The Third Cat Story Megapack: 25 Frisky Feline Tales, Old and New

by Damien Broderick

  I drew away. “Wow! That’s from the kitten?”

  He smiled his gotcha smile.

  Hesitantly, I slid my hand under the tiny warm belly of the orange striped one. I held it to my face, and it stared at me with green, calm, alien eyes and purred.

  I put my tongue hesitantly on the place between its ears where striped cats have that M marking.

  Oh boy. My mouth was flooded with the richest, most expensive orangey chocolate taste I could imagine. I almost dropped the kitten.

  The kitten seemed as pleased as I, and twisted its body around to tongue-rasp my thumb.

  “Herschel, this isn’t humane. I mean, these are real kittens. They’re bioengineered, I’m sure, but somewhere back in their ancestry is a real cat, and—”

  He kissed me again, that complex sweetness fading with the second kiss, and smiled his sardonic, teasing smile. “Ivy, they are in no pain. Look.” He put the black kitten down and it frisked around his Nikes, then discovered its short little tail and chased it.

  “But they could spend their entire lives in a little box. That’s not right, Herschel.”

  The black kitten—I decided to call it Bittersweet, which is the moment at which I knew I was going to keep him at least—caught its own tail, bit it, squeaked, and began licking it frantically.

  The orange striped one was more laid-back. It seemed pleased with the idea that I had licked it, and probably decided if I wasn’t actually its mother, I was a good substitute. I put it on my lap, where it kneaded fervently, purring ever more loudly, its eyes half-closed in a sort of Buddha state. Marmalade, I decided to call it.

  Why was I naming these kittens? Had they hypnotized me? I resolved not to name the white one, even though its name was obviously Ice-cream. Cream for short.

  “They’re no trouble,” said Herschel. “And all fun. Honest.” The white one was clawing at my sofa.

  I always felt sorry when my friends talked about their boyfriends, middle-aged paunchy men with hound-dog eyes and shiny scalps. Herschel is forty one, just as old as any of their boring lovers, but he’s exciting. He has shoulder-length black hair, eyes the color of candied violets, and a long, hawkish face finished by a mobile mouth capable of wryness, tenderness, derision—and those kisses.

  Even without the chocolate, those kisses—!

  “I’ll bring you more of the milk,” he promised.

  The kittens frisked around us as he kissed and kissed and kissed me. My last thought, before my attention turned entirely to Herschel’s hands, mouth, and hips, was that Marmalade was trying to nest in my hair.

  * * * *

  I met Herschel on line while my employer was scoping out a facility on Mars. Like many entrepreneurs, my boss felt hampered by international laws restricting biological research. Mars corporations lease habitats suited for scientific R and D; Herschel was an agent for one of these corporations.

  We hooked up because of a hematite ring he mentioned buying when we were married, on business one afternoon. Mars hematite. He gave me a URL which carried Mars jewelry. I hadn’t ordered any of it—its satiny silver gleam is best appreciated with the naked eye, not in pictures—but they told me when you scratched it, it showed a blood-red streak.

  Herschel had been to Mars three times. It wasn’t hard to bring back experimental products; most weren’t actually illegal on Earth, just the stem-cell and other research that spawned them.

  He could have made a wad of money selling psychoactives too new to be against US law. But he didn’t. He only brought back the occasional novelty, only for private use. Gifts for his mother, sister, nieces. And, since we had met through on line a few months ago, for me.

  When Herschel and I came up for air, some forty minutes later, the kittens were all in their box, nursing fervently on the nipples of the white vials.

  * * * *

  Herschel was as good as his word, and brought me a case of the kitten-milk. MicroMilk™. He said he’d give me the address of the Earth-side company that sold it—it apparently was used for something else, he forgot what—so I wouldn’t have to worry about the poor little guys starving.

  Herschel was as good to me as those boring men my two office mates were dating. I’d had a long run with the VR personals, and I knew what was out there. How could I be so lucky? My first husband, who had died of Fell’s syndrome, was a gem, but, kind and supportive though he was, not as sexy as Herschel.

