by H. L. Logan
I rummaged around in the garage and found a shallow, unused plastic storage bin, and filled it up with shredded newspaper as an impromptu cat box. I brought it inside, and set it in the sunroom. “Shit in here,” I said to the cat, picking him up and placing him inside the box. He stared at me, batted at one of the strips of newspaper, and then hopped back out. “Shit in there, you hear me?” I called after him as he strolled back into the house like he belonged here. I huffed a resigned laugh and followed him.
My old childhood bedroom upstairs, along with my Dad’s old study, was packed to the brim with moving boxes filled with things from my old New York apartment. Charles and I had lived there together for five years—the duration of our marriage. We’d been together for seven, though the definition of “together” was a bit up in the air. He’d been somewhat of a mentor during my last years at Beasley University, managing at the gallery that I’d showed and sold my ceramics work in, and after I’d finished my masters he’d taken me under his wing. I stayed at the gallery, and it wasn’t long before he’d pitched her idea to me for starting a ceramics design firm. We’d start small, with me as the lead designer until we could bring on others, and we’d sell work to people interested in limited, high quality pieces that weren’t quite one of a kind, but felt that way.
I was a fan of money—still am—and so I saw the value in doing the commercial stuff. And hey, I could still retain some of my artistic integrity. I was head designer after all, and I could make what I thought was good. It didn’t stay that way, though.
The company grew, my work’s reputation grew, and soon we were getting offers from big corporations requesting designer features to use in their catalogues. Being a fan of money, it didn’t take much convincing for me to start making my work more and more mainstream, and more consumable. By this time too, Charles and I had decided to move in with each other. He’d been the one to suggest it. I was hesitant, but my mother was sick at the time, and she was so concerned that I wasn’t married yet, so… to ease my dying mother’s concern for her youngest daughter, I asked Charles if he wanted to get married.
Was he in love with me? I don’t know. Like I’d said, we’d made a great partnership, and he was a great friend. Maybe Charles was the type of man who normally wouldn’t have been interested in marriage. He was forty when we married, and he’d never mentioned any prior marriages or girlfriends. Business and art was his life. He knew the advantages of our marriage, and he knew why I’d asked him. He’d never been interested in my body.
I’d been back here for two months now, and I still hadn’t unpacked most of my things—just the tools, mostly, and some necessary clothing. I didn’t know how long I would be staying here. Just until I got over this creative block, I’d told myself, but I’d begun to wonder if that would ever happen.
Chrissy
Lee had offered to put me up at his and his wife’s house until the storm lifted enough that we could mount a proper search operation for Henry. I’d spent over an hour trudging around in the mud and rain in the woods surrounding the gas station, but I’d found no sign of him. It was when the lightning started to strike that I’d decided Lee and Reynold were right, and it would be safer for me to wait, but the thought of Henry scared and lost somewhere out there during that thunder and lightning tore me up inside. That night, Lee’s wife, Margery, made a big lasagna dinner and gave me a slice of apple pie. It was the best I’d eaten since I’d left Georgia, but it was difficult to enjoy it knowing that Henry was out there hungry somewhere.
I was responsible for the little guy, and I’d let him get lost right under my nose. I figured he must’ve wandered outside when Lee had opened the garage, and gotten startled by the thunder and ran off somewhere to hide. The other possibility, which I really didn’t want to think about, was that he had gotten snatched up by some coyote or hawk out there. He was small, so it was possible…
I lay awake in the guest bed, my eyes blurry with tears. Damnit, I thought. Please let me find him. The thought of moving on to California without Henry just killed me, and the thought of going back to Georgia was even worse. And there still remained the problem of what I would do next. Get another soul sucking job? Same shit, different town?
Maybe I could stay here. It was a weird thought, but at the same time, a pleasant one. All the people I’d met here were so nice, and there was a real sense of community. Of course, I doubted there were any apartment buildings I could move into, and the nearest city was an hour’s drive, so staying here was probably not going to happen. I’d find Henry, and then move on.
Please let me find him, I thought again.
I was sad and couldn’t stop thinking about him, but my body was exhausted and relieved to finally have a proper bed to sleep on, and I quickly fell asleep.
I woke to another dreary day, the sun hiding behind grey clouds. Margery had made pancakes, and the news on the kitchen television said that the storm was passing east. “Worst of it’s over for us, I think,” she said, drizzling maple syrup onto her pancakes. She was robust as her husband, with an appetite to match her size, and her stack of pancakes towered over mine.
The stairs groaned and creaked with Lee’s heavy footsteps. He appeared in the kitchen wearing a rain jacket and holding two pairs of rubber boots. “Good morning,” he said, dropping the boots by the front door. “You have a raincoat, Chrissy?”
“Yes, sir,” I said.
“Finish up your breakfast and we’ll get looking. It’s just a drizzle right now. I’ve got a pair of boots you can borrow.”
