the cat rolled to its feet and craned its neck to look inside. “Come on, then,” I coaxed, and it entered, fluffy tail held high.
He (I checked) was gorgeous – fluffy, shiny, jet black coat, bright green eyes, and when I picked him up he was solid muscle. This was no stray – this was someone’s well-cared-for darling.
“Now where did you come from, hmm? No collar. You got a microchip? Huh?” He melted into me and started to purr, so I didn’t have the heart to put him down. I walked around the apartment holding him. We looked out all the windows, and I took him in the kitchen and fixed him a bowl of water. “You want some water? Huh, Boo-Boo Kitty? You want some water?” Crap, I was already talking baby-talk and naming the furry intruder.
I finally plopped him onto the sofa and went across the landing to knock on Don’s door.
“What’s up?” he asked when he answered.
“Come check this out.” He followed me back across the landing and we stood in the door of my apartment, looking at my visitor, blinking back at us from the arm of the sofa.
“You got a cat?”
“No. He just showed up and, like, knocked on the door. Isn’t he gorgeous?”
“You gonna keep him?”
“I can’t keep him. He’s gotta be someone’s pet. Do you think we should introduce him to Bridger?”
“Too late for that.” We looked down to see that Bridger had followed Don across the landing to see what was going on. He hop-limped towards the sofa and my visitor jumped down to approach the little fluff-ball. We watched, ready to intervene, as the big black cat circled Bridger, sniffing at him and nudging at the spot where his fourth leg should be.
Bridger swatted at the bigger cat, and knocked himself over. I stifled a laugh and Don jabbed me with an elbow.
Boo – it popped out earlier and I had to call him something – head butted the kitten, then picked him up by the scruff of the neck and took him to the sofa. “Hey! No!” I called and headed towards them.
“No,” Don laid a hand on my arm. “It’s okay.”
We walked over to stand behind the sofa and looked down to see Boo, holding Bridger down with one paw and licking furiously at his face. Both cats were purring, and we figured they were getting along okay and left them to it to get beers for ourselves.
We watched the cats bathing for a while, until Bridger got bored and wanted to play. Boo tolerated him, and twitched his tail back and forth for the youngster to chase. After a while, though, Boo gave Bridger a little slap-down and headed to the other end of the sofa, where I was sitting.
“Hey, Boo,” I said. “You looking for a lap?”
He meowed, and climbed aboard. After circling a couple of times he flopped down and closed his eyes.
“That’s the damndest thing,” Don said.
“I know, right? Where did he come from? How did he show up at my door? So weird.”
“If you keep him you’ll need to get him fixed, you know.”
I felt Boo stiffen in my lap. He must have been responding to my own unease. “I’m not keeping him. He’s not my cat, so it’s not my decision. He’s full grown, and look how gorgeous he is. What if he’s, like, a champion stud or something? His bits are staying where they are.”
Boo stretched and started purring again, and I stroked that soft, shiny fur. He was probably the most beautiful cat I’d ever seen.
“Okay,” Don said. “Well, I’m off. Come on Bridger, let’s go home.” Don scooped up his three-legged terror and headed back to his own place. I got up to close the door and turned to see Boo watching me from the sofa.
“Time for me to get to bed, Boo-Boo Kitty. What’ll it be? In or out?” He didn’t move, so I gave him one more chance. “You wanna go home, Boo?” He blinked and jumped down from the sofa, but instead of heading for the door he jumped up onto the bed and started sniffing around.
“Okay, then. I’ll leave this window open, though, in case you want to leave or go take care of your business. I don’t have a litter box, Boo, so be a gentleman, okay?”
He blinked at me again, so I opened the window and crossed my fingers. I rattled around the apartment for a while, cleaning up and getting ready for bed. Boo was still stretched out across the bed and I had to shove him to one side to make room for myself. “Don’t be a bed hog, Boo,” I told him as I slipped under the covers. I rolled onto my side and reached over to turn off the bedside lamp. Boo curled up against my belly and I hoped I didn’t scare him off with any bad dreams.
Of course the dreams came. I started to feel panicky and confused. I was in a familiar place, but it felt wrong. I went from room to room, searching for what was missing. The Jake part of my brain knew what was wrong, but the dream me was confused and lonely. My dream-self started to whimper and cry, and then I was being shaken awake.
I gasped and clutched my chest, feeling fur. I’ve got a little chest hair, but not that much, and I had put a t-shirt on before going to bed. Boo. I pulled my hand away, not wanting to hurt or scare him. He was kneading at my chest and purring, and I realized that was what had woken me.
“Oh... oh geez. Did you wake me up, Boo? Did I scare you?” There was a little light coming in from the streetlight outside and I could make out Boo’s shape in the bed next to me. I scratched the ruff around his neck and he head-butted my chest. “Sorry, Boo. It’s okay, just a bad dream. You may want to go home, you know. I get a lot of those.”
Boo head-butted me again and made a mournful little trilling sound.
“Yeah, Boo. It’s pretty sad, huh? Not much fun to sleep with. Shit. I hadn’t thought about that. If I ever did get that hot detective to notice me, it wouldn’t get very far. Nobody wants to sleep with someone who wakes up screaming or crying every few minutes.”
Boo made that trilling sound again and started rubbing on me. He head-butted my chin and it was strangely comforting.
“You’re so sweet, Boo. I wish I could keep you and you could be my kitty. Someone’s probably really missing you right now. But maybe you could stay a little longer, huh?”
Boo collapsed against me and started purring again.
“Good decision, Boo.”
