Go to Next Chapter -- Return to Contents/Writer's Den
Chapter Seven
As Sam led his troupe into his apartment, the
camaraderie in each of their heads was tempered by the realization that they
were running out of time.
“Let’s
eat!” the others cried.
“The
first thing I’m going to do,” Sam
vowed mentally, as he waited for Wanda and Neva to enter the hole in the
screen, “is e-mail Alice. I sure
can’t use the phone!”
“I’m
going to get something to eat,” Drew replied with a meow, leaping up onto the
ledge ahead of Sam.
When
they had all passed through the screen and congregated in the living room, Sam
said a prayer of thanksgiving, while the other cats bowed their heads. Wanda, Neva, and Drew had accepted Sam
as their leader now. Wanda, in
fact, had grown fond of the once self-righteous apartment manager. She continued to rub up against him
every chance she had, bringing forth the response “Please Wanda, I’m engaged to
Alice. Let’s just be friends!”
Drew
had no such inhibitions when the beautiful black fluffy Neva rubbed up against
him. Her purring and bubbling form
continued to tease and tempt the tan cat, until finally, as they all
congregated for their meal, Sam took time to warn his newfound friends. After pulling a portion of last
night’s roast from the refrigerator, he dangled it thoughtfully in his muzzle,
and then dropped it unceremoniously onto the floor in front of the group.
“All
right, let’s not stand on formality,“ he transmitted as they devoured their
meal.
“I
love roast,” exclaimed Neva. “All we need is the right wine!”
“I
could use a beer,” Drew replied, giving her a bump.
Sam
poked his head into the circle to get his share. Wanda, inspired by her friend’s spirit, nudged Sam playfully
with her nose. When this failed to
elicit a response, she followed Drew’s example and bumped Sam several times
with her rear.
“Listen Drew.” Sam backed away from the group. “You
cats be careful. Neva might
not be human, but she’s a still female.”
“Well,
duh.” Drew chortled, giving Neva a wink.
“I’m
a feeee-male, but I used to be a woman,” she purred brazenly.
“Sammy,
you’re such a prude,” Wanda pretended to pout.
“Hold
on, let me finish!” Sam barked into their heads. “As a female—this goes for
you, too, Wanda—she can get pregnant, just like humans. I’ve seen cats mate when the female’s
in heat!”
“I
wish you wouldn’t talk about me in the third person,” Neva complained, licking
gravy off her paw.
“And
I’m not a prude,” he directed his thought to Wanda this time. “I’m just trying
to use my God-given brain!”
“Oh
God, doesn’t care about us anymore,” said Neva carelessly, swishing her fluffy
tail.
Sam
could not believe his feline ears.
He was even more distressed than when Drew made that similar comment
last night. “We’re just animals now,” he had communicated. “ We don’t have
souls!” Sam then watched Neva and
Wanda preen themselves, as would two ordinary cats and detected telepathically
Drew’s urge to curl up and take a nap.
It was clear to him that they were sinking into felinity fast.
“First
of all, “ he frowned at Drew, “all animals and plants are part of God’s
creation, not merely humans. No,
don’t wiggle your whiskers at me, Neva.
I’ve given this a lot of thought…. This is not our fault. Buck, Tom, and the rest of us didn’t
deserve India’s wrath. The Lord
must still consider our souls in spite of her evil act. Perhaps, even so, all living things
have souls. When I was a child I
wanted all my pets up there with me.
Now, I’m almost certain they will!”
“But
it’s not in the Bible,” Drew teased. “What would your Bible-thumping Alice
think?”
If
Sam had not detected humor in Drew’s voice, he would have taken issue with his
new friend, but he half believed what Drew said, himself. Rising up and stretching, he trotted
into his study without a word.
“Where’s
he going?” Wanda paused in her preening to ask.
“Let’s
go see,” Neva, yawned expansively.
“Hey
Sam, I was just kidding,” Drew scampered ahead of the others now. “It all just
seems like such a joke!”
