by Clea Simon
“Don’t use those ears with me, little sister.” Harriet was waiting when Clara finally came up for air. Not to reprimand her, she knew, but to see if she had left anything over. “I won’t stand for it.”
“Fine.” Clara licked her chops clean. “I’m out of here.”
Before the calico even landed back on the counter, her oldest sister was lapping up the few crumbs she’d overlooked, leaving Laurel to watch, a particularly peeved expression on her pointed face.
“I’m sorry, I really am,” Becca was repeating for the umpteenth time. She looked over at the calico on the counter and, wonder of wonders, reached for the bag of treats. Putting the phone down on the counter, she poured several into her palm.
“I can’t—this doesn’t make sense.” The tinny voice seemed to be repeating itself as Clara gobbled down two treats. Take that, Harriet, she thought. “I didn’t think she was that upset.”
“What?” The hand jerked out from beneath Clara. The little calico mewed in protest and her person returned it, even as she again lifted the phone to her ear. “Jeff, what are you saying?”
Clara finished the treats and licked Becca’s palm before looking up with what she hoped was an endearing expression.
“No, she didn’t—it wasn’t suicide.” More treats were not going to be forthcoming. Not while this call lasted. “What made you think…that?”
A loud howl from the floor. Harriet had seen the treats. Seen that her sister had gotten them before she did too.
“Hang on.” Becca went for the bag again, putting the phone on speaker.
“I thought, maybe…” The words were breathy and hesitant, and Clara could almost connect the distant voice to the man she remembered. She had found his boyishness adorable at one point. A little rough with the belly rubs, but tolerant of the sisters’ squabbling and their insistence on sleeping on the bed. But that memory was now overshadowed by another, of the gawky young man pacing back and forth as he explained to their person why he couldn’t be with her anymore. Boyish—try puppy-ish—and not in a good way. It always took him forever to get to the point, as Clara recalled.
“You see,” she heard him say, and Clara realized she could. He’d be pushing his too-long hair back from his forehead, a strained look on his dog-like face. “It’s just that, well, you know I’d gone out with Suzanne a few times. I mean, it wasn’t anything serious. But, well, what makes this all so awful is that I had just told her that I couldn’t see her anymore. Becca, I’d told her I wanted to try to win you back.”
Chapter 10
Becca didn’t sleep much that night either. The image of Suzanne’s too-white skin streaked with darkening blood might have been stained on the inside of her eyelids. Clara picked up on her restlessness and did her best to calm her, staying as still by her human’s side as she could. Not that it mattered. Even when Becca finally drifted off into an uneasy rest, Harriet kept waking her youngest sister with her own grumbling complaints.
“So selfish,” the big cat muttered. “Doesn’t she know I need my beauty rest?”
Clara didn’t respond. Her oldest sister could sleep anywhere—and did. But since Clara had gotten on her case about summoning that pillow out of the ether, she had made a point about what she’d had to sacrifice to live by what she called the “silly” rules. As if she didn’t know full well that the number one rule of feline magic is that cats must keep their powers secret.
Despite Harriet’s complaints, all the sisters knew that wasn’t difficult to do. People attribute all sorts of qualities to cats. Even the most mundane of their kind is considered mysterious, as if being beautiful and incredibly limber were special skills. But while it is true that some basic physical attributes—like a feline’s excellent night vision—are common to all cats, and most felines can conjure up a few supernatural tricks—that disappearing through walls thing Clara had used to follow Becca—only a few are actual witch cats. And, therefore, it was incumbent upon the three sisters to be extra careful.
Harriet sometimes said that they were descended from feline royalty, from the great Queen of Cats herself, and Clara knew that often other cats did treat them with a certain respect. But whether the claim of royal lineage had any basis in fact or was merely another of Harriet’s ploys for getting the best treats, her youngest sibling couldn’t tell for sure. Clara’s one distinct memory of their mother was of being licked by a warm, rough tongue. However, her injunction against revealing their power had stayed with Clara, even if her sisters chose to ignore it. The loyal calico could still clearly recall their tabby mother purring it into her ear even as she sent them off to the shelter to be adopted by the young woman they now served.
