Henry the Cat

by Jeri Anne Agee

  Mrs. Doolittle said, “Birdie Mae and Sally, thank you girls so much for finding our sweet little Marshall!”

  As we walked back to the Doolittles’, Mrs. Doolittle told us that the neighbor had been having some work done on his house and had left the door that leads to the crawl space open for several hours. Marshall must have gone in during that time and probably fell asleep. By the time he woke up, the door was closed.

  Mrs. Doolittle turned to Marshall and said in a baby voice, “Poor wittle baby, let’s get inside and get you cleaned up and get some kibble in your tummy.”

  Peter’s face turned bright red, and as they carried Marshall home we heard him say, “Mom, do you have to talk to the dog like that? It’s embarrassing!” Sally and I both giggled and waved goodbye.

  And then I remembered Henry. I looked around to see where he had gone, but he was nowhere to be found. I didn’t know if he had just wandered off again, or if he had disappeared into thin air.

  Chapter 6

  SALLY’S BROTHER DARREL

  After all the excitement at the Doolittles’, we decided to go to Sally’s house for a little while. On the way over I kept an eye out for Henry while Sally talked about how cool it was finding Marshall, and on and on about “our” secret cat.

  As soon as we headed up the driveway to Sally’s house, I saw Henry in their garage. His big white fluffy body was sitting in the box strapped to the front of Darrel’s bicycle. Sally’s older brother Darrel is in fifth grade, and he loves his bike. He rides it everywhere and carries all sorts of stuff in the box tied to the front like a basket. He’s always finding and bringing home animals in it, like lizards, snakes, injured birds, even stray puppies. And now Henry was in it!

  Henry was giving himself a bath by licking a front paw and rubbing it across his face. I stopped as soon as I saw him, and Sally must have sensed something because she stopped too and said, “What’s the matter? You see Henry, don’t you? What is he doing?”

  I answered, “Yes, he’s in your garage sitting in the box on Darrel’s bike!”

  Sally and I ran up the driveway and into the garage. Henry ignored us and continued to clean his face. When we got a bit closer, he hopped out of the box and started circling around Darrel’s bicycle. I looked at Sally and was just about to tell her that Henry was on the move again when I had another feeling like something was about to happen. I knew a vision was probably coming soon, I could just tell. I had never had any of my visions this close together. Did it have anything to do with Henry, or was it just a coincidence?

  Just then, the door swung open and Darrel bounded out of the house fully decked out in his bike helmet, knee pads, and elbow pads. It must be race day, I thought. Darrel races his bike on some dirt tracks right outside of town, and he’s really good at it.

  He said, “Move it, girls, I’ve got a bike race to get to!”

  At that moment, my feeling got even stronger. I closed my eyes, and saw a vision of Darrel riding his bike down the big hill in our neighborhood—and his back tire blowing out, causing him to go flying off the bike and rolling down the hill.

  Suddenly, a loud meow right next to me startled me out of my vision. I opened my eyes and looked down, and there was Henry sitting right next to Darrel’s bicycle’s back tire. I bent over to get a better look and saw something shiny and silver sticking out. What was that? I leaned in closer and saw that it was a nail head.

  That would cause his tire to blow! He was going to get hurt!

  Darrel hopped on his bike but before he could pedal off I said, “Darrel, wait! There’s a nail in your back tire!”

  He jumped off the bike, looked at the tire, and yelled “DAD!”

  Mr. Hope came out of the house and Darrel showed him the nail in his tire.

  He said, “It’s a good thing you saw this before the race. If you had been racing and this tire blew out, it could have been really bad.”

  Sally blurted out, “Birdie Mae noticed it first, so she basically saved his life!”

  Mr. Hope said, “Well, that may be a little dramatic, but I do think she saved him from a possible accident. Thank you, Birdie Mae.”

  “Yeah, thanks Birdie Mae. That could have been bad,” said Darrel.

  I smiled and said, “You’re welcome,” and tried to keep an eye on Henry as he strolled down the driveway. He had showed me the nail! I wondered if I should follow him. I was almost ready for our adventures to be over for the day. If this kept up, I’d be saving animals and people all day, every day.

