The Cat Sitter's Whiskers (17 page)

By the time the crying and the fighting, the darkness and the denial and the pain of it all had finally quieted down, that wall was complete. It was layers and layers thick, solid concrete with steel reinforcements, wrapped several times over with razor ribbon and barbed wire. It surrounded my heart, and for all practical purposes it was one hundred percent impenetrable. It was the only thing I knew how to do. I did it because I never wanted to feel that pain again.

Ever.

When I heard the words “our kids” tumble out of Ethan's mouth, it felt like a little piece of that wall had dislodged itself and fallen somewhere inside me. The unsettling thing was, at least so far, I hadn't bothered to put it back in place.

*   *   *

I don't know what the heck I was expecting when I inserted my key in the Kellers' front door. I knew it was safe, and I knew there was no one inside, plus I knew Lizette had already been there. If I'd thought there was even the slightest risk of danger I would never have allowed her to come and take care of Barney Feldman the night before. But as I stepped in, I took a couple of quick glances up and down the road just in case, and then after I closed the door behind me I locked and bolted it.

The house was quiet. All I could hear was the gentle hum of the air conditioner and the quickening thump of my heartbeat. As much as I dreaded breaking the news to the Kellers that they might have been robbed, the prospect of finally getting some answers to what the hell had happened to me sent a surge of adrenaline through my veins.

I pulled my phone out and took a deep breath. Dialing the Kellers' number, I could feel Dick Cheney glaring down at me from his perch on the wall, but I ignored him. The first thing I heard was a couple of electronic clicks, and then silence. I started thinking maybe I'd dialed the number incorrectly, but then there was a short high-pitched buzz, and then a noise that sounded more like a couple of bleating sheep than a telephone ring.

“Baaaaaaa. Baaaaaaa.”

They came in pairs, with about a three second pause in between, repeating about five times. Then there was another click and a low hollow hissing.

I said, “Hello?”

The line went dead.

Mrs. Keller hadn't given me a different number to use while they were in Europe, and I had just assumed she'd bought some kind of international plan for her cell phone, but now I wasn't so sure. I carefully dialed the number again and got the same thing, except this time there was no hissing at the end, just dead space.

I snapped the phone shut and held it out in front of me, hoping that somewhere on the other side of the planet Mrs. Keller had seen I was trying to reach her and would call me back. But it was no use. After a minute or so I let out a long sigh. I hadn't considered the possibility that I wouldn't at least get her voice mail. Now my plans were completely derailed.

I realized I was just standing there with my backpack slung over my shoulder, so I dropped it down on the leather bench by the door and muttered, “Good morning, everybody,” but my heart wasn't in it.

Dick Cheney was still leering at me, surrounded by his motley crew of mask cronies. His expression had taken on an almost clownlike tone now, and as I dropped my phone down on the bench next to the backpack, I could've sworn he made a face at me, the way a little kid makes a face at his mother when he thinks she's not looking. I decided to take the adult approach (something I do occasionally) and ignore him, but I could totally tell all his little mask friends thought he was the coolest thing ever, so as I went by I flicked the tip of his nose with my finger the way I'd flicked the top of Ethan's head.

At the end of the hall, I could already see the fluffy tip of Barney Feldman's tail peeking out from under the antique credenza, so I kept a wide berth.

I said, “I see you, so don't even think about it.”

Silence. I turned around just shy of the living room and folded my arms over my chest.

“Barney Feldman, I am not in the mood for your shenanigans today, so if you want your breakfast you have to come out and say good morning like a proper gentleman.”

He thought for a moment, but then one black-tipped paw shot out and batted the air tentatively.

I shook my head. “No, sir.”

The paw withdrew and there was silence again.

“Barney…”

One more quick paw swipe.

“All right. I'm counting to three, and if…”

But then he came sliding out, chirping like a chipmunk and waving his tail jerkily, as if to say,
Okay, grumpy!

I reached down and gave him a few scritches between the ears, and then he padded after me into the kitchen. I spooned an extra helping of tuna in his bowl and mixed it into his kibble with a little warm water while he caressed my calves with his cheeks. He's a good boy.

