Purrfect Sparkle

by Nic Saint

  “Murder is such a loaded term, sir,” said Sharif. “I like to think of it as providing a permanent solution to a difficult problem.”

  “Looks like this isn’t the first time you’ve done this,” Chase grunted, as he clearly had to restrain himself from giving the fellow a good thrashing.

  “Look, I’m very sorry,” said the Sheikh. “If I’d known…” He turned to Loretta. “Are you all right?”

  “I’ll live,” croaked Loretta, touching her throat, where we could clearly see Sharif’s fingers imprinted on her skin.

  “This is just terrible. First off, I want you to arrest this man.”

  “Sir!” said Sharif.

  “I can’t,” said Chase. “He’s got diplomatic immunity, so we can’t touch him.”

  “Fine. I’ll deal with him myself,” said the Sheikh. “And as far as you are concerned, I think I owe you all a large debt of gratitude. A debt of gratitude so big I don’t even know where to begin.” He offered Loretta a toothy smile—the man had a great dentist. “It took thirty-five years for us to meet, but now that I found you—or you found me—I don’t want to have this unexpected connection severed again. Please take me to meet your grandparents, so I can personally tell them what a fine job they did raising you, and to offer my sincere apologies for this man’s atrocities.”

  “I merely did what was best for the country,” said Sharif stiffly.

  “Well, you’ll be able to spend the rest of your life contemplating your crimes… in prison,” said the Sheikh. And when two burly guards finally materialized in the room, he said, “Please take this man into custody. He’s to be deported back to Khemed at once and tried for his crimes.”

  And as Sharif was led away, the Sheikh shook his head. “What a terrible, terrible waste. I’ve vowed to change the way things are done in my country, and this is a good moment to start. By getting rid of the old regime, and instituting some sweeping changes.”

  “Better watch out,” said Chase. “Or else they’ll try to strangle you, too.”

  “Thank you for the warning, Mr. Kingsley. I’ll take the necessary precautions.” He regarded his sister’s bruises with a look of anger mixed with sadness. “I better take you to see my doctor.”

  “You have a doctor?” Loretta croaked.

  “Are you kidding? I never travel without my personal physician. One of the perks of being sheikh.”

  We watched brother and sister leave, and just as they walked out, a man walked in. “Who asked for a hairdresser?” he announced, then frowned as he took in the strange scene.

  “Fido!” said Dooley, then lowered his eyes to the Maine Coon at the man’s feet. “Buster!”

  “Hey, you guys,” said Buster. “Fancy meeting you here!”

  “You came back!” said Dooley as we all crowded around our friend.

  “Of course!”

  “Um… I guess I can come back later?” Fido said.

  “I thought you were in California?” said Gran.

  “I was, but things didn’t work out,” said the hair maestro.

  “They didn’t need hairdressers over there?” asked Odelia with a smile.

  “Well, I thought I’d end up with a group of like-minded individuals and work on the future of our planet, only when I got there I discovered that the Flat Earth Society was hopelessly divided. Part of the organization had decided they wanted to ask Elon Musk to drill a hole through the earth so they could prove the earth is flat, while a different section wanted to organize an expedition to the world’s end and prove their theories that way. In the end the fighting and the bickering became too much for me, so I decided to chuck the whole thing and come back.”

  “And now you’re working at the hotel?”

  “I closed up my shop before I left, and my customers have all left me,” he said as he idly played with a comb. “So I just figured I’d start from scratch, and the hotel was the only place that offered to hire me.”

  “I think you’ll find that if you open up that shop of yours again,” said Chase, clapping the other man on the back so hard his knees almost buckled, “that your customers will all come flocking back soon enough.”

  “I’d come back to you,” said Gran as she touched her tiny white curls. “In fact I’ll come back right now. That hair salon at the mall stinks. They don’t know how to do a perfect perm.”

  “Only you know how I like my hair done, Fido,” said Marge.

  “Yeah, I missed you, too,” said Odelia.

