Lost and Found

“The world is overrated, Coffee,” Celia Balasco mused.

The brown and black striped cat looked up at her from his seat on the floor. Celia slid down from the chair she was sitting on and crossed her legs. The cold floor bit her skin, but she remained seated.

Coffee meowed.

“Why, you ask? Let’s just say I wouldn’t be home this often if events had occurred differently,” she said.

She pulled a cat toy off the table behind her and waved it around. Coffee’s rear end shifted and he pounced, his claws scratching the wooden floor of the apartment.

Celia tugged at her end of the toy, but Coffee growled and pulled the toy closer to his white underbelly.

Celia chuckled. Her cat, adopted a year ago when he was a kitten, had many interesting mannerisms. Each action sparked joy in her heart.

A loud beeping sound blared behind her.

Celia yanked at the toy, but Coffee wouldn’t give. Sighing, she dragged herself back into her chair and faced the open laptop on the desk.

Her phone sat on the desk, vibrating. She glanced at the missed call.

“Damn it. I only left for a second,” she muttered, redialing the number and placing the phone at her ear.

As the phone dialed, she looked around. Facing her was the view of the city from the top of her five-story apartment. She turned around.

To her right was a door leading into her bedroom, and a door leading to the hallway was about ten feet ahead of her. A woolen cat tree sat next to the door, and a small kitchen area to her left. Ahead of her was a torn couch and television propped up on a table.

Coffee meowed again, the toy forgotten. Celia hushed the cat.

“I can’t play now. This is an important call.”

The cat leaped up onto her desk and rubbed his cheek onto her laptop. She shooed him off the table and closed the laptop.

Coffee glared at her and turned away, stalking into the bedroom.

Celia slammed the phone onto the table and slid into the chair again. The sun was setting over the horizon, shadowing the tall skyscrapers.

The shop she worked at had closed, unable to sustain itself now. This left her only with the money she had stored after finishing college a year ago.

Celia stood up and pushed the chair in as she headed to her bedroom. Shutting the door behind her, she slipped into bed.

The warm water ran over her shoulders, and Celia moved her face into the spray of the shower.

A clock sat on a wall at the other side of the somewhat-transparent shower curtain. She glanced at it.

Eight in the morning.

As Celia closed her eyes, she could hear pounding. The doorbell rang.

“Who is it?” she shouted over the sound of water running.

“Celia? Open the door!” a voice shouted.

Her neighbor, Jacob Stark. Owner of a flourishing local business.

“Can you wait a few minutes?” she yelled.

“No.”

Celia turned the shower off. She then grabbed the oversized towel, drying herself off and wrapping it around herself.

She took a deep breath. What had happened? Was someone she knew in the hospital?

Was her family safe? Did they have…

She sprinted past her clothes on the bed and opened the apartment door, her hands sticky.

Jacob was standing at the door, his blond hair a mess. His eyes fell on what she was wearing and Celia felt the warm blush of embarrassment creep into her face.

“You said it can’t wait,” she said. “What happened?”

He met her eyes and pulled off the mask he was wearing. “Where’s Coffee?”

“Probably somewhere in the apartment.” She looked around. “Why?”

“Can you find him?” he asked, urgency filling his voice.

She circled the apartment, tossing open cupboards and peering into nooks and crannies.

Celia entered her bedroom again and looked around. As an afterthought, she closed the door and pulled on a shirt. She exited the room dressed. 

Jacob looked at her from where he was searching the kitchen. “Did you find him?”

Celia shook her head. “What’s going on?”

He walked toward her and stopped in front of her. She looked up to his amber eyes an inch or two above hers. A reflection of her hazel eyes stared back at her.

“You’re not social distancing,” she said with a smile when he remained silent.

“I found a cat that looked exactly like Coffee hit by a car on the street,” he said. The smile vanished from her face.

Coffee. Her dear sweet Coffee. Injured.

Her vision swam, and Jacob reached out a hand to steady her. She took it.

Celia breathed, looking at the floor. Flashes of her Coffee laying on the ground, broken, filled her eyes.

She looked up, still gripping his arm. “Where is he now?”

“At the vet,” Jacob said, looking away. “You should come.”

She nodded, only half listening to his words. “I don’t have a car.”

“Let’s take mine,” he said.

After a moment, Jacob added, “It’s going to be okay, Celia.”

“Yeah,” she whispered. “I hope so.”

Celia grabbed a coat lying on the couch and shoved her feet into shoes. Pushing her hands into the undersized sleeves, she headed for the door.

This cat couldn’t be Coffee.

The broken, bruised tabby cat lying unconscious on the vet’s sterile white table couldn’t be Coffee.

Yet Celia knew it was, without a doubt, her cat.

The vet had wrapped two of Coffee’s legs in bandages. Various patches of fur were missing, and the exposed skin showed purple bruises. Coffee lay still, the only brown and black thing in the room.

Celia tore her eyes away and looked at the vet’s cabinet hanging on the wall to her right. The bed was in front of her and the wooden door on the other side. A small stool sat in front of the door.

“Ms. Balasco, this is your cat,” the vet, standing next to the surgical bed, said. It was a statement and a question.

Celia nodded and swallowed.

“Do you have any idea how this happened?”

She shook her head and met the vet’s eyes. “I usually leave my door locked every night. Will he be okay?”

