Folded ears are as good as dental records

People know that I love my cat. Sometimes I gaze at her and declare that her beauty far surpasses that of all other cats and most other animals. And even though she may never curl up on my lap or snuggle at my hip like a good cat, she is a wonderful pet.


Some nights she gets the kitten crazies. She gets possessed and gallops from the far north side of my apartment straight on through to the head of my bed, where she stops, meows and turns right back around to complete the lap and start again.

I've taken to closing the french doors to my bedroom, a rather unpleasant measure in the height of summer's heat, but tonight that didn't slow her down. Once Miso realized she couldn't bust through, she just whined pitifully in the studio until I finally let her outside.

I went back to bed, turned out the light, glanced at the alarm clock, 12:01.

I turn for a minute or two and then heard the sounds of barking dogs. These weren't the yips of the Paris Hilton-y rat-dogs that live in the apartment across 31st St, but deeper, more menacing barks. The barks sounded darker and scarier than just about any I had ever heard before in my life - and my step-grandmother rescues the most rejected reject dogs and keeps them in her garage, so I have heard my share of howls. Suddenly, as I listened, I felt a twinge in my heart and I knew something was wrong.

I looked out my window and saw, beyond the branches of a tree, at least three dogs teaming in the middle of the street. Then my superweird/supernice neighbor tore out of her house (the one that caught on fire a few months ago) and started clapping her hands and screaming, "Stop that!" She scooped a small something up from the street and rushed back into her house, cradling a limp little body in her arms.

Holy shit, Miso.

I was half asleep and clad only in underwear and though clothing seems perpetually strewn across my bed, it seemed to take me forever to find and put on some shorts and I do not even remember what I wore on my feet. I crossed the street and realized that I've only recently begun talking to my neighbors and here I am about to knocking away just after midnight.

A short boy with a sweet face and a scruffy beard opens the door.

"Uh, hi, I live across the street and I heard those dogs and saw your roommate scoop up a cat..."

"Yeah, it's my roommate Rebecca's." He whispered it as if to protect her even though she was out of earshot.

I sighed. We both looked back across the street to the dogs that had disbanded but still kept near one another. They looked a lot more innocent that I wanted them to. Miso was still no where to be found.

"So are they strays?" I asked.

"Let's find out!" He said, his tone didn't entirely warrant an exclamation point but he was little more excited that a mere period can convey.

We sort of strolled across the street calling after the dogs who promptly disappeared in the narrow alleyways between the houses. He introduced himself as Ben and I as Maura.

"So, Ben, are your sure it was your roommate's cat?"

"Yeah. I mean, I think so. She isn't home right now but my other roommate's up there with the cat. I don't know what to do. I mean, the cat is pretty much in pieces."

Jesus.

"What does it look like?"

"Gray stripes with a white belly."

"So does my cat."

"Um, I am pretty sure it's [cat's name]."

He asks me more questions, he gets less sure. I stay surprisingly calm. He keeps asking me what color Miso'S eyes are.

"Yellowish green, I think? I don't know, you know, cat-eye color."

His roommate emerges from their house with the cat wrapped up in a towel.

He looks at her and then at me, sort of holding up a hand to her. "Is there anything special about Miso? About the way she looks?"

I blank and can only find adjectives that she seems to share with the deceased. Telling him that she is the most beautiful cat he'll probably ever see probably wouldn't help much here. "Scottish fold! She has a Scottish fold!"

"A what?"

"One of her ears curls back at the tip."

He goes to look and before he can stop her, his roommate walks right on towards me. It is dark and the cat's fur is all wet and matted but I can clearly see its ears.

"Definitely no curl." Ben says softly with just the slightest reassuring smile. And though I am very sad for this poor, tiny creature who just died a terrifying, painful death, I am quite relieved that her ear wasn't folded.

I got Lisa's cats in house and told her about the massacre. "Maya's cat was killed last week by a stray pit bull," she says.

"Churchill has got a stray pit bull? Awesome. "

Maybe I am a baby, but I am pretty sure I would bawl my eyes out for a solid couple of weeks if Miso were mauled to death by some mean, dirty dogs. I'd be sad to lose her and I would be haunted by how scared and alone she would have felt in her final moments. In the year and a half since we've had eachother, she's sunk her claws into my heart. She can aggrevate the crap out of me, but I will forever be scratching her neck and marveling at ber beauty.

Lisa finally spots her across the street. She wandered back to us all wide-eyed and stayed close to me until I got into bed. I hope she enjoyed those last few minutes in "the wild" because she'll be living it up indoors for the rest of our stay in RVA.