  How could any man top this gift?

  We were going to a performance chef affair that Saturday. He said I should dress up, so I wore the little dark red number. It was cut modestly in the front, but the back showed everything down to the rouged tops of my buttocks.

  I usually put the kittens back in their box when I was out of the apartment. My lease said no pets, but they were quiet and although I was afraid they’d give away their presence by sunning themselves in the front window, they seem to enjoy basking in shadows.

  The others went willingly, but this time Cream hid under my couch. I put my hand in to pull her out, and she scratched me.

  The little rascals had claws, all right. I tried to staunch the bleeding with a tissue, but it was deeper than I thought. Cream ran away; I knew most of her hiding places, I could get her later.

  Worried about the time, I threw the dress on and was a little annoyed to find a snag in the hem of the dark red dress. Which kitten had done this? Somehow I suspected Cream, but I figured it hardly showed.

  * * * *

  The chef was a riot, especially the knife juggling salad prep and the entree where he produced ingredients from his hat. As a finale, he used contained explosives to finish our bombe chocolat.

  Herschel waited until the pyrotechnics were over to tell me, over the undramatic coffee, that he had another business trip to Mars. He’d be gone almost a year. He said he understood if I wouldn’t wait, but if I would—

  The ring was a huge ruby surrounded by faceted hematites.

  A cynic once told me engagement rings are soft prostitution; how many women have agreed to marry a man because they were temporarily hypnotized by the refractive depths of a gem?

  No. This was only the icing on the cake.

  I loved Herschel; it wasn’t just that he was handsome and a spectacular lover; he really was good to me in many ways, the compliments and gifts, listening to my thoughts and problems.

  We could write back and forth every day, Herschel said. And I’d have the kittens to keep me company. Chocolate company.

  I wondered softly whether these absences might be a challenge when if we were married, but Herschel offered to get me a position in his company. We’d travel together.

  His flight to Kennedy left the next morning. So little time for goodbye kisses. I almost forgot to ask him where to get the milk for the kittens. He scribbled a URL for MicroMilk™ on the back of an envelope, kissed me again with the last of those kisses that left me weak and dizzy. And he was gone.

  I let the kittens out of their box. Forget my melancholy with their antics. Bittersweet had a thing for the tip of his tail, but he could also go for Marmalade’s tail. He was my pouncer; his genome must have included a good mouser.

  When they clawed their way into my lap, I licked each one, laughing at the absurdity of it. But then closed my eyes and savored the flavors.

  Belatedly, I realized I didn’t even have a good photo of Herschel. I was late to work trying to capture an image of him from our many internet conversations. Unsuccessfully. Herschel’s good looks didn’t translate to archive mediums.

  The kittens, and their chocolate flavors, were a distraction, as we continued our relationship long distance. Herschel’s company let him have unlimited access to his account while he was on the Mars-bound spacecraft, but the intervals—because the craft was receding from Earth—got longer and longer between my affectionate outpourings and his erotic responses.

  The kittens, all three, climbed into my lap every time I sat at the computer. Bittersweet was fascinated by my hand on the finger
pad, convinced that my pinkie was a mouse. Cream used the time to climb up my neck and, if I let her, to the top of her head, where she would curl up in my hair and try to sleep, tightening her tiny claws if I moved too much.

  Absently, I’d lick them whenever I could. Great, all the chocolate I wanted, no calories, three flavors.

  When Herschel and I were tired of teasing each other and playing mutual admiration games, we talked about the news (two religious groups were at war on the moon, Congress was debating a ban on brain implants in infants, the President was off his Prozac) but our most frequent conversations were plans for our future, joy and yearning. And, of course the kittens.

  I was busy the week after Herschel left, so I didn’t get around to ordering the nutrient fluid for them. Then the company sent me two months’ supply, again in sealed bottles. How did the kittens survive on such tiny amounts of this “milk”? I was tempted to break open one of the white nursing bottles, but the stuff was expensive, and the directions indicated that it was sterile, would be ruined by contact with air.

