Chez Stinky

by Susan C. Daffron

  A few years ago Kat had read that the secret to technical writing is an ability to tolerate boredom. Yes, her job had many boring moments, but this was the first time she’d literally fallen asleep at her desk. How embarrassing. With any luck, Chris wouldn’t blab to Mark about it. Finding a job as a writer wasn’t easy, and she’d had to take a pay cut to get this one after she’d been laid off a year ago. Glancing up at the clock on the wall, she pressed her lips together. It was already midday. Sadly, napping tended to cut down on editorial productivity. There was no way she could finish the proposal by herself. Time to call in reinforcements.

  She strode to Mark’s office and faced the back of his big leather chair. It looked like Mark might be observing something out the window or maybe playing with the toys on his credenza. Kat was sure she didn’t want to know. She knocked on the door to get his attention.

  Mark spun around and gaped at Kat with sheepish look on his face. “Oh, hi.”

  Kat raised her eyebrows. What exactly had he been doing? “Hi, Mark. I need to get help on this proposal. I made all the edits on the paper copy, and I think that if we divide it up and several people put the changes into the file, we can get them all in and make the deadline. Can you get everyone together and tell them this is important?”

  Mark nodded his head and looked down at his fingernails. “Didn’t I tell you? Over the weekend, I went out for a beer with one of my buddies at the agency. He gave us an extension. We don’t have to have it done for another month.”

  Kat’s eyes widened. “And you’re just telling me this now?” she fumed. “Why didn’t you tell me this earlier? Like when I came in after getting no sleep last night. Or even better, you could have called me over the weekend. You have my number. It’s not like you don’t call me with meaningless drivel all the time. You must have me on speed dial. Whenever you have one of your brilliant ideas, you call me.”

  Mark brushed a lock of hair off his forehead and looked out the window. “I had stuff to do. I was busy and forgot.”

  “And I didn’t have stuff to do? I just found out my aunt died!” Kat spun around and stomped out of the office. She was so outta here. Clenching her fists, she stopped and said over her shoulder, “So did you let Chris in on this little tidbit of information? Maybe you should. Oh and by the way, I’m taking the afternoon off.”

  Kat marched down the hallway back to her cubicle, gathered her belongings, and left the building. Wound up on caffeine and fury, she was practically vibrating. Gripping the steering wheel in her little Toyota, she replayed the conversation with Mark in her head. Yes, she needed money to pay her rent, but being jerked around by that self-absorbed idiot was no way to live her life. She was smart and willing to work hard. Why was she settling for this?

  Back at her apartment, Kat flopped down onto her bed. As if she could sense Kat was mentally and physically exhausted, Murphee didn’t complain about food. Instead, she jumped up on the bed, curled up by Kat’s side, and started purring. Kat stroked the cat’s long black fur and her body started to relax. Maybe she should fix up Chez Stinky after all.

  Kat was jolted awake by the sound of her phone ringing. She couldn’t think of anyone in the world she wanted to talk to right now, so she rolled over and put her pillow over her head to shut out the noise. Murphee leaped off the bed with a disgusted meow.

  “Sorry Murph,” she mumbled. The answering machine could take the call. That’s why she had one, after all. Kat just wanted to get some sleep.

  When she woke up several hours later, Kat walked over to her answering machine and noticed that the red light was blinking. She pressed the play button.

  “Ms. Stevens,” the voice on the machine said, “This is Jean Hartland. I’m the apartment manager for this building. I’m calling to see if you got the letter we sent you. Just in case you did not receive it or haven’t had a chance to read it, I’m informing you that the apartment complex has been purchased and the new owner will be converting the units to condominiums. You will need to find a new place to live and move out of apartment 152 within three months, so the new owners can begin remodeling the units. I’m sorry for the inconvenience and thank you for your cooperation. If you are interested in purchasing the apartment, please give me a call. We can offer you advantageous terms if you would like to stay here.”

  Kat’s jaw dropped and she gaped at the machine, as if it might magically give her more details. You have got to be kidding me.

