Charlie

A while back Emily worked her way laboriously down a list of jobs and goals to prove that she is responsible enough to take care of a cat. Then she got a feisty black and white kitten from her friend Phebe and named it Charlie.

Charlie was a bit like Matt, male and always inviting trouble. He swiped his paw up through the slats of the porch swing to distract us from a peaceful conversation. He annoyed Katzie to death. He pounced viciously on the swimsuits drying on the porch rail.

Then he disappeared. Well, hey, you know how cats are, especially not-yet-fixed toms.

Some time later an awful smell wafted up from under the porch. Steven and Emily investigated, and there was Charlie, dead and decaying and horribly torn up.

Then I remembered a terrible cat-fight I heard in the middle of the night not long before he disappeared. It wasn’t a normal spit and snarl fight, but serious yowling and screeching. I remember hollering out the bedroom window but being too lazy to actually go out there to break things up. After all, you know how cats are, and at worst he’d have a torn ear in the morning.

I now think Charlie tangled with a raccoon or other wild beast and lost by a long way and crept under the porch to die.

I tell you, this is a haunting thought on dark nights: that torn-up, defeated little cat crawling away to die alone.

I have a new resolution that I have to get involved when the innocent suffer. Even if it means stumbling outside in jammies in the middle of the night. Even if it means—who knows what it might mean, but I just have to.

Quote of the Day:
"At least he died a noble death."
--Emily. You can see a picture of her and Charlie here.