Cat Tales Issue #3

by Steve Vernon

  JP’s eyes glittered. “A prize‌…‌!”

  “What?” said Marta, coming back from her father’s side. She stuffed white tissue in her pocket and zipped it up.

  “We’re going to be in the Pet Parade,” said JP. He asked the pastor, “Where is it?”

  While he pulled out a piece of marked paper, I heard Marta say, “Baba, want to be in a parade?”

  The hound bayed her happiness. “Land’s sake, I’m gonna be in a Christmas parade with an angel, wearing my best sweater! Oh, and right after I done been to the groomer’s, too! What a grand day this is turnin’ out to be!”

  “What’s a parade?” asked Patch.

  “It’s a thing humans do Outdoors. They do a big one on TV on Thanksgiving.” I squinted, filing through my TV memories. “There are these things called balloons‌…‌and they fly down the road, but slowly‌…‌And on the ground, there are humans in the leftover costumes that weren’t scary enough for Halloween.”

  “Balloons? Costumes?” Patch’s eyes bugged out.

  “Yeah! You’re gonna be in a parade, Cowboy! But you can’t ride Bronco. ‌…‌’Cuz he’s inna PURSE!” Nikki threw back her head and cackled.

  Her mom looked at her in surprise, mouth starting to smile.

  “Okay, okay, enough about Bronco’s bag,” said JP. “Come on, let’s go!”

  “All right,” said Ms. Daly. “If you need me, call my cell. I agreed to help Mr. and Mrs. Rivera with their booth.”

  JP marched us down one of the roads. Baba kept pace with her long brown legs, which was helpful because JP was moving so fast that all the sights and scents around me blurred together into one big soup. Having the big dog there kept me steady.

  At last, the roads opened up on a row of white scenery, small human buildings and candies, Christmas themes.

  “Is that snow?” asked Patch, reaching a paw towards the scenery.

  Baba gave a big sniff, then snorted. “No, young cat, that’s just cotton and white paint.”

  JP stopped in front of a lady with a funny burgundy vest that went down to her knees. Seeing me, she cooed, “Hi, kitty!”

  “Is this where you sign up for the Pet Parade?” he asked.

  I kept an ear on them while I checked on Patch. Nikki was doing a good job cuddling him close, and even spoke into his ear.

  “Not so close, Baba,” said Marta, leaning back on the dog’s leash.

  “Humans,” said Baba. “They bring you to such interesting-smelling places, then tell you to quit sniffin’. What’s a poor dog to do?”

  “Over here,” said JP, then he trooped away from the snow-scene, Marta and Nikki following.

  Christmas quilts had been hung up between some trees to form the wall of a fort. I smelled dogs behind them.

  Before Nikki stepped behind the curtain, there was an explosion of woofs and barking.

  “Hey! Who’s out there? He’s no dog!”

  “I think it’s a cat!”

  “There’s more than one!”

  “What’s cats doing here?”

  “Gingersnap?” Patch’s voice wavered. He dug his claws into Nikki’s sweater. She crooned at him, but even my fur was fluffed. I couldn’t let Patch get eaten by dogs when we were so close!

  It was Baba who reassured us both.

  “Set your worries down, you cats. Today you’re part of MeMe’s pack. Y’all hear that?” shouted the hound to the dogs as we stepped behind the quilt curtain. “These cats is my pack, so don’t none of y’all go bothering them now!” She eyed every dog in turn: a brown Chihuahua like Sammy, wearing a red and green sweater; a square-bodied terrier who was jumping straight up and down; a black-furred retriever; and a stout but strong-bodied dog with a smushed face. They all leaned on their leashes towards me and Patch.

  The jumping dog stopped, pink tongue lolling. The jingle bell collar he wore around his jangled to a halt. “Whaa, Baba? These really are cats? I never seen cats Outdoors before,” he said.

  “Least, not on a leash.” The retriever rose up on two legs to sniff at Patch’s jacket. My hackles bristled to see such a big strange dog next to the little kit, but Baba caught me and said, “It’s OK, Sir Angel, I see these fellas on walks all the time. They’re my neighbors‌—‌Riss-riss, you leave that kitten alone, you’re raisin’ his dander, see?”

  “Sorry,” said the black dog, and he went back on all fours.