  I no longer kept the kittens in their box; they romped or slept all over the apartment full time, even when I was at work or asleep. Their tiny warm bodies next to my head on the pillow seemed a consolation for the absence of my love, even Herschel’s messages. Cream, particularly, enjoyed nestling at my throat, purring and kneading.

  Herschel’s craft would be cycling behind the sun in a few days, and in anticipation, he had composed a series of ten love notes, one to be opened each day.

  That was when I tried to order more milk for the kittens, and discovered the company responded neither to phone calls or e-mails. The MicroMilk™ website had vanished, nothing but a black box with a red edge left at the URL.

  * * * *

  I crammed them back in the box, determined not to let them use their energy until I could find something to replenish them. Herschel, is there an alternative source for the MicroMilk™? I expected it would be the first thing Herschel would read—and respond to—when the craft came from behind the sun and we could e-mail back and forth again.

  But as I lay sleepless one night (I blamed my insomnia on lack of both kittens and Herschel) I obsessed that perhaps the kittens were already dead. I got up and, without turning on a light, opened the box.

  They were awake, quiescent. Their eyes gazed up at me, green eyes all. Then a car passed on the street outside, and the eyes reflected it with feral opalescence. Reassured, I tried to clap the lid back on the box, but Bittersweet had uncurled, stretched, risen, and clambered half outside. I shoved him back in, but Cream got out, then Marmalade, and it was like—well, like herding cats. They hadn’t been out in three days, and they were ready to play.

  They frisked around the room, chasing each other, inserting tiny claws into the cloth of my bathrobe, jumping from chair to table to refrigerator top. I couldn’t keep track of them. Finally, they gathered at my feet and yowled. Yowled!

  Nervously, I tried to gather them up before a neighbor complained. But they were having none of it. They were hungry.

  What could I do? I offered them the empty vials, hoping the small residue or even the flavor might keep them busy, but only Cream tried to nurse on them. The other two just sniffed and began to rake against my legs, screaming in their tiny, piercing voices.

  I scooped them all up, hoping that my warmth would quiet them, and went to my computer.

  Herschel, I know you won’t get this for almost a week, but I really need a solution to this kitten-feeding problem. The little guys won’t go back into their box. The poor little babies are so hungry!

  I opened the refrigerator (Bittersweet had always taken serious interest in it, so maybe there was something inside he might like) and my eyes lit on the coffee cream.

  I poured some in a saucer, and the kittens all approached and sniffed it. Bittersweet even lapped up a drop or two. But all of them backed away hissing, then meowed every louder.

  I scooped them up and again tried to put them back in the box—actually got Bittersweet inside and slammed the lid down—but the other two ran away. I gave up and left Bittersweet in the box. I could hear his muffled screams, but I hoped in a few minutes he’d shut up and go to sleep.

  The other two had disappeared under a sculpture of antique AOL disks my niece had made for me. I tried to retrieve them, but got only a six-inch long scratch for my pains. I gave up and tried to go back to sleep. After a while, I felt the tiny weight of kittens spring up on the bed with me. My last memory before going to sleep was of fur under my chin and at the nape of my neck.

  I awoke groggy and weak. No answer from Herschel, of course. I tried an internet search but got some ominous cookies that suggested I was trying to break the law. And in fact, maybe I was. The kittens were forbidden technology on Earth.

  Maybe even on Mars.

  The kittens stayed out of their box. I tried at one point, when I thought they were exhausted from chasing each other around my desk, to shove Cream and Marmalade back in the box, but of course this only meant that Bittersweet got out too. Now I had three starving cats running loose. I was afraid even to lick them for their flavor. Perhaps production of the chocolate alkaloids and complex flavonoids taxed their metabolism.

  Every morning, exhausted and heartsick, I got up expecting to see their starved tiny bodies dead in the bed beside me, but the fact is, they were growing.

  Wait a minute. Did this mean something in the box was a growth inhibitor? Bittersweet, who had spent an extra night in the box, did seem fractionally tinier than the other two—

  At last, the tenth day, the space liner emerged from behind the sun, and Herschel’s warm pixels bloomed on my screen. Feed them cow blood was all he said.

