The Tale of Two Tails

The Tale of Two Tails

The day that Norma-Jean Prescott kicked me in the shin and ran away laughing I knew we’d be great friends. Now I know that may seem far-fetched, seeing as she had just left my leg in agony, but the thing about Norma-Jean was that she was something of an enigma.

I was an enigma too. Everyone told me so and it was not something I saw as an insult or anything like that. I saw it as a distinction.

There were the regular people and then there were the enigma’s.

I may not know exactly what an enigma was, but the word was fun to say. Three distinct sounds mashed together to form a word that rolled off the tounge with a certain…roll.

The next time I saw Norma-Jean was at lunch. She was peeling off bits of her peanut butter and jelly sandwich and throwing it across the table to her brother Randy. Randy was an older kid, but he had stayed behind a grade so he still got to have lunch with the fourth graders.

Randy was not an enigma. He was a bully. There was this one time I watched him put gum in Kaitlynn’s hair and then deny it. Was there a greater definition of evil?

I came over and sat beside Norma-Jean. The siblings both stopped laughing and turned to look at me with eyes that were exactly the same color blue.

“What are you doing here Trevor?” Norma-Jean trilled picking a fleck of jelly off her fingernail and sending it in my direction.

“I have decided that we should be friends.” I told her flatly, pushing my glasses up my nose.

“Is that so?” Norma-Jean asked. She glanced to Randy as if to make sure he had heard this conversation too.

“I don’t mean Randy. Just you and me. We should be friends.” I continued and just for a moment her jaw slackened and I caught a glimpse of the little pink bands that surrounded her braces.

“Get lost Trevor.” She told me and I nodded politely.

“Will you be coming to find me?”

Her brow furrowed and a red flush crept onto her cheeks, “Just go away.” she waved out her hands in my direction like my mother did when she wanted me to leave the room.

I was a gentleman, I took the hint.

I went to my usual table and sat down alone. It was a while before the red completely left the back of Norma-Jean’s neck.

Three days later I had the chance to talk to Norma-Jean again. We were in gym together and paired up to play catch with this huge, brightly colored beach ball. I told her again that we should be friends and she rolled her eyes as she flicked her blonde ponytail over her shoulder.

“Why should we be friends Trevor? We don’t have anything in common. I am a girl and you are a boy. You are a nerd and I am not.”

“You are an enigma. I am also an enigma.”

“What does that even mean?” Norma Jean stressed as she batted the ball at me and I gallantly missed. This was my moment to impress her.

“It means you’re not like everyone else. You’re special.” I told her as I retrieved that ball and threw it back her way.

“Did your mommy tell you that?” Norma-Jean sniped and I pushed my glasses back up my nose again.

“Yes.” I said shamelessly.

Norma-Jean sighed, “Okay look Trevor, what if I don’t want to be your friend? What if I don’t care about this eni..whatever stuff?”

“Enigma.” I repeated the word and Norma-Jean just nodded. I had not considered this. Norma-Jean was an enigma. I was an enigma. We were meant to be friends right?

Okay, I needed a new approach. What was it that all the heroes in movies did when they wanted to be friends with someone? I racked my brain. They usually went on some quest to retrieve a stolen object or something important and then they were the best of friends when they all came back.

“Have you lost anything recently, or had something stolen?” I asked.

“Stolen! What are you on about now?” Norma-Jean threw the ball so hard that it hit me in the face and knocked my glasses askew. She put her hand over her mouth for a moment before she forced a laugh.

“Put your eyes back on straight Trevor.”

“I should like to retrieve something important to you, to show that I am a worthy friend.” I straightened my glasses ignoring her insincere teasing. She frowned.

“You’re so weird.” She muttered and then tapped her two fingers to her lips in contemplation. “However, there is one thing you can get me.”

“Name it and it shall be yours.”

Norma-Jean rolled her eyes, but she continued, “There is this stray cat that lives in that ally behind the mini-mart. She just had kittens and there is this one that has two tails. I want it.”

This gave me a moment’s pause, but I nodded all the same. If this cat of two tails was the way to gain Norma-Jean’s friendship then I must get it.

The mini-mart was two blocks from my house. I was only allowed to walk there if my big brother Beck would walk with me. He was in the seventh grade, he was allow to ride his bike to his friend’s house. When I was older like him I would ride my bike to Norma-Jean’s house. The escort cost me four days of emptying the dishwasher.

Beck hardly spoke to me as we walked. He was supposed to hold my hand, but we had dispensed with that last year when I turned seven. I was old enough now to know not to run into the street and to look both ways before I crossed it.

“So what are you looking to get Trev?” Beck asked me as we neared the convenience store and I caught a glimpse of the ally in question.

I pushed my glasses up my nose, “I need to get the cat with two tails for Norma-Jean so that she will be my friend.”

Beck snorted through his nose, “Come off it Trev. You can’t bring the girl a two tailed cat, they don’t exist. Besides I’m sure she set you an impossible task just to see if you’d get rabies. That whole family is a bunch of bullies and snobs.”

“She is an enigma.” I asserted, puffing out my cheeks.

“Whatever Trev. You can’t get a cat though. Mom could kill me if you came home with so much as a scratch on you.”

