Lucky Penny

I’ve been through my fair share of litters (thanks to my imbecile owners who never cared enough to get me spayed, fuck you always) and hardships in my life (my singular life, not nine, just one. Humans always have to go and make whacky assumptions. I’m just a sentient cat who happens to remember her past life, not some magical, freakishly long-living fairy. Come on.) 

As I was regaling before being rudely interrupted by, well, my own thoughts; I’ve been through rough shit, a lot of it, but never have I been so grieved as I am now. And I’m not even grieved for myself, which says a lot. 

Syre’s face is crumpled and blotchy, quite frankly, the worst I’ve ever seen it. Just when her shaky hiccups halt for a second and she wipes the fat tears from her face with a gulp, just when I believe she’s calmed down and ready to take on the world again, her body convulses and she’s back to weeping in her special baby blue cloth. She doesn’t know it, but sometimes, when she inadvertently leaves it out after a harsh night, I like to pick at the dark green leaves of the flower in the corner. What can I say, cat’s will be cats.

My lime green chatoyant eyes lock with her glassy dark brown ones, and a thousand silent words are spoken. She’s the only one I can genuinely read and attempt to communicate back with out of the whole family, and it’s no surprise. She saved me at my lowest point, and for that I will always be grateful. For that, I will always protect her and be there for her, no matter what.

Before I get into the nitty gritty details of Syre’s Situation (that’s what I’m calling it for I long to revel in my past life being an author. We’ll get to that part later) we need to establish how she and I came together in the first place.

***

Four years ago, 30th October, 2016. An exceptionally warm day of Autumn, I was trying to soak in the sun and enjoy it while dreading the next one because Halloween never went well for a cat like me. Having a senile man with Alzheimers and his drunkard son for owners, the only place I was safe from being forgotten and lectured, beaten from a lack of soberness, or all of the aforementioned things, was outside. I had been residing outdoors for so long that I had become accustomed to a life of frequent pregnancies when I was on heat and subsequently scouring for rats to nourish myself as well as my children. Not to mention being on the lookout for the sporadic stray dogs that would make their way into the compound.

All this would have been absolutely fine with me if I was a normal cat who couldn’t comprehend, or rather, care for being in the wild or the comfort of a home with doting owners. But I wasn’t a normal cat, and hadn’t been since birth. Well, actually, since being reincarnated. I never believed in such a concept when I was a human. Why would I? I lived as a devout Christian who went by the name of Cara Langford, keen on my actions that would either secure my place in heaven or hell. I lived a good life. Mild, but good. I never married due to my burgeoning career in writing. Having a partner would only diminish my creativity and bring my book that was already halfway done to an impasse. I promised myself, since the age of 18 when I was affirmed in my passion for the art of changing the world with words, that I wouldn’t let anything, or anyone get in my way. 

I truly was an idealist, hoping to create worlds in the form of books in which people could relate to and perhaps, even be inspired by. It didn’t bother me that I didn’t have anyone to share it with; I was going to share the entirety of my mind with the world once I published my novel. And I did. In fact, I published a trilogy for young adults, and by the age of 45, I was a renowned author who made enough money to live the rest of my carefree days on a beach house just off the Gold Coast of Australia. Not that I had many carefree days ahead of me; three years later I was involved in a harrowing car accident while travelling to the North for short story inspiration from the Australian bush. 

I’m sure my death was mourned greatly in the world of authors, and it was supposed to end there. I was supposed to die and that was it for me in the tangible realm; the next part was supposed to confirm whether my pious practices for 48 years of my life would come to fruition in the afterworld. Never, in all my years, did I imagine my afterlife to go like it had. I had actually woken up, after what felt like five seconds later. I had opened my eyes and the world was right there, right back in front of me. In black and white. What. The. Fuck?

After getting over the shock and confusion of a) being reincarnated, b) being reborn as a female calico and c) having full access to the memories of my human life, I settled into the journey of a feline for the next rough eight years. That was, until Syre came along, like a deity in an angelic glow, to save me. My geriatric owner, Mark, had died after a whopping 80 years, and I was left on my lonesome with my recent litter of kittens and Derek the alcoholic. Our neighbour, a sweet lady called Nancy who always smelt of potpie noticed regular shouting at ungodly hours of the night. This was usually Derek spitting phrases like “You useless piece of shit, get out of my fucking house” and “Idiot cat, stop messing up the furniture” at me. Could you blame me, though? I was getting old, and my children needed a warm and safe space to grow up. Raising them in the house was my only viable option.

Anyway, as Derek got incessantly more violent and loud, Nancy started to grow more concerned. She eventually put up a post on a Facebook group called Adopt A Cat Near You, and the next thing I knew I was out of that god-awful stale smelling house and into a new, fresh scented one. Syre’s family were half Pakistani and half White, making their house perpetually smell like a blend of masala spices and a plethora of homemade berry juices. I came to realize that this wasn’t just a house. This was something I’d never experienced before during my years as a cat. This was a home; my home. 

