Catalyst

by Sarah Beth Durst

  “Or a teleporter,” Alex said cheerfully.

  “Or a dinosaur,” Zoe said.

  “Not a single mystical object.”

  “Not one enchanted sword. Or a lightsaber.”

  “I want a lightsaber,” Alex agreed.

  “You’d cut your arm off,” Mom told him, then asked Zoe, “Do you like the necklace Aunt Evelyn gave you?” Her eyes were twinkling, and Dad snorted a half-disguised laugh.

  “It’s amazing,” Zoe said honestly. The necklace in question was made of rhinestone letters that spelled out the word FUN. She was certain if you tried to find a necklace that tacky and absurd, you’d fail. “I’m going to wear it ironically to every funeral, final exam, and dentist appointment for the rest of my life.”

  Dad beamed at her. “I love that we raised a daughter who uses the word ironically correctly.” Leaning over toward Mom, he held out his hand for a high-five. She slapped it.

  Alex raised his eyebrows. “Did they just high-five their parenting skills?”

  “I think they did,” Zoe said.

  Alex regarded their parents with mock pity and said to Zoe, “Do you want to break the news about how badly they did, or should I?”

  Zoe heaved a sigh. “Earlier today, during the party . . .” She paused for dramatic effect. “Alex ate a potato chip that fell on the ground.”

  “But surely . . .” Dad said, his voice trembling, “he only let it sit for five seconds.”

  Zoe covered her face as if in shame. “It was ten seconds!”

  Dad wailed. “The horror!”

  They all burst out laughing.

  “If that’s the worst either of you do,” Mom said, “I’d say we’ve done our job well.” Dad held out his hand for another high-five, but Mom ignored him in favor of passing out napkins to go with the cake. She herself had eaten so neatly there wasn’t a crumb left.

  This is how it’s supposed to be, Zoe thought. The four of us, together. Her laugh faded as she thought about what would happen at the end of the summer. I wish it could last.

  “Hey, no sad face!” Alex said. “I think it’s illegal to be sad while having second cake.”

  “What if you aren’t here for my next birthday party?” Zoe stared at the kitchen floor as she asked. Her eyes felt hot, and she thought that if she looked at Alex, she might start crying, which she did not want to do on a day that had been so nice. Thanks to the distraction of the kitten, she had almost managed to forget that Alex, the best brother in the world, was leaving for Europe in September.

  “Aw, Zoomaroo, I’ll always come back for your birthday! Exams are in May. I’ll be home every June. And of course I’ll visit before then too.”

  He was supposed to go to college at one of the hundreds of schools within driving distance, close enough to visit whenever he wanted. Somewhere in Boston. Or New Hampshire. Maine would have been fine. Even New Jersey. But no, he had to win a scholarship to study in France. He wouldn’t be back for months, and even though Zoe was proud of him, it was difficult to pretend to be happy about having to say goodbye. His choice affected her life too, and no one seemed to care about that. She wasn’t asking for a pity parade, but it would be nice if someone acknowledged that this was a big deal for her. “It won’t be the same.”

  Dad’s voice was quiet. “Zoe, things never stay the same. That’s just the way life is. It doesn’t mean it’s all bad. Change can be good. Even exciting!”

  Not for me, she thought. Everything’s fine the way it is!

  But Zoe plastered a smile on her face and squished her feelings down. She was not going to be upset on her birthday, especially on a day she’d saved a kitten. And especially during second cake. “You’re right, Dad. Everything will be fine.”

   Chapter 2

  ZOE WOKE TO THE SOUND of purring in her ear. She wished Dad wouldn’t mow the lawn so early on a Sunday morning. Flopping her arm over her face, she mumbled, “Murph-mrrr.”

  Sharp pins pricked her arm.

  That’s not a lawn mower.

  Her eyes snapped open. She turned her head and stared directly into the face of a purring kitten. Claws retracted, the kitten tucked her paw under her fuzzy belly.

  “Mew?”

  Zoe suddenly remembered yesterday, sneaking the kitten up to her room before second cake, and a rush of joy flooded through her. My kitten! Except she couldn’t keep her. My temporary kitten. “How did you get up on my bed, you cutie?” she asked. When Zoe had gone to sleep, the kitten had been safely nestled in the sweater in her box.