The vet hesitated. When Celia didn’t avert her gaze, she said, “I am uncertain. He may have suffered head injury. I can only tell the extent of the damage when he wakes up. There’s no guarantee he’ll survive.”

Celia’s vision blurred and she blinked. She just had to breathe. Coffee would live.

Coffee, her best friend since the beginning of college, had to live.

The vet turned to Jacob. “And you, Mr. Stark, found Coffee on the road?”

“Actually,” Jacob started, glancing at Celia’s blank gaze.

She looked up at him, her thoughts interrupted. “Actually what?”

He sighed. “I was the one that hit him.”

Celia inhaled. “What?”

“I accidentally tried to open Celia’s door instead of mine last night. I didn’t think too much of it until she said she left her door locked,” he admitted.

Of course. This morning, when she had opened it for him, the door had been half unlocked. Easy for a cat to open.

“I was driving to work this morning when Coffee ran across the street with a mouse in his jaws,” Jacob continued, keeping his eyes on a wall. “I couldn’t stop the car in time.”

No one said anything. Celia walked around the table and twisted open the doorknob, exiting the room and sliding the door shut behind her. She leaned against the wall next to the door and breathed.

Celia looked down the hallway to see many other doors like the one she had exited from.

Inhale.

She focused on a nearby poster.

Exhale.

A picture of a black and white kitten was on the poster under the words, ‘Foster parents needed!’

“This kitten, named Raven, is one of many pets needing a foster home during this time. She, like many pets, is scheduled for euthanization later this week,” Celia read.

“It’s sad, isn’t it?” Jacob asked. Celia turned to see him shutting the door behind him.

“Another pet soon to die,” Celia remarked, her voice flat.

“The vet told me to tell you…” Jacob trailed off, his gaze on her eyes.

Without looking at him, Celia opened the door and walked back in.

Coffee gazed up at her. The vet was nowhere in sight. Celia crouched next to the cat and stroked the soft fur on his head.

The cat meowed.

“I’m sorry, darling,” Celia whispered.

The soft rumble of Coffee’s purr met her ears. Yellow eyes met her hazel ones.

A trickle of water ran down her cheek.

Coffee’s round eyes closed.

One.

Last.

Time.

One year later...

“Celia Balasco?”

“Yes?” she asked, looking up from where she was sitting inside a restaurant.

“Someone’s here to see you,” the waitress said, her brown hair flowing about her face.

Celia pushed her own short-cropped hair behind her ear. “Who?”

“Jacob Stark.”

“Tell him to get the hell away from me,” Celia said, standing up. The cold black metal of the chair bit into her thigh, but she remained standing.

The waitress’s eyes widened. “Why?”

But Celia had already turned around and walked out of the shop, the doors swinging behind her.

“You didn’t pay for your coffee!” someone yelled. 

Hearing the word again brought a stab of pain to her heart, but Celia kept storming down the street.

“Celia?”

“Go away,” she hissed through her gritted teeth. “Are you here to kill my cat again? Oh, wait, I don’t have one anymore.”

Jacob increased his stride until he was in front of her. She stopped, her eyes narrowed.

He was wearing a simple white t-shirt and jeans. She turned around to see a limousine parallel parking a few yards behind them.

“I can see you’ve gotten richer now that the pandemic is over,” Celia said dryly.

“I understand you’re still mad,” he said.

“Damn right,” Celia interrupted. “You murdered the one living being that I loved. You didn’t even pay for the costs of taking him to the vet!”

A few people walking by eyed her, but she kept her stare on Jacob.

He held up his hands in supplication. “Fine. As I told you then, I’m sorry. Just take the basket.”

She raised her eyebrows. “Basket?”

He picked up a basket he’d set on the ground and handed it to her. It was heavier than she expected, and Celia almost dropped it.

A small meow sounded from inside the basket.

“What..?” Celia pulled off the blanket on top of the basket.

Staring up at her with sparking amber eyes was a black cat with white paws. The cat’s fur was groomed down and a pink bow wrapped around its rose collar.

She looked up at Jacob. “Is this Raven?”

He nodded. “I saved her that day in the vet’s office and fostered her for a year. I’ve paid for all her vaccines and insurance already, if you want her.”

Celia stroked the kitten. “Thank you.”

“There’s something else,” he said, gesturing to the basket.

She saw a piece of paper peeking out from under the kitten. When Celia pulled it out, she almost dropped the basket again.

Her jaw dropped and she stared at the check for what seemed like hours.

“You’re kidding! I can’t accept this,” she said, still in shock.

Jacob offered her a smile. “It may not be compensation for killing Coffee, but I hope it helps. Consider it a debt paid.”

Celia bit her lip. “You know I can’t fully forgive you for what happened to Coffee.”

“You don’t have to,” Jacob said, shoving his hands into his jeans pockets. “See you soon, Celia.”

A small smile blossomed on her face and she blushed. “See you soon.”

As he walked away, Celia looked down at Raven. The cat could never replace Coffee.

But that was okay.

Warm droplets of water ran down her cheeks and she wiped them away.

She looked up and watched Jacob entering the limo. He waved.

She waved back.

The car reversed and turned around, heading into the bustling city.

Maybe the world wasn’t as bad as she thought.

The world was not overrated at all.