A Small Town Christmas

by Sheila Roberts

  “Hey, are we going to watch this movie or not?” Zach snapped.

  “Yeah. Sure,” said Ray, and he sat there on the couch the rest of the night with a smirk on his face.

  Crab-in-the-pot syndrome, Zach thought irritably. There was nothing a guy who’d been burned liked better than to know his buddies were suffering right along with him. Just let a man try to climb out of the pot, or, in Zach’s case, not fall in, and they were reaching out to pull him down into the hot water with the rest of them. But Zach wasn’t going to end up like Ray, led around by his zipper, taken for a ride, and then tossed and left living in a ratty apartment, using garage sale pots and pans because he’d lost his shirt somewhere in divorce court. Oh, no. Not him. And having a cat didn’t make a man domestic.

  Zach’s new furry friend came out of hiding once Ray was gone and the television was off. Zach suddenly realized it had been hours since the animal had been outside. Cats went outside at night, right? That gave them a chance to do their business, hunt, cat around.

  “It’s time to do your thing, dude,” he announced and walked to the front door.

  The cat followed tentatively.

  Zach swung the door wide, an invitation to freedom. A cold gust whooshed in. It was sleeting now and he suddenly felt like a Scrooge.

  Well, it couldn’t be helped. He didn’t want to have to deal with getting the smell of cat pee out of his wood floors or the carpet. “Probably lots of mice out there for you to chase,” he said, trying to put a good spin on the situation. “Come on.”

  The cat slinked to the door, stuck his head out and sniffed. He raised one tentative paw.

  “Out you go,” said Zach, using the door to nudge him onto the porch.

  Instead of getting the message and going out, the cat whirled and started in the other direction.

  Zach couldn’t say he blamed the little guy, but he was sure Tom had to take a whiz after all this time. He grabbed the animal, saying, “Come on now, dude, you’ve got to go do your business.”

  He gave the cat a gentle toss and shut the door firmly.

  And then felt like King Rat as he headed for his nice, warm bed.

  He felt even worse in the morning when he opened the front door and Tom darted back into the house, his fur wet.

  Zach put some canned cat food in a cottage cheese container and set it on the floor. The animal settled in front of it and started chowing down like it was his last meal.

  “Sorry about sending you out in the cold last night, guy. That was a shitty thing to do.”

  The cat ignored him, tossing back a mouthful of Tuna Surprise and giving it a vicious chew with his sharp little teeth. No leg-rubbing today.

  Zach couldn’t blame him. He heaved a sigh of resignation. The last thing he wanted to mess with was a litter box, but if he was going to do a good deed he might as well do it right. “I’ll make it up to you, bud. No more cold nights stuck outside.”

  True to his promise, he hightailed it over to Pet Palace as soon as the place opened.

  A huge warehouse of a store, it had everything for every kind of pet imaginable. Shoppers stood mesmerized in front of tropical fish tanks, compared prices on gerbil cages, and strolled up and down the aisles with their dogs on a leash, checking out chew toys and doggy sweaters.

  Funny he’d never been in here before considering the fact that he was hanging out with the owner’s daughter. And it hadn’t occurred to him before now to wonder why Blair didn’t have a pet when her family owned a pet supply store. What was that about? Probably, like him, she’d lost an animal she loved and decided she didn’t want to go through such misery again.

  Zach found the cat section and picked up the first litter box he saw. Then he snagged a couple of bags of litter and, what the heck, a cat toy, and started for the one open checkout stand.

  There she was, standing at her cash register, ready for business, the little elf from the night before.

  For a moment, his steps stalled. He should put the stuff back and go somewhere else. She’d think he was stalking her.

  No she won’t, he argued to himself. Why would she? Just be cool and casual.

  Today she wore a brown polo shirt tucked into khaki slacks. The company logo, a mutt sitting in front of a castle, was emblazoned over her left boob. The uniform was ugly, but it confirmed what Zach had suspected the night before. She did, indeed, have a nice body.

  Her name tag (right boob) showed that she had a nice name, too. Happily serving our pets: Merilee. It was the kind of name that made a guy think laughter and good times and a good life.

