Whimsy and the Missing Chair

The point is that I enjoyed sitting on the chair.

I enjoyed it and I don’t get to enjoy many things in this life--or any of the other eight, for that matter. Nature has made me the greatest predator on the planet only to place me in a tiny body from which I can do no real harm to anyone other than a mouse. The last time we had a mouse, I wasn’t even allowed to chase it. Patricia caught it in a shoebox and then made a comment to Hudson that if he didn’t leave food lying around all over the place, we wouldn’t have an infestation.

I wish I could have encouraged Hudson to leave out food. That would have kept my hunting skills sharp. I would enjoy taking down at least one mouse a day. Instead, I feel bloated and ineffective. I sit on a chair and look out the window at birds I’m also not allowed to murder. The entire world is full of things I should be allowed to kill, but can’t, because I have (allegedly) been domesticated by Patricia and Hudson.

But at least I had the chair.

Was it comfortable?

Not really.

But it was mine.

It was one thing that belonged to me in this unfortunate house. Hudson bought the chair (without consulting Patricia) from a yard sale at what he believed was a deal, but what Patricia believed was some kind of scheme to unload a bunch of disgusting furniture onto unassuming husbands like hers. Hudson’s plan was to sit in the chair and watch his spaceship movies, but I had other ideas. Something about the chair appealed to me. Perhaps it was the faded scent of an alpha male. Perhaps it was the stain on the left arm of the chair that looked somewhat like a sparrow. Who can say? I only knew that the chair should belong to me.

Such as it is in the wild, so it must be in the living room. Assert dominance. When Hudson attempted to sit in the chair, I swiped at him. He jumped back. I arched my back. Prepared for a fight. I was not a swiper. Though I had murderous rage running through my being at all times, I had rarely attacked in such a way. Hudson called out to Patricia.

“Is something wrong with Whimsy? She just tried to scratch me when I went to sit in my chair.”

His chair?  It was not his chair. His purchase did not entitle him to ownership. I was a resident in this house as well. I was a pristine feline bestowed with keen reflexes and adorable ears. I was owed a throne upon which to sit. Hudson could keep sitting on the couch that he and Patricia bought together when they first moved into this house and furnished it together as a loving couple.

Now, they were chilly towards one another. Patricia would eat her yogurt over the kitchen sink instead of at the dining room table with Hudson the way she used to. She stays later at work. Hudson doesn’t rub her shoulders like he used to when he walks by her sitting down at her desk in the home office. She doesn’t make the paella he loves. He doesn’t call her “Bop Bop” which was an inane nickname he had given her years before they adopted me.

I was a birthday present. Patricia loved me. She loved Hudson. Hudson loved her. I detested both of them, but they didn’t know that. All was well for everyone, but me.

Then, the chair disappeared.

You might argue that I should have noticed Hudson’s disappearance first. That would be a reasonable assumption. The trouble is, he and Patricia were avoiding each other so much that neither of them was around all that often in the weeks leading up to the disappearance of my chair.

Oh sure, they would come home from work, fight about something insignificant, heat up leftover pizza in the microwave, and then retire to separate rooms, but that evolved into Patricia staying out later and later with friends from work, which led to Hudson staying at his brother’s house more and more, which led to me wondering if either of them would one day forget to leave enough food in my bowl thereby bringing out the demise of the only thing either of them claimed to truly love.

This is why humans should only be in charge of dogs. Cats require a higher level of maintenance. Dogs just need to be squealed at like a baby in between frisbee throws. I require attention. I require attendance. I require effort.

Patricia and Hudson were checked out.

The day the chair went missing, I could hear Patricia crying in her room. I thought she was crying because now I didn’t have a place to sit. Good, I thought, you should cry. Some thief has stolen in here whilst we were all sleeping and confiscated my beloved chair! Do something, Patricia. Call the police!  Or have Hudson call them. Have him…

That’s when it occurred to me.

Hudson’s coat was not on the rack by the door. His shoes were not in their usual spot. I couldn’t detect that foul cologne he insists on wearing permeating the air.

Hudson was…gone.

And he had taken my chair.

I sat with my grief for a bit. That chair and I were as one. We were a spider and its web. A duck and its pond. A litter and its box. How would I live without it?

Moments of sorrow often necessitate going inward, but I remembered a program Hudson enjoyed watching (some rare non-spaceship content) all about this huckster who conned hundreds of people into selling diet lemonade. I remember the huckster saying that when you’re at your lowest, you should try and find somebody else even lower to you to lift up.

(This was before he was indicted and the diet lemonade was revealed to be store-bought apple juice.)

I took his words to heart and made my way into the bedroom where Patricia was oh so gently weeping whilst sitting on the edge of her bed. She was holding one of Hudson’s sweaters. He must have left it behind. I could smell the malodorous cologne even from the doorway. It made me want to keep my distance, but I soldiered on.

Up against Patricia’s legs I brushed, thereby letting her know that I was available to comfort her in her hour of need despite my own crushing loss over my poor chair. She was surprised at my behavior. I had never shown much affection for her or Hudson. With (wise) trepidation, she scooped me up and held me in her arms. Her nose pressed down onto the top of my head. She rocked back and forth with me as though I were an infant suffering from colic.

“It’s okay, Whimsy,” she said, her tears wetting the tips of my ears, “We’re going to be okay.”

I didn’t believe her. Not that it mattered. 

After all, it was more important that she believed it.

For a cat, it’s not that simple.

We always know better.