At first I couldn't find his place mat, but then I found it on the island, spread out to dry on a clean dish towel next to a handwritten message on a piece of paper torn from a spiral notebook:

Hi Mrs. Hemingway!

Barney is SUPER frisky today! He played for an hour with one of his pingpong balls while I did my homework. Then we played some more and when I left he was sound asleep. I'll come back after school and I can give him his dinner too. I get so much more work done here cuz I don't have to listen to my two older bothers, I mean brothers, play their lame computer games all afternoon.

PS—Full Disclosure. There was a Teen Wolf marathon on MTV so we watched a little of that too, but don't tell my mom!

Her name was signed in bright blue ink at the bottom with a big curlicue
l
and a plump heart over the
i
instead of a dot, and underneath was a surprisingly skillful drawing of Barney. He had a mischievous twinkle in his eye and bushy whiskers, and his paws sported outrageously long claws that ended in sharp, gleaming points.

I smiled. I knew Lizette, but I hadn't actually seen her in almost a year. I'd taken care of her four-year-old Lhasa Apso while her mom recovered from surgery for a slipped disk. At the time, Lizette was awkward and shy, still struggling to define what kind of woman she wanted to be, but it was clear from her note that she'd blossomed since then. I couldn't wait to tell her how impressed I was with her drawing talent.

After I washed out Barney's bowl and place mat, I took him out back to the garden and gave him a good grooming with a stiff-wired brush. I must have collected a half pound of fur, which helps ward off marauding critters, so I sprinkled it around the garden. While I was doing that, I caught Barney pawing at something near one of the miniature roses. It was a little pile of coarse yellow powder, sort of like cornmeal. I know sometimes people use cornmeal to repel ants, but I didn't want Barney eating it so I shooed him away.

After that we had a nice time chasing bees. There was also a Cape honeysuckle scrambling over one of the garden walls, and for a while we watched with rapt attention as a pair of tiny ruby-throated hummingbirds pirouetted around its neon-orange blossoms. It was better than a movie.

I left Barney stretched out on his side, his arms and legs all akimbo in a square of sunlight by the folding glass doors in the living room. I gave him a kiss on the nose and told him what Lizette's note had said—that she'd be back this afternoon to hang out with him. I knew he hadn't seen it because he's not allowed on the countertops.

In the foyer, I leaned against the wall and tried to call Mrs. Keller again, but to no avail. I figured I'd just keep trying for the rest of the day until I got her, so I grabbed my backpack and was almost out the door when I remembered: my meeting with the gallery owner was at three o'clock, and since I didn't think I'd be back before then, I wanted to take Mrs. Keller's package with me.

I knelt down next to the bench and pulled it out, and then when I was reaching for the doorknob I felt a tingle of excitement, like a tiny army of ants racing up the back of my neck.

“No,” I whispered out loud. “You
can't
.”

I paused and looked down. It was a brown cardboard box, roughly ten inches square, sealed with clear wrapping tape and several red
FRAGILE
stickers. It was addressed to Paxton Fine Art & Antiques in Mrs. Keller's curly handwriting. I weighed it in my hands and jiggled it slightly. There was something heavy inside.

Well,
I thought,
you've finally gone right off the deep end.

With one quick swipe, I ran my fingernail along the taped edge where the flaps met at the top, and it popped open like a jack-in-the-box.

 

21

When we were little, Michael and I would wake up around four a.m. on Christmas morning, our alarms set to “sneak mode”—a special feature of any child's internal clock—and tiptoe downstairs to inspect all the goods our grandparents had laid out under the tree after we'd gone to bed the night before. I remembered on at least two different occasions Michael went into the kitchen and came back with a spool of wrapping tape and a sharp kitchen knife—a definite violation of my grandmother's strict kitchen rules.

I can still feel the terrible thrill of it. He would already have selected the best present, either the biggest or the heaviest, and with the calm dexterity of a gourmet chef he'd set upon it with confident ease, skillfully carving his way in, taking extra care not to cause any irreparable damage.

