The Purrfect Brownie

When the black cat appeared for the fourth time that day, I thought he might’ve been a sign of luck. But I knew he wasn’t when I saw him a fifth time. He was clearly trying to lead me somewhere.

Black cats are usually associated with witchcraft, monsters, and ghosts that haunt you in the dark. But I didn’t see it that way. For me, black cats were like four leaves clovers to some people or like the number seven to others—a sign of luck. This cat, though, was something different.

I walked against the current of commuters that looked in an extreme hurry to arrive to their respective works—with their long faces and baggy eyes indicating they were running in no sleep.

The cat crossed a green light and I was forced to follow his lead, making many cars stop and honk at me for being so stupid and inherent. “You stupid girl!” “Don’t you have eyes?” “You’d do a better job walking on a table instead of the street!”. The classic rudeness of New Yorkers.

I followed the cat for around ten blocks until he finally decided to turn right. That was a relief, I was getting weary—not just from walking, but from dodging people and explaining why I was rushing around, dressed as if I’d just rolled out of bed.

The turn led to nothing more than an alley. My mind had maybe imagined something better, like a deluxe five star hotel or a street filled with lost dollar bills stuck in the drains. But I knew this was the place, judging by the way the cat looked at me with those sky-blue eyes that seemed to say, Give me a treat.

The alley intersected between two apartment buildings. You could see shadows dancing with the light that reflected against the curtains, and lots of windows that built upon a high building. There were also stairs, so you could climb in or out of the house . . . because, why not? An ugly stench came from an overflowed pile of garbage worth a month of no cleaning, that smell made the pastry stand nearby look far less appetizing.

Yes . . . there was a pastry stand. In the middle of an alley, surrounded by garbage and broken glass that crunched under my feet. Maybe I’d been wrong about the cat; maybe he just wanted a brownie. He looked at me again, tilting his head as if to say, Please, lady, give me a brownie.

Reluctantly I walked up to the pastry stand that read: ‘Best Pastries in New York, come get one!’ with a very excitedly face of an old man that looked nothing like the one that was sleeping above the stand. His snores made the table stand rumble.

“Um . . . hi” I said clearing my throat.

The old man’s head moved in unison with his slow breath. Clearly the old man hadn’t heard me, so I tried again.

“Ahem”

His eyes flew open as he jumped out of his seat, his arms moving around not throwing anything just out of pure luck. Wh-wha-what? Pizza sticks?” His eyes, full of boogers, scanned the scene around him He looked at me standing right in front of him. “Oh . . . it’s you . . . um” he furrowed his brow “Katherine Bell, right? Here for your brownie delivery? Right, right, right.”

“I’m not Katherine,” I said, quickly extending my hand in greeting. “My name’s Elena, and I’m a new customer.”

“Oh . . . a new client” his green eyes grew in admiration “That’s just great, you know, I don’t usually get new clients. You, Esthela, are the first in . . . I can’t remember how long. Let me tell you about the variety of pastries we have in here.”

I didn’t mind correcting him on my name so I listened to him blurt out and show me all the different pastries he had available on the little stand. They came in a lot of colors and flavors: Mango pastries, vanilla cake with pieces of meat, lemon pays, pumpkin cake that came with different expressions (it did look tasty), a pistachio-chili-strawberry pastry, chocolate cake with colored chips, a big gummy bear with chipotle and Oreo with a taste of I-want-to-throw-up-so-bad, and the typical vanilla cake that looked as innocent as a prisoner.

But none of those caught my eye. What did was a brownie, glowing faintly in the dark alley. It had two triangles for ears, bright green eyes, a candy corn for a nose, and little whiskers made of sugar—almost alike the black cat sitting beside me, still staring at me with hungry eyes. I didn’t know why, but I had a strange feeling that the cat had brought me here to buy those brownies. Who was I not to listen to luck?

“I want those” I said, and pointed to the brownies the old man held in a transparent box.

“Well, bless my soul! those are my favorite pastries in all my collection.” said the old man gleaming with a wide smile “You’ve chosen well.”