  Zach quickly reminded himself that he already had all that.

  At the sight of him she stared wide-eyed and blinked. Then she blushed. Then she stammered, “Good morning. Welcome to Pet Palace.”

  So, he flustered her. She thought he was hot. The ego stroke made him smile. Until he remembered he didn’t want anything stroked by this kind of woman. “Hi Merilee. I forgot something important,” he said, setting down Tom’s toilet supplies.

  The simple statement put her at ease and she smiled. “So, your new cat is an inside kitty.”

  “He wants to be. He wasn’t real happy when I put him outside last night.”

  This bit of sharing produced a disapproving little frown. “They do like to go outside, but not in the cold and rain.”

  “Hey, who does?” Zach cracked, trying to make light of his heartless behavior of the night before.

  “I do,” she said brightly, then looked like she was reconsidering her confession. “I like to hike,” she explained.

  “Yeah?” He liked to hike. Most women he dated didn’t, though. They were always worried about their hair or their clothes getting dirty.

  “I think walking in the rain is romantic,” she confessed. This brought another deeper blush, and she kept her gaze riveted on her cash register.

  “You’re the first woman I’ve met who actually thinks that,” Zach said. “You don’t worry about your hair?”

  She gave a handful of curls a self-conscious tug. “It’s hopeless.”

  “Naw, it’s cute.” It was. He wasn’t flirting, just making an honest observation. Dude. What are you thinking? No more “honest observations.”

  She cleared her throat and got busy ringing up his purchases. “You’re smart to keep your cat inside.”

  Zach almost reminded her, He’s not really my cat. He’s just staying with me for a while. Instead, he said, “Oh? Why?”

  “It’s safer for them,” she said, her voice taking on authority. “They can contract diseases like feline leukemia or get hit by cars. So inside is best. Credit or debit?” she added after telling him his total.

  That much just so the animal could shit indoors? “Uh, debit,” Zach said, fishing out his card. The cost of being a Good Samaritan was starting to climb.

  “Thanks for coming in,” she said when they’d finished the transaction. “If you need any help with your cat, I’m here.”

  She may as well have said, ‘Call me.’ With those big green eyes and that hot little bod he could have been tempted. If she’d given him any sign she wasn’t looking for something that led to the church altar and then divorce court, if he wasn’t already with someone who had no dreams of white wedding gowns.

  I’m here.

  Which meant that from now on, he would have to make sure he was … there.

  * * *

  Merilee poked her head outside her second-floor apartment door. Good. The coast was clear. She slipped outside, her garbage bag in tow, and hurried for the Dumpsters out back. When she got to the ground floor she did a quick bolt past Mrs. Winnamucker’s unit, her heart beating an anxious tattoo. Fortunately, no curler-clad head poked out the door to ask where she was going.

  Thank God. That had been known to happen. Mrs. Winnamucker, manager of the Angel Arms Apartments, took her job seriously and kept a careful eye on all the residents. (Which was why most of them were over fifty and sedately settled. No one with a girl-gone-wil
d kind of social life stayed for long.)

  Mrs. Winnamucker especially kept an eye on Merilee, even though she was a quiet renter—never a wild party or a TV turned up too loud. But Merilee worked in a pet store, and in Mrs. Winnamucker’s mind that made her suspect. She was a resident who might just fraternize with the enemy: animals. The Angel Arms Apartments didn’t allow pets (a new policy they adopted right after Merilee moved in) and Mrs. Winnamucker took her job as a guardian of the complex’s carpets seriously. Living on the ground floor just two apartments away from her was, well, dangerous. At least it was dangerous these days because Merilee was harboring a cat.

  But what could she do? Queenie had been one of several kitties the animal shelter had brought to Pet Palace, hoping to find families for them. All had gotten homes but poor Queenie. For some reason she had gone beyond her expiration date. The thought of the little white cat being destroyed had been more than Merilee could bear, so she’d done something very un-Merilee. She’d broken the rules and smuggled Queenie into her apartment. And she wasn’t sorry. Not one bit!

