Still There

 Even though I haven't been writing full time lately, that doesn't mean my characters aren't in my head at all. Every once in a while, one of them wanders in to say hello. Here's one of them:

Reggie Hawkins decided that if he kept his head down, he didn’t have to acknowledge that he was alone. He studied the label on his beer, which hadn’t changed since the last time he studied it, and took another drink. It didn’t taste any better than the solitude.

He finally shifted his gaze down the long wooden bar to where the bartender was wiping the same glass he’d been wiping for the past half hour. It must be hard to look busy when there was no one around. Maybe he was just waiting for Hawkins to leave so he could drop the pretense.

Hawkins had thought that some of his crewmates might come down, but it was getting late and that looked unlikely. He really ought to return to his room, but it wasn’t any better than this place, although the bed was probably a little more comfortable than the bar stool.

He took another drink, unsure why he’d come down here in the first place. Maybe he’d thought there’d be people here and he could find something in their chatter that didn’t exist on the television or his phone. It was a good thing the ship was scheduled to leave the next morning or who knows what he would have tried next.

He picked at the label, which really wasn’t a label since they’d gone to etching to save on paper. The trees were probably happy, except that they were no doubt used for something worse, like toilet paper. He bet they’d rather be beer labels.

Hawkins sighed. The truth was that he missed Nick Bartucci. He had no shortage of friends—on and off the ship—but no two friends are alike and he missed the one who was Nick.

The memory made him realize there were two things he needed to do: decide if he’d have trouble being aboard Penumbra when Nick wasn’t there … and get over it.

It still took him by surprise when some random thought pierced his brain and he was brought up short, as if walking into a wall that he hadn’t seen there. It made him shake his head, wondering why the memories wouldn’t leave him alone. They could be caused by anything, really: a laugh, something irritating, a baseball cap he spotted on a passerby. It didn’t seem to matter. Each time, he felt a sharp dig in his midsection, followed by shortness of breath and sometimes a coughing fit. A few seconds later, all seemed normal.

Sometimes Hawkins recalled a memory on purpose, just to avoid the surprise, but it still affected him the same way. And this had been going on for a few months. It was time to get past the whole thing.

He just didn’t know how to do that.

Hawkins turned his head. The bartender had set down the glass and stood at attention, gazing at the front of the bar as if he’d seen a miracle. Seconds later, the sound of voices told Hawkins what had caused the reaction. Three young people, two men and a woman, sailed into the room and docked at the bar, where they placed cheerful orders and carried on a lively conversation. Drinks in hand, they barely considered their options before selecting a booth a few meters from Hawkins, apparently unaware of him or the bartender smiling at them.

Hawkins offered his own smile at the beer bottle as he listened to the animated chatter, punctuated by laughter and occasional mock outrage. His muscles relaxed and his spine straightened a bit. After a while, he was ready to go upstairs and try to sleep.

“Hey,” he said as he reached for his phone.

The bartender gave him grudging attention.

“Put their first round on mine,” Hawkins said.

The bartender nodded and poked a few buttons on his monitor.

Hawkins saw the balance change on the little screen built into the bar next to his bottle. He tapped some information into his phone to increase the balance to include a hefty tip. Then he tapped the phone against the screen and put it away, which he also did with the last of the beer.

Then he headed to get some sleep before the next day's flight.

Cat

      I don’t quite know how to begin this, except with tears in my eyes.

A few years ago, we started to see a black and white cat in our neighborhood. He was rather large, with poofy fur and a rather arrogant gaze. He didn’t have a collar or tag, so we never knew whose cat he was. He never seemed afraid or happy or much besides regal. He seemed to believe he owned the neighborhood, posing like a statue in various front yards.

Our yard was one of the yards he chose. I don’t know why. I wasn’t particularly welcoming, especially whenever I caught him anywhere near my birdfeeders in the back yard. He would position himself there as if waiting for a snack. I would chase him away. For a large cat, he got over the six-foot fence in a flash, each time with a rather accusing glare.

I decided to follow my usual rule, though: cats are not allowed in the back yard, but I will not disturb them if they’re in the front. He didn’t seem to understand about the back yard, but he certainly took advantage of the front yard, posing on the front sidewalk as if challenging me. Several times he took a nap between the front bushes, a curled-up ball of fur among a bed of leaves. Those were the only times he looked happy.

He also liked to position himself on the front splash block (I had to look that up), at the base of a gutter downspout on the garage, looking like the sphinx as he surveyed the surroundings. He’d be there when I came home, watching me as I pulled the car into the driveway, eyeing the garage door as it swung upward. I was always worried that he’d try to get into the garage, but he never did. The first time it happened, he was startled by the garage door’s sudden movement, but after that first time, he didn’t react at all, as if to show me how enlightened he was.

If we came home from the store and he was anywhere near the car, he’d watch me as I got out. His eyes would narrow, but he wouldn’t move. It was as if he knew I could be mean, but somehow I wasn’t going to be at that particular time.

If only he and I had known …

I came home from work at 5:00 on Friday. The forecast said it would be cold overnight so I went outside to put down some bird seed. When I got out there, I saw the cat under the birdfeeder again. It had been a long, hard week at work (which isn’t an excuse), so I overreacted. I tried to shoo him but he just looked at me with his narrow eyes. I thought he’d finally decided to challenge me, so I grabbed the hose. Of course the hose wouldn’t work, which only enraged me more. I ran inside, filled a milk jug with water and ran outside to splash him with it.

This time he tried to get away. It was with a jolt of horror that I saw him pulling himself forward with his front paws, while his back legs dragged uselessly behind him. Something terrible had happened and he was badly hurt.

I dropped the jug, knelt down and said, “Oh, sweetie! I’m so sorry. It’s going to be okay.”

He nestled into the leaves and gave one soft meow, which even now breaks my heart into little shards of glass.

I bolted into the house and there followed a series of frantic phone calls. The one veterinary office still open didn’t have anyone available other than a sympathetic receptionist. The other clinics were closed. The police said they couldn’t do anything for a cat. The humane society was closed. Etc.

Finally, my husband called our next-door neighbor, who owns cats. He came over, assessed the situation and went to get a cat carrier. I got thick gloves because I’ve handled an injured pet before, but the neighbor was able to crawl into the bushes and simply lift the cat up, depositing it gently in the carrier. I was amazed that the cat was so calm. I wanted to do something more, but there wasn’t anything I could do as he took the carrier back to his house.

Later we received an email: the cat was so badly injured that they had to put him down. We’d thought he had been hit by a car, but he apparently had a BB pellet near his spine. Surgery would have been difficult and expensive.

And now I’m crying again.

Much of it is guilt: I splashed water on the poor animal! Much of it is rage that a cat would have to suffer so much. And perhaps most of it is grief. I’d started to like the cat, despite my grumbling about him, despite my chasing him from the back yard to protect the birds. I remember him sleeping peacefully in the bushes. I remember him almost seeming to wait for me to get home. I remember how beautiful his fur was. I remember his soft meow, which I now interpret not as a warning or rebuke, but more a sigh, a comment that he was tired and hurting and he just couldn’t do what I wanted.

I’m sorry, cat. I should have done better. I should have let you know that not all people are horrible, but I only reinforced it instead. I don’t feel I have the right to ask for your forgiveness.

At least now you don’t have to feel it anymore.

Please, please rest in peace.