  The kitten nuzzled her cheek. Her fur felt as soft as velvet. Zoe stroked between the kitten’s ears, which made her purr even louder, an extraordinary volume for a creature her size, and it made Zoe want to laugh. She held it in so she wouldn’t startle the snuggling kitten.

  “Did you sleep all right?” Zoe asked.

  Sitting up, she looked down at the box. The bowl of milk was empty, and there was a tiny kitten poop in the corner of the sweater.

  That wasn’t quite as cute as the kitten herself.

  “On the plus side, at least I don’t have to make you go—the way Harrison said they did for newborns,” Zoe said. “Don’t worry—your new owner will have a litter box.” She wished that new owner was her with an ache so strong that tears pricked her eyes.

  Plopping the kitten back into the box, Zoe showered and dressed. When she returned, the kitten was looking mournfully at the empty milk bowl. “Mew?”

  “You want breakfast? I can do that. Wait here.”

  Leaving the kitten in the box, she closed her bedroom door so the little cat couldn’t escape, even if she crawled out of the box again. Carrying the empty bowl downstairs, Zoe heard voices: Alex, Dad, and Mom. Everyone was awake.

  It will be tricky getting the kitten out without anyone noticing, Zoe thought. If it was a weekday, no problem, but on a Sunday? Also, how do I explain needing a bowl of milk? But it was too late to turn around now.

  “Good morning, almost-birthday girl!” Dad called.

  “Happy last day of eleven to you,” Alex sang. Off-pitch. “Happy last day of eleven to you.” He kept going. “Happy last day of eleven, dear Zoe!” And going: “Happy last day of eleven to you!” Ending in a shout: “Countdown!”

  Entering the kitchen with the bowl behind her back, Zoe announced, “It is one day until I’m officially twelve!”

  Alex roared, “Let her eat cake!”

  It was a silly ritual they’d invented when they were both little kids and couldn’t wait until their “real” birthdays, but she loved it. “Thanks, but I think I’ll just have some cereal for now.” She held up the empty bowl, as if she intended to fill it with Cheerios.

  “Very grown-up of you,” Mom said approvingly, and Zoe was tempted to grab a piece of cake just because she said that. But Mom’s attention had already shifted back to her laptop.

  Alex had finished his breakfast. A plate with bagel crumbs was sitting on the table next to printouts. Glancing at the papers as she passed, Zoe saw they were course offerings. Alex was choosing his classes in Paris.

  Returning to their conversation, Dad waved a printout in Alex’s face. “You can’t skip Impressionism. It altered the world of art forever!”

  “I already picked French Painting from the Seventeenth Century to the Nineteenth Century,” Alex protested. “That includes Impressionism.”

  “Van Gogh’s Starry Night changed how we see the sky itself!”

  “You do realize that I’m the one taking the classes, right?” Alex asked, amused. “You already did college. It’s my turn.”

  “I’m just excited for you,” Dad said. “You’re embarking on a new adventure, a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity! You have to embrace it!”

  The study-abroad scholarship Alex had applied for was supposed to have been a pie-in-the-sky long shot. Zoe firmly told herself she should be feeling happy for him, like Dad was.

  Thinking about another long shot, she wondered if maybe she should tell her family about
her pocket-size kitten. Yes, Mom had been furious about the baby skunk, and she hadn’t reacted well to the mess the squirrel had made, but it had been a while since Zoe tried to take in a lost animal. And the kitten was different from all those others! For one thing, she wasn’t a wild animal, which had to be a plus. For another, she was absurdly cute and sweet and wonderful. Zoe glanced at Mom to see if she was in the right mood for such a reveal.

  Mom was sitting by the window, typing on her computer. She’d just started her new job at the mayor’s office, and she had to work weekends now. Yesterday had been a rare exception, a day off for Zoe’s birthday party. I guess the day-before-my-real-birthday isn’t a holiday anymore. They always used to celebrate day-befores. She felt bad moping about it. After all, Mom’s new job was important, and Zoe was proud of her, but she’d liked that family tradition.

  Worse, Mom did not look in the right mood for meeting a kitten.