“Serve indeed!” Laurel was wakeful too. Needless to say, her memories—and her understanding of the injunction—differed from Clara’s, much as her ease at reading her sister’s thoughts illustrated the range of their powers. “It was pure chance Becca picked us,” said the seal-point beauty as she leaped to the kitchen table, where Becca had abandoned her breakfast to peck away at her computer. “I knew I should have hissed at her. Then maybe some handsome banker would have taken us in.”
“Taken you, you mean.” Clara couldn’t help responding. “We were lucky to stay together.”
Laurel blinked her blue eyes demurely, which was as close to an acknowledgment as she would give, and leaned forward to sniff at Becca’s cereal bowl.
Becca, too intent on her computer, didn’t notice, not even when Laurel extended her pink tongue and began to lap up the leftover milk. Harriet did, though, and after a grunt of effort, landed with a thud by Clara’s side.
“Is that the Fruit Loops?” She nudged Laurel aside. Some things were worth the effort. “Are there any left?”
“What do you mean, ‘blocked’? ” Becca’s question didn’t even merit a tail flick from the sisters, seeing as how it wasn’t accompanied by any move to unseat them. Instead, her hands went to work on the keyboard in front of her. “I’ll show you ‘blocked,’” she muttered, typing furiously.
With her sisters occupied finishing Becca’s breakfast, Clara was free to study her face. For a human, Becca was almost cat-like. Although she was significantly larger than they were, she was small for her kind, and her short, brown hair lay close to her head, much like their fur did. It was the expression on her face, however, that held Clara this morning. When she focused, as she was doing, her lips pursed slightly. If she’d had whiskers, they’d be bristling, the calico thought. Pointing forward, almost. And as if she were truly one of their litter, her intense stare made it evident that she was on the prowl—though how she could trace anything through her computer was beyond the feline who watched her so closely. True, it was warm and at times it purred, but Clara didn’t think that even Becca’s constant stroking and murmuring could make the silver machine give forth the kind of prey that would interest one of her own kind.
“There!” With a final, triumphant slap at the keyboard, Becca sat back, and realization dawned on Clara. Whatever kind of hunt the young woman before her had managed, using this device and her own rather closely cropped claws, she had made a successful pounce.
“So much for wanting me back, Jeff Blakey. So much for nothing serious…” A few more keystrokes followed and then a sudden intake of breath. “Oh!” Her voice was soft. “Oh.”
“What?” Laurel looked up, a rime of milk around her brown snout. “Is she okay?”
“Like you care.” Clara rubbed up against Becca’s hand, partly to comfort her and partly to gain access. As Laurel licked her chops and began to bathe, Clara focused in on the picture in front of her. Sure enough, up on the screen was Becca’s ex-boyfriend, posed in front of the software startup where he spent his days. Even in this flat miniature, with none of the reassuring confirmation of scent, the calico cat recognized those floppy bangs, the broad, easy grin that her person had thought so charming. With a slow blink of her r
ound, green eyes, Clara also realized that she recognized the woman in the picture—the one he had his arm around. Tall, blonde, slim. Suzanne.
“Oh, Clara.” An arm swept the cat off the table before she could see more, and Becca held her close, burying her face in the multicolored fur. “Maddy was right. It wasn’t just a few dates. Jeff even changed his status to ‘in a relationship.’ It was Suzanne, and I didn’t even know.”
Clara felt the warm wet of tears begin to seep through her fur but held still. She knew her sisters scoffed at her sometimes, but the youngest cat saw comforting their person as much of a sacred duty as, well, keeping rodents away or kicking litter on the bathroom floor.
After a few minutes had passed, Becca’s sobs subsided, and she freed the cat to wipe her face. Clara stayed on her lap, though, aware of how her presence had helped. Besides, she had a great view of the computer from here, and she could see where the melancholy girl was now manipulating the image.
“April,” Becca read aloud. With a tingle in her whiskers, Clara could almost feel her thinking. April had been the bad month—the month on the sofa… “So this was from a month ago. Maybe he really did break up with her…”
A few more clicks, and his page was replaced by one that featured Becca’s slender blonde colleague, only in a lot better shape than when Becca had just seen her. Clara’s ears pricked up as Becca began to type some more, her fingers patting at the keys as if they were catnip mice.
