June 6, 2010; The Abandonati

Skeet and I were taking our afternoon walk. It was glorious outside—perfect temp, tons of sunlight and there had been a hard rain which meant all those fucking wasp nests had been destroyed...I hate wasps. It was also one of those neighbourhood days where everyone you know seems to be outside as well. Babs and Ginger, the old biddy and Benjie, the floor mat up the street was sitting on his verandah with the two young men Skeet always slows down to look at (and who may be lovers or brothers or one of those weird configurations you read about in horror novels). The upshot was I was doing so much arse-sniffing and chatting that Skeet got tired of the stop and start and toddled us into an alley where there were far fewer 'hood-dogs getting in the way.

There, of course, we ran into Cleo. ("I decided to come down this alley," Skeet said, "because I know she lives here." I guess he can be nice, sometimes.) Cleo was not looking any the worse for wear. In fact, she looked rather magnificent. She had worked off all that apartment pudge which I used to like but which, gone, revealed a svelte, cat body where the tail was more than an appendage and what was under it was more that just a pair of orifii. My little kitty was turning into one hot mama.

And her smell! Glorious! Cat and garbage and street and trees and grass and a whiff of carrion on her breath. As we nuzzled hello I said, "You, sweet sexy thang, are now queen of the alley cats." She mewed appreciatively. Skeet sat down on a turned over garbage can so that he could smoke and we could chat. "So you're adapting," I said.

"The only bad nights are the rainy ones," Cleo said, "but we all get together under a balcony and cuddle and it's not too bad. Not looking forward to winter, though."

"Ask her about the screamer," Skeet said.

Cleo understood and said to me in Cat, "Sad story; that's Cordelia—"

"—yeej! Just the name tells me it's a sad story!—"

"—yeah; another case were the fucking owners spend more time choosing a name than taking care of the fucking pet. Again, two incredibly retarded people; she was fucking his best friend and he was fucking her best friend and her best friend was a guy. You don't get more stupid than that. When they broke up they took separate apartments and did not even discuss Cordelia's place in them." She hissed, gagged and hawked up something as if to punctuate the statement. Skeet looked at her concerned but all those alley noises just made her sexier to me—like a particularly hornifying biker chick. "Anyway," she went on, "she's new to the Abandonati—"

"—Abandonati?—"

"—That's what we call ourselves. The cats who get tossed when the masters move on. And Cordelia is one of us and she can't handle it at all."

"I know. We hear her all night, wailing away. And it's worse on rainy nights."

"Yup. She's pretty much a lost cause. No one can do anything for her and some people are trying but she always runs away from them; her heart is broken and she's a little mad from it. One day she'll just get hit by a car and it'll be just as well."

I sighed, turned to Skeet and repeated the story to him. He looked truly upset by it and said, "Some people are just fuckers—"

In Cat, Cleo immediately rejoined, "—you said a mouthful, Buddy." Then she went back to me and added, "There is one other thing you should know, sweetie. I'm out here now, and it's survival of the yadda yadda yadda etc. So we look out for each other and that means a lot of us don't like humans and most of us hate dogs. I've told them about you so you're relatively safe except around Slicer."

"There's a name," I said.

"And it doesn't tell half the story of how vicious he is—"

"—I can't imagine with a name like that he could be anything but vicious—"

She sighed and I felt a little stung because it was the sigh of someone who is trying to deal with the profoundly stupid. "No," she said as gently as her new street persona would allow, "his name before is a deep, dark, secret. He chose Slicer. And he'll kill you and him," she said tilting her head to Skeet, "and all of us if he's having a bad day. But he also gets us food and protects us in his own bizarre way. He's like the kingpin. So if you see him, don't fuck with him."

"I've seen him," I said. "Big, gray, matted hair—"

"—yup. That's Slicer."

"He nearly killed me." She tittered and it was a glorious, beautiful, cat sound. Then she said, "Now on your way. Don't worry about me."

"I worry about winter," I said, nuzzling her goodbye.

"Life goes on," she said, "or not."

That night, as I was in bed, curled up to Boo-Boo, I heard Cordelia shrieking away in the alley and I thought that, yes, sometimes it is better to be get hit by a car but, mostly, I wished the two cunts who had left her behind would be the ones under the wheels.