Never Were There Such Devoted Sisters

Finally! Quinn the slacker rouses from her hibernation and places paws on keyboard. If guilt were writing, I’d have done this blog days ago. Then again, if guilt were writing, I’d create the works of the major Russian writers on a daily basis.

To answer the inevitable question: no, Lu the cat hasn’t come back. I can only hope someone sees her tag or scans her for a chip and she comes home but I’m keeping my expectations pretty realistic. Oddly enough, we haven’t seen Victor/Victoria since Lu went missing. Daughter suggested they ran off to get married. Consort suggested Lu and Victor/Victoria have bought an RV and moved to Branson, Missouri, where they could live unnoticed because many people were shaped like them. I doubt this. Lu doesn't strike me as an Oak Ridge Boys fan. The fact remains, she’s gone to her next adventure and wherever she is, we love her and we hope she’s raising hell.

Luckily for me -- the parent not looking forward to a grieving child pining for her fur-football-with-halitosis sister -- there were the foster kittens to distract her. For the past four years we’ve fostered kittens. Every year, someone would see us enjoying the endless kitteny silliness and announce “You’re keeping this one” and I’d always explain that no, kittens are great fun but our job was to keep them safe and happy and get them ready for their family. Anne and Diana were just another couple of cogs in the feline wheel.

But no one told them that.

After the first week, we started letting them out beyond the laundry room, mostly because we didn’t have any choice what with them adhering to any mammal who passed through. Two weeks after that, we knew Diana wouldn’t sleep anywhere but nestled in the kid’s armpit, kneading the sleeve of her pajama top. Anne favored me, mostly when I was trying to work. Sensing my unspoken need, she’d spring neatly into my lap and commence to reducing the thread count of my pants. Both girls woke up for an evening’s workout just about the time I go to bed, which is five minutes before Consort starts his evening television ritual. One afternoon, during those few hours a day Consort and I are equally lucid, he told me the previous night, he’d stumbled across some Harrison Ford movie about...something. You know, average man, armed only with superior intellect, some FBI training and a thrilling score, does mano-a-mano battle with sadistic, evil guy who is usually kind of British.

Against his will, Consort got drawn in, even though it was on basic cable and a commercial popped up every five minutes. Fully awake, the kittens galloped through the room, bent on mayhem. Hours later, the movie finally reached the dénouement; Bad Sort-Of British Guy and Harrison faced off, a couple of more commercial breaks happened, and then the big fight scene starte-

The screen went black. The kittens had run behind the TV and unplugged it.

By the time he got the TV back on, there was another commercial. Then, Harrison, blood-flecked and triumphant, reunited with his family. Consort never got his guy-payoff. The kittens had ruined it. And he didn’t strangle them. In fact, he was laughing. We loved these critters. They were going to make someone great pets. They were great cats.

But apparently not on weekends. And especially not when they were being be shown to potential adoptive families. At the rescue place, they would huddle together at the back of the cage, glaring and hissing at people, making noises as if they had been found living behind Chernobyl. I came to pick them up one Sunday night and the woman who runs the place was crawling around under a bookcase. It seems Anne had sprung herself from the cage, raced under there and was batting at anyone who got near her. The rescue leader, usually an unflappable presence when it comes to cats, was flapped. This cat would not come out.

I leaned over and said, “Anne, pumpkin, I’m here. Let’s go home.” Anne shot out from under the bookshelf as if by slingshot, landing somewhere on my abdomen and leeching on. The rescue-group leader said, “We need to get them out of your house. They’re already so devoted to each other they have to be adopted together. And now they’re getting that attached to you.”

I agreed. In theory. I also begged for one more week with them because...I don’t know, they’d get less devoted to us after spending more time with us? That week passed, and then another, during which Lu left. By this point, we couldn’t possibly send them back during the week and it didn’t make much sense to send them for the weekend showings because they made such a dreadful impression. And then, late one night, I went in to check on the kid and straighten her quilts. I found Anne sleeping sprawled around the kid’s feet and Diana under the covers, nursing on the duvet. That's when I realized, Sometimes the family you get them ready for is your own.

Consort still has allergies. I Swiffer a lot more now. I bathe them in Allerpet. They don’t go outside, nor will they, which should keep the allergens slightly less horrifying. The air purifier runs 24/7. Consort is a saint and I’m very grateful for him. I’m also grateful for the insistent little orange presence currently purring in my lap as I write, reminding me again that in this life the unexpected can be pretty horrible, but it can also be pretty wonderful.

Here are the girls. Please forgive the background; their bed is next to the dryer, which is unsightly terrain but warm and purrish.