“That’s strange.” She rested her chin on the top of Clara’s head, a sure sign that she was thinking. A flurry of typing followed, but the picture on the screen didn’t change. “How can someone on social media have no recent photos?” Clara swished her tail in the hope that Becca wasn’t talking to her. Because of all the mysteries to which the feline was privy, this was one question for which she had no answer.
***
Becca did not answer any of Jeff’s calls that morning, and there were enough of them that they had become annoying.
“I could break it.” Laurel sat atop the bookshelf, looking at the buzzing device. “Just a little push…” One dark chocolate paw rose in the air, ready to dab.
“You can’t,” Clara hissed. Sometimes, she felt like she was the oldest sister. “She needs it.”
“Needs it, huh?” Laurel turned and began licking her tail. She didn’t have to bathe, but she did like to show off her flexibility on the high, narrow shelf.
“You know what I mean.” Clara tried a conciliatory tone. “It’s how she reaches out without having to actually go outside.”
“I thought she was trying to learn how we do that,” the seal-point sister responded, her mew muffled by a mouthful of fur. “Get into people’s minds. Like old what’s his face is—at least now.”
True enough, Jeff had been calling since Becca had turned her phone back on. The voicemail kept piling up, though, and even Harriet could tell they were weighing on Becca. So, Clara at least was glad when Becca had ducked out for a run. She came back glowing and warm. And if her exuberance had been forced, at least she seemed to have an appetite finally, although Clara suspected that Laurel had a paw in that—implanting such an idea was kitten’s play for the seal point, at least with a person as open as Becca.
Whatever the initial impetus, Becca poured more cereal into that bowl and topped it off with more milk as the three felines looked on. That she held the bowl and began to eat before hitting “play all” on her message app did nothing to dissuade Laurel, who circled the young woman like a shark in shallow water.
“Hi, Becca—” She paused, spoon in mouth, to hit delete.
“Bec—” Another gone. “Wait—” Gone.
Two more and she was through, but by then the poor girl seemed to have lost her appetite. Leaving her bowl on the table—Harriet and Laurel eyed each other, waiting for the right moment—she headed for the coffee maker. Before she could even fill it with water, the phone rang again. Thumping the pot down hard enough to make the sisters scatter, Becca reached for the offending instrument, a look like thunder on her usually sweet face.
“Jeff Blakey!” Her voice was at a thunder pitch too. “If you think that I—oh.” She stopped so short that Laurel looked up. “Oh, I’m sorry. Yes. Yes, I understand,” she said, her righteous indignation replaced by something more like a soft worry. “The station house? Yes, I know where it is.”
Another pause. “No, no, that won’t be necessary. I want to help. Suzanne is—” She swallowed and took a deep breath. “Suzanne was my friend.”
Chapter 11
Disruption—even when it resulted in abandoned food—was not something any cat could enjoy. And this latest call, which sent Becca out of the kitchen in a rush, was too much flurry for any feline. But Laurel’s latest manipulation—following as it did on Harriet’s lazy summoning of that pillow—was giving Clara an idea. It started as a twitch in her tail and moved up to tickle her whiskers, before emerging as a full-fledged possibility. Since Clara and her sisters did indeed have the powers that Becca believed she possessed, was there any reason they couldn’t use their particular skills to help out the human who had taken them all in?
The sisters had a quick confab on the subject while Becca showered and changed. Or Laurel and Clara did. Harriet was too interested in Becca’s discarded cereal to contribute much.
“And here I thought you didn’t want us using magic in front of humans.” Laurel’s half-closed eyes could have denoted sleepiness, but Clara knew her too well. She was watching her baby sister, hoping to catch her in a contradiction.
“I wouldn’t let her see me—see us—doing anything, of course.” Clara spoke softly but with what she had hoped was a contagious urgency. “But maybe we could poke around a little. Listen in to on her friends and check out what they’re doing when they don’t think anyone is watching?”
