Chapter 19 Cat Camera
Cat Camera
Blue wanders along the rooftops. I scrub on: walls, trellis, trees, bushes, the backs of brick buildings…
Suddenly I stop. A man is kneeling in his large back garden at an upturned bike, tools spread on a blanket.
He is in his mid-sixties, pale-faced, and slack-cheeked, wearing a cap and a windbreaker.
He’s in good shape for his age, with an athletic physique and a full head of thick gray hair, but from the look of the back of his house, his barbecue set, and tidily arranged plastic patio furniture, I can tell he doesn’t own a Bentley.
And while not unattractive, exactly, there is a distinctly disappointed, tightly wound quality to this man, as if he might live several days in the space of one morning.
I find myself wondering how far down our road he lives, and how far we have come to get here.
The man’s face is hard-set, a frown of concentration firmly in place. After a moment, he leans back from his work on the bike chain, gingerly spins the back wheel, and watches intently as it circles.
He reels back from it, apoplectic with rage, his face contorted as he lashes the bike frame to the ground, rises over it, and gives it a hefty kick.
He turns from it and paces away from it, attempting, it seems, to calm himself, wandering now in wide circles, his hands rubbing over his irritated face.
Becalmed, and clearly regretful, he heads back to the fallen bike and rights it.
We shift along the wall warily, our gaze staying firmly on the man.
His hands have come to rest on his hips now, and he sighs deeply as he takes in the bike, shakes his head, says what looks like: “For fuck’s sake.”
The man’s head whips fast to the back door of the house, a woman in a bath towel, hair wet, having poked her head out to ask him something. He heads toward her; we cannot see his response.
The woman smiles warmly, satisfied, before slipping back into the house. The man turns back to the broken bike and then suddenly looks directly up at us.
He looks surprised to see us, then his face softens, and he squats and snaps his fingers, beckoning us over.
I feel the muscles inside me tighten now, too.
I brace for the full extent of what Blue may have recorded.
After a moment of consideration, we leap down, the green of the lawn rising fast to meet us as we land softly and look at him. He is smiling, pleased to see us.
We head toward him, the man extending his hand to bridge the distance. He scratches the chin above us, the footage shuddering with the vibration of Blue’s purr. He does not seem to notice the lens trained on him.
He stands and beckons us into his house, holding open the back door.
I feel the legally minded part of my brain kick into gear, noting the fact that this man literally invited my cat into his home.
Once inside, we survey the space. It is very well ordered, but unlike Matt’s kitchen or my own, this is a prefabricated, fitted kitchen, without an extension. On the wall, by the back door, a cream-colored sign dangles, golden words spelling out the phrase Coffee Pairs Nicely with Silence!
We watch as the man pulls a carton of full-fat milk out of his fridge. He pours it into a hastily sourced olive dish, which he places delicately onto the floor, its swirling floral design just visible above the surface of the white liquid.
The furry chin above us lowers into the dish and we bob rhythmically, over and over, into the milk bowl, dark, light, dark, light, dark, as Blue drinks.
I try not to think what the vet would say about what is happening, about what the full-fat milk will do to poor Blue’s diabetic blood-sugar levels and his digestion. At least he’s having a lovely time, I force myself to think, though my anger at this man is escalating.
The bowl is empty, and the woman has reappeared and is crouching in front of us. She is dressed now, her hair tied back wet. She pets us, her smile broadening, as Blue leans in to it, her mouth moving, though her words are not audible.
Then it happens: her eyes flick directly into the camera’s aperture. You can see the second it clicks in her mind, what she is looking at, what the glowing green light on the collar means. Her smile stutters to a stop. Her eyes narrow, all her softness instantly gone.
She squints at us through the lens, her face a mask of disgust. She rises quickly, out of shot, and for a moment only her slippers and legs are visible, like in an old-time cartoon.
This must be them, the husband and wife who sent the message. Not Marina and Chris at all.
Suddenly, we are hauled up into the air. We are in the bike man’s arms as he bundles us back out into the garden.
Above us, the sky is a cloudless cerulean blue.
The man throws us down, we land deftly, and thunder away from the man and his house, leaping back up onto the garden wall in one fluid bound.
We skip along fast, adrenaline pumping, the glowing windows and back doors of houses flashing past, a drop of milk still clinging to the furry chin above us, in spite of everything.
We reach a junction of walls. We sit, the camera rising and sinking fast with Blue’s panicked, exerted breath. It takes a long time for the movement to slow, for him to calm enough to bend and lick his paws. Yesterday’s video ends.