******
The
cats were all sleepy now. Sam sat
in front of his laptop, which he managed to pry open, and looked down at them
from his desk, the screen’s eerie light making him that much more attractive to
Wanda below.
“What’re
you doing, Sammy?” She asked pertly, a portrait of feline beauty registering in
his mind.
Sam
feared for his humanity more than ever this hour. He was beginning to feel attracted to the beautiful white
Persian cat now that he was a cat, and he almost felt disloyal to Alice for the
thoughts racing in his head.
“I’m
trying to use the keyboard,” he answered simply, making another feeble attempt.
The
stubby appendages of his paw made it difficult to use the computer. For a brief moment the hourglass hung
suspended after the Windows screen appeared, taunting him with the reminder
that time was running out. By
trial and error, he was able to bring up Microsoft Outlook and enter his e-mail
box. As he attempted to compose a
message for Alice, however, it was much more difficult for him. He drew back, cocked his head
reflectively, and tried again.
Seeing a crafty look on Wanda’s face, he cautioned her again “Please
behave yourself!” as she hopped onto the desk. But Wanda had no intentions of not seducing him and feigned
interest in the screen.
“What’s
that?” She pointed her little white paw.
“It’s
an e-mail screen,” he thought warily, as she edged closer. “Surely you’ve seen that before!”
Embarrassed at
his ineffectiveness, he offered no more explanation. Soon Drew and Neva were also crowded around his laptop with
expectant looks on their faces.
Wanda now rubbed her rump against Sam’s leg. Neva did the same to Drew. Sam was now certain that, responding to feral urges, the
girls were in heat. Drew and
himself, for that matter, were reacting, as would two normal male unneutered
cats.
“Stop it Wanda, I’m trying to think!” He hissed,
humping up his back.
“Yeah,
stop it again and move away closer!” drawled Drew, nestling beside Neva and
licking her ear.
“As
I was going to explain to Wanda,” Sam communicated to the group, “it’s hard to
use the keyboard with these stubby paws.” “You see what I mean?” he asked,
trying to hit a few key.
Sa;lioxcweasfgnmaslk.,cviomn! appeared on the
screen.
“Oh,
dear me,” mewed Wanda.
“Looks
like gibberish,” observed Neva.
“I’m
lucky I got this far,” Sam confessed, trying one more time.
A
similar mish-mash of letters was now displayed in the e-mail address box.
“Try
using just one,” Drew held up a nail.
“I
already tried it,” whined Sam. “You’ve got skinny claws, Drew. Mine are stubby, fat little
appendages. How do you expect me
to type with these?”
“Oh,
I used to play the piano,” Drew explained, typing a message in the
hunt-peck-style in the message portion of the screen.
In
capital letters, the message read playfully SAM HAS FAT PAWS! HA! HA! HA!
“I
like his fat little paws,” Wanda purred loudly now.
“All
right, Drew,” Sam announced solemnly, “you’re going to be our inputter.”
“That
sounds sexy,” cooed Neva.
“Now
listen to what I tell you to type.” Sam nudged her aside.
Drew’s
held his paws over the keyboard.
“Okay.” He looked at Sam anxiously. “Let’s get started.”
That moment, as Sam began to dictate, the landline
rang. After a series of jarring
rings, it switched to the message machine, followed by a beep, then the voice
of the caller: “This is Dolores Jeffries, in apartment 1g. Where are you Sam? Why don’t you answer your phone? The police were here; must’ve been a
dozen of them. Did you know
that? Are you even home? You should’ve talked to those men, not
Frank and me. You’re the manager
of this complex. That’s part of your
job. And what was all that racket
early this morning. You should’ve
called the police Sam—”
Dolores continued to list his failings as an
apartment manager, which included his inability to maintain order in
Shadowbrook Arms. Pouncing on the
machine, Sam cried, “Enough! We
don’t have vocal chords. I’m
turning this infernal thing off!”