  I decided not to go after Henry this time, and Sally and I headed back to the park. But as we were walking, I looked behind us—and there was Henry, following us from a distance.

  Chapter 7

  GRANDMA RAY

  For the next couple of nights, Henry showed up outside my window, but I had not seen him around anywhere else since the day we found Marshall and helped Darrel with his tire. I was kind of glad to have a break, because I was starting to think that every time I saw him it meant that something was going to happen, and that meant I really should be on my game. And that takes a lot of focus.

  But the more I thought about it, the more I thought that Henry was trying to get me to follow him somewhere. What if my visions had interrupted wherever it was he was trying to take me? As Grandma Mae said, maybe he needed my help, and that’s why I could see him.

  The other possibility was, what if I now needed Henry to be able to see my visions? I’ve been thinking about that since Henry showed up. I had so many visions that first day I saw him, and I haven’t had any since. I’d even tried to have a few visions at school, but nothing happened. I really needed to talk to Grandma Mae again soon.

  Peter told everyone at school how we found his dog, Marshall. And Sally told everyone at school how I saved her brother, Darrel. People kept coming up to me all day asking about it. I guess I was the news for the day. It must have been a slow day.

  Even Virginia Flanker asked me about it, which is surprising since she pretty much hates me. Wait—Mama says I shouldn’t use the word “hate”—so, what I meant to say was, I was surprised when Virginia asked me about it since she pretty much dislikes me. Virginia is tall and has long blond hair that she wears in a high ponytail on top of her head and she usually wears dresses to school. Mama says maybe she isn’t very nice to me and Sally because she’s jealous that we’re friends with Peter Doolittle—she has a crush on Peter. Yuck!

  But it’s true. Everyone knows that Virginia Flanker likes Peter Doolittle because she doesn’t try to hide it. One time she kissed him on the cheek at school! Double yuck! And, just like I told Mama, I don’t know what she has against me and Sally because we have always been nice to her, even when she used to put salt in her hair and then suck it off. She still does it sometimes. She sucks on the end of her ponytail to get it wet and then takes the salt shaker and shakes salt all over the end of it and then sucks the salt off. Mama couldn’t think of a thing to say when I told her about that.

  Anyway, hearing everyone talking about Peter’s dog reminded me of the time Billy’s dog followed him to school and someone left the door open and he wandered in. Billy was already in class and the dog ran all over the school looking for him. When he finally found him, he jumped up on Billy’s desk and licked his face clean and Billy’s mom had to come and pick the dog up.

  I guess if Henry decided to do that, no one else would see him! That would be kind of cool. I still wasn’t sure I liked being the only one who could see him, though.

  Later that week, I woke up one morning after dreaming about my Grandma Ray—though I couldn’t remember much about my dream except that she was in it. She’s my other grandma. I have a Grandma Mae and a Grandma Ray. It gets real confusing sometimes. Grandma Mae is the one who told me about my gift. She is my daddy’s mama and I was named after her. Then I have my Grandma Ray, who is my mama’s mama. She lives nearby too, but I hadn’t seen her in a few weeks.

  That morning, I woke up thinking about her. Usually, that w
ould make me smile because I’ve learned all sorts of fun things from Grandma Ray. Things like: how to tell time, how to hula-hoop, how to belly dance, how to golf, how to bowl, how to play tennis, how to cross-stitch, how to pretend you didn’t know you were speeding when the police pull you over, and lots of other cool stuff.

  But that day, my dream about Grandma Ray left me with an uneasy feeling. I was really hoping it was just because I was hungry.

  Chapter 8

  THE WALK

  After I ate breakfast, I noticed Henry sitting outside my window. I opened it and let him into the house for the first time. He just purred and rubbed up against me and then curled up on my bed and went to sleep.