  “Angel,” said the smush-faced dog. “I’ve been smelling angel around my house ever since my sister crossed the Rainbow Bridge,” she said.

  “That happens sometimes,” said the Chihuahua. “They cross back to check on their families. Hey, Angel Cat, you looking after your fam?”

  “No,” I said. “Just helping this kit get to the family he needs to be in.”

  The Chihuahua’s eyes bulged further out of his apple-shaped head. “You mean he doesn’t have his forever home yet?”

  “Forever home?” said the smush-faced dog. “What’s that?”

  “Jenni’s got a pedigree,” said the Chihuahua to me. “Purebred English bulldog. Never lived in a shelter.”

  “I’ve never lived in a shelter,” said Patch.

  “No, sugartail, but you done lived Outdoors your whole life,” said Baba. “Jenni was born Indoors, raised with humans and her dog family until she got big enough to go to her Forever Home. Isn’t that so, Jenni?”

  “Yes, MeMe. But my girls don’t treat me fancy,” said the bulldog, accepting a scritch from her human, a girl about the age of my Gina before I died. I wondered if she’d been at College, too.

  “Your Christmas hoodie sure is fancy, Jenni,” said Riss-riss.

  The bulldog grinned. “Thanks, Riss-riss.”

  “Guys, you miss the point,” said the Chihuahua. “It’s Christmastime and he needs a Forever Home. Ping Pong, you remember your shelter, right?”

  The terrier rolled on the grass. “Yep.”

  “Where would you rather be at Christmas? Your house, or your shelter?”

  The terrier barked. “Good joke, Pinto Bean! I wouldn’t go back to a shelter if you threatened to take away all my tennis balls!”

  The retriever gasped. “All your tennis balls? Are shelters really that bad?”

  “Yes,” said the Chihuahua, stomping a tiny paw. He put his forepaws on Nikki’s leg. “How can we help, mijo? Is there any way we can help you get your Forever Home?”

  “Well‌…‌” Patch looked at me, but I just purred some encouragement. Sooner or later, he would have to figure out the things he needed without me.

  “I want to get down and walk in the parade,” said the kit. “Will you be nice to me when I’m on the ground?”

  “Sure, man!” said the Chihuahua, and to my surprise, Baba’s other dog friends joined in agreement.

  “And MeMe will be right here by you, little one,” said Baba. “No strange dog’ll get a holda you while we’re here!”

  Patch took a breath, then began squirming down Nikki’s arms.

  “Cowboy! Do you wanna meet the doggies?” said Nikki. And then‌—‌plop‌—‌Patch was on the ground at her feet while Nikki held the end of his leash. The dogs rushed him, sniffing, but Baba blocked them with her be-sweatered body. “Now don’t everybody crowd him! One at a time if you please.”

  While the dogs and Patch exchanged curious sniffs, JP said, “Nikki, is that a good idea? He’s awful small‌…‌”

  He’s bigger than that Chihuahua!

  I leapt off JP’s shoulder to the ground and sat next to Patch.

  “Hey!” said JP.

  Jenni’s cold wet nose pressed into my neck and I jumped. She didn’t notice, though. “Oh, yes, definitely angel,” she said. “If you happen to see my sister up there, will you tell her ‘hi’ for me? Her name is Lula.”

  I smoothed my fur back down. “Er‌—‌sure!”

  Above me, JP spoke. “Whoa. They’re all acting‌…‌nice.”

  “Maybe they think he’s a dog, ’cuz of the leash,” said Mart
a.

  I laughed and Baba laughed with me.

  “Imagine that! A dog who’d get a cat mixed up with a dog just ’cuz he had a leash on ’im! Even if my smeller was broke, I hope to howl I’d be able to tell a cat apart from a dog!”

  The makeshift curtain lifted and in came a group of children with their dogs. One of them howled, “Cat!” and charged, but Riss-riss ran up to them, blocking their way. Baba started forward.

  “I got this, Sir Angel. You stay with your kit while me and Pinto explain,” said the hound over her shoulder before she hurried over to the new arrivals.

  The children took one look at Patch and laughed in surprise.

  One girl in a red yarn hat bent down, fending off her dog’s attempts to lick her. “Is that a cat?”

  “Yeeeah,” said Nikki in her slow drawl. “His name’s Cowboy.”