  She was, however, nervous. If Mrs. Winnamucker got wind of this, if someone heard Queenie meowing, they’d both be cast out of the Angel Arms and into the cold sans damage deposit. She could always go home to her parents but because Merilee’s mother was allergic to cat dander Queenie would be homeless. Merilee couldn’t do that to the poor cat. If only she could afford a nice, snug rental house with pet-friendly landlords. Sigh.

  The best way out of this was to find a home for her furry houseguest soon, before she got caught. Queenie was such a sweet cat. Surely someone would want her. Merilee had put a picture up on the bulletin board at the library and placed an ad on Petfinder.com but no response so far. She’d tried to convince both of her sisters that they needed an animal, but they’d turned her down with flimsy excuses like allergies and busy schedules. Her younger sister, Liz, had even quipped that she was already engaged to an animal and one was enough. Ha, ha.

  What was wrong with people, anyway? Didn’t they get how dependent animals were on them? It was too bad there weren’t more people out there like the man she’d met in the grocery store.

  Envisioning his smile heated Merilee to the point that it made her coat unnecessary. If only she could have said something clever to him when he came into Pet Palace maybe she’d have had a date with him instead of her TV tonight. If only she’d thought to toss her hair, or run her tongue across her teeth or do any number of things that worked for women in the movies. Except she didn’t have enough hair to toss. (You should never have cut it. Fool!) And doing the tongue-tooth thing when talking about feline leukemia would have made her look demented. Anyway, it was too late now, so there was no point in even thinking about it.

  Merilee made it to the Dumpster and threw away the bag with the damning litter box contents. Mrs. Winnamucker had been known to poke around the Dumpster for telltale signs of excessive partying or drug use but luckily for Merilee it was winter. Even Mrs. Winnamucker had her limits. Anyway, who here did she think was going to go wild?

  Merilee, of course. If only.

  The evidence of her criminal behavior ditched, she pulled her jacket close and hurried back toward her apartment. She was ten feet from Mrs. Winnamucker’s door when the manager stepped out, her plump body encased in a long, red quilted coat, her gray curls hidden under a jaunty red hat.

  With her round face, wire-rimmed glasses perched on a button nose, and sweet granny smile, one could almost mistake the woman for Mrs. Claus. Looks were deceiving. Mrs. Winnamucker could sprout fangs at a moment’s notice. Merilee knew. She’d seen it happen.

  “Hello, Miss White,” she greeted Merilee in the deceptively sweet voice she favored.

  Merilee’s steps faltered, but she pulled herself together and smiled at the manager like a woman who had nothing to hide. “Hi, Mrs. Winnamucker. Nasty night, isn’t it?”

  “It certainly is,” said the woman. “I’m surprised you’re out in it, my dear.” She added a cocked eyebrow to the smile. Every time Mrs. Winnamucker cocked an eyebrow Merilee felt as if she was in one of those police interrogation rooms you saw on TV shows, getting the old good cop–bad cop routine. Except in Mrs. Winnamucker’s case there would never be a good cop. Him she’d have devoured for breakfast right along with a box of donuts.

  “I’m just dumping some garbage,” Merilee stammered. “I’ve been cleaning my refrigerator.”

  Mrs. Winnamucker nodded but now her mouth had turned down. “Velma Tuttle thought she heard a cat the other day.”

  Velma Tuttle, the old bat on the other side of Merilee, couldn’t hear a Rottweiler barking in her ear even with her hearing aid turned up.

  “Have you heard anything, Miss White?” asked Mrs. Winnamucker.

  “No, but we are surrounded by houses and there are several cats in the neighborhood.”

  “Yes, well, I suppose. Have a nice night.” Mrs. Winnamucker heaved her bag over her shoulder, locked her door, and marched toward the parking lot.

  Merilee watched her go with a frown. The woman didn’t need to bother with a car. She could probably manage fine with a broom.

  * * *

  Ambrose was still vague on the specifics of what he had to do to keep his ninth life, but the reason he was here with this particular human came to him in a blinding flash of clarity when the man was dishing up his food.

