Amber Croft A Cat of Nine Tales
Tale 1 Part 2
Things
started to disappear. It was weird, I mean, you get used to something being
there and then it isn’t. First my favorite napping chair was gone . . . then
the kitchen table, the couch and finally our cat tree. As items disappeared
they were replaced by cardboard boxes, lots
of boxes. Soon there was nothing left but boxes, a veritable labyrinth of
boxes. I found it sort of amusing, but Bucks was freaking out.
“What’s
going on?” he meowed. He always expects me to know what’s up and I usually do.
But not this time.
“How
should I know?” I told him. “I just live here.”
I
didn’t see much of him after that. I suppose I should have kept an eye on him.
Bucks doesn’t take well to change, but didn’t think much about it. There were a
lot of new places to hide in cardboard world and I was less than upset by his
absence. It was kind of like missing an itch.
A
few nights later I was having my nails done by Lou, the house-woman. “Leave them sharp, and not too short,” I told
her. A cat never knows when she might need her claws. We were almost finished
when her mate came in. His name is Willie.
“Bucky’s
gone,” he said. “Can’t find him anywhere.”
“He’s
probably hiding somewhere in the boxes.”
I
hopped off her lap as she got up to search and made a graceful leap to the windowsill for a look outside.
There was a quarter moon and I have
excellent night vision. I saw Bucks skulking around some bushes. God only knows
what he thought he was doing, but stupid is as stupid does. Then a saw
something that made my fur stand on end.
The coyote! Better known in the neighborhood as,
The Angel of Death.
He’d claimed two victims this last year. I still remember
hearing the bone chilling screams of his last.
(Parts 3, 4 and 5 can be found on later posts - Search for: Amber Croft)
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