  One of the boys‌—‌the girl’s brother, from the smell of him‌—‌wrinkled his nose at Nikki.

  “What’s wrong with her?” he said.

  JP stiffened behind me, but suddenly, Marta was in front of the mean boy, her mittened fists clenched at her side.

  “Nothing! You wanna make something of it?”

  The boy stepped back, seemingly addled by this pink-jacketed girl staring him down.

  Attagirl, Marta!

  Nikki watched them, eyes wary. But then the sister said to her, “Can I pet him?”

  Nikki saw the eager smile on the girl’s face and brightened up. “Sure!”

  The girl ran a soft-looking hand over Patch, sliding off the jacket, over his furry rump, and going up his tail without pulling it. Then she gave me a head pat, though I was too busy watching her brother to acknowledge it.

  “Who’s she to you?” the boy asked Marta, jutting his chin out.

  “My friend!”

  Marta must have won the chin jutting contest, because the boy turned away to one of the other children he had come in with. But his sister kept talking to Nikki, and Nikki’s smile kept growing.

  In time, more children and dogs of all sizes joined us behind the curtain, and more often than not, some of them stopped to ask Nikki about Patch and me, even if their eyes first said they noticed Nikki was different from them. And, of course, Baba and Pinto Bean the Chihuahua made sure the new dogs didn’t get their tails twisted about Patch, though judging from the whispers of “An angel!” and some of the sniffing I was catching, I could have put an end to that pretty quick!

  The lady in the funny burgundy vest came behind the curtain.

  “OK, kids! The parade’s starting! Line up, then just follow the red line on the ground until you get to the end.”

  The children shuffled their dogs around until a wobbly line had formed. JP scooped me up and I wiggled to get down until Patch meowed up at me.

  “I’m fine, Gingersnap.”

  “We’ll guard him, Angel,” said Riss-riss. “We’ll do a good job. All of us.”

  From JP’s shoulder I could see all of Baba’s dog friends. Pinto Bean led Riss-riss, just ahead of Patch in line, while Baba, Jenni the bulldog, and Ping Pong followed my kit. I purred. Who’d have thought dogs could be so nice to a kit they didn’t even know?

  “Thank you, everyone,” I said.

  “Well, it’s Christmas time, you know,” said Ping Pong.

  Jenni snorted. “Yeah! Some Good Dogs we’d be if we didn’t help out an angel‌—‌even if he is a cat!”

  The dogs chuckled until Pinto Bean sniffed. “Time to go, guys!”

  Riss-riss padded forward with his owner.

  “Your turn, Nikki,” said JP, and his sister walked ahead with Patch.

  The red line led us to the pretend snow scene we’d seen earlier, the Winter Wonderland. Half of it was on our weak-paw side, the rest on our grooming-paw side. We walked in-between. There were no balloons in this parade, or dancers. But there were humans cheering and clicking their rectangles at us.

  When Nikki and Patch walked on, you could hear squeals in the crowd.

  “Look, she’s walking a cat!”

  “Look at his cute coat! It looks like a red bandana!”

  “Mommy, can we get Maxine a coat?”

  “He’s got a kitty on his shoulder!”

  Suddenly I remembered that I hadn’t groomed my blaze at all in the past hour! If I wasn’t careful, I’d turn into a dog.

  “Aw, ain’t that nice how they like our young cat, Jenni?”

  “He’s popular, MeMe. He’s a Good Kitty,” said the bulldog.

  We turned around the bend in the fake snow scenery. There in front of the rectangle-holding crowd, I saw a very familiar face peeking out behind a very strange gray contraption, one that was all angles, like boxes melted together, except for a part he squinted through with one eye. He seemed to be aiming the machine at us as we walk.

  I put my paws on top of JP’s yellow-capped head.

  “Dwight! DWIGHT! It’s me, Gingersnap!” I called.

  “Whoa, Bronco!” said JP. “Watch the hat!”

  The crowd laughed.

  “You know that guy?” Patch called up to me.

  “Yes! He’s an angel, too, my partner! DWIGHT!”

  JP pulled me off his head and started stuffing me into the front of jacket.

  Nikki laughed, but I kept calling until the bearded angel pulled his face away from the contraption. He gave me a thumbs-up, but then pointed to a tall brown woman next to him. She turned to move ahead of the parade, but Dwight caught her and whispered in her ear, pointing at me and Cowboy.

