“Maybe he’s hosting a rave in that abandoned house,” my friend Amy said.
We laughed at the idea of a wild housecat party. It was good
to lighten the mood. We’d been sadly stuffing “Lost Cat” fliers in mailboxes.
Our family’s dear Garfield, the first pet my boys have known and loved, was
missing. And Amy and I thought we were looking for a body.
We’d already peered beneath hostas past their prime, poked
through overgrown brush in neighbors’ yards, wished aloud that neither of us
ended up with poison ivy. We called Garfield’s name. Made kissing noises.
“Here, kit kit kit….”
Last night, after Garfield had been gone for hours, I walked
our street in the dark, thumping a can of food. When I came home catless,
Thomas said, “That is really a terrible sign. We need to prepare for the
worst.”
It was true. If Garfield could have come home, he would
have. He just wasn’t there.
Garfield came to us a year ago last spring. Blake had been
asking for an orange cat – he liked the “Garfield” movies – so when a friend
asked if we wanted to take in an orange stray she had been feeding, Thomas and
I agreed.
We said OK even though we still missed and mourned Tippy,
who had died three years earlier. This time would be different, we told
ourselves. We wouldn’t be so invested. Garfield would be the boys’ cat.
Garfield was a hunter, and he found the children’s legs as
tasty as the birds, rabbits and chipmunks he liked. So despite risks to his
safety, Garfield had the roam of Randal Avenue and he left the kids’ shins
alone.
He never stayed out long, unless we were outside, too. He
watched the kids play backyard baseball from his playset perch. Inside, he
would be in the middle of everything: breakfast, lunch and dinner, bedtime, TV
time, reading time. We called him “the cat who never misses stories” because,
well, he didn’t.
One night, early on, Thomas was reclining on the couch,
working on his laptop. Garfield had inserted himself on top of the keyboard.
Thomas kept typing, and I think I called him a “cat person,” or something
stupid like that. “Yeah,” he said, “But I’m not getting attached to this one.”
“Will you, please,
just let yourself enjoy this cat?” I said. And I saw Thomas’ shoulders drop 2
inches and the tension of his day fade. Just like that, Garfield was family.
Unable to sleep last night, Thomas drove the neighborhood,
looking for animals on the side of the road. Amy did, too, this morning, but
noticed only a flattened skunk.
“Oh, honey!! Any sign?” she texted me early. And she offered
her help.
Fliers in hand, we rounded the block to the busy main
thoroughfare. Conversation turned from the absurd feline rave to
when-are-they-ever-going-to-clean-up-this-dumpy-house-anyway? We let ourselves
into the abandoned eyesore’s back yard, which is catercorner from mine. We surveyed the
weeds, marveled at the mess, saw nothing, and started to leave.
“Meow.”
Unmistakable.
“Meow.”
Inside!
How in the world? We tried the basement door. Locked.
Another door. Locked.
Amy found a ground-level window.
“It’s him! I can see him!” she yelled.
And there he was. Not even dead.
The window was not secure. We opened it, and he stretched up
from a dirty, rotting rug. I reached in and pulled him out. He seemed confused
for just an instant, then ran home.
Hours later, I was still smiling.
“Wow,” my brother said when I told him the story. “It sounds
like you went on a real search-and-rescue mission.”
“Actually, we thought it was more like breaking and
entering,” I told him.
Either way, Garfield, welcome to inside living, my cat
friend. I suppose it’s time to get the boys some super-thick tube socks.