  “Do you have to go into the office today?” Zoe asked her.

  “Not today, but I do have a lot to get done,” Mom said without looking up from her screen. To Dad, she asked, “Did you call the contractor?”

  “Yes. They’ll start two weeks from tomorrow!”

  It was Dad’s new project—overseeing the construction of a new laundry room. He’d wanted to be an architect before he became an engineer, and so he got overly excited about any kind of home-building project. They were converting a chunk of Alex’s closet, since he wasn’t going to need it anymore. He wasn’t even out of the house, and already they were acting like he was gone and never coming back. Why can’t a new laundry room wait? Just because his scholarship saved them money they would have spent on tuition didn’t mean they had to do it now. Zoe didn’t want any more changes!

  Suddenly the same horrible feeling she’d felt last night came crashing back. Taken separately, all the things that were happening this summer weren’t terrible. In fact, you could argue they were all good things, especially Mom’s job and the impact she could make with the new environmental policy she was working on, but taken together . . . Zoe felt as if a tidal wave were coming at her and she was stuck in the sand. She couldn’t do anything about Alex and Paris, or Mom and her extra work, or the carving up of Alex’s bedroom to make a new laundry room, or growing taller, or the prospect of voluntarily choosing cereal over cake. But I can do something about the kitten up in my bedroom waiting for milk, she thought.

  She made a decision.

  In the middle of Dad and Alex discussing the pluses and minuses of art history classes and Mom typing on her laptop, Zoe said, “I found an abandoned kitten out by the trash last night, and I want to keep her.”

  The typing stopped.

  Dad and Alex broke off mid-sentence.

  “You what the what?” Dad asked.

  “Cool!” Alex said.

  “Zoe, what did you do?” Mom said, a warning note in her voice. “I thought you outgrew this. Please tell me there isn’t another skunk in your room.”

  “She’s definitely a kitten,” Zoe said. Belatedly, she thought she should have eased into the request. Or at least given it more than three seconds of thought. She should have written out her arguments. Or made a poster. “Wait here. I’ll show you.”

  Her heart was racing as she pounded up the stairs and into her room. She scooped up the kitten, cradled the little cat against her chest, and carried her more slowly back down to the kitchen. Staring up at her, the kitten said, “Mew” and laid a soft paw on Zoe’s throat, as if out of concern. “They’ll love you once they see you,” Zoe whispered, wishing she were sure about that.

  Her parents and brother stared at her as she deposited the kitten on the table. Zoe poured her a bowl of milk. The kitten splashed the surface with her paw happily. Zoe saw Mom wince as drops spattered across the table, and then the kitten plunged her face into the bowl and began drinking.

  For a long minute, the only sound was the lap-lap-lap of the kitten’s tongue.

  “Are you sure it’s not a really large caterpillar?” Alex asked.

  Zoe glared at him.

  “It’s cute,” Dad admitted, “but we agreed that you weren’t going to bring any more animals home. We made it a rule.” Dad didn’t like making rules—he liked to be the “fun” parent—but this was something he and Mom had both agreed on.

  “Rules can change, can’t they?” Zoe said. “You said yourself last night: change can be good.” She held her breath and hoped this worked.

  Alex laughed. “She’s got you there. And it is the day before her birthday. By the tradition of the sacred day-before, you’re obligated to grant her wishes, if possible. It’s not like she’s asking for a pet lion. Or a skunk.”

  Zoe gave him a grateful look. Alex had always been the kind of big brother who stood up for his baby sister. She remembered playing catch with a teddy bear in the living room—she must have been five or six years old—and her aim was terrible. She had thrown the bear into a lamp and knocked it over. The lamp had shattered, and when their parents rushed in, Alex said it was his fault. She should have known he’d help her now.

  “You all have something you’re excited about,” Zoe pleaded. “Alex has his scholarship. Mom, your new job. Dad, the laundry room. I think . . . I need something that’s mine?”

  “Excellent argument,” Alex said approvingly. “I’m going to Europe. Why shouldn’t Zoe have something special too? Besides, she isn’t asking to foster a wild animal this time. She wants a proper pet, and she’s old enough to care for one. You don’t want to be like those parents who stunt their children’s growth by denying them the milestones of independence and personal responsibility.”