Laurel’s ears angled forward, and Clara knew that she was intrigued. “Spy?”
“Well, maybe not that.” Clara had the classic feline sense of entitlement and knew she could enter any room at any time. That word, however, sounded a little nastier than what she had intended. “Just…see if we can help at all. See what we can find out. Becca needs us.”
“Seems to me she’s doing fine.” Laurel was quick to pick up on her sister’s distaste. And as the slender seal point regarded herself the most fastidious of the three felines, she decided to be insulted. Nose up in the air, she turned away from Clara—and then dipped it quickly down to lick Becca’s spoon. Harriet had knocked it out of the bowl when she dove in face first.
“She’s eating. We’re eating.” The slightest tilt of those fluffy white ears—visible above the breakfast bowl’s rim—gave the sole indication that the oldest sister was listening, as Laurel continued to lay out her case. “Am I right?” One dark paw swiped at Harriet’s broad and fluffy tail. “And now she’s rid of both her two-timing boyfriend and the little alley cat he was running around with.” Another swipe. “Hey!” Harriet sat up, licking her chops. “Stop that!”
“I was afraid you’d drowned,” purred Laurel, nudging Harriet aside.
“I hadn’t,” Harriet pouted, before beginning to wash. “Laurel’s right, though.” She hiccupped slightly as she chuckled at her sister’s joke. Cats do enjoy portraying humans as inferior felines. “Becca’s doing fine, and besides, you were so upset with me the last time…”
Clara sighed and felt her whiskers sagging. If only she weren’t the youngest—the baby, the “clown”—maybe her sisters would take her seriously. Sometimes, she thought, that was why she cared about Becca so much. The young woman was a small creature too, in her own way. And they both needed allies. Which was why the compact calico decided to make one more attempt to win over her siblings.
“I’m not talking about physically.” She worked to keep her voice even. Any hint of a growl and Harriet would be on her high horse about rank and birth order again.
“I’m worried about her emotional well-being.”
Harriet blinked. Laurel didn’t even look up.
“Did you enjoy being kicked off the bed last night?” Clara was playing her last card, well aware of the reputation cats had for being selfish. In some cases, she was ashamed to admit, it was deserved. “If Becca keeps tossing and turning, then none of us will ever get to sleep on the nice comforter again.”
Harriet’s nose wrinkled up slightly in thought, making the Persian in her background even more obvious. For a moment, Clara dared to hope.
“Doesn’t matter.” Laurel glanced up from the bowl, her pink tongue wiping over a swath of fur. “We can sleep during the day. And this morning, she left two bowls of cereal unfinished. Two.”
“She has a point.” Harriet looked over at the bowl with longing, but Laurel had already licked it clean.
***
Neither actually refused to accompany Clara when she set out with Becca soon after. But, as if reflecting their person’s mood, the day had turned grey, and the threatened rain was enough to have Laurel up on top of the bookshelf, tail curled protectively around her neat booties. Harriet, at least, sounded conflicted, and for a few moments, her youngest sister had thought the big fluffball might join her.
“I am fond of the girl,” Harriet began as Becca laced up her sneakers. “Truly. But it’s so hard to dematerialize right after eating. Couldn’t we wait a half hour and then follow?”
“She’s going to the police station.” Clara tried to convey the urgency. “Where they lock people up—in cages!”
“Oh!” Harriet drew back, raising one paw as if to bat away the idea. “Well, then. As the head of this family, I don’t think any of us should be going there.”
“No, we shouldn’t,” Clara agreed as she watched Becca head out the door. “But she is, and so I am too.”
Even though Clara had dismissed Harriet’s excuse as unworthy, she was grateful that she herself hadn’t indulged in any breakfast treats. It isn’t difficult for a cat to pass through a wall, not exactly, but they do have to shimmy and squeeze a bit—just as they do through a regular door as it closes—and the atoms of a solid structure do press in an unfortunate way on a full belly. As it was, the calico had to lope to catch up with her person, and she was pleased to see that the young woman had decided to walk, despite the slight drizzle, rather than catch the bus that stopped at the end of the street.