  Seeing us, a look like she’d come across a forgotten treat flashed across her face, and she hurried even faster to beat the parade. Dwight followed her without hesitating.

  Huh! I wonder what that was about.

  “You cold, Bronco?” JP asked. “Is that what you were complaining about?”

  I licked his hand in apology, and he carried me through the rest of the parade in his cozy jacket. The whole time, though, I kept an eye out for my fellow angel.

  20

  The fake scenery led out into a little circle of chocolate-smelling building-boxes. Dogs from the parade milled around with their owners, and humans were handing out steaming white cups of drink to all the different children.

  Standing near the middle of the circle was Dwight. When he spotted me again, he tapped the woman with him on the shoulder and lifted his chin at us. The woman came straight for us, holding a black stick with a bulb at the end of it. I’d seen those before on TV‌…‌I thought the word was “microphone”.

  “Uh, JP?” said Nikki, as the woman and Dwight came over. She quickly bent down and picked up Patch, who had been talking with Baba.

  “It’s okay,” Marta whispered back.

  When the woman spoke, her head turned to Nikki, then JP. Dwight stood behind her, aiming the superbox on his shoulder at us.

  “Hi, kids, I’m Lana Fitzgerald from Channel Three News. Did you guys know you had the only cats in the entire Pet Parade here at the Christmas Fair?”

  JP’s face twisted up. “Kiiiinda?” he said, looking at his sister. She giggled, and so did the microphone woman.

  “We’d love to do a story on you two. You and your cats would be on TV.”

  “We don’t get local TV,” said JP, turning a little red.

  Marta elbowed him. “You guys gotta, JP! It’d be so cool.”

  “What do you say?” said the microphone woman. After another glance at Nikki, JP took her hand. Then he nodded at the woman.

  “Great.” She put the microphone under her chin and spoke. “Lana Fitzgerald reporting at the Christmas Fair in Hillerman Memorial Park. I’m here speaking with two young Pet Parade participants and their unusual animals.”

  Patch reached for the microphone with a paw. “What’s that?”

  “Is that your name, little fella?” The microphone woman asked Patch, hearing his meow.

  “No!” said Nikki. “It’s Cowboy. And this is his brother, Bronco.”

  My ear turned at a guf
faw coming from Dwight’s direction, but when I looked, the face behind the shoulder contraption was suspiciously blank.

  “How long have you owned them?” asked the microphone woman.

  “Couple days,” said Nikki. “My brother found them at school.”

  “On the way home from school,” said JP. “With my friend Marta.”

  Marta waved, huge smile turning her eyes into squinty lines.

  “I wanted to bring them home to help my sister.”

  “Help her how?”

  JP squared his shoulders. “She‌…‌she was in an accident this year at a water park where we used to live. She used to be an honors student in high school, but she got brain damage because she was under the water too long before anyone found her. After we moved here, she didn’t want to go to school anymore. Or make friends. But now that she has Cowboy, she’s talked to lots of people, and come out to the fair, and it’s only been two days since she met him.”

  “That sounds amazing!” said the microphone woman.

  “Yeah, it is, but Mom says we can’t keep them past Christmas.”

  “Why not?”

  “I mean, she wants to! But we don’t have an apartment yet.”

  “Or a job,” said Nikki absent-mindedly, scratching Patch’s ears.

  “Yeah, Mom’s still looking for one.”

  JP hugged me tight. I butted my head against the underside of his chin.

  “Well, I’m glad you at least have your kitties to keep you and your sister company during the holiday,” said the woman. “They looked wonderful in the parade.”

  Both Nikki and JP beamed up at her. But there was that hurt in his eyes again.

  “Thanks!” said Nikki.

  The woman turned to Dwight’s contraption and said something, but I was busy purring for JP. Everything will be OK. Oh, how I wish I could talk to humans sometimes!

  The woman turned back from Dwight and let the microphone stick relax at her side. “You two’d better go get some cocoa, it’s free for anyone who was in the parade.”

  “Oooh!” said Nikki, and she and JP ran me and Patch towards the smell of chocolate. Over JP’s shoulder, I watched Dwight put his contraption down and talk to Marta while the microphone lady listened.