They were the kindest people I had ever encountered, even more so than the rare strangers who passed by my old estate and came to stroke me for a few minutes. Syre’s family though, they were strong and kind because they fostered stray cats and found them new abodes. They weren’t supposed to keep me; just provide me with the comfort of a dwelling long enough until they found me a forever home, or as their community referred to it, a “furrever home.” They found friendly families for my two babies fairly quickly, and though I missed them dearly I became preoccupied with the most important responsibility in the household; I was given the opportunity to nurse and be a mother to the potential kittens that they fostered. I felt like the onus of the whole family's purpose was on my shoulders, but it only encouraged me to carry it out with as much determination and pride as I could.

I don’t know whether it was that exact sentiment I carried out my job with that touched her, or the fact that I heard her somberly remarking on the amount of irreparable scars I had, but she fought for me. She fought so hard to permanently let me be a part of their family, even though they already had five cats of their own. Not that her mum needed more convincing, she’d own an established cat shelter if she could. It was her dad and his allergies, but once she started sobbing and wouldn’t stop, he realized that I was special. I wasn’t just another cat that she found cute and wanted to keep; I was her cat, a companion who needed me just as much as I needed her. After a month of squabbling, he finally agreed. 

From then on, we were two peas in a pod. I think sometimes she questioned whether I had supernatural abilities, but I didn’t care. If I could talk to her in English, I would, but my vocal ability was annoyingly limited to a range of different sounding “meows.” Not that it stopped me. I would look her dead in the eye and communicate to her just like that, in our way, with her telling me about her day in school and her friendships and parents and crushes and I would always listen, I’d listen attentively because she was so interesting and she had been my beacon of light the past four years and I absolutely adored her with all my heart and-

***

My memory of history is sharply cut off as I feel something warm engulf me. Sweet vanilla invades my nose as I realize I’m caught in Syre’s tight embrace, her tepid tears seeping through my thin fur. It was times like these where I momentarily wished for my human arms to hug her right back. “You can’t...you can’t leave me Pens. You just can’t, you can’t you...imagine being that selfish. You’re being selfish right now Penny, so damn selfish” she barely croaked this out and I was once again filled with nostalgia. I don’t recall having a name when I was living with Mark, he just interchanged with “cat” and “catty.” Original, right? Syre, however, my perfect Syre, she had called me Penny because she claimed I was her lucky penny. 

“I don’t want to leave, but this is out of my hands and you know it” I meowed back at her, knowing that she was just trying to deflect what she already knew. “I’ll miss you” she says sadly, tucking her face into my neck. I wanted to live, I wanted to live on for her, but I knew my time had come. The vet said I only had two more months to live four months ago. It was a miracle that I had even survived double that time, considering kidney failure slowly but surely turned you into a skeleton and a stranger. I’d have preferred going then, actually. It was a better option than what it’s come to now. My condition had become too dire, and the only thing left to do was put me down. Although I had come to terms with it, aware that most cats don’t even get to the tender age of twelve, Syre hadn’t. My ribcage had become prominent, and although her clasp around me hurt, I didn’t want to ruin the moment. It was our last.

I let out a small meow and nuzzle against her face. 

We lock eyes one last time, a thousand words exchanged, a thousand memories, a thousand goodbyes. 

Her parents open the door silently, and we both eventually look up. They nod without speaking, and just like that, it’s time. After a while, Syre lets me go, and I’m gently put into the cat cage, although this time I wouldn’t have struggled.

I’m not certain why I was reincarnated as a cat, and even more so why my life as one turned out the way it did. I was a decent person as a human, so why did karma deal me a bad lot for my first eight years? It was the big question that had been on my mind for a long time, but somehow I knew the answers were better not known. What I did know for sure, though, was that Syre and her family had saved me, and were the kind of people the world needed more of. Perhaps I’ll be reborn as another animal in the next life, or maybe even an object. Or maybe a human again. I probably wouldn’t remember this life though, it feels like a one-off.

The needle is a few centimetres from me, and I realize that I’m looking up at Syre and her family's melancholic faces, but there’s something fundamentally different about them, too. I realize that I’m witnessing colour for the first time. Oh, how I had missed colour! Her and her mum’s light brown skin contrasting her dad’s pale complexion, the dark green of her shirt, the deep red blush in her cheeks, the clinical white of the room. My heart is content. It was as if, after the years of metaphorically bringing it into hers, she brought vibrant colour into my life. Of course, she had done that since day one, but right now, just for a moment, it was literal in every sense. 

If I am reborn as a human, I’d like to be someone as radiant as Syre. My last thought fades before the cold sting of the needle pierces my skin and my eyes go back to viewing in black.