She has a book tonight instead of the little light. I noticed the difference right away because a book weighs on her differently than the phone does — heavier in her lap, held with two paws instead of balanced in one, and it makes a specific sound when she opens it that the phone never … Read more
She came in through the front door at the usual hour, with the usual keys, making the usual amount of noise setting down her bag, and I did not go to greet her the way I normally do, because something about the shape of her head was wrong. I want to be precise about this. … Read more
She was washing the kitchen windows today, which is a task I have never once seen her enjoy but which she does anyway, with a blue bottle and a gray cloth that smells sharp enough to make my nose twitch from across the room. I don’t understand the purpose of it. The windows always look … Read more
She did not go to the desk today. I want that noted, because the desk is where the working happens, and the working happening somewhere else is the sort of thing a cat is entitled to have opinions about. Instead she came into the front room with a mug of tea and a stack of … Read more
I was asleep on the arm of the couch, which is a narrow perch that requires a certain amount of commitment to stay on, and I want it noted that under normal circumstances I manage it without incident. The sun had moved onto the cushion in that lazy afternoon way it does, warm through the … Read more
There is a moment every night that I have never once managed to skip ahead of, no matter how I position myself beforehand. It happens after she puts the book down. The book goes on the little table on her side, spine cracked open to whatever page she stopped on, always face-down, which I’ve come … Read more
I want it on the record that I have made that jump before. Many times. It is not a difficult jump. The bookshelf is not especially tall, and I am not especially small, and the two facts have always balanced each other out in my favor. I have landed on top of that bookshelf with … Read more
I want it on record that I was awake first. I am always awake first, technically, in the sense that I never fully stop being awake, but this morning I was awake in the specific, aggrieved way of someone who has been personally wronged before the sun has even finished coming up. The alarm went … Read more
I want it on record that I heard them before she did anything about it. A voice, male, unfamiliar, coming from somewhere in the vicinity of the kitchen table where she’d set up her laptop, laughing at something in a way that suggested he found himself very charming. I was on the floor at the … Read more
Something was wrong with her today and I want it on the record that I noticed immediately, before the sighing even started, back when she was still just standing at the counter holding her phone like it had personally disappointed her. I have a very good nose for the ordinary chemistry of the house — … Read more