“Okay,” I said, scarfing down the rest of my pancakes. “What about you? Aren’t you going to eat?”
“I’ll be fine. I’d like to get out there as soon as possible. It was eating at me all night. I’d feel better the sooner we get out looking for Henry.”
“It’s not your fault, Lee. But I appreciate your help. I appreciate what both of you have done for me.”
Margery smiled. “We do what we can to help folks in need around here. The world needs a little more kindness in it, I think.” She picked an apple out from a basket on the table and handed it to her husband. “It’ll tide you over for now.”
“Alright, you ready to go?”
I nodded and quickly brought my plate over to the sink. “Thank you for breakfast,” I said. “Hold on, let me grab my raincoat.” I dashed upstairs to the guest room to dig my jacket out of my bag, then jogged back down and pulled on the spare pair of boots. They fit me perfectly.
“Belonged to our daughter,” Lee said. “She’s in Phoenix now. Programmer.”
We pulled up our hoods and headed out the door. The rain was light—not much more than a scattered pattering. We hopped into Lee’s car and drove the short distance to the gas station. My eyes scanned the trees in a shallow hope that I might spot Henry, but of course, I saw nothing. The woods spanned wide areas between houses and the chances of spotting him from the car were slim.
The chances of spotting him in general are slim.
I pushed the thought from my mind, and we pulled up to the gas station. We went up to the minimart, and I was surprised to see a paper flier taped up to the glass on the inside of the front door that said, MISSING: Henry. Black Cat, five months old. Call Reynold at 555-346-2311. Reynold was watching TV, his feet propped up on the counter, and he stood up when he saw us walk in.
“’Morning, you two,” he said.
“’Morning, Reynold,” I replied. “No sign of Henry?”
“I’m afraid not, Chrissy. Sorry. Hey, I printed out these fliers. If you can’t turn him up looking around in the woods, then you might try distributing them up in the town. We’ve got a pet store here, so if anyone found him, they’d probably go there.”
“I’ll do that,” I said. “Thanks Reynold.”
“Hey,” he said, giving me an encouraging smile. “Keep your head up.”
I smiled back. “Yeah.”
Lee and I moved out from the gas station and started to comb the trees surroundi
ng it. Lee split off from me to cover more ground, and he carried Henry’s bowl filled with kibble to shake and entice him out if he was hiding. Every dozen feet or so, I would call Henry’s name, stopping to look up into the overhead branches and beneath shrubs. I realized that the chances of just happening on him were pretty slim—he would need to come out and find us. There was just too much ground to cover, too many places he could be hiding.
After fifteen minutes of walking, I checked the map on my cell phone and saw that I was quite close to a street, and I followed the GPS until I reached it. I called for Henry again, and then stood there silently, straining my ears hoping to catch the sound of his meow. All I heard was the steady patter of rain on soil and asphalt, and the light rustle that came from thousands of trees caressed by the wind. I walked up the street a little ways until I reached a large wood paneled house with a white BMW parked in the front. I was surprised to see that it had New York plates.
Guess I’m not the only one from out of town, I thought, and turned to head back to the gas station. I’d have to depend on the fliers—they’d be more effective than walking around by foot, and I didn’t want to keep Lee. He hadn’t eaten breakfast, and he’d already done a lot more than he needed to just to help me. So far, everyone had.
I felt my eyes getting hot with tears. It was a weird mixture of disappointment in myself for losing Henry, sadness knowing he was out there scared and hungry, and amazement for how these strangers had gone so out of their way to help me and show me such kindness and hospitality. It was something that had been sorely missing from my world.
“Anything?” Lee asked, back at the gas station. I shook my head, and he patted me on the shoulder. “Nothing on my end either. We’ll drive up into the main part of town, and put the fliers up in the pet store, the bank and the market. If anybody’s seen Henry, they’ll pass through one of those places for sure.”
I nodded and smiled. “Thanks, Lee. Really. I’m just blown away at how kind everyone has been to me since I’ve arrived. Is everyone this nice here?”
“Well, I don’t know about everyone,” he said, shrugging. “But I suppose most. There are a few that keep to themselves, but for the most part, Armstrong is a pretty close-knit community. We’re a small place, and we’re all the type of people who like simple things, so we all share something in common. Some folks have lived here all their lives.”
“Have you?”
“Oh, no. We moved here when we had our daughter. Wanted to raise her away from the big city life. Of course, that’s where she is now, but I’d like to think she has a wider appreciation for things after growing up here. And it’s not so bad, you know? We’re only an hour or so out from a city anyway. I’ve been retired for a while, but I still work at the gas station to keep busy. Reynold has been here his whole life; his father was the one who opened that gas station.”
Lee opened the door to the minimart and we went back inside. “There’s a few others on our side of the town,” he continued. “Oh, the Duncans. Their property was unmanaged for a while after the husband and wife passed and their children moved out, but recently one of the daughters came back. She kind of keeps to herself though.”