This was another dilemma I had not foreseen, I had not considered that my brother would try to stop me. “Mom doesn’t have to know.”

Beck shook his head. His hair fell into his eyes, Mom had begged him to cut it, but he had always been her rebel. I was the good one, the smart one who had skipped kindergarten and went straight to first grade. I was the one who let her cut my hair.

We reached the ally and I stopped to peer into it. It was clean as far as allies went, there was just a few cardboard boxes propped up on the far side of the mostly empty dumpster. Beck reached out for me, but I stepped quickly out of reach as I came even with the boxes. I held my breath as I tipped the first one back to reveal…

Nothing.

Beck clamped his hand over my shoulder and I felt as though I would dissolve into nothing under the weight of the disappointment crushing me.

“They’re gone.” I felt compelled to point out.

“It’s okay buddy, it’s for the best. You can’t have a cat anyway, you know Mom’s allergic.”

I allowed Beck to steer me into the mini-mart. We wondered the aisles for a few minutes as Beck looked at snacks and I sulked. How was I to win the friendship of Norma-Jean now? We passed into the tiny toy section and my eyes fell on a stuffed cat that was perhaps the size of my torso. It was orange with black button eyes and nose. It only had one tail though.

Beck saw me looking and he pushed me towards it slightly, “There you go Trev, you can get the girl a cat after all.”

I picked it up, unsure, “Norma-Jean said she wanted the cat with two tails.”

“Then just add another tail. How hard could that be? Mom sews things all the time.” Beck started to push me towards the front of the store.

I clutched the $5.99 cat all the way home. Beck munched on chips he would have to finish before we got home. If he didn’t Mom would throw them out, she would tell him he shouldn’t put that junk into his body.

Mom was half slumped over her checkbook at the kitchen table. Her tounge was just poking out the side of her mouth as she scribbled the pen across the small, shiny paper.

“Mom?” I asked and she looked up. Her face broke into a smile that didn’t quite reach her eyes.

“What’s up sweet-pea?” She was still in her nurse clothes. There was a small stain on the collar and her badge was still pinned to her breast pocket.

“I would like a second tail on this cat.” I blurted before I could stop myself and thrusted the cat towards her. Mom jerked back as the cat scooted across the table scattering paperwork and sending the pen rolling. It hit the floor with a soft ping.

Mom sighed, “Why do you want a second tail on this cat when it already has a perfectly good one?”

“I need it to be friends with Norma-Jean.” I was getting tired of explaining this.

“Why would Norma-Jean need a two tailed cat to be your friend?” Mom asked picking the stuffed animal up gently and putting it to the side as she set about reordering her papers. She leaned down and picked up the pen.

“It is a quest to prove my worth.”

Mom laughed lightly, “You are an enigma Trevor.” She ruffled my hair and I compulsively ran my hands over it to smooth it down again. “You don’t need to prove your worth to anyone who is going to be your friend sweet-pea. They will want to be your friend because of who you are, not because of what you did for them.”

Mom handed me back the cat. I took it reflexively. “Give Norma-Jean the cat. If she really wants to be your friend she won’t care if it has two tails or not.”

I took the cat back to my room and set it on the desk across from my bed so I could stare into its black button eyes. “Stupid cat.” I muttered. “Why can’t you have two tails?” 

I saw Norma-Jean at lunch the following day. I sat down at her table and she looked at me. “Did you get the cat weirdo?”

I unzipped my backpack and held out the stuffed cat for her. “I got this cat for you.”

Norma-Jean took it and laughed, “This only has one tail.”

“I know, my mom said it shouldn’t matter. That if you wanted to be my friend, you would like me for me and not what I offered you.”

She rolled her eyes, “Whatever Trevor. I don’t want to be your friend. I told you already, you’re a nerd and I don’t like you.” She threw the stuffed cat at her brother. He just batted it away and it landed on the floor off to my left. Conversation stopped as the orange cat skidded across the waxed floor and lay between the tables on its side. I stood up abruptly.

I walked away and sat down at my usual table. No one else was sitting there.

I was just contemplating how many pieces I could rip my sandwich into when someone cleared their throat behind me. I spun around in my seat.

Emma held out the orange cat to me, “You dropped this.”

“It was meant to be a gift, an offering worthy of friendship.” I muttered sullenly.

“Oh.” Emma hugged the animal to her chest.

“You can have it, if you want.”

“Oh.” Emma repeated holding the cat tighter. One of its button eyes had chipped when it hit the floor. “Would you want to be friends then?”

I looked at her like I was seeing her for the first time. Emma was not an enigma. She was just a girl. My gaze strayed to Norma-Jean laughing as she flicked crackers at her brother.

Maybe she wasn’t an enigma either. Maybe she was just a bully.

Emma was still looking at me with expectant eyes.

“Only if you want to be friends with me for who I am. I am an enigma.”

“What does that mean?” Emma asked.

“I don’t really know.” I told the truth and Emma smiled. Her teeth were a little crooked, but in a good way.

“I’d like to be your friend anyway.”

Her long brown hair hung over her shoulder in a ponytail. It spilled over the cat's back and landed beside its singular tail.

It had two tails now.

I smiled toothily at Emma, "I'd like that a lot."