  “Hang in there, guy,” he had said while Ambrose brushed against his legs to remind his new human that he was starving to death.

  Hang in there, guy. Hang in there!

  The words hurled Ambrose into the past. It was the Christmas of his second life. Big white trucks with the letters FedEx printed on their side were rushing everywhere. He’d been minding his own business, just getting ready to cross the street when one of them rushed right into him, adding a new word to his vocabulary: splat.

  Out of nowhere a stranger had appeared, picked Ambrose up, laid him on a car seat, and rushed off to the animal hospital. Hang in there, guy. Hang in there!

  So that was where he’d seen this man before. No wonder his face had seemed familiar. It was the same face that had looked at him with such concern in that car all those lives ago. The man had grown older—bigger, too—but he and that noble youth were one in the same. Once upon a life, back when Ambrose was still innocent and trusting, this man had tried to save him.

  Surely it was no coincidence that their paths had crossed. Twice now. It was payback time.

  So how could Ambrose repay him? The man had to need rescuing, but what, exactly, did he need rescuing from? He seemed to be doing fine.

  Ambrose carefully observed his new human, checking him out from many different vantage points: the top of the dresser, the foot of the bed, the fireplace mantel, the floor, and, of course, the man’s lap. Like all the other humans Ambrose had known in his past lives, this one dedicated a great deal of time to sleeping, grooming, and playing with his food—all good uses of one’s time, as any cat could attest. But he also wasted much time and energy ripping out and replacing parts of his house. And talking on his cell phone.

  Ambrose didn’t care for those objects. A female human using one had robbed him of a life.

  She’d been in a car, talking into it and looking the other way, and before Ambrose could scat out of the way it was Thump, thump, good-bye Life Number Six. Those things were dangerous toys, if you asked Ambrose. Didn’t humans talk to each other enough as it was? Why did they have to carry their phones with them everywhere?

  Still, much as he hated them, Ambrose understood that he could learn a lot listening when a human played with one. So he hung around and eaves dropped while the man talked into his, mostly to females.

  One was Mom. Ambrose knew what a mom was. In all his dealings with families he had found that she was most often the person who fed him. She prepared food for the other humans, too, and kept their house clean. (Sometimes the males helped, but usually the females did most of the work.) Moms fussed over the s
mall ones and mated with the large male frequently. In spite of all that mating, moms rarely produced a litter. The few who did wound up appearing on television or in magazines. The rest managed to occasionally produce one small human called a baby, and when that happened, oh, the fussing that went on. Human babies took forever to grow into children. And children … ugh. They could be torture. They did everything from pulling a guy’s tail to stuffing him into doll clothes. Very humiliating. Moms still loved their children in spite of what the little monsters did to their cats, and children all gravitated to their moms. Whatever their age, they would often seek out those moms for long conversations about things like school projects and boys or work or how to cook a turkey.

  For some unknown reason, this man didn’t call his, but she called him and he didn’t seem very happy about it. He said things to her like “Yeah, the remodel is going fine.”

  Remodel. Was that what you called the mess the guy was making?

  He also said things like “I don’t think I can come” and “Sorry, Mom. I’ve got plans.”

  Tonight’s plans appeared to be with someone called Baby, obviously not the small, diapered version since this particular baby knew how to operate a phone. When the man talked with her he said things like “I can hardly wait to see you in it, Baby” and “Come on over. I’ll get takeout.”

  Baby was obviously someone important, Ambrose decided, as he and the man sat on the big leather couch, the man petting Ambrose as he talked.

  It didn’t sound like Ambrose was going to meet Mom anytime soon, but he would see Baby tonight. Ambrose licked his paw and began to slick back the fur on his head. A guy wanted to look his best when he met someone important in his human’s life.

  * * *

  Ambrose stared in horror as Baby stepped through the door. He knew this woman, this taker of lives, this callous creature who talked on her cell phone when she drove and ran over helpless cats who had so much to live for. His tail quivered at the memory of her standing over him, still talking on her cell phone.

  “What do I do? Pick it up? Are you crazy? It might bite me. Oh, God, I’m going to be sick.”