The girls laughed as he fumbled with the machine. Drew trotted over calmly to lend him a
‘hand.’ The girls hopped up onto
the desk to offer moral support.
“My
paws are useless,” Sam groaned, pawing frantically. “Why did they make such a
tiny switch.”
“Remember,” Drew counseled, “one toe and one nail.”
“Here.” He bumped Sam gently aside. “I’ll shut that bitch up.”
“—and
further more,” droned Dolores, “I think India Crowley is insane. I heard she claimed to be a witch—Bleep!”
Stopped
in mid-sentence, Dolores last words reminded them of the dilemma they were
in. They were cats under a witches
spell. When the cell phone Sam had
left by his easy chair began to ring, the group ignored it. It was probably Dolores, guessed
Sam. The old woman would probably
send him a text message too, but it didn’t matter. Without voices, they couldn’t answer the cell phone or
landline. The keys were much too
small on the cell phone, even for Drew.
What they could do, Sam reminded them cheerily, was send a message from
his laptop.
“Let’s
pull up Alice’s e-mail,” Sam directed as the four cats stared at the screen.
“Type the first letters of her name, Drew. It’ll pop up automatically.”
“Wow,”
Wanda purred, you’re computer’s smart!”
Certain
she was teasing, Sam explained tongue in cheek. “It’s in my contact list. All Drew has to do after we compose the message is hit Send,
and everything is sent to the recipient, just like a letter.”
“Huh?”
She gave him a blank look. “What about your return address?”
“That’s
automatically provided.” Sam pointed a paw. “Right there above To:, next to
From:—’SamBurns112@hotmail.com.’”
“There’s one hundred and twelve other Sam Burns out
there?” Wanda muttered in amazement to Neva. “I wonder how many Neva Bravnics
there are.”
“All
right Drew,” Sam forged ahead. “In the Subject Box, simply type ‘please respond
quickly,’ with several exclamation points.”
“Gotcha,”
the tan cat flexed his paws. “Let’s see,” he said, his whiskers bristling on
his mouth. “Voices in the head are one thing, words are quite another.”
“No-no,” Sam sighed wearily, “that’s a B, Drew. We need a P. P-l-e-a-s-e.”
Wanda’s
behavior worried Sam the most. How
could anyone in the twenty-first century be that computer illiterate? Had she just been teasing? Playing a dumb blond was something she
had done very well as a human. His
newfound friends were behaving less and less like humans and more like
cats. In spite of Drew’s boasts,
it took him awhile, by trial and error, to find the right keys, correct his
errors by backspacing, and achieve a semblance of what he wanted. To Sam’s annoyance and dismay, Wanda
and Neva began acting very much like distracted felines as Drew struggled with
the words. Wanda was again preening
herself and purring loudly as Neva batted a paper clip around on his desk. And Drew, though probably the smartest
of all the cats, had forgotten how to spell.
“Okay.”
Sam gave him a nudge. ‘Pleex Comt
Quik’ is good enough. Alice will
know for sure there’s something wrong.” “Now go to the composition box,”
he instructed wearily, “and type the message.”
Drew
cocked his head in a thoughtful feline pose. “That sounds easy enough. What do you want to say?”
“First
off, type Alice at the top of the page.”
“All
right.” He flexed his paws again. “Spell it for me.”
“A-l-i-c-e.”
Inexplicably,
Drew turned away from the keyboard.
For a moment the male cat had forgotten his attraction to Neva and
hissed at the black Persian as she played with his tale. To make matters worse, Wanda now rubbed
against Sam, her whiskers brushing the side of his face.
“Stop it you dumb bitch!” growled Drew.
“You have lovely brown fur,” Wanda purred loudly in
his mind.
“Drew,” Sam shrilled into their heads, “get back to
work. Wanda, Neva get off the
desk. Go take a nap if you can’t
behave!”