  Kat had never considered buying a condo before. She loved the cozy nest she had created here, surrounded by all her favorite books and knick-knacks. Renting had certainly been convenient. Her apartment was close to work and when the hot water faucet on her kitchen sink stopped working for no apparent reason one day, all she had to do was make one phone call and someone came in to fix it while she was at work.

  Kat had always been a renter. She liked not having to worry about repairs herself or deal with complicated financing and mortgages. Her mother said she was being a fiscal idiot to throw money down the toilet on rent, as she put it, but Kat had never had the money or inclination to buy her own place. Owning a home implied settling down and a level of permanence that she didn’t want. Committing to one place with a mortgage would tie her down. What if she wanted to take off to Peru? Not that she ever had taken off to Peru. But she could!

  Within the last three days, Kat had gone from a quiet and more-or-less worry-free, flexible existence to being essentially homeless with a bunch of tough grown-up decisions to make. Should she look for a place to rent somewhere else? Buy her current apartment? Buy a different condo? Fix up Chez Stinky? The options seemed overwhelming.

  When Kat didn’t know what to do, she liked to write things down. Maybe it was a tech-writer thing, but she always felt better when she made lists. Writing out pros and cons or brainstorming ideas on paper tended to help her think. She went to her little wooden desk and pulled out a yellow legal pad.

  She sat down and considered the events of the last three days. Job, work, home, family had all become complicated. Time to write down whether the options were good or bad.

  Inheritance money: good

  Proposal not due for another month: good

  Boss is a jerk: bad

  Inheriting house: good

  Chez Stinky falling apart: bad

  Linus the sweet giant dog: good

  Spastic golden retriever: bad

  Kat continued the list and then put down her pen and sighed. It wasn’t getting her anywhere. Every good thing on the list seemed to have a corresponding bad one. So much for analysis. She was still confused.

  The next morning Kat drove to work, still reflecting on her list. As she walked through the doorway into the office building, she knew what she needed to do: take a vacation!

  A vacation would give her time to get over her anger about the Big Bad Proposal snafu and being so furious with Mark. And she could spend some time in Alpine Grove figuring out what to do about Chez Stinky. Kat knew that the only way she could decide what to do about her inheritance was to spend some time in the little town. She’d always considered herself as more of a city girl, and she wasn’t entirely sure she was cut out for small-town life. So it was time to find out! Alpine Grove might not be Peru, but while she still had flexibility, she could just grab Murphee, lock the door of her apartment, and take off.

  Excited about her conclusions and finally making a decision, Kat practically skipped into the office. It was a relief to finally have a plan of action. She dropped her belongings in her cubicle and went to talk to Mark.

  She strode into his office and stood in front of his desk. “Hi, Mark.”

  Mark looked startled to discover Kat standing there looking determined. Sure, he might think of her as a geeky vanilla doormat, but today she didn’t care. Tearing his gaze away from his nail file, he said, “Hey. What’s up? How’s the proposal coming?”

  “Nice to see you too, Mark. Did you forget to take your gingko today? I hope not, because I need to
talk to you. Since the proposal deadline has been pushed back, I’d like to take some of my vacation time. I’ve already done the editing on the proposal; someone else can put the changes into the computer file while I’m gone. I have some personal things I need to deal with.” She paused for a moment, considering other options. “Maybe it could even be longer than two weeks, too. What do you think about the idea of me telecommuting?”

  Mark wrinkled his nose and brought his brows together. “But what if I need you? There could be…stuff…that happens. I need you here. I read about telecommuting and no one does that. I don’t think that idea works. I like to see my people working at their desks.”

  Kat mouth tightened. “Whatever. We can talk about the concept of telecommuting later. Like I said yesterday, my great-aunt died and right now I have family stuff I need to do out in Alpine Grove where she lived. I’m sure someone will figure things out here while I’m on vacation.”

  Mark studied her face to see if she was really serious. “Alpine Grove? But, that’s the middle of nowhere. You can’t go out there! It’s two hours away. What if something comes up? And you haven’t taken a vacation in ages. Why now? You know we have the important proposal.”

