by Steve Vernon
The wind whistled around us, but I barely felt the chill. Dwight pulled his green windbreaker tighter around him. “I’ll be working the human side of the equation. Maybe we’re supposed to meet up while we’re down there, exchange notes.”
“I might get dreams that tell me what to do.”
“Whoa, yeah! Follow those before you listen to the schemin’ of an angel!” He winked.
“But…I’d like to meet up. If we can?” Suddenly I felt like a squirrel-brain. I had no idea what I was doing! I should be in the bobtail’s orientation class, not driving to Earth with a human stranger!
“Sure we can!” said Dwight. “Listen, I used to be like you. No clue what I was doin’!” He swiped his hands out in front of him, reminding me of my Damien. “Actually, I still am like you! Once you’re down there, you gotta keep focus on your person—or cat, in your case—and wing it!”
I wrinkled my nose. “Wing it? Like a bird?”
The glow of the Earth was getting closer. He laughed. “Sorry. That’s a human saying. I mean…you take it a step at a time. Maybe one day you get the feeling to go someplace. You don’t know why, but you do it. And after you get there, more often than not, you get another idea, then do that. Before you know it”—he did that human snappy-noise thing with his fingers—”you’ve done your mission.”
I waved my tail. “My mother taught us something like that—to check all the hunting spots in your territory, even if they were empty yesterday, since you’ll never know what you’ll find.”
“Yeah,” he said, rubbing his beard with his hand. “I guess it’s a little like that. We humans call it faith. You know? To get somewhere, you only gotta see as far as the next step. One step’s enough.”
“Yeah,” I said, watching some roofs come into view. “I can do that. One step’s enough.”
The nervousness of coming back to Earth wound around my excitement of doing something that mattered. Would I be a good angel? Could I help my street kitten?
But Dwight’s advice helped keep my excitement and my fear from fighting.
One step’s enough. That’s all I need to see.
7
The red chariot touched down in the middle of a park. It was nighttime, but the park was lit by those strange orangey stick-light-trees that poked out of the sidewalks like too-long hooked claws. There weren’t as many trees as I would have liked, and we were awfully close to one of those strange chair-building-toy-places human children liked to climb on and jump off of and slide down. I thought of them as “kiddie condos.”
“I guess this is where you get off, Mr. Gingersnap,” said Dwight.
I pedaled my back feet until I was out of the bag, then jumped onto the ground.
The moment my paws hit the ground, I knew things had changed. In Heaven, remember, you could feel things only a little. But the gray ground here felt hard and cold against my toepads. Had Heaven turned me into a tenderfoot?!
I flexed my claws, scenting the crisp air. Wow! The smell of pet dogs and their humans was distinct, wafting over the hard roads humans had made over the dirt hills of the park. But I was used to the smell of grass.
“Dwight?” I said. “Where’s all the grass?”
“I think we’re in Texas,” he said.
“Is that a Housing?”
“Nah, it’s a state! In the desert, or at least, part of it is. Hard to grow grass in the desert,” he explained. “Not enough moisture.”
“Moisture?”
“Yeah, you know, like rain or snow.”
My tail swished. I was supposed to be done with my mission before Christmas Day’s snowfall. Could it snow here?
The chariot began to lift. I jumped around, tail puffed. The stars in the wheels shone bright, brighter, began to whirr.
“Be careful out there!” called Dwight. “Don’t get downhearted. And who knows? I might be seeing ya soon! WHOA!” He said this last word just before the chariot disappeared into an orange streak blurring across the purple night sky. I followed the motion, fast as a sparrow’s flight.
The wind whistled and my ears folded to keep the chill out. There might not have been any snow here in the park in Texas, but the wind was cold! I hadn’t ever been cold in Heaven.
I ran up the slide for human children and crouched at the end of a tunnel with round windows. The wind whistled at the slide’s mouth. I had no idea where my mission kitten was, my fellow angel was gone, and I’d forgotten how awful it felt being cold. Heaven and my Lord and all my friends felt very far away, their love a faded memory.
