Chapter 13 - Henry #2
The claws had come out, but in her defense, it appeared to be friendly fire.
I reached out and carefully unhooked her claws from his skin and lowered her paw back to her chest, which I tickled with one finger.
She was obviously at least eight weeks old if they were ready to adopt her out, but she seemed so tiny.
One of my fingers almost spanned the width of her chest. I could feel it vibrate under my hand as she purred.
Jamison stroked a hand over the kitten’s head. “I think I’m in love.” He looked up at Sandra. “Would she cope with being…ugh, I can’t think of a better way to say this…with being ignored while I work?”
Sandra’s gaze grew slightly shifty. “You know the best way to keep a cat entertained and out of trouble?”
I saw where this was going, but Jamison, in his innocence, just said, “No, what?”
She grinned. “A second cat.”
He blinked at her, then looked at me. I shrugged.
She wasn’t wrong. “Oh but I…” he began, nervously rearranging the snoozing kitten in his arms. She swatted halfheartedly at his arm as it jostled her, purr stopping for a moment before her claw snagged his shirtsleeve and pulled his hand into her stomach.
She wrapped both paws around his wrist and closed her eyes again.
I was melting. Maybe Curie wouldn’t mind a cat companion…
“Let me show you Pops,” Sandra said, gently prying Minnie out of Jamison’s hands and studiously ignoring his bereft expression as she did it.
“Pops is named well, because he’s sort of the old man of the bunch.
Low-energy, very steady, but friendly.” Minnie was placed back into the crate and a gray tabby was extracted and placed into Jamison’s hands.
The kitten sat there, blinking up at him owlishly for a moment, and then you could almost see him shrug. He nuzzled into Jamison’s elbow and settled down for a nap, apparently over the whole excitement of being handed to a stranger.
“He’s sweet,” Jamison whispered. “But…” And here his voice dropped even further. “...kinda boring.” He made an apologetic face at the kitten.
Sandra just smiled. “Like I said, a steady old man. Here, let me…” She picked him up, eliciting hardly a blink from the cat, and put him back in the crate.
“And here’s Kellogg.” She snagged the mother cat and swung her up into her arms. Kellogg immediately threw her paws around Sandra’s neck and held on, leading to an awkward few moments where Sandra tried to pry her off herself without doing any harm.
Finally, Kellogg was transferred to Jamison, who tickled under her chin.
Kellogg snuggled her face into the crook of his neck and began purring loudly.
Honestly, Kellogg didn’t look much bigger than some of her kittens. “How old is she?” I asked, stroking a finger over the top of her head where it stuck out from Jamison’s neck.
“We don’t know for sure,” Sandra said, “because she came in as a stray. But we’re guessing she’s not much more than a year, if that. She’s still got a bit of the kitten in her. We call her the teenage mother.” She grinned. “Naughty girl didn’t have safe sex.”
Hearing this matronly woman pronounce the word “sex” with that lascivious lilt was not something I’d expected out of my afternoon. I managed not to wince…too much. Instead, I petted Kellogg again. “I’m sure she’s a good girl who was just taken advantage of,” I played along.
Jamison frowned at me. “Hey, girls can be enthusiastic participants in sex too. Don’t ignore her choices.” He juggled Kellogg’s weight a little to bring her closer to his chest, and she responded with increased purr volume. “See, she agrees.”
We were debating the sexual agency of a cat.
Of course we were. I managed a serious face and nodded understandingly.
“You’re right. I’m sorry, Kellogg.” I reached out to scritch her head and couldn’t resist making a little kissy noise I didn’t even know I could make before that moment. “Your choices are your own.”
“She knows what she wants.” Jamison stroked his hand down her back. “And I think she likes me.”
Sandra chuckled, gesturing to the way the man and the cat were clutching each other. “I think you just might be right. So,” she went on, reaching out to gently pry Kellogg away from Jamison, “you like Minnie and Kellogg? Do you want to meet more cats or are you set on these two?”
I noticed that she smoothly referred to them as a pair, as if Jamison had already agreed to two cats instead of one, but the hint seemed to go over his head and he just nodded. “I think I really like these guys, but let’s meet a few more just in case.”