  “Just don’t mention this flat earth business again, will you?” said Marge. “It’s a real turnoff.”

  “I won’t,” said Fido with a crooked smile. “I guess I went a little loony there for a while, didn’t I?”

  “It’s that darned internet,” said Gran. “It turns everybody looney.”

  “I know,” said Fido. “I watched a YouTube video on how to baste a turkey, and the next video was about how to shoot a turkey, and I don’t know how it happened, but suddenly I was watching videos about how the earth is flat, and I couldn’t stop! I watched those videos day and night—I had them on autoplay and they just became more and more cuckoo and in the end so did I!”

  “That’s YouTube for you. You start with a turkey and end up with a cuckoo.”

  “It’s the human brain,” said Dooley. “It’s a very delicate instrument, and a YouTube bombardment can easily destroy the balance that makes it all work together in perfect harmony.”

  We all stared at the cat.

  Dooley shrugged. “I watch a lot of Discovery Channel. At least it doesn’t melt your brain.”

  A round of heartfelt laughter was his reward, and even Fido laughed, though of course he hadn’t understood a word Dooley had said. But the mere fact that three former customers had told him they’d come back in a heartbeat was enough to spirit a big smile onto the hair wizard’s face again.

  Epilogue

  Tex had fired up the grill, and had provided the rest of the family with an assortment of sausages, steaks, ribs and other goodies, and the scent of deliciousness had even caused our next-door neighbors Ted and Marcie Trapper to stick their heads over the fence and see where that wonderful smell was coming from. So Tex had very magnanimously invited the couple over, and since the Trappers never went anywhere without their precious sheepdog Rufus, the latter was now lying next to us on the porch, and was chewing at a very large rib. His best friend Fifi, a neighboring Yorkie, had also been invited, and was trying to chew through a piece of steak.

  “Tex is definitely improving,” said Brutus as he savored the piece of prime beef he’d been fed.

  “Yeah, he’s improving with leaps and bounds,” Harriet agreed as she dug her teeth into a hamburger patty.

  “I think it’s because he’s finally reconciled himself with his position in life,” I ventured as I enjoyed the taste of a piece of chicken filet.

  “And what is his position in life?” asked Dooley, who was nibbling a meatball.

  “Being the town doctor, of course.”

  We all glanced up at Tex. I still felt a little bad about the way I’d treated him, when all he tried to do was help me get rid of that diamond. Then again, it’s hard to control a bowel movement.

  “I’m sorry, Tex!” I cried, not for the first time, I might add.

  Tex raised his tongs in recognition. Even though my words eluded him, I think he grasped my intention. He’d forgiven me, I like to add, which just shows what a good-hearted man he is.

  The rest of the family were all gathered around the table set up in Tex and Marge’s backyard, and thoroughly enjoying the feast.

  “So what happened to Johnny?” asked Gran.

  “Ancient history,” said Scarlett with a careless wave of her hand.

  “Too attached to his ethically challenged partner?”

  “Too needy,” Scarlett said as she pronged a potato and bit off a tiny piece. “After our second date he was talking wedding plans. So I told him I don’t do marriage, and I don’t do cohabitation, a
nd when he kicked up a fuss I kicked him out.”

  “Good riddance,” said Gran.

  “Johnny is a nice person,” said Marge. “He just hangs out with the wrong crowd.”

  “He is the wrong crowd,” said Gran.

  “So what’s going on with Loretta?” asked Charlene.

  “I was chatting with her last night,” said Odelia. “She’s in Khemed right now, and things are going great. Bab El Ghat rolled out the red carpet for her and her grandparents and installed them at the palace for the duration of their trip. He wants to make amends, and show them that he’s not like his dad. Also, he’s asked Loretta to advise him on some necessary changes to the archaic nature of certain Khemed customs. Like polygyny, the right of any man to marry multiple wives.”

  “Next thing she’ll become the Sheikha,” said Uncle Alec as he savored his cold beer.

  “So who’s this Loretta you’re talking about?” asked Ted Trapper.