I thanked the old man, paid him for the order of five brownies and went along my route, which was no route at all. I only followed the black cat who occasionally stopped to lick his fur or ask for another piece of the brownie.

It tasted good, you know, the brownies. They were homemade and brought whole new flavors around my mouth, and the sugar made my mind explode in all colors. They were probably the second best brownies I had ever tasted in my life—just behind the ones my grandma used to make every Christmas, those were heaven to my mouth. I wanted to keep eating those cat’s brownies if it weren’t for the fact that there were none left.

A sigh of disappointed escaped my mouth

Strangely the cat led me to my apartment, he looked at me in indifference and continued his ritual of licking his fur. I’d never want to know how he threw up fur balls around, I once saw my cat do that and . . . I fully regret it, a truly traumatic experience. Not recommendable.

After getting inside the apartment, and battling to find the keys inside my purse I laid on my bed and for a while and just looked at the ceiling. Not doing anything, just looking . . . and looking . . . and looking. Until before I knew it was Tuesday already . . . and that meant work.

I hated work.

I woke up with the feeling you get after a night of heavy drinking, though I hadn’t touched a drop. My head pounded as I stumbled out of bed, nearly hitting my nightstand. The clock read 7:17 a.m.

A curse escaped my lips.

Late, I was late. No time to think, let alone care about my hair or hygiene. I threw on clothes, brushed my teeth, and shoved the papers I needed for work into my bag. I didn’t even glance at the fish tank as I dashed out the door. Poor Jimmy and Dua Lipa, they would have to wait for their mommy to come from work.

Waiting for a taxi was one of the most depriving tasks in all of my day. Torture. Standing there, looking foolish in my tie and coat, while traffic worsened and people gave me judging looks—it was awful.

My stomach churned, probably from that damn brownie. Could a brownie made me feel as if I had eaten a bomb? Probably not . . . maybe it was something else.

Time ticked away on my wristwatch, the wind hit against my not-so-great-and-formal hair. I waited, tapping my feet against the pavement, seeing cars honk at each other and pedestrians walk to their own hell. The taxi never arrived.

Minutes were taken away by the air and the taxi hadn’t yet arrived. 7:30, 7:31, 7:32 and still no car. My heart was growing restless, my feet couldn’t stop tapping against the hard floor, I kept watching the streets searching for a yellow cab in the midst of the thousand of cars, but the only yellow I saw was the one from the traffic lights.

I couldn’t stand there longer looking as if I had been dumped by someone. So I began running—wearing my black heels and all.

Around two blocks I couldn’t take it anymore and was tempted to take my heels off and run in my bare feet, but thankfully I found a lonely taxi around there. I called for it’s attention and in no time I was inside the taxi, my feet filled with calluses and blisters that wouldn’t go away that easily.

“Where to?” asked the taxi driver.

“Madison Avenue, Suite 1200”

The taxi driver nodded and drove. He must’ve seen my sweaty face and my heart that threatened to come out of my throat, because he hit the gas hard. I was almost going to thank him for that before we turned right, and saw all the traffic stop before my eyes, a musical of honks filled the streets.

This couldn’t be going worse.

I tried waiting, scrolling on TikTok and answering my text messages hoping that maybe the traffic would loosen up or the car that had crashed had been taken out of the driving zone. But that was not the case. The taxi didn’t go forward a millimeter and the counter kept going up and up and up and up . . . I think you get me.

“Thanks, but I’m getting down.”

I paid the taxi driver the price that appeared on his little display (almost my week’s salary) and ran through the streets, this time not on high heels but on my bare feet—ignoring the calluses that really hurt. I literally ran faster than I’d ever run in my life, maybe I could beat Usain Bolt in this form.

My mind didn’t dare to look at my wristwatch. I knew I was late and seeing the actual time would be too humiliating. It was my first time arriving late, and the thought of that made my stomach twist

But I arrived, right to the office.