I, on the other hand, followed the rules. I never said a word in protest, though, and I never ratted him out. I just sat there and watched, part appalled, part delighted, while he inspected whatever gift was inside and then expertly wrapped it back up good as new. Then he'd put it back in its place under the tree and we'd slink back upstairs to lie in our beds for a few more restless hours.

Not once did it ever occur to me that I could easily have done the same thing with one of my presents, and strangely enough, I didn't want to. I didn't want to spoil the surprise. When Michael and I finally did come downstairs, sleepy-eyed and innocent as can be, that look of delight on my grandparents' faces was well worth the wait. It's still one of my most treasured memories.

Now, sitting there on the bench just inside the Kellers' front door with Mrs. Keller's package sitting on my lap, I was reminded of that rush of guilty excitement. I also wondered if I might need to call Michael for a little help wrapping it back up.

The box was packed with soft, crumpled tissue paper printed with red and black block-cut shapes, sort of like stylized cave drawings. As gently as possible, I removed some of the tissue from the top and laid it on the bench next to me. Underneath was a shiny silver dome that at first appeared to be some kind of mirror, but after I removed more of the surrounding tissue I realized it was the lid to a squat, glazed clay jar about the size of a cocoa tin and held in place with a piece of thin red twine.

“Dammit,” I whispered as I pulled it out of the box and turned it on its side.

It was heavy, probably about ten pounds or so. I removed the twine and lifted the lid, and inside was nothing but sand—except it was bright yellow. The same bright yellow, in fact, as the cornmeal that Barney had found in the garden.

I whispered under my breath. “No way…”

As eccentric as Mrs. Keller was, I seriously doubted she would ever have paid, as she put it, a “small fortune” for a jar of cornmeal. It had to be something else. I don't know what frankincense looks like, or myrrh, for that matter, but I figured it had to be something like that, or some kind of ancient incense … maybe Cleopatra's eye shadow? Nefertiti's talcum powder?

I shook my head as I tied the lid back down and lowered the jar into the box with a sigh. It didn't much matter anymore, because one thing was certain—it wasn't a stone statue. I looked up to find Barney Feldman sitting like a sphinx in the doorway to the hall and watching me with his eyes narrowed to tiny accusing slits.

I said, “It's not what it looks like.”

I doubt he believed me, and I couldn't blame him. It was
exactly
what it looked like: I had opened Mrs. Keller's package and snooped through it. I'd been so certain there was a statue inside. For a split second, I imagined Lizette opening the front door and finding me sitting there like a common thief. I imagined her saying she'd have to report my illicit activities to the Kellers … and then I stopped myself.

At that very moment, I realized it was high time I gave myself a good talking-to.

As quickly as possible, I stuffed the tissue paper back in, muttering under my breath the whole time. “Are you out of your cotton-picking mind? This is the about the silliest thing you've ever done in your entire life. Seriously? You're sneaking around in people's houses opening up their things?”

Myself replied, “What was I supposed to do? I needed to know what was inside.”

I stood up and marched the box into the kitchen. “And now you know. Feel better?”

Myself shook her head. “Not really.”

“Well, let that be a lesson to you.”

I frowned. I had no idea what I meant by that or exactly what lesson I thought I was trying to teach myself. All I knew was that I felt like a complete fool.

I found a roll of tape in one of the kitchen drawers and sealed the box back up, and as I passed back through the living room I noticed Barney had returned to his patch of sunlight and was sound asleep. I didn't want to wake him up with another kiss good-bye, so instead I gave Dick Cheney a contrite nod as I set the alarm.

Back in the Bronco, I put the package in the passenger seat next to me and announced out loud, “No more.”

I was done trying to figure out what had happened. If I'd found an ancient figurine inside that box, then maybe I would have had a different attitude, but failing that, there was nothing to prove I hadn't fainted and dreamt the whole thing. I told myself I was lucky I hadn't gotten through to Mrs. Keller, because if I'd told her my whole cockamamie story she'd think I was nuts.