“No luck?” Reynold asked, sipping a coffee.
“None,” Lee said. “Fliers?”
Reynold pushed them over the counter to us. “Hey, Chrissy.”
“Yes, sir?”
“So, Lee filled me in a bit on your situation. He said that you’re headed to California, is that right?”
“That’s right. Though I don’t really have much of a plan once I get there.”
“Any reason why you chose there?” He paused and scratched his chin. “Sorry, I don’t mean to pry, that wasn’t my intent.”
“Oh, no problem,” I said, waving my hand. “You all have been so welcoming to me, you have a right to know why I left Georgia and all.”
“Well, your business is your own, if you want to keep it. I just wanted to know if you had a specific reason why you were going to California. What your end goal was, that is.”
“I left Atlanta because of the hurricane and flooding there—I know, ironic, isn’t it? But that was more of a catalyst. I’d been thinking about leaving for a while. Or rather, I just wasn’t happy with my life there. I was working a call-center job where I was supposed to be helping people, solving problems for them, but with corporate BS, all I could do was ruin days and put people in bad moods. It was the only work I could find after school, and well, frankly, I don’t even know what I want to do with my life.”
“I see,” Reynold said. “A journey of self-discovery.”
“Nothing like a quarter life crisis,” Lee chimed in, fishing a frosted donut out from the plastic box of donuts and bagels.
Reynold nodded thoughtfully. “You’re young, so it’s a good time to be thinking about that stuff. You’ve got choices available to you, so you might as well explore them. Broaden your horizons.”
“Exactly,” I said. “That was my thought.”
“You have any family in Atlanta, if you don’t mind me asking?”
My thoughts immediately went to my parents and the hateful tirade they’d went on before excommunicating me from the family, and again I wondered if I would be as welcomed here if they knew my orientation. It made me feel terrible, thinking that, especially of people who had been nothing but the kindest to me, but the wounds my parents had given me had cut deep.
“Um,” I said, feeling slightly uncomfortable for the first time. I chewed my lip. “Not really.” It was all I could think of saying, but Reynold seemed to catch on that it wasn’t a topic I wanted to discuss.
“Well, sometimes it’s necessary for a person to venture out far from home to get to know themselves,” he said. He tapped his finger onto the stack of fliers. “Come back here and see me after you go give these out, okay?”
“Sure.”
Lee and I took the stack of fliers and went out to his car. It wasn’t raining and the shops weren’t too far up the road, but Lee suggested we drive anyway in case of a sudden downpour. I had no complaints with that, so we piled into his car and drove the short minute up to the center of the town.
Armstrong reminded me of one of those frontier towns you might see in an old western film, with the single main road lined with the general store and the saloon, and horses tied up to posts all along the way.
The drive really was only a couple of minutes, and we pulled up to the curb in front of the small pet store called “Pampered Paws”.
“I’ll go drop some fliers off at the market,” Lee said, pointing down the street. “You go ahead and take care of the pet store.”
I nodded, and went inside the shop. The woman behind the counter was probably in her mid-forties, with red hair, red lipstick and a stone washed denim jacket and jeans bedazzled with metal star sequins and tassels. She had her nose stuck in a tabloid magazine.
“Hi there,” she said, perking up. “Welcome to Pampered Paws, I’m Patty. Is there anything I can help you with?”
“Hi,” I said, surprised by her bubbliness. She made me think me of one of those overly hyper lap dogs that seemed to be vibrating from too much pent up energy. “Yes, there is something you can help me with, Patty. I’m from out of town, and yesterday my cat escaped from me.”
She threw her hand to her mouth. “Oh, no! That’s horrible, I’m so sorry to hear that.”
“I’ve got these fliers here…” I pulled out the stack and showed them to her. “And I was wondering if it’d be alright to hang one in the store?”
“Of course it would be alright! I’ll put them up on the window, and have a few on the counter too. You don’t have a picture of, uh…” She skimmed over the flier for his name. “Of Henry?”
I shook my head. “I rescued him just a few days ago from a flood back home, so I never got a chance to get any photos of him.”
“Oh, poor thing, one storm to the next. Well, I’ll keep an eye out for Henry too.”
“T
hanks, I really appreciate that.”
She smiled and nodded, then went to stick up one of the fliers onto the window. I went back outside, and met up with Lee who was walking down from the market. The wind started to pick up again, pushing the trees into a sway and sending leaves and other debris tumbling down the street.
“Did the lady know anything about him?” Lee asked, and I shook my head.
“No… How about at the market?”
“No. Put up all the fliers though, on the bulletin board and right up at the checkout. If someone has seen Henry, they’ll know he’s missing for sure.” He looked up at the sky. “Seems like we’re gonna get another bout of it soon. Let’s head back to the station.”