Chapter 18
“There’s a lot of love in the air tonight, Max,” said Dooley.
The meeting had ended, Harriet and Brutus had gone out on a date, and all our humans had retired for the night.
Marge was probably dreaming about her favorite band—and Tex probably was, too.
It was nice to see a couple as close as Marge and Tex brought even closer by their shared love of the same music.
Dooley and I were outside, enjoying a look up at the night sky, where stars were twinkling pleasantly, and life seemed pretty great.
But then I find that this is often the case when humanity has gone to bed: all of a sudden, all the problems that seem to have kept them enthralled throughout the day don’t look so important anymore and fade away.
I hadn’t really been paying attention to my friend and said, “Love? What love?”
“Well, all the love that is manifesting, Max.” He started to tick off the different kinds of love he was referring to. “Odelia is in love with another recruit. Chase is in love with his new partner, Marva.”
“What new partner Marva?” I asked, since this was the first I was hearing of this.
“Oh, hasn’t anyone told you? Now that Odelia is out of the game for the time being, Uncle Alec has partnered Chase with a lady officer named Marva Prink.
Dolores told Scarlett all about it, and she told Gran, who told me last night, when we were watching a show about the police academy on television. ”
“Marva Prink,” I said. “That’s not good, buddy.”
“No, Gran said that Chase will fall in love with her, since police officers who have been teamed up with one another often fall in love. Especially when they get involved in dangerous situations, and they need to have each other’s backs.
That kind of thing creates a bond. And often it ignites the flame of love.
” He sighed deeply. “Looks like our home is breaking up, Max. First Odelia and her new love, and now Chase. And then, of course, there’s Scarlett, who’s in love with Dick, and Marge, in love with this Daniel Bozek guy. ”
“God,” I groaned. “This is bad, isn’t it?”
“But love is good, Max,” said Dooley. “Except, of course, when it’s not,” he accepted.
For a moment, neither of us spoke, since the specter of love wreaking havoc on our humans kept us busy with our thoughts. But then Dooley spoke again.
“Gran also says that music soothes the violent beast. But Marge has never been a violent beast, has she? Or Tex? So I don’t see why they need to listen to music at all.”
“I’m sure that a lot of people who listen to music aren’t beasts, Dooley,” I said.
“Have you heard this band that Marge likes so much? This Turbo Heartthrob?”
“No, I haven’t, and I don’t think I have much interest in listening to them.
” After all, humans play music for other humans, and not for their pets.
The only kind of music that I like is cat choir, since it’s cats entertaining cats.
And as a rule, not a lot of people like our kind of music, which tells you something about humans’ tastes. Or the lack thereof.
“I think we need to fix all of this, Max,” said Dooley. “We need to make sure that all of these people fall out of love again. And quickly, too. Or otherwise there is going to be so much trouble coming our way.”
“You’re absolutely right, buddy. But how can we make someone fall out of love if they insist on being in love? It can’t be done.”
“We need to make sure that they see only the bad side of the other person,” said Dooley. “You know, that he’s smelly, or mean to pets, or generally a bad person.”
“That’s a big ask for a pair of simple cats, buddy.”
“But it’s important, Max. Otherwise, we won’t have a home. Imagine if Chase and Odelia get a divorce. Who are we going to live with? Odelia or Chase?”
“That’s easy. Odelia, of course, since she has always been our human.”
“No, she hasn’t. Chase is Brutus’s human.
So if they divorce, Brutus will have to go and live with Chase, and we will stay here.
Unless, of course, Marge and Tex also get divorced, and then I will probably stay with Marge, since Gran will stay with Marge, but one of you will probably be awarded to Tex by the judge. ”
“You mean one of us will have to go and stay with Tex?” I asked. Even though I like Tex a lot, not seeing my friends anymore and having to stay with the doctor all the time was not a fun prospect.
“Of course. Judges are always deciding which partner gets the pets in a divorce. We’re considered part of the furniture, Max, so we get passed around like a pair of shoes.”
“Oh, dear,” I said. This was not good. “So how do we make sure that Marge falls out of love with her band person?”
“We need to find him and prove to Marge what a bad person he is, and what a bad match for her. And we need to do the same about Odelia’s recruit and about Marva and about Dick Bernstein. It’s the only way to make sure that our lives aren’t ruined forever.”
It seemed like a tall order for a pair of cats, but Dooley was right. We had to stop these couples from becoming serious, because once that happened, it would be too late.
