22.
We had found out what we had wanted to know: For five whole weeks, Tibby had camped nearby, eaten junk food, cavorted with strays, ignored my calls.
But why?
“It is confusing that Tibby was lost for so long, so close to home,” Cat Whisperer A said.
“He wasn’t lost,” I said sadly. “It seems he simply wanted to leave for a while.”
The Cat Whisperers nodded, their expressions sage. “If cats don’t like where they’re living, they’ll just move into another house,” they said, and explained that a cat named Blackie had arrived that way. His owners had snakes, in particular one large anaconda that roamed the house freely, and Blackie had had enough. The Cat Whisperers would deposit Blackie at his home, but within hours he would be back.
“Cats choose,” Cat Whisperer B said, her voice gentle.
“But I don’t have an anaconda,” I whimpered.
Our meeting was drawing to a close when Wendy said, “Too bad we spent so much time on technology when we could have just talked to our neighbors.” I hung my head, sheepish.
“Oh, I used to be really shy,” Cat Whisperer A said, glancing at me with kind eyes. “And then ten years ago I became a schoolteacher and now I walk around the neighborhood and talk to people. But San Francisco can be a really cold place. It’s a place where people stay indoors. We don’t have any porches to hang out on, so it’s hard to connect with people.”
“Yes,” I agreed, nodding at each Cat Whisperer in turn. “Well, I’m glad I finally talked to people. Or else I wouldn’t have met both of you.”
The Cat Whisperers stood to go. But one final thing puzzled me: Tibby had begun to eat at home almost immediately after the last round of flyers had been placed in mailboxes in the Suspicious Area. Could it be that the Cat Whisperers had seen our note and, shaken, withdrawn food? I began to form the question in my head.
But did it matter? It didn’t change the fact that my cat had left of his own free will—and stayed away. I looked from one Cat Whisperer to the other. I frowned. If they’d actually received our flyer their whole story would be in doubt. If their story was in doubt . . .
I could hold on to some of my denial a little bit longer. Maybe Tibby had gone to Antarctica, or on rumspringa, or a kitty walkabout. Maybe he had been trapped, or kidnapped, or brainwashed.
Wendy looked at me. The Cat Whisperers looked at me. Wendy must have seen something in my face, because she narrowed her eyes.
What good was an obsessive quest if, when nearing the end, you forgot your obsession? No good at all. Wasn’t this my last chance to hold on with scrabbling fingernails to the cat I thought (hoped) I once knew? Yes. Wasn’t Truth the most important? Certainly. And so I dug deep, and after a moment, found Truth.
“Thank you for taking care of Tibby,” I said. “Thank you so much.”
23.
Operation Chasing Tibby was officially over. We gathered the GPS unit, the CatCam, the notes from my animal communications class, the flyers, and the laminated missive. We packed them into a box. We marked it “Tibia Stuff,” and put it away on a shelf.
But there was one last thing that remained unexplained. Why had Tibby left?
In the hopes of coming closer to an answer, I decided on one final foray. I decided to visit the banya.
A truck was parked in front of the large three-unit house behind which, out of sight, lay the fabled ruins. I rang the doorbell. Then I waited. And waited. But no one answered. This cold, cold city, I thought. Just then a car pulled up, and a man got out. He lived there, yes. The banya? Sure, he would be happy to show me.
He opened the gate and we walked/crutched up an outside stairway that ran along the side of the house. At the top he pointed to what looked like a large run-down toolshed.
“There it is,” he said.
The banya was indeed a kitty paradise. It had possum-size holes by which to enter and exit. The yard that surrounded it was a tangle of bushes. It was a world apart, a memory of bygone years, ignored by humans, perfect for animals.
The banya was so strange—plopped down in an urban backyard like a fallen spaceship—that for a moment I let myself believe that maybe Tibby hadn’t heard me calling him all those weeks. Perhaps there was an otherworldly force field around this area. Surely the dense shrubbery and brambles had acted as a sound buffer. But then a car alarm went off up the street, its monotonous shriek piercing and clear. I was yanked into the present. I thanked the neighbor and returned to my house.
I didn’t need to turn on the computer and reanalyze the maps. I didn’t need to scour the photos. I didn’t need to have an animal-human conversation. Clear and bright as the pink of a kitty trail on a satellite map was this final truth: Tibby had just not wanted to be at home.
Every long-term relationship has its ups and downs. Last summer had definitely been a down. I had been a greasy-haired, foggy-eyed, catheter-wielding lump on the couch for months. My depression had leaked from every pore. My physical pain was palpable. Fibby, always possessive when I was home, had swatted and hissed at Tibby 24-7. Visitors had tramped in, bringing chocolate and sympathy. Family had stayed for weeks to help take care of me. Tibby had had enough.
Sometimes relationships end at this juncture. But sometimes they mend. I knew then that the point was not that Tibby had left.
The point was that Tibby had returned.
24.
Every quest is a journey, every journey is a story. Every story, in turn, has a moral.
Here are seven possible morals of our story.
1. Technology is awesome. It’s the wave of the future. Computers! GPS! Cat cams! Next time, buy the gizmo that orders pizza, irons shirts, and turns into a stun gun.
2. Don’t rely on technology. It’s fine for some things, but in our story, talking face-to-face with our neighbors proved the most beneficial and rewarding. For future quests, we recommend the most old-fashioned technology of all: the larynx-tongue-jawbone contraption.
3. I was once depressed, but then I got out in the world and I wasn’t depressed anymore, just bonkers.
4. Bonkers is in the eye of the beholder.
5. Sooner or later everyone becomes a cat lover. Just ask Wendy.
6. You can never know your cat. In fact, you can never know anyone as completely as you want.
7. But that’s okay, love is better.
Events in our household settled down. The crutches had finally been put away. Wendy moved in permanently. And Tibby showed no interest in wandering anymore. He still came and went freely, but he was never gone for long. Mostly he would saunter to a patio chair, look around, yawn, and stretch out underneath. He would close his eyes and nap for hours, dreaming dreams that I now accepted I would never know. Gradually he adjusted to being the only cat in the household, the sole recipient of laps and baby talk and cloying affection. He even seemed to like it.
Friskies were offered regularly.
Recently, Wendy proclaimed she wanted two kittens. We’ll get them from the pound, she told me, and at the doddering old age of fourteen Tibby will have young feline companionship.
“Two kittens!” she exclaimed, her eyes shining. “Please?”
“Are you sure?” I asked.
I reminded her that she was about to embark on a journey of love, jealousy, and abject bewilderment.
She assured me that she could handle it. Yes, you can never know your kitties, she agreed, but the lesson she’d learned from Operation Chasing Tibby was that trust was paramount.
“I’ll trust that they’ll love me no matter what,” she said, and I saw in her face all the hope and enthusiasm and future heartbreak of a new cat owner.
8. Trust is good, but there’s always GPS.
Tibia
1994–2012
A Very Good Cat
A NOTE ON THE AUTHOR
Caroline Paul (carolinepaul.com) is the author of the novel East Wind, Rain and the memoir Fighting Fire. She lives with Wendy in San Francisco.
/> A NOTE ON THE ILLUSTRATOR
Wendy MacNaughton is an illustrator based in San Francisco. Her work has appeared in the New York Times, Juxtapoz, and Print Magazine. Her illustrated documentary series “Meanwhile” is published by the Rumpus. She lives with Caroline in San Francisco.
Table of Contents
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Copyright
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Notes On The Author
Dedication
Lost Cat: A True Story of Love, Desperation, and GPS Technology Page 6