Chapter 12
Selena (Past)
Miss Astoria arrived on Katherine’s fourteenth birthday inside a carrier lined with pink satin that looked completely ridiculous against the kitten’s tiny white body. I remember the satin because it shimmered under the dining room lights like something meant for a doll instead of a living animal.
The cat herself looked just as out of place, a purebred ragdoll with blue eyes and paws so soft they barely seemed capable of touching the ground.
Mrs. Montgomery had spent three weeks pretending she knew nothing about the gift while leaving breeder brochures scattered around the house and asking questions at dinner like whether cats ever got lonely.
Katherine had noticed everything, the way she always did, but she still gasped when her father carried the carrier into the room after the cake had been cut.
“God damn,” Katherine said, the words slipping out before she remembered she was supposed to sound elegant in front of her parents.
Mrs. Montgomery laughed softly. “Language, sweetheart.”
Katherine ignored her completely and dropped to her knees beside the carrier, her pale brown hair falling forward over her shoulders as she stared inside like someone had handed her a living miracle.
“She’s beautiful,” she whispered, voice full of wonder that made her sound younger than fourteen.
Mr. Montgomery looked pleased with himself in the way wealthy men often did after solving a problem with money. “She’s purebred,” he said, swirling the last of his wine. “Apparently, one of the best bloodlines in New England.”
I remember thinking that sounded like something people said about racehorses or maybe about children who went to the right schools.
Katherine opened the carrier door carefully.
The kitten stepped out with startling confidence, tiny white paws sinking into the thick Persian rug while the whole room watched in silence.
She walked straight past Mrs. Montgomery, ignored Mr. Montgomery entirely, and stopped right beside my chair.
Then she sat on my foot like she had made up her mind about me.
The room went quiet for half a second. Katherine blinked.
“Oh,” she said softly, almost hurt.
I looked down at the kitten. “I think she likes me.”
“That’s rude,” Katherine told the cat, though her voice stayed light, the way it did when she was pretending to be annoyed but really wanted to laugh.
Mrs. Montgomery laughed again. “Maybe she recognizes another stray.”
My mother stiffened beside the wall where she stood waiting to clear the dessert plates. The joke had been harmless on the surface, but rich people rarely understood when they were cruel.
I reached down slowly and touched the kitten’s head with one finger. She felt soft and warmer than I expected. The kitten immediately climbed into my lap like the decision had already been settled.
Katherine stared at her in open betrayal. “You were supposed to love me first.”
“She probably will,” I said, stroking the kitten’s back while it purred against my school skirt.
“She better.”
Mr. Montgomery picked up his wineglass again. “Have you thought of a name?”
Katherine looked down at the kitten curled against my leg. Then, with complete seriousness, she said, “Miss Astoria.”
Her father nearly choked on his wine. Mrs. Montgomery closed her eyes briefly. “Katherine.”
“What? She looks expensive.”
“That is not a personality trait.”
“It can be.”
I laughed before I could stop myself. Katherine looked at me immediately, pleased in that quiet little way she always was when she managed to make me laugh first.
“Miss Astoria,” she repeated firmly. The kitten sneezed. “See? She agrees.”
That should have been the end of it.
But three days later Katherine’s eyes swelled nearly shut during our math tutoring session.
Mrs. Montgomery panicked and started talking about calling the breeder.
Mr. Montgomery threatened to sue. My mother calmly handed Katherine an antihistamine and asked whether anyone had remembered the childhood allergy tests.
No one had. Apparently, Katherine had tested mildly allergic to cats when she was seven.
“It’s mild,” Katherine insisted through watery eyes while Miss Astoria slept in her lap completely unbothered by the chaos she had caused. “And I already love her.”
Mrs. Montgomery looked exhausted.
“Sweetheart, love does not prevent histamine responses.”
“It should.”
Mr. Montgomery rubbed his forehead. “We can rehome it.”
“No.” The word came sharp enough to surprise everyone. Katherine sat straighter, one hand tightening protectively around the kitten. “She stays.”
Mrs. Montgomery hesitated. Katherine rarely fought them directly. She resisted quietly most of the time, through silence and withdrawal and pretending not to care. Open stubbornness meant she really cared about something. My mother noticed it too.
“She may adjust over time,” my mother said carefully. “Especially if the cat isn’t sleeping directly on her bed.”
“She’s not sleeping anywhere else,” Katherine said immediately.
Mrs. Montgomery sighed. And somehow, without anyone formally deciding it, Miss Astoria became my responsibility partially after that.
At first, it was small things. Brushing her hair because Katherine sneezed less afterwards.
Keeping lint rollers in Katherine’s room.
Opening the windows before Mrs. Montgomery noticed fur on the curtains.
Then bigger things. Feeding her when Katherine forgot.
Cleaning the litter box because the smell made Katherine nauseous.
Taking Miss Astoria to the vet once with my mother because Mr. Montgomery had meetings and Mrs. Montgomery was in Boston for a charity event.
I did not mind. I loved the cat almost immediately.
Miss Astoria followed me through the house whenever I visited.
She slept beside me during study sessions, curled against my thigh while Katherine explained biology concepts I barely understood.