Why did I ever think it would be a good idea to come back to the streets?
8
“Hey. HEEY!”
I sprung awake. Hard orange walls surrounded me—nothing outside the round window looked like cat Housing. And facing me was a snarling black cat with a chipped fang. He was blocking my exit. My claws tried to dig in, but the floor of this place had many little holes in it.
“What?” I said.
He growled. “These are my digs! There ain’t enough food ’round here for sharin’!”
“Oh! Um…” That’s right. My mother had taught me if you could find land with enough prey, a few cats could share on it. But if times were tough, forget it!
“I’m new here. I just needed a place out of the wind for the ni—”
“Sure you did! I know a takeover when I see one!”
I got to my feet, bristling my fur so I looked like I filled the tunnel. He yowled at me again, but I’d already seen him flinch. I was big and strong from Heaven. He wasn’t going to fight me if he could avoid it.
“I’m not interested in your turf. But if you want me to leave, better move aside, bud.”
He growled in the back of his throat, but backed away. I could see cold daylight behind him, broken up by the hard shapes of the kiddie condo. I zipped past him, leapt down onto the rubbery ground beneath the condo, then turned around at the sound of his heavy body landing on something above me. He glared down at me from a purple box thing with spinning wheels facing out. “Get outta here!”
My whiskers twitched, ready to snarl back. But then a quiet feeling came over me, smoothing my fur. It was like being petted by a warm, invisible hand. I didn’t feel like snarling anymore.
“What’s your name?” I asked him. I hadn’t planned on saying it, but out the words popped.
Now he looked surprised. His fur smoothed. He sat down, laying his tail over his front paws. “I’m Shade.”
“Gingersnap,” I said, bumping my tail against my chest. “Nice to meet you.”
He frowned at me, but his scent on the air was confused, not angry.
“Shade, have you seen any kittens outside your territory? Well, guess I should say kits. They’re older than newborns.”
“Maybe,” he said. “Why?”
“I’m looking for one—white, with a gray blotch on his head and back, and a gray tail. It’s important.”
He stared off into the trees. I thought of my miracles. Was now the time to use one? Maybe he’d help me if I promised him food…
“He your housemate?” Shade asked.
I looked at him, surprised. If he had ever lived with humans, it didn’t show anymore.
“No,” I said. “Did you have a housemate before?”
“Almost. Her name was Pepperoni,” he said. “Her humans called me Olive. I didn’t go inside the house, though. But Pepperoni was my wall-friend, ’til another tom took over her block. I like it here, though.” His ear flicked in the wind. “Listen, uh, sorry ‘bout earlier. I haven’t seen a kit like that in my territory. You know what he smells like?”
The toy kitten hadn’t had any scent—or at least, not one strong enough for me to remember on Earth. I shook my head no.
“Well, if I was a kit just starting out, I know the spot I’d try to stake out.”
He slid his front paws down the front of the purple box, then jumped off it
to land on the spongey ground. He curled the tip of his tail. “Come on. I’ll point you in the right direction.”
A churr escaped me. All this because I’d asked his name?
“Thanks for the help,” I said.
I trotted to Shade’s side and we set out opposite the rising sun. From time to time the breeze blew, but it moved about as fast as the breath from a snoring human, so I couldn’t feel it through my fur. He walked us parallel to the dog-smelling path, close to bushes we could escape to.
“Do dogs come here often?”
“Every day,” he said. “But with the cold weather coming, most the humans wait ’til the sun’s up to walk ’em. Think it’s warmer, though how they get on without proper coats, that’s a curiosity I haven’t answered yet.”
“Some of those yarn pelts they wear are pretty warm. Some even warm themselves,” I said, thinking of Marie’s electric blanket.
“Where’d you come from, anyway?” he said. “You’re big and clean like an Indoor cat, but I can’t smell any human on you. I can’t even smell where you came from! And…” He went quiet.