  Cow blood? You think cow blood is an easy commodity to acquire? I tried the butcher at a Tiptops three blocks from my apartment, but he looked at me strangely and I decided not to go back there ever again, even for coffee cream.

  I was exhausted. I was losing weight. I looked like hell. The kittens were angry and playful and pleading by turns. Cream would dance up to me, scratch me furiously, and then, contrite, lick my hand with her tiny, abrasive tongue, cleaning the very scratch she’d made.

  I tried repeatedly to trace the company that had made the original kitten fluid. I even tried e-bay. My e-bay search got a call from a detective. I told him I needed to contact MicroMilk™.

  “You and a lot of other people,” said the detective. “Including the law.”

  Later, I wished I’d asked him to elaborate.

  “Herschel,” I wrote, desperate, “they’re dying. They haven’t had any nourishment in over two weeks.” But a message came back from the triplanet server: the craft was now having communications problems.

  I’d have to wait until Herschel got to Mars.

  I found a source for chicken blood (don’t ask) but they simply looked at the saucer of the nasty stuff and then gazed at me with green eyes puzzlement, as if I’d offered them a dish of red poster paint.

  But the kittens weren’t dying. They seemed quite happy, in fact.

  They were, in fact, thriving. Growing. They weren’t supposed to grow.

  And I was beginning to get suspicious. I’d always had to watch my weight, but now my clothes were hanging on me. I tried eating real chocolate, candy, croissants, cookies, even Count Chocula with chocolate milk and Dove liqueur. None of it tasted as good as the kittens. I found myself wishing for a taste of their fur even while I was at the office. I considered smuggling Bittersweet, the smallest, into work in my briefcase.

  I wondered now if they thrived on being licked, and if the chocolate flavor was somehow destroying my health.

  I tumbled to what the kittens were doing when one of my coworkers asked me why I had scratches and cuts all up and down my arms. And on my neck.

  I didn’t need to go to my internist to know I was anemic.

  Chocolate vampire kittens from Mars.

  They were cute. I couldn’t put them out in the cold
. Even if I wanted to, somebody else would find them, adopt them, get sucked dry by them.

  And perhaps that person would be victimized without even the joy of knowing their chocolate secret.

  They were way too big for the box now.

  Could I have them killed?

  No! It wasn’t their fault that they were engineered this way. They hadn’t signed up in the womb—or test tube—to be chocolate or to be vampires. They were so cute, playing around my legs, purring against my neck as I fell asleep, kneading my throat to get the blood to flow—

  And the chocolate. So much better than mundane chocolate, which tasted bland and chalky, ruined by off flavors and wax and the stuff used to extend and harden it. The kittens’ chocolate flavor had the slight bite of bitterness, the teasing sweetness, the richness that floods your mouth, and so much more.

  Some nights I completely lost control and licked them all over, from their whiskers to their twitchy tails. The fur back of their ears was particularly delicious.

  I’ve heard people say that chocolate is better than sex. They’re wrong. But my kittens, unlike earthly chocolate, really were better than sex.

  And if I could only get some MicroMilk™, they’d be fine again.

  I hoped.

  Of course, they’d never fit back in their little heart-shaped coffin again.

  I was hooked on the kittens, that was the problem. I no longer had the strength of will to control them, or figure out a solution to my dilemma. Once, when the scale had hit a new low and I was trying to build myself up with iron pills and milkshakes, I thought of eating garlic. Since these weren’t supernatural kittens, I doubted that the old vampire remedy would help, but I did know that babies didn’t like the taste of garlic in their mother’s milk.

  The kittens didn’t like it, either. They sulked. They hid in a dark closet for days. When they came out, they tasted of garlic. Garlic and chocolate don’t taste good together.

  The garlic was worse than useless. They cried until my neighbor downstairs called the office, but they continued avidly to suck my blood, though complaining constantly and refusing to be petted. And then I discovered they were roaming.