  “She’s the writer of this fantastic book,” said Marge, and handed a copy of The Sheikh’s Passion to the Trappers.

  Marcie took it and nodded. “I read this. It’s great. I saw the other day that Hollywood has bought the rights. They’re turning it into a TV series.”

  “Oh, I wonder who’ll play Sheikh Bab El Ehr,” said Marge excitedly, “and Loretta’s mother.”

  “I don’t care who plays them, as long as they stay true to the book,” said Marcie. “Too often they change the whole story and I hate that.”

  “So how are things with Fido?” asked Uncle Alec.

  “He’s doing fine. His old customers have all returned,” said Marge, nodding. “So all’s well that ends well.”

  “I’m not so sure,” said Gran. “When I went in there yesterday he was telling me this whole story about how the earth is actually hollow, and how strange creatures live under our feet.”

  “Oh, dear,” said Marge. “Looks like we’ll have to have another talk with him.”

  “And wean him off the YouTube. For good this time.”

  “YouTube is overrated,” said Brutus. “Tik Tok is where the action is.”

  I laughed. “Are you into Tik Tok now, Brutus?”

  “You bet. Harriet and I made our first Tik Tok movie yesterday. Wanna see?”

  “I wouldn’t miss it for the world,” I said indulgently, as Harriet fired up the tablet Odelia leaves lying around for us to play with.

  Moments later we were all watching a short video of Brutus and Harriet moving to ABBA’s Waterloo and doing a funny little dance.

  “Cute,” said Rufus as he yawned, showing us he wasn’t particularly impressed. “But you should see my Tik Tok.”

  “You have a Tik Tok?” asked Brutus.

  “Of course. Me and Fifi made it together,” he said.

  “We love our Tik Tok, don’t we, Rufus?” said Fifi.

  “Absolutely. We make a great team.” He instructed Harriet to surf to their channel, which was called Ru-Fi, and soon I had to admit Rufus was right: the short videos they’d posted—or that Marcie had posted for them—were fun. They jumped through hoops, played fetch with Ted, and generally did the kind of stuff dogs are good at: basically what their humans told them to do.

  “I like Harriet’s video better,” Dooley whispered in my ear.

  “Me, too,” I whispered back.

  “Why don’t we start our own Tik Tok channel, Max? I think it could be a lot of fun.”

  “Yeah, why not? Odelia can film us and put everything online. But what could we do that would make people watch?”

  “I know,” said Dooley. “We’ll solve mysteries.”

  “Solve mysteries in under three minutes? That’s a stretch, Dooley, even for us.”

  “Oh, I know, we can dance and shake our tushies, just like Harriet does. People love that stuff.”

  I arched my eyebrows. Dancing and shaking my tush is not exactly my thing. Then again, if it made my friend happy, why not?

  And to show us how it was done, Dooley now hopped down from the swing, and demonstrated a little dance he’d seen in another Tik Tok video.

  We all laughed, and so did the humans, who encouraged Dooley to go on. Then a couple of the humans took out their phones, and soon he was doing a whole show.

  “You’re a natural, Dooley,” said Brutus with a wide grin.

  “You should have been a dance star,” said Harriet reluctantly. She likes to be the center of attention, and she didn’t appreciate sharing the limelight with Dooley.

  “Your turn, Max,” said Odelia, holding up her phone.

  “Yeah, Max,” said Gran. “Show us what you got.”

  “I don’t ‘got’ anything,” I said. But since they were cheering me on, I had no alternative but to hop down, and strut my stuff.

  Soon we were all dancing to the music, and even Rufus and Fifi joined in, and then it was the humans’ turn. And generally a good time was had by all. Even Tex stood shaking and swinging behind his grill, Uncle Alex danced with Charlene, Chase and Odelia demonstrated a few steps of a dance called the tango they’d recently picked up, and Scarlett and Gran showed us they weren’t too old to hit the dance floor either. But Ted and Marcie beat us all: they actually danced a mean foxtrot, and moved like professionals!