Along
with all their other cat-like traits, Sam was very worried about the cat’s
attention spans now. They could
not seem to focus at all, even Drew.
Wanda was the worst. Was
this, too, a sign they were becoming more feral? How much time did they all have left before they were one
hundred percent cats?
“In that large area below,” he motioned testily to
Drew, “type: Please drop everything and get here as fast as you can. Don’t worry about India. She’s been shot and is in the hospital,
but don’t call the police; they won’t believe what has happened. We’ll just wind up in the city animal
shelter. . . . Signed Sam, Wanda, Neva, and Drew.”
“I
think you better remove the last three names,” Drew suggested wryly, drawing
back his paw. “She won’t understand us being here, Sam. She’ll think we corrupted you last
night.”
“You’re
right,” Sam sighed, discouraged by the way the girls were acting now. “She
doesn’t like Wanda and Neva very much, and she probably doesn’t like you. Leave off yours and the girl’s names, but
add I Love You before my name and a
dozen exclamation points behind.”
It
took several moments for Drew to type Sam’s message. The spelling was atrocious and Drew left out articles of
speech, which made it sound primitive and ill thought, but they were running
out of time. Alice knew Sam was an
excellent writer. When she read
this gibberish, he reminded himself, she would know there was something wrong.
“Now hit Send
at the top of the screen,” he concluded after inspecting the e-mail,
“and let’s hope Alice checks her e-mail.”
“Wow,
that was fast!” cried Wanda.
“No,
Wanda, it wasn’t fast,” Sam looked at her in disbelief. “If Drew had his human
appendages and faculties, that message would be long gone,” “but he doesn’t,”
he added shaking his head, “because Drew’s a cat. Like you and me, Neva, he’s beginning to act and think like
a cat. I fear for Buck and the
others. The question is ‘how long
do we have?’”
Only
Drew registered alarm at this thought and he was, as they sat there waiting for
a response from Alice, quickly distracted by Neva’s presence. As the females continued purring and
occasionally emitting a yawn, and Drew began licking Neva’s head, a thought
came into Sam’s overwrought mind.
“Drew,”
he commanded gently, “type in the Google Search
menu Witchcraft.”
“Where’s
that?” Drew squinted at the screen.
“Hit
the backspace arrow at the top.
Right there!” Sam pointed testily. “That’s it. It’s right in the middle of the screen.”
“Good
idea Sammy,” Wanda came close again, her feline breath blowing warmly into
Sam’s ears. “Can I help?”
“This
time, Drew, try to spell it exactly as I dictate.”
For
a moment, Sam struggled with the word, realizing that he, too, was having
trouble with abstract symbols in his head. When, after a series of hunting, pecking and backspacing,
Drew managed to type Witchcraft exactly in the Google Search box, the web
provided him with countless entries for this theme.
“Smart
thinking,” Drew nodded, cocking his head. “Go to the source!”
“I’m
looking for information that might explain this spell,” he informed the group.
“Good Lord, there must be a thousand entries for this. Let’s see if we can find one for—what
should we call it—oh yes, shape-changing spells.”
For
several moments the four cats hovered around the screen, as Drew began
scrolling with the mouse, a much easier task than typing keys. As their eyes went down the list
searching for something that might help, each one called out mentally when they
saw something significant, but in the end, after a dozen failed attempts, and
after a long night and morning with little rest, they had simply worn
themselves out.
“I’m
going to take a nap,” Neva thought, hopping down onto the floor.
“I’m
going to help her take a nap,” Drew
responded in quick pursuit.
“Remember
this one word:” Sam called after them now “litter!
If Neva gets pregnant, she
won’t just be carrying a baby, she’ll have a litter, not the roadside kind but
kittens—several of them, capiche?”
Neva
flashed Drew a terrified look.
With these thoughts in mind, the couple found a corner, curled up
together, and were soon fast asleep.
Sam and Wanda, who were also ready for catnaps, leaped off the desk and
found themselves a nest too, but the apartment manager lie there with an ear
cocked for the sound of Alice’s key rattling in the door.