  Just then, the doorbell rang. I leaned out my window and saw Sally on my front porch. I left Henry on the bed and put my jacket on and told Mama and Daddy goodbye. They were busy chasing Bubba around trying to get him dressed and ready to go with them to run some errands. As usual, he was scampering around the house in his underwear. This time he was playing cops and robbers. He had a mask over his eyes like a robber and a belt around his waist with handcuffs and toy guns in a holster. Sally and I had to laugh as we closed the door and left for the park.

  When we got to the bottom of the driveway, I was surprised to see Henry waiting there for us. I looked at him . . . and then back at the house. A minute ago he was on my bed! How did he get here?

  We turned toward the park, but Henry must have had other plans because he started walking in the opposite direction.

  I told Sally about Henry, and we both agreed that we needed to follow him.

  We walked behind him for a couple of blocks and Sally said, “This is fun! I wonder who we’ll help today. Maybe we can be like a superhero team or something!”

  I smiled at her and just shook my head. It did seem like it could be the start of an adventure, but I had an uneasy feeling. And it seemed to be getting worse.

  Before Sally and I knew it, we had walked and talked so long that we had followed Henry out of our neighborhood and toward the train tracks. We then followed him along the train tracks—well, I followed him, and Sally kept asking me every ten seconds if he was still there. As we went farther on the tracks, the houses turned to farms, and fields of cotton stretched as far as you could see. We saw an old cotton gin in the distance, and it reminded me of the time Sally and I got to jump around in one of the big bins of freshly picked cotton.

  Then it happened . . . the uneasy feeling I was having turned into a vision. When I closed my eyes, I saw Grandma Ray lying on the floor of her kitchen in the dark with groceries scattered everywhere around her. Was she hurt? I didn’t know where Henry was taking us, but I knew that we had to get to Grandma Ray’s house and fast. Maybe that’s why she had been on my mind lately. I knew something must be wrong.

  I told Sally that I’d just had one of my feelings and that we needed to hurry up. Just then, we came to the clearing behind my Grandma’s house. I recognized it immediately. Had Henry been leading us here?

  When we got to the backyard I could see Grandma Ray’s car parked in the driveway with the trunk open. We walked a little closer and noticed that the screen door to the kitchen was cracked open. Henry had disappeared into the house.

  I called out to Grandma Ray from the backyard, but there was no answer.

  When we reached the back door, I yelled to her again. “Grandma, it’s me, Birdie Mae.”

  Then we heard her voice call out, “Birdie Mae, I’m in the kitchen . . . I’ve fallen and I can’t get up!”

  We went inside, and I saw Grandma Ray lying on the floor, looking just like I’d pictured!

  “Oh my gosh, Grandma! What happened?”

  “I slipped when I was bringing in the groceries, and I think I may have broken my ankle. Thank goodness you came along when you did, or I may have been sleeping on the kitchen floor tonight.” She laughed when she said it.

  I was glad to see that Grandma still had her sense of humor, at least. But that would’ve been terrible for her!

  I didn’t know what to do at first, so I called Daddy. He said to sit tight and that he and Mama would be there as soon as they could. Sally and I were too small to pick Grandma Ray up off the floor, so we sat down beside her while we waited for Mama and Daddy.

  After about ten minutes they came running through the back door. Mama let out a loud gasp and ran over to Grandma Ray as she said, “Mama, what happened? Are you okay?”

  Grandma said, “Well, don’t just stand there asking me questions, help me up. I need a little help getting up off the floor. I do think I may have a broken ankle.”

  As Daddy picked Grandma up and carried her to the door, Mama was already on the phone with Dr. Roberts making arrangements for him to meet them at the doctor’s office.

  Sally and I could hear Grandma complaining about it the whole time Daddy carried her to the car. I wondered if Grandma Ray was afraid to go to the doctor like I am sometimes. Mostly I don’t like it because I don’t want to get a shot. Would Grandma Ray have to get a shot?

  We ran to catch up with Daddy while Mama was still on the phone with the doctor. Neither one of us wanted to walk all the way back home, even if it did mean taking a trip to the doctor’s office first. We sat in the backseat with Grandma Ray and she rested her legs across our legs. It reminded me of the first time I went to Birmingham, a few months ago.