  Zoe nodded vigorously in agreement, and Alex winked at her.

  Both of them turned toward their parents.

  Mom opened her mouth, then closed it.

  Dad began to laugh. “We raised clever children.”

  “Too clever,” Mom grumbled, but she wasn’t fully frowning. “If we keep it, and I said if, then Zoe, it has to be entirely your responsibility.”

  Dad jumped in. “You feed it, water it, walk it—”

  “You water plants, and you walk dogs,” Zoe said, knowing he was teasing her but unable to resist correcting him. “But yes, I promise I’ll take care of her.” Please, let me keep her! She needed this kitten. She couldn’t even explain why.

  “You clean its litter box,” Mom added. “You take it to the vet. You pay for whatever it needs with your own money. Use your birthday money. Save your allowance.”

  “I’ll do all of it!” Zoe promised. She held her breath again and watched her parents’ expressions as they shifted from exasperated to amused to resigned.

  “Well, since, as Alex pointed out, it is your day-before-your-real-birthday . . .” Dad began.

  “Yes!” Zoe said. Cooing at the kitten, she said, “You’re mine, and I’m yours. And I will take care of you forever and ever.”

  Both her parents simultaneously sighed, and she knew she’d won.

  “Fine,” Mom relented. “She’s yours, and you’re hers. But you need to keep her out from underfoot. She stays in your room. And as soon as she’s big enough, she becomes an outside cat. I don’t want cat hair and hairballs all over the house. Do you understand, Zoe? We’re trusting that you’ve grown up enough for this level of responsibility. If you can’t handle it, then she finds a new owner who can take proper care of her.”

  “Yes!” Zoe couldn’t believe it—they’d agreed! She wondered if it was because they felt guilty about all the changes lately, or they wanted to make her feel better about Alex’s leaving . . . Or maybe they just saw how cute the kitten was and couldn’t resist. Whatever the reason, it worked! She wanted to cheer and dance. Instead she hugged each of them. “Thank you!”

  “What are you going to name her?” Alex asked. “Hey, how about Tiny? Or Shrimp? Or if we’re going for irony, the Hulk or Godzilla?”

  “Skunk?” Mom suggested.

  Zoe made a face. “Very fun
ny, Mom.”

  “Fluffy?” Dad said.

  Alex snorted. “Do you know how many cats in the history of the world have been named Fluffy? Your naming privileges are revoked, Dad. How about Minnie, short for minuscule?”

  “Mew!” the kitten said, a sound so tiny it was like a squeak.

  “I know,” Zoe said fondly. “Her name is Pipsqueak.”

  * * *

  Cradling Pipsqueak, Zoe hurried across her yard, squeezed through the gate (which wasn’t so much a gate as a loose board in the fence that Harrison’s dog wasn’t clever enough to move), and let herself in through Harrison’s back door. She couldn’t wait to tell him the news!

  Harrison’s older cousin, Surita, didn’t look up from her cereal. She was seventeen, with purple-streaked hair and cat-eye glasses. Zoe’s parents and Harrison’s were paying her to keep an eye on Zoe and Harrison this summer—at least while she wasn’t off being a camp counselor—but she was off duty on weekends. “Don’t slam it.”

  Zoe caught the screen door on her foot and let it close gently.

  “Is Harrison in his room or still in the backyard?” she asked. “I didn’t see his tent.” He was going to be so amazed they’d said yes! I’m still amazed.

  “Yep.” Surita was reading a magazine with the title Unexplained Mysteries scrawled in neon orange over a grainy photo of Bigfoot. Both Surita and Harrison loved those kinds of magazines. Harrison claimed he liked that they tried to explain the unexplainable, even though he knew it was mostly nonsense. Ten points to them for trying to give answers, he said.

  “Is that ‘yes, he’s upstairs,’ or ‘yes—’” Before Zoe could finish the question, Pipsqueak began to squirm. “Whoa!” Zoe said, lunging forward and holding out her hands so that Pipsqueak, when she wriggled free, plopped safely onto the kitchen table instead of plummeting to the floor. She immediately started exploring. “You have to be more careful!” Zoe scolded her.