My desk was just as I left it—neat files of paper stacked in the desk, post-its pasted in every place with every task I was missing, a cup of coffee reminding the late nights I had spent in there, and of course, the plaque I had earned last month. Employee of the month. My biggest achievement so far, a reminder of how great I was.

Although I had arrived almost an hour late no one seemed to note my absence, not even the secretary who was still trying to remember that my surname was Erickson and not Errandson.

I was beginning to think that this would all be another regular day in the office before the secretary stood in front of all our cubicles and called for our attention. Every head turned her way.

“Elena Erickson, whoever that is, come to the boss office, now!” she said pushing her eyeglasses up her nose.

I raised from my seat, trying to ignore the multiple of judging eyes that were staring at me, maybe thinking, Oh, that girl is in problems. And there was a pretty good reason to think that, because meeting with the boss wasn’t something you’d want to do on your day.

I walked inside the messed up big office with multiple photos of the boss’s happy family clung to the walls. When he used to smile and not scold and grump at anything that came his way. His eyebrows were frowned and his smile was upside down. I felt as if I had gulped a rock down my throat.

“Please seat, Ms. Erickson”

“Um . . . good morning boss, it’s so nice to see you!” I said trying to bring my best smile “I never asked you about your trip on Madrid, how did it—?”

He stopped me short, pushing a paper in front of me. His eyes gestured me to read the paper. It was just a basic graphic with a line that was starting to rise up and then went down and down and down, almost to ground level.

I looked up at him, my lip twitching. “Um . . . that’s supposed to be?”

“Our sales”

I got closer to the paper and looked at the line that spiraled itself down, totally not reflecting the hard work I had poured in my day to day “I think the . . . uh” my finger wagged over the paper “may be upside down.”

Boss clicked his tongue “It’s the sales of last month, and I want you to explain them.”

My heart raced fast. It just didn’t made sense, I pictured all the days in my desk working hard towards the project, pouring all my effort and just doing things for this to happen. For sales to be this bad. It was impossible.

I tried to come up with any excuse, to say that it was because of a family problem and my husband was abusing me, but I knew very well, as same as the boss knew that I was not the kind of girl that was on a marriage.

My cheeks blushed and I could feel my body temperature rise. I couldn’t look neither at the paper or my boss’s face. So I kept my face in an in between.

“I-is it because I arrived late?”

Boss’s face froze “You arrived late?”

Right there I knew I had signed my death warrant. My face went pale, and I felt my stomach drop. I opened my mouth again, but I couldn’t form any words to counterattack him. I was out of options and I knew that. The boss raised his eyebrows and crossed his arms, staring at me with a look that said it all.

“You know what, Ms. Erickson” he said slowly “I was going a chance to explain this decline. But if you can’t even manage to get in time . . .”

I swallowed hard, my mind scrambling for a response.

“I think it’s best we part ways right here.”

I couldn’t process the words, they hit like a cold slap in the middle of winter, and winter was months away. None of it made sense, I had been the one who had stayed late to finish the project, I had been the employee of the month, I had been the best of the best. Fired? That was impossible.

My ears buzzed with static as I stared, unseeing, at the opposite wall, while the boss’s voice went on about HR procedures and final paperwork. I felt my head nodding, my hand automatically reaching for the pen to sign off on my exit, but none of it felt real.

My body moved on autopilot collecting my belongings and in no time I was out to the crowded city of New York, where no one cared about your well-being. Maybe that was why it was one of the states with more suicides in the USA. I was ready to go to my apartment and cry all day while eating ice cream when I saw him, sitting calmly in the middle of the sidewalk, watching me with those sky-blue, unblinking eyes.

It looked almost brightened, tail flicking like he knew exactly what had happened.

“You!” I shouted harshly, pointing at the cat, my voice cracking. Several pedestrians stopping to look at me and then deciding I was just another crazy civilian who had lost her job. Maybe I was. “I followed you, thought you were my lucky charm. And for what? I lost everything. Everything! You heard me?”

The cat cocked his head from side to side, flicked his tail again, then stood and walked against the current of people, casting me a look like, Well? Are you coming?



With a sigh, I followed.