Short Story

Here Kitty Kitty
By Michael Braae

   There were cockroaches everywhere, in the cupboards, in the drawers and on the ceiling. It seemed like they liked to come out at night and play with the mice. I thought about demanding a refund, but the landlord had already moved me twice. This bug infested apartment was way nicer than the other ones, so I decided to stay. 
 
   There were a lot of stray cats lurking around. They were probably drawn by all of the easy meals that appeared to be living at my place. If I could just cure one of them cats in and make him a pet, maybe he would scare off some of the furry pests or perhaps eat them. Then I would only have to figure out how to get rid of the cockroaches. 
 
   I walked down to the store on the corner and bought a can of tuna and a bottle of bleach. An old derelict behind some bushes look like he was contemplating a robbery. After identifying the contents of my purchase, he changed his mind and I made it home unmolested. I opened a window and place the tuna on the sill and then begin my antiseptic assault on the cockroaches in the kitchen. Twenty minutes later, it was a lot cleaner and I heard a cat meow. As I approached the window I could see a big tabby fighting a giant cockroach over the can of tuna. “Here kitty, kitty,” I said, in my kindest cat luring voice. But to no avail. As soon as I got near, he backed away and tippy toed off, never to be seen again. I thought of using a trap, but I didn’t have one. All I had was a small tangled ball of twine. So I made a loop and put it on the window sill with some tuna in the center of it. One after another snatch the tuna from the trap faster than I can tighten up the loop and before long the can was empty. Several cockroaches had begun chewing on me when my attention was diverted, and when it finally dawned on me, I jumped up and began flailing like a madman and swatting myself until I noticed a herd of cats in the window gazing at me in apparent amusement. But the moment I quit whacking cockroaches and switch to kitty catching mode, the cats took off and left me standing there looking stupid. After a few days of this I was about to give up on catching a cat. Then it occurred to me that I could just adopt the damn cat from the shelter! “What an idiot!” I said out loud as I swatted at a cockroach with a rolled up newspaper, then through an old shoe at a mouse that was trying to eat the power cord on my toaster.
 
   The window display at the shelter was overflowing with cute little kittens in search of a home. I was afraid that one of those adorable little kitties would be attacked by an angry mob of cockroaches in the night, then carted off and eaten by rats. 
 
   The young woman at the counter was giving me a physical look as I entered, tilting her head to the side. I thought it was because I was scratching and swatting imaginary cockroaches. Then she said “You might want to leave your pet mouse in the car” indicating the small varmint sitting on my shoulder, twitching his whiskers against my face. It slowly begin to dawn on me that I must have had a mouse on my coat ever since I left the apartment!
 
   “Whaaah!” I yelled, simultaneously jumping up in the air like I was on fire, trying to brush the little bastard off my neck. “Get him off me, get him off me!” I screamed like a girl even though the tiny mouse had already leaped to the floor. 
 
   Incredibly the mouse seemed to survive the fall but only to be instantly attacked and eaten by scraggly looking black cat, who until that moment appeared to be afraid of his own shadow.
 
   The young lady covered her mouth and looked at me and apologetically, until I declared “I’ll take that one!” Indicating the Black rack of bones that was now casually licking his paw as if nothing out of the ordinary had just happened.
 
   The girl looked at me as if I completely lost my mind and said “You want THAT cat!” it wasn’t as much of a question as it was a statement.
 
   “Yes!” I said enthusiastically, as I wondered what that slippery substance stuck to his fur might be. “Do you have something that I can put him in so that he don’t get loose in the car?”
 
   She looked at me like I was some kind of an idiot. “I got to tell you, he is not a he, he’s a she!”
 
   “That’s okay,” I said eager to get home and resume exterminating the unwelcome Intruders in my apartment. “Just put her in a box for me okay?”
 
   “Okay,” she said in a tone that is usually followed by I tried to warn you! 
 
   “That’s a recent capture,” she said having no effort on my feeling that I’d lucked out and found the perfect cat without all the shopping around that I thought I was going to have to do.
 
   “That’s okay,” I said. “Just stick him in the box for me, would you?”
 
   “She’s pregnant,” She said thinking that would be the deal breaker and I would change my mind. 
 
“Hmmm, ” I said. “Pregnant eh?”
 
   I didn’t really take time to consider all the implications or possible responsibilities. I was so happy to have located a mouse killer so quickly. I thought it might even be a benefit because she might be more protective and aggressive with a litter of kittens. 
 
   I opened the cardboard carrier as soon as my new cat and I crawled into my apartment through the window. 
 
   “I’m going to call you, Panther!” I said proudly, as I reached into the box to extract my new mouse eating companion. But apparently, panther was not grateful to be rescued, nor was she anxious to acquire a new friend as one might suppose. She attacked me with the ferocity of a wild animal! 
 
   “Yee-oww!” I hollered as the blood began to ease from my shredded hands. Panther jumped out of the box and ran directly over to the open window. She turned and looked over her shoulder and said “meow!” then disappeared. 
 
   “Come back Panther!” I yelled at her memory. 
   
   “Dammit!” I said as I noticed that someone had stolen my toaster while I was gone. 
 
   That night I was mauled by cockroaches and mice in my sleep.