  I remember I couldn’t believe my eyes when I saw all those tall buildings and cars and people everywhere. I might have seen more of it, but Grandma Ray had been in the backseat with me with her feet propped up on my legs then, too.

  She kept saying, “Birdie Mae, look at my feet—look at the size of those things!” Mama had been taking Grandma Ray to the doctor to have some big bumps called “bunions” taken off her feet. Bunions rhymes with onions, that’s the only way I can remember it. I don’t know why Grandma Ray wanted me to look at them. Mama says when people get older they sometimes like to talk about everything that’s wrong with them.

  When we got to the doctor’s office, a nurse came out with a wheelchair, and they took Grandma Ray into the building with Mama following close behind.

  Daddy decided to take me and Sally home and then come back to get Mama and Grandma Ray. Once we were alone in the car with Daddy, he gave us the third degree about why we were all the way over at Grandma Ray’s. Then he quickly realized maybe he didn’t want to know all the details and said, “Oh never mind, it’s just a good thing you came by to check on her!”

  Sometimes Daddy forgets about my “special abilities,” and then he remembers. Had Mama told Daddy about me being able to see an invisible cat? I didn’t think now was a good time to bring it up.

  On the drive home, I kept an eye out for Henry, but he was nowhere to be found.

  Later that night Mama told me that Grandma Ray did break her ankle. She got a hot pink cast on it, and she wanted me to sign it the next time I was over there.

  Chapter 9

  FRIENDS AND AN INVISIBLE CAT

  The following afternoon, Sally, Peter, Billy, and I met up after school at the neighborhood park at the top of the hill. Most afternoons we try to meet at the park because it’s a pretty cool park and it’s one of our favorite places. It also just happens to be conveniently located on the hill at the end of my street. From one side of the park you can look down and see all the houses in the neighborhood. From the other side, you can see a giant paper mill. Sometimes when the wind changes you can smell that paper mill for miles around and let me tell you it does NOT smell good.

  At night, when it’s all lit up, it looks like a big city. Sometimes Sally and I pretend it really is a big city and pick out which building we want to live in. Then we take turns thinking up what we want to be when we grow up. Sally can’t decide between having a lemonade stand and driving an ice cream truck. I don’t blame her, because those are both really good choices. Sometimes we decide that I’ll do one and she’ll do the other. But what I really want to do is ride on the back of one
of those really big garbage trucks and jump off and on at each stop like the garbage men do. I don’t know if I’ll be able to do that and drive an ice cream truck, but I guess I can try.

  We all took turns talking about what we wanted to be when we grew up. I knew Billy and Peter would say something about video games and Ping-Pong. It seems like that’s all they do when they are together.

  Billy looked at Peter and said, “Did you hear about the Ping-Pong competition at school this year? We have one every year but I’ve never had anyone to enter it with before.”

  Peter answered, “Yes, I did hear about it. Let’s do it! But we need to practice more.”

  Sally said, “Practice more? All you two do is practice Ping-Pong and play video games. I don’t even know when you get your school work done. Also, you know who wins the competition every year? Doyle and Virginia. So, actually, you two better practice a lot so someone else can finally beat them.”

  Peter said, “You two should enter, too! What do you all think?”

  I did not think that was a good idea! We were all talking about the Ping-Pong competition and how much practice Sally and I would need for it when I suddenly noticed a big white fluffy ball in the distance. It didn’t take me long to figure out what it was. The longer I looked, the bigger it got, until it was clear that Henry the cat was heading our way. He was hard to miss, since his big white fluffy body stood out in the bright green grass he was walking through. I was still amazed that no one else could see him.

  As soon as he reached us, he let out a meow and rubbed up against my leg. I looked around to see if anyone noticed, but no one seemed to see or hear him, as usual. I feel bad for not petting him, but if I did, it would look extra weird. I was happy to see him, but also a little nervous, as you can imagine. It seems when Henry is around, some kind of adventure is also right around the corner.