Sandra slipped Kellogg back into the crate, latched it, and clapped her hands happily. “Great! I want you to meet Solo Cup first. He’s an absolute doll, but he’s a mature adult so he’s been passed over a few times.”
“I’m not sure anyone mature is going to fit well with me,” Jamison joked with a smirk. “I specialize in immaturity.”
I rolled my eyes; Sandra ignored the quip as she crossed the room to another stack of cages with us following her.
“This is Solo,” she said, gesturing to the cage on top, which held…
well, as best I could tell, it held a giant cotton ball that had suffered an unfortunate facial accident.
Solo Cup was apparently one of those designer cats that had been bred to be so ugly they were cute.
He stalked up to the bars of his cage and meowed at us, reaching a paw out through the bars to bat at Sandra’s hand as she worked the latch. “Bad boy,” she cooed in a voice that was anything but censorious. “Let me get you out, and then you can meet everyone.”
Surprisingly, the cat obeyed, backing up a step until Sandra had the crate open and then practically launching himself into her arms. She caught the - not-insignificant, judging by her oof - weight of the flying cat handily and turned to pass him to Jamison, who accepted the furball warily.
“He’s…poofy,” he reflected in a voice that was careful to be neutral.
Sandra just nodded. “Yeah, he’s pretty good about grooming himself, but he does need a good brushing every day or two. Luckily, he likes the Furminator.”
Jamison blinked at her. “The what-nator? Is it made of liquid metal? Does it have an Austrian accent?”
I laughed, but Sandra looked like she’d heard that one before. “It’s a type of brush,” she explained without a change in expression. “It helps strip the shedding fur, especially the undercoat. A lot of cats like the sensation, which supposedly feels like being groomed by their mama.”
Jamison looked at me with wide eyes. “We didn’t buy a Furminator!
We didn’t buy a brush at all. Oh no,” he moaned.
“What else did we forget that we didn’t even think of?
What if I get a cat home and then I don’t have what I need?
I don’t want my cat to get tangled!” He stroked a hand over Solo’s back, carefully soothing the fur into place.
Solo, having none of that, immediately bristled his fur back as it was and directed a nip at Jamison’s inner arm. Jamison yelped, holding the cat out. “He bit me!”
A bit alarmed at the loose hold he seemed to have on Solo, I reflexively reached out and settled a hand under the cat’s butt and one on his withers, beating Sandra to the punch. To my surprise, Solo didn’t appear to take offense to my hands, instead relaxing into my hold.
Jamison, pursing his lips, pushed the cat a little more toward me. “I think he likes you better.”
With nothing else to do, I accepted the cat’s full weight and brought him to my chest. Immediately, he started purring.
I warily ran a hand over his back, not wanting to earn myself a matching nip, but he showed no sign of disapproval this time, nudging his head into the crook of my elbow contentedly.
My stomach went a little light, and I felt my heart tap out a double beat as I looked down at the cat cuddled in my arms. He was so ugly, so why was this so damn cute?
Sandra’s eyes danced from Jamison’s empty arms to my full ones, and she directed a sly grin in my direction. “You in the market for a cat?”
“Oh, I…” I stammered. “I’m really not, my cat…
I don’t know how she is with other animals, she’s always been an only cat since she was a kitten, and anyway I don’t have…
” What didn’t I have? Surely something. Something that you needed for two cats that you didn’t need for one.
“I only have one litterbox!” I finally managed to come up with, weakly.
Solo’s rough tongue came out and started licking my inner arm, and I died a little.
He turned his smooshed little face up to me, and I swear he smirked.
The damn cat knew he was charming me. This was all part of his plot.
“How…is he with other cats?” came out of my mouth, surprising me because that was not at all what I’d intended to say, which had been He’s adorable but I can’t.
Sandra waggled her hand from side to side.
“Mostly disinterested. We put him together with Snowball for a meet ‘n’ greet, and they ignored each other. With Lady Snazzle-pants” - Lady Snazzle-pants?
Who was naming the cats in this shelter?
“- he was polite and they played a little and then they took separate naps.” She offered me a confident smile.
“That’s actually a good sign, that he could relax around another cat enough to nap.
If he hadn’t felt comfortable he’d have been puffed up and wary, instead. ”
I couldn’t adopt a second cat. I hadn’t even asked Curie!