Гвен Купер - Homer - The Ninth Life Of A Blind Wonder Cat

People always asked about Homer during the Q&A sessions after I’d finished reading. Was he still alive? Was he in good health? I would tell the story of that last visit to the vet’s office, how Homer—tiny Homer, sick as he was!—had overpowered the staff and thrown the entire animal hospital into disarray. I told them of the dire predictions that Homer wouldn’t last out the month, wouldn’t live to see the New Year. But here it was, the following summer, and Homer was still with us! A little slower, perhaps, and a little skinnier, but eating like a champ and enjoying his life.

People would shake their heads in astonishment. How was such a thing possible? How could such a little cat have so much fight in him? It became a standard part of these talks, of telling this story, for me to clench my right hand into a fist and strike the left side of my chest—just over my heart. In my best approximation of a Russian accent, I would proudly declare:

“Because my cat is strong like bull.”

HOMER WAS STRONG like a bull—and he’d fought hard and far longer than any bull in a ring ever had. But it was a fight we’d always known couldn’t go on forever.

The end came one late-August afternoon, nearly four years to the day since Homer’s Odyssey had first been published. Laurence and I had gone out to run a few errands. When I walked back in through our front door, the first thing I saw was Homer hanging from the side of the couch, his front legs splayed out to full extension as he dangled from two claws—one in each front paw—that had become snagged in the fabric as he’d tried to pull himself up. Too exhausted to try very hard to free himself, he simply dangled, waiting mutely for me to find him and help.

I’d noticed that Homer had slowed down even more in the past few days, that he’d gone from being tired to being tired , not stirring from his spot on the couch unless it was time for him to eat or follow me into the bedroom for the night. I’d also noticed that Clayton had seemed to be sticking to him more closely. Clayton was always fascinated by Homer and loved nothing more than to follow him around, even if Homer was ignoring him. But a sleeping Homer had never held much interest for Clayton, and when Homer settled down for a nap, Clayton would usually hop off to find something else to do. For the past week, though, whenever Homer curled up on the couch to sleep, Clayton would lie down on the floor directly in front of him—not moving, not bothering Homer in any way. He’d just watch him intently without taking his eyes off him.

I hadn’t thought much about it at the time, and I’d tried not to think at all about Homer’s increased weariness. On the face of it, there wasn’t even a connection between those two things. But it all came together in my mind now in a single, blurred rush.

“Oh, Homer. ” I threw down my purse and ran to the couch. “Oh, my poor boy. My poor, poor boy.” I gently released the two claws and sank to the floor, cradling him in my arms, my cheek pressed to the top of his head. “I’m sorry, Homer-Bear. I’m so sorry I wasn’t here. I’m so sorry, little boy.” I swayed back and forth, kissing his brow, as he lay inertly in my arms. “I’m so sorry, Homer-Bear. I love you so much.” I placed him on the ground, on his own legs. He feebly took a few steps, then laid down, clearly spent from the effort.

I went outside on our balcony then. Pulling the sliding door firmly closed behind me, I began to sob—great, gasping heaves that seemed to start at my knees before being wrenched upward and out through my mouth. I cried for having been gone when Homer needed me, and I felt the pain of that, his pain, as a physical pain in my own body. I cried for all the times I knew I would cry about it again, that image of Homer hanging from the couch. Countless times at unexpected moments, down through all the remaining years of my life. I cried for what I already knew in my heart even though I hadn’t yet told it to myself in words. I cried for the blind kitten nobody had wanted, who’d come at a time in my life when I wasn’t sure that anybody did, or ever would, want me. I cried for the last tangible link to those years of youth and uncertainty and discovery—a time that, even though it had since evolved into things infinitely better, was a vanished country now, one I could never return to. I cried for other things that would never come back, the greetings at the front door when I came home; the funny, sonar-like, sweeping turns of a little black head; the rattlesnake vibrating of an ecstatic tail ( Hooray! We’re both here! We’re together! ) that had been the first thing I’d seen every morning for sixteen years. I cried for all of it, although the only articulate word in my head was, Never. It was suddenly the only word in the whole world. An awful word. A final word. Never. Never. Never.

I had gone outside because I didn’t want Homer to hear me cry like that, or Laurence for that matter. For their sakes, but also for my own. That first convulsion of grief was an animal thing, and instinctively I’d crawled away to hide my wound, to be alone with it. There was no one to hear me now but the buildings across the courtyard from ours. Their walls caught the sounds of my cries and sent them back to me, until the entire courtyard wailed in a Greek chorus of woe. Alas! Alas! I hung my head and arms over the balcony railing, pressing my hands over my eyes, and howled my loss to the empty courtyard below.

But I didn’t allow myself to stay outside for more than a minute or two. I knew what had to be done, and I didn’t want to give myself time to second-guess, to argue that maybe tomorrow would be better, that there might still be plenty of good days ahead. I had vowed that day when I’d spoken to Jackson, in preparation for just this moment, that I wouldn’t wait until worse came to the absolute worst. I wouldn’t wait until Homer wasn’t Homer anymore before I let him go.

Months earlier, we’d found a vet who would be able to come to us at home when the time came. I had no intention of subjecting Homer to the animal hospital again, of making him spend the last moments of his life in the only place in the world of which he’d been starkly terrified. I spent the few hours before her arrival cuddling Homer in my lap and stroking his head in our old way. Laurence went out and got him a Popeye’s chicken breast, which he mixed up with some turkey in Homer’s bowl. Homer managed to make it from my lap as far as the bowl, but he was too tired to eat standing up and so ate reclining, like the Roman aristocrats of old. He did eat, though. He may not have cleaned his bowl, but he did eat.

The vet, when she came, was as kind as she’d sounded when I’d first spoken with her. She sat in the living room talking to Laurence and me about nothing in particular, until her presence among us stopped feeling awkward and ominous, and I was almost comfortable. Homer was lying in his spot at the end of the couch, close to her chair, and she affectionately stroked his head while she talked. He lay passively under her touch, although at one point he turned his head to press it into her hand.

Eventually, I picked Homer up and carried him into the bedroom, and the vet followed.

In the end, Homer died in his own home, in his own bed, in the arms of the person who’d loved him most. The vet left and quietly closed the bedroom door behind her after she’d given him the shot. I cradled Homer in my lap as I watched the muscles around the place where his eyes would have been relax into sleep for the last time. “ Eras mucho gato ,” I whispered into his ear. Thou wert plenty of cat.