You didn’t run back there, I finished for him.
He shook the words off his tongue and said something different. “It’s like you flew in on wings!” he said.
I swallowed a chuckle. If only you knew!
“I’ve lived on both sides of doors,” I said. Was I supposed to tell him I was an angel?
“Which do you like better?”
“Indoors,” I said. “But only with the right humans.”
“But Indoors, you lose so much territory! You can’t come and go! Forget any Midnight Rallies! And you forget how to hunt!”
Sure hope I haven’t forgot that!
“There’s trade-offs either way,” I said, pausing as he sharpened his claws on a wooden signpost. “I was hungry on the street a lot. And lonely. My old territory wasn’t so hot, though—definitely not as nice as what you have here. Do you manage the whole park?”
His chin lifted and his chest puffed. “Sure do!” Then his tail fell a little. “But only since the summer. Last tom disappeared, nobody’s seen him since.”
“Humans?” I’d been picked up by them. That’s how I got to the shelter, and eventually to the Romanos. What it’d looked like to my fellow alley cats, I hadn’t considered ’til now.
“Maybe,” he said. “I hope. There’s rumor a coyote—that’s a wild-type dog—made it here deep in the city, but years ago the humans kept dropping their, you know, personal dogs off wherever.”
“What?!”
“Some of ’em got picked up again by other humans, but others had to become alley dogs…” He flicked a whisker in disgust. “You can imagine how that turned out, poor chumps. One night, getting all the kibble they can eat and a warm crate, the next, gotta feed themselves with their own claws and jaws…But a very few of ’em remembered they’re wolves at heart. They turned mean.” Shade’s hackles bristled with a chill that had nothing to do with the wind. “If you’re ever cornered by one of them, you’d better hope a tree’s nearby and claw your way to the tippy top.”
All the dogs I’d watched from my window had been barky pushovers. Could there still be off-leash dogs out there who thought they were wolves? Things on the street had changed since I was a kit.
Shade paused to spray a bush. It faced a black plain with white lines on it. From vet visits, I remembered looking out the window and seeing many human growl-machines loafed between those lines, but right now the plains were empty.
“It’s quiet back here, but if you turn towards your weak paw, you’ll hit the main road. Cross it, then keep going ’til you smell the dumpster farm. There’s a mess of them, and rats to go with ’em. Head thataway. If he ain’t there, I don’t know where he’d be.
“This is the edge of my digs,” said Shade. “If I go past the boom-machine ground, I’ll tick off Queen Chalky across the street, and we’ve been good neighbors for a while.”
“Got it,” I said. “Thanks for everything, Shade. If you ever want to live Indoors—”
“No, not me, tom! Living with humans ain’t my scene. But I appreciate the kind whisker behind your offer.” He slow blinked at me. “Good luck finding your kit.”
Shade left me, melting into the shadows beneath a trash bin, disappearing after our goodbye.
I turned towards my off paw, smelling machine juice in the distance, hearing the roar of the human death-machines in the distance. If my kit wasn’t at the dumpster zone, I didn’t know where to look for him next.
“One step’s enough,” I murmured.
I set off for the main road.
9
Wheel machine fumes had long since soaked into the black-tar road and the bushes next to it. So while only one or two machines rumbled past, I knew there’d be a river of them soon enough.
Probably when the sun is higher.
But I hoped to be far away from the busy roads before then. The machines usually traveled in straight lines between the yellow marks on the tar, but once, when I was an alley cat, one of them had gotten hungry and had jumped for me, crossing the marks. If I hadn’t thrown myself out of the way in time, I would have died!
I could hear the growl of its engine like it had just happened. I dropped my head to clean my chest, until the trembling stopped.
Come on, Gingersnap. Those machines can’t hurt you now.
I took a deep breath, double, then triple-checked the road was clear, then hurried across. At the safe white path on the other side of the tar road, I stopped to pick a pebble from out between my paw pads. Then I sniffed the air. No dumpster smell yet, or restaurant smell, either. I padded forward.
