Missing Cat: Reward If Found

My head upside down, legs in the air, I listened without interest to the drone of adults talking. I was in my pajamas, laying upside down in one of the white wicker chairs my dad repainted about every three years or so. Sometimes the paint stuck to my sweating legs when I stood up, and I’d meticulously peel the spots of white. 

The thermometer on my back porch that summer night read 87F. It hadn’t cooled off at all since the afternoon when I was in the pool. The faint smell of chlorine from my towel, thrown carelessly on the back of a chair, mixed with the humid air trapped inside the enclosed back porch. Nightsongs of crickets echoed from the dark outside, while the frantic flights of a variety of bugs zipped around the deck light shining into the backyard.  

My neighbors from behind our house, Sam and Dana, had pushed aside the green plastic coated wire fencing that separated our properties to come over.  My father had cut it to easily venture back and forth between our houses. No children of their own, I invited myself over quite often to visit them. I was a delightful child, wasn’t I? I’m sure they loved my unannounced arrivals. In any case, they always greeted me with smiles and snacks, so of course I went back frequently. 

But that night, they came to visit with my parents and enjoy a peaceful summer night chatting with glasses of iced lemonade. The heat made the glasses sweat giant beads of water that collected in little elf-sized swimming pools on the glass top table. 

My ears perked up when I heard Sam bring up their neighbors. I knew those neighbor’s kids the way only kids know other neighborhood kids. There were the ones you ride your bike with to the next town in secret, and the ones you avoided. These were the ones you avoided. 

Always in trouble, their teen son John spent his time stealing from the Convenience store on the corner and spray painting swear words on the elementary school in town. His sister Jackie was no better, and enjoyed teasing all the kids who declined to play with her. I was one of them. 

Just the day before, she had knocked on my door and asked if I saw a cat around that was black, white, and fat. I had told her no, I haven’t seen any cats, and she went on her way. I expected a comment on my hair, or a laugh at my Rainbow Brite tshirt. But no, she just surprisingly left. I shrugged it off and returned to my Barbies. 

Sam was telling my parents how awful those two kids were to each other and also to their pets. Just recently he saw John taking their chubby little furball of a cat and laughing as he made her slide down their old rusty slide in the backyard. He said he came outside and told him to knock it off, that he could hurt her that way. But John just laughed. He also saw him wrap a belt around the cat’s neck like a leash, and the poor thing hissed and meowed til Sam stepped in that time too.

     Sam’s face had turned crimson as he talked about it. Dana put her hand on his arm, an effort to calm him. 

“They don’t deserve to have animals,” he said with anger that had turned to sadness. 

I stayed very quiet as the adults talked. I didn’t know if I should tell them John and Jackie’s cat was now missing. 

As I looked at Sam, and replayed his words in my head about some people not deserving animals, I wondered…could Sam have taken their cat away from them? 

I hadn’t been over to visit in a few days, so if they did have a cat roaming around their house I wouldn’t have known it.

I looked carefully at Sam, then at Dana. Did they exchange a knowing glance? There was a cat unaccounted for, one that deserved a better home and life than what it had been given. They were such kind people, the kind you never forget when they are in your life. Could they have taken her? 

And I know my father agreed with them. I saw the cans of cat food he left under the bush by our deck. Their cat was an outdoor cat, always wandering and seemingly looking for food.  My father thought he was sneaky about it, but of course I knew. 

Could my father be involved too? Or on his own? 

I had so many thoughts racing around my mind, that I barely heard the scratching at the metal door. My father set down his drink, and got up from his chair. We all sat up straight to see what was going on. 

My father opened the door, and in walked a much thinner black and white cat. And in her mouth, a tiny gray fuzzball of a kitten, mewing repeatedly. 

“Oh my goodness! Hannah, go get a blanket and towels!” my mother said excitedly. 

I ran to the linen closet and brought back an assortment for the mama cat and her baby. She set the kitten down in the blanket, and almost immediately the kitten stopped its mews and nestled itself into the warm softness of the blanket. 

“So that explains it,” I said with a smile. 

“Explains what, sweetheart?” Dana asked. 

“Jackie came by yesterday looking for her cat. She said she hadn’t seen her in awhile and asked if I had,” I told them. They all stared at me, then back at the cat. 

“What did you tell her?” My mother asked. 

“I said I haven’t seen any cats around,” I told her. 

“But this explains why she was so chubby and not around. She was a little busy having this kitten!” my father explained. 

And at that, the cat started meowing and scratching at the door again. 

“Should we let her go?” I asked. 

“Yes. Let’s see what she does,” my mother suggested. 

My father opened the thin metal door with the window on top, watching as the cat ran off. We sat looking at the tiny gray kitten, when another scratch at the door caught our attention. 

She was back, this time with a tiny black ball of meowing fur. She set him down in the blanket, and was off again. 

Six kittens in total. Each more adorable and fuzzy and precious than the next. I had suspected Sam was behind the missing cat, even my father. But it turns out she disappeared to have her kittens, then brought them to the safest place she could think of to protect them. 

We fed her, and she fed her babies, until eventually we found loving homes for each one. Sam and Dana kept the first kitten that arrived, the gray one, and named her Belle. They bought her a little yellow collar to wear. 

We opened the door to let the mama cat out many times, but she refused to leave. She was happy, well-fed, and very loved. So of course she wanted to stay. 

What about Jackie? 

Well, Jackie stopped her bike in front of my house eventually and stared into the large bay window we had in front. And at the black and white cat sunning herself in it. 

“Your cat looks an awful lot like MY cat you know. Where’d you get her?” she asked, never taking her eyes off the window. 

I nervously looked up from the sidewalk chalk masterpiece I had been creating. 

“Oh, you mean Whitney? Nah, she doesn’t look like yours. And we didn’t ‘get’ her. She got us,” I said quietly, going back to my drawing as nonchalantly as I could pretend to be. 

Jackie looked back at me. We locked eyes, and Jackie gave me a little nod. 

“She looks…happy,” Jackie said, looking back at the window and Whitney, who rolled over and yawned. We looked at each other one last time. Then Jackie peddled away without another word. 

I’ll never forget my first pet, and the night she trusted us with her life and her babies.