As
Sam slept, he dreamed that he was on the broom of the Witch India Crowley and
they were flying over the rooftops of Shadowbrook Arms. Below him he could see lighted windows
with empty rooms. The implications
seemed plain to him, for Alice walked through the complex with a lantern, as
Diogenes carrying his lamp, searching for the lost cats. At that point in his dream, he realized
that he was India’s pet. He
recalled a portion of the poem he had written in college:
Castaway and vagabond,
true
child of the night.
In his secret twilight kingdom
he
shuns dawn’s lonely light.
******
Alice
Wagnall felt both physically and mentally exhausted after a sleepless night and
hectic day at the office. Sunday
had proved to be an ordeal for her.
It had been almost impossible to focus on her work and keep pace with
the busy real estate firm. Her boss
expected her to work extra hours on weekends when needed, even on Sunday, which
was the Christian Sabbath, but she had honestly not been up to it this
time. She and Sam’s confrontation
with India Crowley last night had left an impact on her mind. After a brief nightmare in which she
found herself running from India Crowley’s wrath, she lie awake most of the
night worrying about what India might do.
The curse India leveled against everyone at Shadowbrook Arms had seemed
so ridiculous at the time, but then, as Alice thought about it more and more,
the argument that Sam tried to use on her about India finally losing her sanity
didn’t ring true.
“India’s
not merely crazy, Sam,” she had argued last night, “she’s evil. I saw the Devil in her eyes!”
Now,
after several excruciating hours at the office, Alice felt weak and emotionally
drained. All day long she had
worried that, when she contacted Sam again, something dreadful would have
happened to him and the others at Shadowbrook Arms. He had tried to allay her fears Halloween night and, when
they parted, promised to call her the next day. But he hadn’t called her or send a text message to her today
and she could not reach him on the phone.
What did his silence mean?
Was Sam merely being inconsiderate again, or had something happened to
him last night? Unfortunately,
Alice hadn’t brought her laptop with her this morning or she would already know
there was a problem.
After
frantically unlocking her apartment door, charging through the living room, and
pouncing on the laptop on her desk, she hastily brought up her email, and
spotted the cryptic title in her inbox.
“Pleez
Comt Quik?” she read aloud. “What does that mean?”
Quickly
entering the message box, she stared with incredulity at the screen:
Alce,
Plese drop everthing git here fast you can don’t
worry about Ind she been shot an in hospital don’t call polce they won’t bleeve
what happen we wind up in anmal shlter.
I
lov u Sam !!!!!!!!!!!!
“The city’s animal shelter?” Alice mumbled numbly to
herself. “Now why would he say
something silly like that? Has Sam
forgotten how to spell?” And then
India’s curse thundered into her head.
Suddenly Alice’s nearly photographic memory captured almost the entire
imprecation: “…You,” India had cried out to the Buck, Tom, Jim, Ed, and Drew,
“shall regret your beastly behavior, because you’re going to become exactly
how you’ve behaved!” “And
you two, my pets,” she had promised Sam and herself. “I have the same end planned for you!”
“Beasts?…. Turned into beasts?” She backed away, as
if stricken by the screen. “No, no, I don’t believe this! I’ve got to get over there! Oh sweet Jesus, is this what Sam meant?”
Without even shutting down her laptop or locking the
front door after herself, Alice dashed back to her car, her mind racing with
terrible imagery, her throat constricted with fear as she attempted to
pray. This time it was more
difficult to talk to God. As she
considered the implications of the e-mail Sam had sent and remembered India’s
bizarre behavior last night, she tried to tell herself that this was all just
too ridiculous to be true.
“India is a make-believe witch,” she told herself,
racing across town, “she can’t harm us!
This is just a cruel joke!
Oh, Sam you’ve got a lot of explaining
to do!”