At some point, she stopped waiting outside Katherine’s bedroom door and started waiting outside mine instead.
Katherine pretended this offended her deeply.
“You stole my cat.”
“She’s sitting on your lap right now.”
“She’s emotionally cheating on me.”
Miss Astoria yawned.
“You’re so dramatic,” I told her.
“You made her prefer you.”
“I don’t think cats work like that.”
Katherine narrowed her eyes. “Everything prefers you.”
The words landed strangely. Not quite a compliment. Not entirely a joke either. I looked up from the worksheet she had assigned me. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
She shrugged too quickly. “Nothing.”
Then she pushed my textbook toward me. “You’re behind again.”
That was how our life worked by then. Katherine corrected my homework while Miss Astoria slept beside me.
I fixed Katherine’s eyeliner before parties while she rewrote my chemistry notes.
I helped her speak to people at school. She helped me survive Bellamont Academy.
Sometimes I forgot which parts were friendship and which parts were labour because they had tangled together too tightly to separate cleanly.
* * *
The first time I truly saw the line again was junior year.
I came to Katherine’s room after school still wearing my Bellamont blazer, arms full of shopping bags from town, because Mrs. Montgomery had asked if I could pick up a few things before dinner. The smell hit me before I opened the door fully.
Ammonia. Sharp and sour and awful. I stopped short.
“Jesus Christ.”
Katherine sat cross-legged on the floor beside her bed with an expression of pure irritation while Miss Astoria hid beneath the desk.
“What happened?” I asked.
“That stupid cat peed on my bed.”
Miss Astoria let out a tiny, offended noise from under the desk. I set the shopping bags down slowly. The duvet was soaked. One of Katherine’s silk pillowcases had been thrown across the room.
“When was the last time the litter box got cleaned?” I asked carefully.
Katherine frowned at me like the question itself was strange.
“I don’t know.”
I walked to the bathroom connected to her room and immediately understood. The litter box was full. Not just slightly dirty. Miss Astoria had probably been miserable for hours.
“Katherine.”
“What?”
“She does this when the litter box isn’t cleaned.”
“Well, I didn’t know that.”
I stared at her. “You didn’t notice?”
“No?” She sounded defensive now, exhausted from school and annoyed at being judged. “How would I notice?”
I looked back toward the bathroom. Then at her.
“She’s your cat.”
Katherine’s expression changed immediately. Not cruel, but confused. As if I had misunderstood something obvious.
“No,” she said slowly. “It’s your job, not mine.”
The room went very quiet.
Behind us, Miss Astoria shifted nervously beneath the desk.
Katherine looked at my face and realized something was wrong.
“What?”
I said nothing. Because the terrible thing was that she had not meant to hurt me. To Katherine, this arrangement had become natural. I handled practical things. I remembered things. I cleaned things. I took care of things. Of course I did. I always had. She stood abruptly.
“Selena, I didn’t mean—”
“It’s fine.”
“No, I just meant you’re better at this stuff than I am.”
This stuff. The litter box. The cleaning. The housekeeping. The invisible work that rich people did not care about. I walked into the bathroom before she could keep explaining. The smell was worse up close. I cleaned the litter box silently while Katherine hovered in the doorway behind me.
“I forgot,” she said after a minute.
I nodded once.
“I’ve had exams all week.”
Another nod. I went to the same school. I had exams too.
“Selena.”
I emptied the old litter into the trash and poured fresh litter into the box carefully, smoothing it flat the way Miss Astoria liked.
“You don’t have to be upset.”
That almost made me laugh. It wasn’t funny, but I suddenly understood something I should have realized years ago.
Katherine loved me. Truly. But love had never once required her to imagine my humiliation before speaking.
People like Katherine did not think about labour unless it stopped being done.
That was the privilege. Not money. Not houses.
Not Bellamont Academy. The privilege of believing care appeared naturally around you without wondering who exhausted themselves creating it.
I washed my hands slowly. Then I stripped her bed in silence. Katherine watched me pull off the soaked duvet cover.
“You don’t have to do that.”
“Yes,” I said quietly. “I do.”
She flinched. Good. I didn’t want to hurt her, but I wanted her to feel the shape of what she had said. For once.
Miss Astoria crept out from under the desk while I changed the sheets and rubbed against my ankle apologetically.
“At least someone in this room likes me,” I murmured.
Katherine’s face tightened. “That’s not fair.”
I tucked the clean sheet sharply beneath the mattress corner.
“No,” I agreed. “It isn’t.”
* * *
That night, after Katherine fell asleep at her desk halfway through studying, I carried Miss Astoria back to the cottage with me.
My mother sat at the kitchen table, paying bills beneath the yellow light above the stove.
She looked up when I entered, holding the cat.
“Well,” she said softly. “You stole the rich girl’s cat at last.”
Miss Astoria immediately climbed into my lap when I sat down. I buried my fingers in her fur.
“She forgot to clean the litter box,” I said.
My mother’s expression shifted slightly.
“She’s a child.”
“So am I.” I retort.
Silence settled between us. Then my mother reached across the table and smoothed my hair back from my face the way she used to when I woke from nightmares.
“Yes,” she said quietly. “You are.”