He could hear them coming, his ears sharp enough to pick up the sound when there was still time. He ran to the door and started meowing, hoping for attention before they got here. Usually, he was fine and he’d be let in before they arrived. Just once, they had not opened the door in time and he had been forced to hide in one of the bushes nearby. It was not a good enough spot and he hoped that he wouldn’t be noticed.
It’s fourteen months since Kitty came running to the door on Tuesday mornings. Tuesday is garbage collection day and the county trucks made enough sound, the brakes thudding as it stopped by each house, the crane hissing as it picked up the garbage box and emptied it into the truck’s cavernous interior. All the hissing, starting and stopping of the truck scared Kitty. Kitty suckers, we called them and he had meowed his approval at the name, his eyes still big and a little scared after we got him in, that first time when we had not known that he’d be scared by those monsters. After that time, I kept a lookout by the door till he came running. Even if he was in our backyard, he’d come running to get inside. I guess as a cat, it’s hard to know that trucks don’t just plow down fences to get at a cat.
Vacuum cleaners were the other scourge of cats, if you believed him. When the cleaners came, he’d hide under the bed, hoping they wouldn’t stick the nozzle in too far under the bed. How he could know that the turning of the key meant it was the cleaners, I do not know. If anybody else opened the door around the time they were coming, he’d fearlessly go to the living room, looking to see who it was. If it was one of us, he’d know it and be by the door. His scurrying away from a petting session or a nap session was how we knew that the cleaners would be coming in within the next 30 seconds. Once in India, the maid who cleaned the house had stuck the broom a little too far under the bed and struck him. From then on, she was his enemy number one, even though she fed him while we were out of town. He was fine when she came to feed, but if he saw the broom in her hand, he’d stand his ground and hiss at her loudly.
In the end, kidney failure was the real kitty sucker. Did he hear that one coming ? I certainly did not, I could not open the door quickly enough for him to come in, he could not find a hiding place good enough to escape from it. And when it was over, all that remained were bits of his hair in a few places, and an imprint on my brain.
26ths that are Tuesdays are harder than other 26ths. They make me relive the entire three day agony of his last days. This time, it was easier than before. A part of my mind was observing the other part of me agonizing over his death. It was like the whole thing was taking place underwater, the emotions and the hurt muffled by the depths, in slow motion, somehow unreal.
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