  “YouTube lessons,” said Ted, panting when the dance was done. “There’s a lot of them, and I mean a lot.”

  Okay, so YouTube can be used for good or for evil, and isn’t that the case with all technology? The evening wound down, and it was time to go to bed. At least for the humans. For us cats the night had only just begun. And as we walked along the sidewalk in the direction of the park, a feeling of extreme contentment filled me. “It’s nice to have friends, you guys,” I suddenly burst out.

  “That’s your near-death experience talking, buddy,” said Brutus.

  “What do you mean, near death? I was never near death.”

  “Oh, yes, you were. If that diamond had slipped a little further down, it would have torn a hole in your gut the size of a melon.”

  “No way!” Dooley cried. “A whole melon?”

  “Yep, a melon, and then you wouldn’t be here right now, Max.”

  “A melon is pretty big, isn’t it?” said Dooley.

  “Guys, please, let’s not talk about gruesome stuff like that,” said Harriet.

  “If that diamond had been in there five minutes longer,” Brutus said, undeterred, “it would have turned Max’s insides into mush. Like a blender!”

  “No way!” said Dooley. “An actual blender!”

  “Yep. Scrambled him up something good.”

  Friends. You can’t live with them—but you can sure live without them, right? Though I have to admit I was still glad to have them.

  “If that diamond had been in there for only a single minute more, it would have torn a hole in Max’s gut the size of Mount Everest!”

  “No way! That’s a big hole, Brutus!”

  Ugh. See what I mean?

  THE END

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  Excerpt from Death in Suburbia (The Kellys 2)

  Chapter One

  “Scott! Get up! Time for breakfast!”

  Scott groaned, opened one eye and saw that the day had already started without him. He didn’t mind. As far as he was concerned, the day could do whatever it wanted. So he closed his eyes again and tried to return to the dream he’d abandoned. The one where he was Han Solo and instead of having to endure that weird hairy ape as a traveling companion he conquered the universe with Emilia Clarke by his side. Now wouldn’t that be something!

  But before he and lovely Emilia could board the Millennium Falcon, Mom’s voice pierced the fragile fabric of sleep once more—effectively ending his roseate dreamscape.

  “Scott! Out of bed! Now!”

  He threw back the comforter,
rubbed the sleep from his eyes and yawned. Checking his smartphone, he saw that his best friend Mike was still asleep. If he wasn’t he’d have sent him an update on his Pokemon Go conquests from last night. They might be twelve, but that didn’t mean Pokemon was beneath them now. Besides, with the new Harry Potter Pokemon coming out soon, they needed to work on their mad skillz.

  Shuffling out of his room in the direction of the bathroom, he discovered the door locked. Dragging one hand through his shaggy mane, he pounded the door with the other.

  “Go away, scuzz-ball!” his sister yelled from inside.

  “You go away, snarf-face!” he yelled back.

  “Don’t call your sister a snarf-face,” said his mother as she hurried past, cradling the baby in her arms.

  “Why do you keep carrying Jacob everywhere?” he asked. “He’s old enough to walk.”

  But Mom wasn’t listening. Instead, she was pounding down the stairs, still carrying Jacob as if his legs were too weak to carry him. At this rate, the toddler was never going to learn how to walk all by himself. Scott shook his head. Adults. They just never listened.

  The door to the bathroom suddenly swung open and Maya appeared, a towel draped around her head and another one around her bony frame. She narrowed her eyes at him. “Why do you need the bathroom anyway? You wear the same grungy shirt three days in a row and you don’t even bother to deodorize those pathetic pits of yours.”

  “I don’t need to deodorize my pits,” he said, moving past his sister. “My pits naturally smell like roses.”

  “Nobody’s pits smell like roses. Especially yours, little brother.”

  He squared off against Maya. Even though she was five years older than him, they were the same height. He’d gotten a growth spurt last year to the extent she had no right to call him ‘little brother’ anymore. “Are you dissing my pits?”

  “I’m telling you that if you don’t start working on your personal hygiene no girl is ever going to want to go out with you.”