My cat Cleo and I understand each other. When I got her a year ago at the SPCA, she was a 6-month-old semi-Angora kitten that nobody wanted. She let me scratch her head so I took her home. She and I have become, well, not exactly bosom buddies, but we respect one another and she will do what I ask if she wants to.
When she is ready to go outside and play she sits on the haunches and stares at me until I notice her. Cleo’s stare in unnerving. She has yellow eyes as big as quarters and they never blink. I get her telepathic message soon enough.
To work my lungs and teach her words, I ask the obvious, “Cleo, do you want to go out?” She gives me a look like I should know what she wants. Streaking for the door, she’s gone like a shot.
Yesterday morning I let her out and that was the last I saw of her for a while. The rain started and got heavy. I called her to come in but there was no answer. I stood on the porch and yelled loud enough to wake the dead. Still no answer. I figured Cleo ran into the garage, which sits below the house, to get out of the wet.
By this time the rain was really pelting down a storm. It was heavy and coming down like it must have been for Noah when the flood began. Thinking that Cleo didn’t want to brave the downpour, or frightened at the sound of the rain, I took my big umbrella and went down to the garage to look for her.
She wasn’t in the garage.
After a half hour and no Cleo appeared at the sliding glass window that goes from my office to the front porch, I decided she might have taken refuge in my barn. The barn is at the bottom of the hill. It is a long way for me or a cat to walk in such wet weather. With my big umbrella in hand, once again I braved the weather and went down the hill to the barn.
“Cleo,” I called again.
There she was, in the barn, roosting on the rafters. She came to me and I put her under my arm. With the umbrella over both of us I climbed the hill and dumped her through the front door. Then I went back to my writing.
A few minutes later, like nothing had happened, Cleo found her place on my desk next to my word processor. I do all my writing in my bedroom. The second computer, in my office, I use for research mostly. Cleo found her usual place in the open space next to the keyboard and flopped down.
Like always, she watched the screen. I always feel she is judging what I write. At times she puts her paw on the keys to show me how it should be done. I mostly cured her of that. She has learned not to gnaw at the mouse wire or, with her paw, change my story into cat language. She lays there until I give her a short hello and scratch her neck for a moment. Satisfied, she jumps down and climbs on my bed. Sometimes, if she is in a hurry, she will jump from my desk directly to my bed. When Cleo sprawls out and goes to sleep with her feet in the air, she looks more like a big hairy gray pillow than a normal cat.
Lately, Cleo and I come to an agreement. I keep my house cool. The floor, by the time I ready for bed, is cooler than the air. My feet are in slippers and sometimes they get cold by bedtime. After I have been writing for several hours, I sit in the easy chair nearby and watch television on my wall screen. The place where I sit, after being there for a half hour or so, gets nice and warm. Meanwhile, Cleo, on my bed, lays on the exact spot where my feet will go when I get into bed.
I turn off the lights and climb into bed. Where Cleo has lain, it is warm and toasty. Cleo’s happy and I’m happy. We have the perfect contract. I give her a warm chair to sleep on and my feet are warm while I sleep.
Gene Paleno is an author and illustrator living in Witter Springs.
