Клер Донелли - The Big Kitty

*

Shadow poked hishead into the room, listening to the Young One talk. He’d followed her up the stairs, eager to explore the new house. It was much cleaner than the last house he’d stayed in—the dust in most of those rooms had been so thick, it made all the cats there sneeze.

He’d already amused himself a little, skidding along the bright, shiny floors. But when the Young One went upstairs, he’d decided to tag along. Still, he kept in the hallway, barely poking a nose in wherever he found an open door. Some of the smells—especially from the room where the Young One was—were pretty interesting.

Even so, Shadow didn’t go in. He’d discovered early on that some of these two-legged people had some odd ideas about privacy. And he was leery about following her into a space where a slammed door could leave him trapped in a small area. He hated the idea of being a prisoner; worse, a cat could get hurt if he didn’t have space to run from danger.

Not that this one seemed dangerous. But harsh experience had taught him to be careful. He’d been in houses where seeming kindness had abruptly turned into kicks and curses—usually from males when the female wasn’t around. When that happened, Shadow hadn’t stayed around for any second helpings.

But for all his wariness, he couldn’t help himself when he saw the young woman get into her car. He’d leaped on the front of the thing to play with her. He’d taken a big chance, letting himself get locked up in that go-fast thing, especially after the young woman had tried to shoo him away. But something deep told him the time was right, and after watching from afar for so many days, he couldn’t resist the urge to come a bit closer. And he’d been right. She’d spoken to him gently, taken him to this nice place, and even fed him despite the objections of an Old One who apparently lived here, too.

A male Old One—that would take some thinking about. Males could be dangerous, very free with their fists and their feet. But Shadow smelled illness on this one. Between that and the male’s age, it wouldn’t be too hard to dodge whatever he came up with.

Almost all the older two-legs that Shadow had lived with were females, like the one in the place full of other cats. She was a needy one, always clutching at her four-legged companions, petting and cooing at them. It was more than a self-respecting cat could stand, although some of the horde in that house put up with it to get treats.

They might as well be dogs, wagging their tails for a biscuit, Shadow thought with disdain.

But this two-leg hadn’t been overeager to put her hands on Shadow’s fur. She’d just been nice—and maybe a little bit lonely. Shadow could understand that.

It had taken all of Shadow’s bravery to make the approach to the Young One. And so far, this had turned out to be a Good Place.

He took another deep, appreciative sniff in the doorway. A Good Place, indeed.

*

Sunny smiled asshe came out of her room and found a gray-furred shape lurking in the hallway, his stripes making him almost blend into the shadows.

“What have you been up to?” she asked, bending and extending a tentative hand toward the cat, an overture which he smoothly sidestepped.

“Okay,” Sunny said, standing up and heading back down the stairs, where she started rooting around in the front hall closet.

Mike emerged from the living room. “What are you up to now?”

“Looking for something that Shadow can sleep on,” she replied.

“What, the floor’s not good enough for him?” Mike shot a grumpy look from Sunny to the cat who sat at their feet, looking into the closet with interest.

“I read somewhere that cats should sleep a little bit up from the floor so they won’t be in drafts.” Sunny didn’t mention that the “somewhere” was the Internet and that she’d just looked it up now. “I seem to remember an old pillow in here …” She got on tiptoe to rummage on an upper shelf.

“That’s for guests!” Mike objected, but he shut up when Sunny brought down the pillow in question. It was lumpy and misshapen, and it boasted a tasteful collection of yellowish sweat stains.

“Looks better in a nice pillowcase,” Mike mumbled.

“Well, I think it’s fine for this particular guest just the way it is.” Sunny tossed the pillow to the ground, and Shadow immediately climbed on, sniffing.

“Now what?” Mike demanded as Sunny began rattling hangers. She unzipped a plastic bag and pulled out an old bottle green raincoat. With a few brisk movements, she removed the raincoat’s fake-fur lining.

Mike’s face got a little pink. “What are you doing? That’s a good coat!”

“Dad, when’s the last time you wore it?” Sunny asked.

He humphed for a second, then said, “I’ve been waiting for it to come back into style.”

“For the last thirty years, the only people who’ve worn this kind of coat were flashers,” Sunny told him.

Shadow instantly abandoned the pillow, reaching up with a paw to bat at a dangling sleeve. Sunny returned the coat to the closet and brought both lining and pillow into the living room. Wrapping the pillow in the fake fur, she arranged it in a quiet corner.

Shadow crouched low, then sprang onto the pillow, kneading it with his forepaws and then rolling on the fake fur.

“He likes it,” Sunny said in satisfaction, then glanced at her dad. “It’s only for a night,” she said with an apologetic grin.

“Looks to me as if you’re making our house way too attractive to this stray.” Ignoring Shadow’s apparent ecstasies on the pillow, he returned to his couch and the program playing on the TV.

*

Shadow rolled untilhe lay facedown on the pillow, inhaling deeply. Warring scents fought for his attention, some of them old and faint, others more recent. He smelled cedar most strongly, and under that, the scent of the Old One without the taint of illness. The aromas of many heads wafted up from the pillow, and then there was just a trace of the Young One that teased his nostrils.

Most of all, he enjoyed the sensation of being caressed by the fake fur. When he closed his eyes, the sensation brought up his very earliest memories of his mother.

Shadow had been taken from his mother just after he’d been weaned. He’d found himself on the street as little more than a kitten, big for his age … but alone. For just a moment, he could lean against the soft fur and remember what it was to be loved.

He snuggled down into the fur. It might not be real, but it was very, very comforting.

3

Mike’s dire warningsturned out to be groundless. When Sunny let Shadow out into the backyard the next morning to do his business, the cat didn’t come back.

At breakfast, Sunny’s father breathed a loud sigh of relief. “I guess we can burn that,” he said, gesturing toward the living room and the improvised bed.

“I’d like to keep it around,” she said. “He might turn up for another visit.”

But over the next few days, Sunny didn’t get a return appearance of her gray-furred hitchhiker, although she caught occasional glimpses of a feline figure from her office window and in the neighborhood.

“Cats on the brain,” she told herself sternly.

But if she had struck out with Shadow, Sunny hit a home run when it came to publicity for Ada Spruance and her lottery ticket—far more than she’d expected. Ken Howell had led with the story when the Harbor Crier made its weekly appearance on Thursday, available for free all over town.

And the story had appeared at the end of a slow news week. The Portsmouth paper had picked it up on Friday, along with all the local network affiliates. Ada’s ticket couldn’t have become more famous.