  “That’s why I was suggesting telecommuting. We have e-mail here. It doesn’t really matter where I am as long as I can get an Internet connection. And you’re right. I haven’t taken a vacation in a long time. In fact, I have so much time stocked up, I think I’d like to start my vacation today. ’Bye!” Kat gave Mark a slight parade wave and sauntered out the door.

  Frowning slightly, Mark mumbled, “Umm. Okay. Fine.” He shrugged his shoulders and looked down, returning to his fingernail project.

  Kat almost skipped down the hallway back to her cubicle. Two whole weeks away from here! She was giddy at the prospect of not hearing Chris blathering away on his speaker phone or smelling the lingering scent of years of burnt microwave popcorn that permeated the place.

  After Kat got home, she called Larry Lowell to let him know that she was coming back out to Alpine Grove and asked if she could meet with him again.

  “Larry, I’d like to go out to the property again tomorrow, if that’s okay,” she said. “I know the smell probably isn’t fixed yet, but I didn’t see all the dogs and cats. I’d really like to meet them and talk to the pet sitter who has been working with them since my aunt died.”

  The lawyer cleared his throat, “Yes, I’d be happy to meet you there. I’ll give Cindy a call and see if she can meet with us as well.”

  “Great! Oh, I have one other question. I can’t stay at Chez, um, I mean my aunt’s place, because I know I can’t handle the smell. But since I will be up there for a while, I’d like to bring my cat. Do you know of any pet-friendly motels where I might be able to stay?”

  “Yes, the Enchanted Moose allows pets. It’s an older RV park and motel off the highway. It’s not perhaps the nicest place in town, but they do have little kitchenettes and it’s quite affordable.”

  “I won’t be there for long, I hope,” Kat replied. “I’ll give them a call. ”

  Kat hung up the phone and pondered how best to deal with Murphee, since she was determined to drive out to Alpine Grove today. The first trick would be to get the cat into her travel carrier. To say Murphee was not fond of it would be an understatement. The cat clearly believed that the carrier was an evil agent of doom. It didn’t help that most of the cat’s experience with the carrier involved trips to the veterinarian. Kat had read all the books that extolled the idea of letting the cat get used to the carrier by leaving it out in a high-traffic area of the house, so it became just part of the furniture. The idea was that the cat would be curious, go in, and take a nap in the nice snuggly little plastic box. However, Murphee chose not to use the carrier as a bed. Instead, after a particularly traumatic check-up at the vet, she apparently viewed it as a litter box. The cat expressed her enthusiasm by relieving herself on the evil carrier when it was sitting in the middle of the living room floor.

  Obviously, with Murphee the classic advice from the cat-care books wasn’t going to work. Kat needed the element of surprise. Food might help, too. Kat tiptoed around the apartment to determine where Murphee was currently napping. She found the cat quietly snoring on the bed and closed the bedroom door to keep her confined. Carefully opening the closet door, Kat quietly pulled the kitty carrier down from the top shelf where she had hidden it after the last excursion.

  She brought the carrier to the living room and set it on end on the living room floor. Reaching down quietly, Kat opened the metal mesh door, trying to avoid any jarring clanging noises that would alert the feline. Returning to the bedroom, Kat opened the door and said in a sickly sweet voice, “Hi, Murpheeee….how’s my little lovey cat? Are you sleepy?” The cat raised her head, cocked one ear, and looked at Kat dubiously.

  Kat gently picked up the cat around her middle and tucked Murphee’s body under her arm, so she could grip the front paws with one hand and the scruff of her neck with the other. With as much nonchalance as possible, she carried the sleepy cat out to the living room, pretending not to notice the suspicious plastic box in the middle the floor. But Murphee’s gaze latched onto the dreaded carrier immediately and she tensed in Kat’s arms. Kat knew she’d have to act fast.

  As it dawned on Murphee exactly what Kat was up to, the cat went into full power-kitty berserk mode, paddling all of her legs and extending her claws. Gripping the cat’s scruff more tightly, Kat bent over the carrier, attempting to dump the cat nose-down through the door into the box.

