Independence day

We all know life is unpredictable, change the only constant. Never is that more conspicuous than when something utterly unexpected happens. On Saturday night, right around the time he would typically have come blasting through the pet door demanding acknowledgment and second supper, the noisy, mischievous, lovably scrappy cat we took in a decade ago, was hit by a car. We’ve pieced together a scenario, like you do when you’re trying to make sense of things that don’t make sense.

Our town had just wrapped up its annual fireworks display, an event that brings folks in by land and water, and there was a snaking line of traffic making its way back from whence it came. We were somewhere in that flotilla of cars, having enjoyed time with friends a mile or so away, at the other end of town. We were home by 10:15, home before the thunderstorm hit, home in time to wash the dishes in the sink and round up our two felines, like we always do at that hour. We weren’t terribly surprised when only Nutmeg showed for the bedtime routine. Once every week or two, to remind us who was actually in charge around here, Tucker ignored his curfew. We left the cat door open expecting to see him in the morning.

When he was absent at breakfast and hadn’t returned by midday, we worried. A lovely soul on a locally-focused virtual discussion board noticed my post of concern and got in touch privately to explain that she’d witnessed a black and white cat being struck by a silver car at around 10:00 pm the night before. The driver had stopped, she wrote, but she didn’t know what had happened after that. We suppose Tucker had just enough vitality to leave the scene of the accident, find his way to a grassy patch behind the derelict gas station nearby and catch a red-eye to his next adventure.

He’d come to live with us from the house next door. He was scrawny and persistent, courting us for a month or so before showing up in the midst of a massive downpour, yelling his head off and looking like he might wash away. I’d been resisting the pleas, his and those coming from people I live with, to do more than love him from a distance. We already had two cats, there was no need of a third. But there he was, wet and pathetic, so I let him inside. He devoured the food we gave him, then hunkered down on our sofa and slept for the next 24 hours. When he finally rose, he left behind evidence of tapeworms, so I scheduled an appointment with our vet. I knew then he wasn’t going back to his original owners, though we did nothing to prevent it. They knew he’d taken up with us, and when they moved, they didn’t come asking for him. Against my better judgement, it was the right decision.

Tucker always had something to say and almost always got what he wanted. The smart, charming ones are like that. One of his favorite tricks was ambushing his sister. He could appear to be sound asleep, but at the sound of Nutmeg in the litter box he’d rise, saunter across the house all casual-like, then duck behind the curtain in front of the closet at the foot of the stairs, anticipating her descent. She never found that game as entertaining as he did.

Tucker didn’t have a malicious bone in his body. He was impish and independent but also cuddly. We could hold him under his front legs and let gravity pull down the length of his body, stretching him out like a sock monkey. We could bury our faces in the silky fluff of his mostly white belly without fear of reprisal. He was the kind of cat who could make himself welcome most anywhere, occasionally wandering home smelling of cologne and smoke, having spent the evening on someone else’s lap. He ate the canned cat food we served, but he preferred what he could con out of a neighbor by pretending he lacked a proper home. He was particularly fond of pizza crust and rotisserie chicken. We used to say he was a nobleman trapped in a cat’s body. Tucker believed himself worthy and his world obliged.

I gathered fresh flowers and herbs as my husband prepared a resting place out back. We both noticed the monarch pulsing just above and around the chair where we’d set Tucker down, looking from a distance like a kitty napping on a summer afternoon. The butterfly flew so close I thought it might land on him, but then it danced up into the lowest branches of our best shade tree, lit on a leaf, and stood still. We can only assume it had just emerged from its chrysalis. Rather than fluttering off in a ceaseless search for nectar, it sat stationary just overhead, occasionally fanning open its vibrant orange and black wings, then bringing them tight together again. It lingered there for two hours or more. It stayed until the sun set and the sky shifted from beryl blue to dusty lavender. I sat nearby until I could bear to leave it. I bid it goodnight, wishfully thinking it might be there at dawn, but when I looked out a few minutes later, it was gone. It occurred to me that Tucker had done it again. A monarch. He’d found yet another way to make himself distinguished, adored - and free.

~Elizabeth