We were just toddling along, yesterday afternoon, enjoying a little sun after the rain-storm when suddenly...THERE SHE WAS! I yanked Skeeter for a half-block and went up to the step she was on outside her building (or what I think is her building, because you never know with her.)"Oh God!" I said, trying not to weep, "I thought you were roadkill!"
"Simmer down, little fellow," she said and tapped my nose with her paw which, for Cleo, passes for affection.
Skeeter was holding the leash tight so I snarled, "Hey! Dicksmack! Could you give me a little slack here?!"
"You're acting weird," he said, "I don't know what you'll do!"
"You are acting bizarre, sweetie," Cleo purred in Cat.
To her: "I'm in love!" To him: "I'll be calm"
"You better be," he said, glancing about to assure himself no one was watching. "One thing," he said, "if you want favours from me, you might consider omitting 'Dicksmack' from the exchanges."
"Do you have any idea how queer you sound right now?" I snarled.
"Fuck you," he said but finally let a little more leash out of the gadget and I could rub shoulders with my beloved.
"Where have you been?" I whispered, my words a garble of Dog-Speak and the few phrases I knew in Cat. (I can understand Cat perfectly, but it takes a nimbler tongue than this Jack Russell's to get around those diphthongs.)
"They went on vacation. I've been in a kennel," she said simply.
"THE BASTARDS!" I shouted and immediately the loose leash was whipped back into the machine. I turned to Skeeter, "KNOCK IT OFF OR I'M GOING TO RIP YOUR BALLS OFF!"
"Listen, you little peckerwood," he hissed, "stop acting like...well...you! I'll do about anything you want but can't you see you're making her nervous!"
"He's right," Cleo whispered.
"But why?" I said when the leash was loosened and I could sit on the step at her feet.
"There's talk," she began. "Mortimer, the cat next door, is spreading it around that you and I...well...you know." She turned away and the sun shone on her coat just so and her look was so sad and distant my breath stopped.
"I'll go slow. We'll act like friends. You'll see. It'll be fine," I said, with a whiff of desperation.
"We'll see," she said so enigmatically I fell a little of myself die.
"We sat in silence for a long time. She finally looked over and said, "He can sit down too, you know," and pointed at Skeeter with her nose. He was looking away and I was touched by how the big dink was accommodating us—like the Nurse in "Romeo and Juliet". "Sit!" I said and he did, but as far down the steps away from us as he could get.
"I love you," I said finally.
"Oh don't be a tit!" she said and swatted me. I laughed instead of going on talking but she had hurt me and I don't mean with the swat. There was no easy way for us. None.
So we sat quietly, occasionally rubbing up against each other though, if you had watched, you would have seen nothing. Skeeter was looking more and more tired and I knew I would have to wrap this up because, for some odd reason, he wasn't.
"What's his story?" Cleo said.
"He's queer. He's been sick. For a long time."
"Is he alone?"
"No, but he feels alone, I think."
She thought for a moment and sighed gently. "Well, honey, bottom line: at three o'clock in the morning we're all alone." I remembered something I read somewhere: "There is in true beauty something which vulgar souls cannot admire." That was Cleo.
Finally she got up, I did, Skeeter did. I toddled down the stairs and looked back at her and she stretched for me. It was so erotic I nearly passed out. Skeeter and I went on our way without a word.
Later that night, as we were watching TV, there was a terrible sound outside: a clunk and the scream of an animal. I rushed to the window to discover that Bonheur, the black lab mix across the street, had been hit by a car or a bike or something. He wasn't badly hurt and, to be frank, this is the kind of thing he does which is why the rest of the neighbourhood doesn't call him Bonheur (Joy in French) but Boner; not because he gives us one but because he's as smart as one.
Then I though about what Cosmo said about passing on: Poof! And I thought about Cleo.
Nothing is ever certain.
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