When I was a kit, the mouthwatering salty smell of fries had called me to a dumpster back behind a human food place. I was normally a good ratter, but behind this joint, the rodents were extra wily. I wound up keeping it in my territory, though, when I realized how good the uneaten human food was—especially the fries, but also the buns and milkshakes. I was at least big enough to chase the rats off and eat the lion’s share.
And if this dumpster spot was new enough that nobody had claimed it, word would definitely get out to the younger, less-established kits and queens. I just had to sniff it out, first.
The road parallel to the white walk was quiet. On my weak paw’s side, cinder block walls had gone up around giant human boxes they liked to go in. Buildings. That was the word. My vet had been in one—shudder—but before you got to the vet there were smaller boxes with weird rodents and unopened cans of food. Why humans would hoard them together was beyond me. And why they never brought home a rodent for me, well…I used to think it was rude, but since being in Heaven I’d learned about Fancy Rat Housing and the Hamster Underground…So some of them had been pets, and, being a pet myself, I knew I’d feel betrayed if Marie or anyone ever tried to feed me to a bigger pet!
I scented a dog nearby. Dog with a human. I bunched myself up then leaped onto the top of the wall to continue my walk.
There he was—a dumb golden retriever on a leash held by a man, heading my way. But even if the man reached above his head, he wouldn’t be able to reach me on the high wall. I decided to pretend they weren’t there.
But of course, the dog couldn’t let that happen. As soon as they were within noseshot, the dog started up.
“Dad! Dad, look! Is it Nemo?”
The man tugged on the leash. “Down, Jules, easy!”
I ignored him and hurried along.
The sun was finally visible in the sky, but at this time of year, it didn’t warm my back; the cold air was too strong for it, unless you were Indoors. Ah, nothing like curling up Indoors inside a square of sunshine. Why, once my alley kit tried that, he’d be an Indoors cat for life!
Then I arrived at the next crossing on the wall and my happy sunshine feelings disappeared. My fur prickled at the scene beneath me. The machines were screaming thr
ough the black tar road, three abreast. It’d be impossible to cross! It was so noisy that I didn’t even want to drop back onto the ground.
I tucked my tail beneath me.
Gingersnap! Crossing a road is so easy, even a dog can do it!
The dog! Dogs get walked all the time, and they don’t get hit—not when they’re with a human!
I turned around on the wall and raced back. I caught up with them.
“Dog! Excuse me, dog! What’s your name?”
The man tried to keep walking, but the dog whipped around and stuck his paws against the wall. “Hello again! I’m Jules! You look like my cat friend Nemo! But you smell like a cloud! Are you new here? Do you need a place to stay? Do you have a—”
My tail curled. “Your housemate is a cat?”
“Sure is!” The dog said it like it was normal. “He’s the best! Do you have a Forever Home?”
“Uh—I’m not looking. But I do have a question for you!”
His face lit up. “Yeah?”
“How do you and your master cross the street without getting hurt by the machines?”
“Oh, you mean the cars? That’s easy. If you push the round shiny on the yellow poles, it’ll make the birds chirp and you can cross faster.”
“What?!” He’s nuts!
“Yeah, Dad and I do it all the time.”
My tail swished behind me. Birds? In poles? That stop the car-machines?
But I had nothing else to try.
I made myself purr. “Thanks, Jules! That’s just…what I needed.”
His golden face spread into a huge smile. It even warmed my heart, though Heaven knew I’d spent a lot of my time as a street kit hiding from dogs. But if his friend was a cat, then maybe he wasn’t so bad. For a dog.
“You’re welcome!” he said. “Don’t get squashed!”
I shuddered. “I won’t!”
“Byeeee!” said the dog, his master hauling on the leash.
So there’s such a thing as a friendly dog. Who knew?
I turned back the way I came, picked up the pace, dying to know if the dog’s trick would work. Yellow pole birds! Indeed!