For a moment, I contemplated a life where I didn’t see my friends anymore, and I simply couldn’t. It was too horrible. At least Dooley had come up with a solid plan, and I was determined to put it into action.
“Tomorrow we go to the police academy,” said my friend. “And we find Odelia’s new love, and we make sure that we discover all the bad things about him, so we can tell her, and she will fall out of love again.”
“Good idea,” I said wholeheartedly. It certainly looked like a solid plan to me.
It might be tough, but it needed to be done.
At that moment, a face popped up over the fence, then disappeared again.
If I wasn’t mistaken, it looked like the Germinator.
“Did you see that, Dooley?” I asked.
“See what, Max?”
“The Germinator. I could have sworn—there! There he is again!”
We both stared as the superhero reappeared, his head slowly rising above the fence. He studied us just as intently as we studied him and finally seemed to decide that we posed no threat to him. Then he climbed over the fence and dropped into our backyard.
He was still wearing a mask, and was dressed in his bumblebee costume, which looked a little silly, I thought. But then, to me, all superheroes look silly. I guess it’s the Lycra. It just makes me wince when a grown man or woman wears so much Lycra.
“You guys haven’t by any chance seen a burglar, have you?” asked the Germinator as he stood before us, his hands planted on his hips and looking this way and that. “I could have sworn he was heading this way.”
“No, we haven’t seen a burglar, Mr. Germinator,” said Dooley.
“Darn it,” he said in a remarkably deep and gravelly voice.
Unless I was mistaken, he was deliberately lowering it to sound more imposing and butch—a little like Christian Bale in those Batman movies.
Oddly enough, there was something familiar about the guy, though I couldn’t quite put my finger on it.
“I almost had him, but he gave me the slip.” He pulled a canister containing some unknown substance from the utility belt strapped around his waist and gave it a shake.
“Plenty left,” he murmured, more to himself than to us. “Won’t need a refill anytime soon.”
“What is that stuff, Mr. Germinator?” asked Dooley.
But of course, the superhero didn’t respond. He might be a superhero and possess superpowers, but clearly talking to cats was not among them. Maybe he was able to talk to bumblebees, seeing as he was dressed like one.
“It’s probably that germicide Jerry Vale mentioned,” I said.
“Oh, right,” said Dooley. “Yeah, that makes sense.”
“Okay, I’ll leave you guys to it,” he said. “If you see the burglar, give me a shout, will you? I’m always around if a human in need needs me.” He gave me a look. “Or a cat.”
And then he was off. Not by flying away, as I would have expected, but by simply walking away and disappearing from view.
I had never seen a bumblebee walk when it could fly, but then maybe this guy wasn’t a real bumblebee at all, but just a human playing dress-up.
“He looks like a nice person, Max,” said Dooley. “Though Gran might not like it that he is encroaching on her domain.”
I gave him a look of admiration. “Wow, look at you with the big words, buddy. Encroaching on Gran’s domain, forsooth.”
“Well, Gran always says she fears the day another Neighborhood Watch will form and it will start to patrol the same neighborhood and encroach on her domain. Looks like that day has finally arrived, only it isn’t a Neighborhood Watch but a superhero.”
At that moment, a second man appeared. This one wasn’t dressed like a bumblebee at all but was still playing dress-up.
“He looks like a burglar, Max,” said Dooley.
“He does,” I agreed.
The guy was dressed in one of those black tracksuits that are all the rage amongst the burglarious set, and had placed a mask on his face so we wouldn’t guess his identity. He was also wearing a beanie on top of his head to complete the outfit.
“Mr. Bumblebee told us to warn him if we saw the burglar, Max,” said Dooley. “But he didn’t say how we should do that.”
“Probably by screaming at the top of our lungs,” I suggested.
And since both Dooley and I abhor burglars, we screamed as loud as we could.
The burglar stiffened and stared at us for a beat, then hurried off and jumped the fence.
Before long, the Germinator made a return visit to our backyard.
“The burglar went that way, Mr. Germinator,” said Dooley as he pointed at the back fence.
“Thanks, bud,” said the superhero. “I knew I could count on Odelia’s cats.”
And then he, too, jumped the fence and was gone.
For a few beats, nothing happened, but then a terrifying racket ensued from the other side of that fence, and before long, lights came on in the house and also in the houses next door, and people leaned out of their bedroom windows to see what was going on.
“It’s the Germinator!” Kurt Mayfield yelled. “He’s caught a crook! Look!”