Гвен Купер - I Choo-Choo-Choose You!

* * *

I told myself that Scarlett was just independent—and, moreover, that being independent was a good thing. I was a little fuzzy as to why, exactly, independence was a desirable quality in a companion animal. (It wasn’t as if I were preparing Scarlett to pursue an equitable marriage or high-powered career someday.) Still, “independent” was one of those generically positive descriptors—like “attractive” or “has good taste”—that most people were pleased to have applied to themselves. Why wouldn’t I want it applied to my cat?

I also told myself—and actually knew, deep down at the bottom of things—that it wasn’t Scarlett’s job in life to interact with me in any specific manner, or to make me feel a certain way about myself. Our relationship was based on what my job was—and it was my job to keep her healthy and safe, to love her no matter what her personality turned out to be, and to give her everything she needed to live a happy life on her own terms.

But what if, I sometimes wondered, I simply wasn’t able to give her that happy life? What if Scarlett and I had been mismatched—what if the reason she hadn’t yet “chosen” me was because she’d been meant for somebody else, and I’d interfered somehow in her destiny? Maybe Scarlett’s true human soulmate—a person who could make her happier than I ever could—was still out there, forever to remain undiscovered.

It would be a gross mischaracterization of our relationship to say that it was all bad, that I didn’t love her, or even that I wished I’d gotten another kitten instead. The truth was, I’d fallen irretrievably in love with this bossy, snooty, semi-sadistic little imp who—when she wasn’t tormenting me or demanding something from me—seemed otherwise uninterested in my existence.

I didn’t love her just because she was mine (although that—as with any other parent, cat or otherwise—would have been enough to raise Scarlett above all other kittens in my eyes). I loved the little freckle of black fur, which I called “Scarlett’s beauty mark,” resting on the left side of her upper lip. I loved the way she cocked her head thoughtfully to one side before leaping at a paper ball. I loved the serious, evaluating expression she wore as she sniffed at some new variety of food I put before her when she outgrew her kitten food. I loved the little sway of her backside as she walked away from me in a huff.

When she developed a large sore on her lower lip—the result of a feline herpes virus she’d inherited at birth from her mother, which would plague her on and off for the rest of her life—I fussed and fretted and dragged her to the vet (which didn’t exactly raise me in

Scarlett’s esteem), and mixed the icky pink antibiotic formula the doctor prescribed with some water from a can of tuna, trying to make it more palatable. I’d give her some of the tuna itself afterward to get the yucky-medicine taste out of her mouth, as miserable over her obvious discomfort as if it were my own.

Sometimes, watching Scarlett nap peacefully on a pillow in a patch of sunlight, surrounded by toys she didn’t seem to care about—representing a love she didn’t seem interested in—I thought about what might have become of her if she hadn’t been rescued or found a home. I often took my teenage volunteers to local animal shelters, and had spoken with their staffers enough to know the kinds of things that happened to very small kittens left to fend for themselves on the streets. That Scarlett had been saved against all the odds—that she now had the privilege of being indifferent, if she chose, to a human who provided her with food and shelter and love—seemed like a kind of miracle. My cat was daily proof, in my own home, of goodness in the world. How could I not have loved her?

There are two sides to every story, and I’m sure that Scarlett would have had her own list of complaints about me if she’d been able to talk. She tries too hard, Scarlett might have said. She intrudes on the games I like to play by myself. I can’t even stretch out comfortably on my back without her trying to rub the white fur of my belly—as if I were a dog ! She disappears for hours from the apartment every day, and then turns up again whenever she feels like it. And she expects me to cheer about it like it’s a big deal! She hogs the pillows on the bed. She’ll open a can of tuna and, sure, she’ll give me a little —but she still keeps most of it for herself.

One night Jorge and I were watching a re-run of The Simpsons on TV. It was a Valentine’s Day episode, and Lisa Simpson had, as an act of pity, given a Valentine’s card to a slow-witted boy named Ralph, whom nobody else in the second-grade class had even acknowledged. “I choo-choo- choose you!” Ralph read ecstatically from Lisa’s card, which was decorated with a drawing of a smiley-faced train engine.

Crazy as it sounds, I was envious of that slow-witted little boy. He’d been chosen, and I had not.

* * *

It had been May when we first adopted Scarlett, and it was November when my boss sent me to attend a three-day national conference for youth outreach programs like ours. Although the conference was being held in Miami, the downtown hotel where I’d be staying was far enough away to make it impractical for me to get home to feed Scarlett twice a day. Jorge traveled frequently for work and was scheduled to be away himself that entire week. We couldn’t find a pet-sitter willing to come all the way out to our neighborhood for what we could afford to pay, so Jorge’s parents offered to take Scarlett for a couple of nights.

I arrived at their house early on the morning of the first day of the conference to get Scarlett and her gear—her litter box and extra litter, cans of food, her water and food bowls, her scratching post, her brush, her antibiotic medication in case her herpes flared up in my absence, and a few toys—set up in the guest bedroom. With its adjoining bathroom, Scarlett would have free run of a space nearly as large as our apartment. Keeping her separated from the other three cats—and especially from Targa—meant she would spend most of her time shut in by herself, except when Maggie could slip in for feedings and visits. Given how much Scarlett seemed to crave solitude, however, I didn’t think she’d mind a few days of extra alone time. She’d probably see it as a vacation.

Scarlett sprang from her carrier as soon as I opened it. I’d spent half an hour that morning chasing her around the apartment to get her into it, and the fresh claw mark on my hand attested to just how reluctant to travel Scarlett had been. I tried to give her a conciliatory scratch behind the ears with that same hand now, but the decidedly cool manner in which Scarlett shook me off let me know that I hadn’t been forgiven. Exploring the room with her little black nose to the ground, she seemed reassured to find so many things with her own familiar scent on them.

The window in Scarlett’s room overlooked the driveway, and as I headed out to my car I saw her sitting on the sill, watching me. I crept over and, with one finger, lightly rubbed the glass over the bridge of Scarlett’s nose. “It’s only a few days,” I told her. “I’ll be back for you soon.”

Scarlett opened her mouth wide in a mighty yawn, then hopped down from the windowsill and disappeared from sight.

I thought about her in between conference sessions during those three days, and called Maggie both nights to see how Scarlett was doing. I’d be lying, though, if I said I worried about her much. Scarlett’s independence—her apparent indifference to me, specifically, and humanity in general—had become an accepted fact. There would be someone to feed her while I was gone, and to clean up after her, and she’d have her little paper balls and the stuffed worm—the only store-bought toy in which Scarlett had shown even the remotest interest—to play with. What more had she ever really needed?