3. Henley #2
I’d been mostly homeschooled because we’d moved around so much.
Monster hunting wasn’t a nine-to-five kind of job, but I’d always thought I’d gotten a pretty good education.
“I think I’m going to start a list of all the questions I come up with, so I can research them.
There’s no point in dying and not knowing how this sandy grass issue works. ”
I was starting to run out of reasonable rambling but my murder kitty seemed to like it best when I chattered, so I was going to keep going no matter what.
“It’s not a bad area as long as I ignore the sand.” I wasn’t sure I could ignore the sand, though. “It’s got cute little towns dotted around the area and lots of farms.”
What else had I seen?
“They have a small local water park thing. It’s too big to be called a local pool, and it’s got slides and I’m pretty sure I saw a lazy river.
I’d have loved hanging out there when I was a kid.
” It still looked like fun. “I think I’ve got until I turn thirty to be too old for something like that, though.
So maybe I’ll use this as a cosmic warning to keep having fun just in case. ”
I needed to learn something from this, so that didn’t seem too bad.
“I’ve been driving around looking for…jobs…yes, we’re going to call them jobs…but I’m starting to think I need to focus on planning my trips around fun middle-of-nowhere kind of activities like that random water park down the street.” It had to be safer at the very least.
Because I had the rope off and a murder kitty still standing over me.
Yeah, that would definitely be a safer travel plan unless I somehow ended up at a haunted water park or one with some kind of creature living in the bottom of the pool.
“Are you ready to help me get water, kitty?” Would he eat me if I sat up?
Could I sit up?
I’d wiggled the rope down to my feet but I wasn’t sure what my next move should be. “Part of me was really glad I hadn’t consumed enough liquids this morning to piss myself when you scared the fuck out of me, but now my throat is dry and I think I swallowed some sand when I landed.”
I wasn’t still stuck in the tree, though, and that was what I was going to focus on.
“You’ve been my good helper so far, and now your new special friend needs water from his backpack.” Nothing. “Um. Thank you for keeping me safe and for watching over me while I got free. That was very good of you.”
Now what?
We seemed to be in some kind of stalemate but I wasn’t sure what we were debating. My death didn’t seem to be it, but that wasn’t narrowing down the problem much.
“I can figure this out. I’m actually very smart in practical situations even if I’m not showing you that right now.” If he had been monster Lassie, I’d have said that look was pure skepticism, but he couldn’t have been that smart. “Hey, one bad day doesn’t mean I’m an idiot.”
Okay, a bad six months might but I didn’t have to admit that.
“You haven’t eaten me yet. You helped me get down.
You seem to like the way I smell.” Oh. “Well, shit. We ended up with a damned near feral cat living with us when I was a kid because my mother fed it and told it how sweet it was. He hated everyone but refused to leave and I ended up dodging his claws for three years.”
Had I somehow adopted a monster?
God…I really was my mother’s child.
“He liked my mother, though, and he didn’t scratch her or chase her out of the trailer on a regular basis.” That’d been a stressful couple of years but it’d honed my reflexes. “You’re going to be my good murder kitty and not scratch me either.”
I was so screwed.
“It’s going to be fine.” Fingers crossed. “We’ll figure out how to make this work.”
My hand started reaching up for his head before the rest of me could tell it to stop being stupid.
It wasn’t a sudden enough movement to scare murder kitty but his entire body seemed to focus on that one idiotic body part as it inched closer.
“Yes, you’re my murder kitty, so you’re not going to eat me.
Humans are fragile even if we seem to forget that on a regular basis. ”
Time seemed to stop as I crossed the final inches and barely brushed my fingers over his head. The fur covering him was softer than I expected and made me wonder if I should’ve been calling it hair instead. That debate could wait until I survived my current round of bad decisions, though.
“Soft murder kitty. Yes. You’re my good boy.” Please let him be my good boy. “You’re going to be my new friend and we’re going to be a team.”
Somehow?
Okay, at least for a few minutes until I figured out how to leave him on the side of the road?
He didn’t belong in my camper and definitely wasn’t a pet, so I didn’t have to feel bad about lying to him.
I was not supposed to bring home wild animals, and it wasn’t like I could hide him at trailer parks.
But if we did more off-grid camping it would work.
As tiny strokes turned into full head rubs without my being turned into lunch, my murder kitty’s chest rumbled and I was pretty sure he started to purr in some kind of mangled way. “Good kitty.”
Or whatever mishmash of animals he was because my murder kitty looked a bit like a drunk with both hands tied behind his back had tried to draw what a large cat should look like.
Yeah, I couldn’t be mean to kids…drunks were better to blame murder kitty on.
Oh.
If he hadn’t eaten me, I probably shouldn’t keep calling him my murder kitty. “We need to figure out a new name for you. The only name the locals call you is The Beast of Bladenboro, and that’s good for marketing but not for a useable name.”
Beast seemed rude too.
“We’ll keep it simple.” I could do that. “Kitty. Beast. Bladenboro.”
Oh.
“Bladenboro. A murder kitty with blades on his feet.” It worked for me. “You’re going to be Blade.”
It wasn’t that creative but I hadn’t died of a heart attack or pissed myself, so I was going to give myself some props.
Now what?