  She had been so close. But with a mighty squall of anger, Murphee braced her front paws on the sides of the carrier doorway. At the same time, the cat was using her rear claws to scratch anything in range, which included Kat’s arms. Kat struggled to dodge the razor-sharp flailing talons and shove the rotund black body down into the carrier.

  At last, one of Murphee’s front paws slipped, and she fell down into the box. Kat slammed the metal door shut and let go of the breath she’d been holding. Mission accomplished. She checked her forearms, and it looked like there had been minimal collateral damage.

  Kat turned the carrier so it was flat on the floor and peered in the doorway at Murphee, who had her ears flattened back on her head and a look of rage in her squinting eyes. Kat threw a kitty treat in through the wire mesh door. “Good kitty,” she said. I’m lying, you nasty cat! I hope we don’t have to go through that again for a while.

  After packing her luggage, Kat strapped the kitty carrier into the front seat of her Toyota with the seatbelt. Murphee was decidedly not amused by the impending travel plans and began meowing quietly when Kat started the engine. As Kat backed the car out of her parking space, Murphee increased her volume, to make sure Kat truly understood the gravity of her unhappiness and how very wrong car travel was. “MEOW! MEEEE-YOOOOWLLLL!”

  Kat sighed. It was going to be an extremely long trip out to Alpine Grove. She tuned her radio to a heavy metal station and cranked the volume up a bit. Murphee seemed to get into the groove as she yowled along to Metallica. Kat shifted the car into gear and pressed the accelerator. Rock and roll.

  After listening to Murphee yowl for the entire two-hour drive, Kat was delighted to check into the Enchanted Moose motel in Alpine Grove. The lawyer’s description had been accurate. It was definitely not the nicest place in town and a better name might have been the Elderly Moose. But the plumbing worked and after being released from her carrier, Murphee was finally quiet.

  The next morning, Kat drove out to the property to meet Larry. She had finally gotten a good night’s sleep and now she was ready to tackle the changes in her life. Apparently, Murphee had been exhausted by recent events as well. After the trauma of the car trip, she had curled up quietly next to Kat’s head and didn’t move all night.

  As Kat drove down the driveway toward Abigail’s house, sunlight streamed through the canopy of evergreens, and Kat was again struck by the peaceful feel of her aunt’s little corn
er of forest. She got out of her car and inhaled the somewhat sweet damp mossy smell that was unique to this place. The aroma outside the house was certainly far better than the one inside.

  She turned toward the sound of a truck rumbling down the driveway. Larry’s salmon-colored Dodge came into view. The truck shook a bit, sputtered, and spit out a few last coughs as Larry killed the engine.

  Today Larry looked quite different than he had the last time Kat had seen him. Instead of his conservative drab brown suit, the lawyer was clad in old jeans and a black-and-red-checked flannel shirt. The geeky outdoors look didn’t quite work for him. What did the lawyer do with his weekends, anyway? She hoped he wasn’t going hunting, and peered at the back of the truck cab to see if there was a gun rack. It was undoubtedly the season to hunt something in Alpine Grove. Kat was sure she didn’t want to have a conversation about the best ways to blow away wildlife and prep it for dinner.

  Fortunately, there didn’t appear to be any obvious armament in the truck. Maybe flannel was standard weekend wear in Alpine Grove. Kat looked down at the cute, strappy black sandals on her feet. It was possible she might be a bit overdressed for the occasion.

  A clattering noise arose from the back of the house, and Linus the gigantic brown dog leaped out from behind the building and raced toward Kat. Although intellectually Kat remembered that Linus was a friendly fellow, that fact didn’t seem to register with the rest of her body, which tensed as the great beast approached her at an alarming speed. Kat squeezed her eyes shut, bracing for impact. A whoosh of dust hit her sandaled feet. When she opened her eyes, Linus was sitting in front of her wagging and panting at her. She reached out to pat his large brown head. “Hi. It’s nice to see you again, Big Guy.”