Софи Келли - A Case Of Cat And Mouse

Rebecca pulled a small brown paper bag out of her pocket and handed it to me.

I shook my head as I unfolded the top to look inside. I knew exactly what I was going to find. Kitty treats: big surprise. They were tiny crackers shaped like little birds.

“Roasted chicken,” Rebecca said helpfully. “It’s a new flavor Roma’s friend is testing.”

Roma had a veterinarian colleague who also owned a small organic pet food company. Owen and Hercules had been his eager taste testers in the past. I hadn’t even noticed Eddie slip Rebecca the bag while we were at the house. Clearly it was something the two of them had planned, probably when they’d talked on the phone.

“What am I going to do with you?” I asked.

“Wish me luck with my bread-making,” she said with a completely straight face.

I laughed and leaned across the seat to hug her. “Good luck,” I said. “I can’t wait to try the results.”

Rebecca headed for her back door, carefully carrying the bowl of starter. I headed home.

I found Hercules was still sitting on the bench in the sun porch looking out the side window. It wasn’t that he didn’t like the outdoors; it was more that he didn’t like wet grass under his feet, or mud between his toes or grackles dive-bombing his head. He liked Mother Nature from a distance.

He turned to look at me, a questioning look in his green eyes.

“Yes, Rebecca sent you a treat,” I said, holding up the small paper bag.

“Mrrr,” he said. Then he jumped down and went through the door to the kitchen. Through the door as in he passed directly to the other side of the solid wooden door without even pausing and without waiting for me to unlock and open it.

Hercules had the ability to pass through solid objects. It seemed impossible. It seemed to defy the laws of physics that I had studied in high school but it still happened. I had yet to come across any wall or door that was too dense for the little tuxedo cat to pass through to the other side.

I pulled out my keys and heard a faint but clearly impatient meow from the kitchen. As I turned the doorknob he meowed once again.

“Excuse me, some of us have to actually stop and open the door,” I said as I stepped into the kitchen.

His whiskers twitched as though he was making a face at me. Which he was.

Owen then appeared in the living room doorway. Literally appeared. Unlike Hercules, Owen couldn’t pass through solid objects, but he could make himself invisible—also equally unexplainable.

The first time I had seen Owen’s ability was in the backyard while he was chasing a bird. It was easy to dismiss what I’d seen—or more accurately what I hadn’t seen—as a trick of the light. The first time I had been confronted with what Hercules could do was at the library. That had been harder to explain away.

At the time a section of the library had been cordoned off. One of our meeting rooms had been part of a police investigation. Hercules had slipped nonchalantly under the yellow crime scene tape. I had scrambled after him, but he had just walked out of my reach, through the closed door in front of us, and disappeared.

I remembered how my knees had started to shake. I’d closed my eyes and taken a couple of deep breaths. “Be there,” I’d whispered. I’d opened my eyes again. There was no cat.

I had kept the secret about Owen and Hercules for years. I was too afraid of what might happen to them if anyone found out, even though there had been some close encounters during that time. Finally, a couple of months ago, I’d told Marcus. He had had trouble accepting what I was saying, even when Hercules walked through the kitchen door and Owen sat on a chair and then vanished right before our eyes. Marcus was even more shocked to learn that his own cat, Micah, shared Owen’s gift. Weeks later he was still looking for a rational explanation when I wasn’t sure there was one. Sometimes I had the feeling that all three cats were getting a little tired of it.

I saw Owen and Hercules exchange a look. More than once I’d wondered if telepathy could also be one of their special skills. Owen came purposefully across the floor, stopped at my feet and fixed his golden eyes on the bag in my hand.

“Merow,” he said sharply.

“Is there any point at all in having our usual conversation about how spoiled you both are?” I asked, one hand propped on my hip.

Once again they exchanged a look.

“Mrr,” Hercules said and he almost seemed to give an indifferent shrug.

I took that as a no.

I gave them each three of the crackers. The tiny birds did smell like roast chicken and gravy. I had no doubt they were going to be a hit.

I went upstairs to get ready to head to the library. I needed to leave a bit early because I wanted to stop and see Eugenie. I was on tiptoe trying to reach my favorite sweater at the back of one of the shelves in the closet when I heard a meow behind me.

“No,” I said without turning around. Just as I managed to snag my sweater with two fingers Owen wrapped himself around my right ankle. I looked down at him. “No,” I repeated.

He cocked his gray tabby head to one side and gave me his cutest face.

I crouched down so my face was close to his. “I love you, too, but no more treats.” I stroked the fur on the top of his head. “You should know by now that all of this ‘I’m so adorable’ stuff isn’t going to work.”

He sighed—at least that’s how it sounded to me—and looked at the sweater in my other hand. Then he wrinkled his nose.

I stood up, shook out the sweater and held it against me, but Owen continued to make the face. I set the sweater back on the shelf and pulled out a blue, fitted, three-quarter-sleeved shirt that Maggie had convinced me to buy because she insisted it flattered my brown hair and eyes. Maggie Adams was one of my closest friends in Mayville Heights. She was a mixed-media collage artist and past president of the artists’ co-op. She had short blond curls, green eyes and aside from small furry rodents, nothing rattled her. She was also the most creative person I had ever met. If she suggested I try a certain color combination, I generally listened to her.

Owen seemed to consider the shirt for a moment and then gave me a mrr of approval. I held it up, checked my reflection in the mirror and decided the cat was right.

Owen had already disappeared, maybe literally, maybe figuratively.

“Thank you,” I called. I received an answering murp from the hall.

Once I was dressed for work, I grabbed lunch from the refrigerator—a container of chicken soup and a cheese and bacon biscuit. I pulled on my jacket, picked up my messenger bag and called, “Good-bye.”

There was an answering good-bye from upstairs—Hercules. I waited another minute and Owen meowed from the living room. I knew what he was doing in there. He was stretched out in my big wing chair with his hind feet propped against the chair back and his head almost hanging over the edge of the seat. I decided to pretend I didn’t know that.

I drove down Mountain Road and parked in the community center’s parking lot, turning down my driver’s-side visor to display my show parking pass. The building where the actual filming took place was set up beside the boardwalk running along the waterfront. It was a temporary structure that Burtis Chapman and his crew had assembled with a PVC roof, steel cladding and two steel roller doors. There was no other place in town large enough to work. The building looked very utilitarian on the outside. On the inside the space had been set up to resemble a cozy country kitchen with (faux) exposed wooden ceiling beams, retro-look appliances and white Shaker-style cabinets.

The walking trail that the boardwalk was part of was one of the highlights of the downtown area for me. It curved its way from the old warehouses down by the point, went past the downtown shops and businesses, including the library, and continued all the way out beyond the marina, past Wild Rose Bluff. The path was shaded most of the way with tall elm and black walnut trees. I’d walked it a lot when I had first arrived in town.