When
Alice reached Shadowbrook Arms, she shuddered as she passed through the
entrance to the complex. Her first
impression as she turned left from the breezeway and stopped in front of
apartment number 1a was that the complex was unusually quiet. Only last night this apartment complex
was alive with merriment. She
might not have approved of the drinking behavior and attitude of some of its
young residents, but they had not deserved the malediction thrown at them by
India last night. What a
dreadful thing to say to them! She thought giddily, as she pulled her key
out to unlock Sam’s door.
Somewhere, she could imagine, India standing over a
cauldron and stirring its contents with a big spoon. Now, as she entered the dimly lit apartment, she noticed two
cats hopping off the couch as if in greeting. Almost immediately afterwards, two more cats joined the
first pair, purring and meowing loudly as if they were glad to see her
too. The first questions to come
into her head then were Why would Sam have all these cats in his house? Is he cat-sitting for someone? He knows I hate cats! Then, staggered by the implications
growing in her mind, she found herself collapsing into a nearby chair.
At that point, a sable brown cat jumped up into her
lap, purring so loudly she could not help but to feel moved in spite of her
state of mind.
“Nice kitty,” she replied, her heart pounding loudly
in her chest. “…. You seem to be a nice cat!”
“It’s me, honey,” Sam looked squarely into her face.
“You gotta get over your dislike of cats!”
Hopping off her lap, he motioned to her with his
snout, meowing vigorously, then led her trembling frame from the living room to
his study. All the while the other
cats also meowed excitedly, purring loudly now that their rescuer had arrived.
******
“Now
what’s this nonsense about an animal shelter,” she muttered, positioning
herself expertly in front of the computer. “…. Oh, someone’s been reading about
witchcraft…. My-my, how interesting… how very quaint! The stereotype card-carrying witch!”
“She’s in denial,” Sam observed, looking back at the
others on the floor.
“I think she’s in shock,” thought Drew, appearing
suddenly on the desk.
“I can’t believe it,” transmitted Wanda. “She doesn’t like cats!”
“Yes, Wanda” Sam said, rubbing Alice’s cheek with
his snout, “she doesn’t like cats, but we’re very special cats. She’ll like us!”
Alice cringed at the sensation, her natural aversion
to felines warring with the realization growing in her mind. Wanda took an immediate dislike to her,
but Drew, Neva, and Sam looked desperately to Alice for help.
“She’s looking at the witch on the screen hovering
over a cauldron,” Sam acted as narrator. “…. There’s a black cat nearby in the
picture sitting by a broom…. Come on Alice, wake up and smell the coffee!”
After coaxing her in the background, as would fans
at a sports event, the four cats came right up to her face and studied her
slack-jawed expression. Again she
cringed, but this time she fought so hard against her dislike of cats a
hysterical smile broke her face.
All of the cats purred loudly, occasionally meowing with encouragement
for Alice’s help. Surely there was
something this human woman could do…. And then it happened: Alice Wagnall
collapsed onto the keyboard, her blond hair covering it like a mantle, her
hands dangling over the floor.
“What’s wrong with her now?” asked Wanda, nudging her with her nose.
“It’s obvious,” cried Sam, hovering frantically
around her head, “Alice has fainted.
We gotta bring her around.”
Barking orders to his group, Sam’s first concern was
Alice’s pulse, which he couldn’t take.
While Wanda and Neva went to fetch a wet rag, Drew tried his paw at
checking her pulse, while Sam stuck his snout under her hair to make sure she
was breathing. Suddenly, as he
began licking her furiously with his tongue, she awakened from her faint,
protesting groggily as the rough little muscle worked on her check.
Rising up with blurry eyes and a light head, Alice
stared vacantly at the telltale screen and rotated her head slowly his way.
“Sam?” She murmured breathlessly. “…. Is that really
you?”
“It’s true,” nodded Sam, wishing she could read his mind, “India has turned us all into cats!”
Go to Next Chapter -- Return to Contents/Writer's Den