Here she is:
Isn't she adorable? Yes, yes she is. She is also very naughty. Let me tell you about this.
I received this cat from my friend, Betsy, who at the time was moving from Mankato to Minneapolis and had no where to keep her for a couple weeks. She asked if I would "cat sit" until she figured things out with her living situation. I said yes. I knew this was going to be terrible because A. I love cats and B. I knew I wasn't going to want to give her back. Betsy said I could keep her.
So, five days later. It's nice out. I decide to shut my air conditioner off and open a window. I normally shut the doors to my spare rooms as I do not want Lucy pooping under my bed or in a corner I can't find. My apartment is very small, so this only leaves three rooms for her to now roam around. One day I left the door open to a room I had the window open. I go to the grocery store. I stop at my Mom's. I come back home. I am sitting in my living room doing something and Lucy is all up in my grill, so I ask her to get down. This is when things turn south. An hour or so goes by and I do not see her. I call her and check every inch of my apartment and nothing. I notice I left the door open to the room right by my bathroom. I never do this. This is the room where I opened the window. A WINDOW I DO NOT HAVE A SCREEN IN. Fuck. I forgot this was a window I had something strung from another room (internet cord?) and didn't put the screen back in when I got my laptop). I look down out my window and I don't see her dead on the porch, so I know she is out there somewhere. Mind you, I live two stories up. I have a deck. This little brat scaled the side of my building like Spiderman.
I am frantic. I call my sister crying. She comes over to help me search. She makes me feel like dog shit for losing Lucy and being so irresponsible, so I call my mom to have her come over and make me feel better. It is now almost 9 pm and it's getting dark. Lucy has been missing for an hour and a half. I walk up and down my street calling her name, asking neighbor kids if they have seen her, everything. Nothing. I am depressed. I go to my friend Shauna's to get my mind off of it. I am greeted by Madi asking me if I am alright that I lost my cat. This does not make me feel better. I ask Shauna if Madi can spend the night because now my apartment is lonely and quiet without Lucy's little bell collar walking around. She says yes. I take Madi back to my apartment and we look for her a little bit and go back upstairs. I cannot sleep the entire night because I am so worried about my cat. I go check outside about every hour until 4 am when I finally am getting tired. Madi decides to wake up and ask if I found Lucy yet. She suggests that I need to wait until its light out to find her because Lucy is black and how can I see her at night? She is smart for four years old. I have no idea how this next conversation with her started but it was about kidnapping. OH. Probably because for a week or so at this point, Madi has been very upset with her daycare mom. She was yelled at for getting off a rug to help another child come inside and this was wrong. She tells me that her daycare mom LEFT a child (her child) outside by himself and he's not even a year old. She has been spinning this story to everyone she sees as she knows she was in the right and doesn't want to look bad. She tells me that maybe Lucy was taken like Jacob could have been taken. I go, "so, you think someone saw Lucy and decided to kidnap her?" And she goes, "Elyssa, don't you mean, catnapped? She's not a kid." I died laughing. She is so smart.
It's about 5 am now and I fall asleep finally. First light, Madi is awake asking me if we should go look for Lucy. I say sure. During the night, I put food out for her hoping this would entice her to come back home. It didn't. Instead it attracted an ugly, FAT, grey cat from down the street. Gross. Madi and I walk up the alley to my friend Jodi's house to ask her if she has seen Lucy. She says she saw her neighbor kids CARRYING her around in a BIRD CAGE the previous night. I am livid. These kids need to be in cages, not her. They're bad. Jodi also says she had no idea I even had a cat or she would have called me right away. I say I am keeping this on the DL as my landlord does not know I have her. Oops.
I try to get a hold of these kids. Nothing. I go back home. I am still very depressed at this point and by this time, Shauna has picked up Madi, so while I wait, I sleep.
I wake up around 430 to go back outside and check for her. I see a little girl who is friends with the other children who had her in a cage. She says they are gone until tomorrow (visiting Dad I think she said). She says she will be on the lookout for Lucy if she sees her. I go back home and have a little hope.
I am in the middle of watching Jeopardy when I hear a knock at my door. Here is the little girl with my cat! No more than 15 minutes later, she brings her home! I cry, of course. I am so happy she is home.
She has now been home for about 2 weeks, and couldn't be happier. I think she likes living with me, even though she proved she didn't within the first week. I am very cautious about windows and doors being open now. Every time she goes near the window, I yell at her. I don''t think she would be so lucky a second time. I think this might be what having a child is like. I'm very overprotective... OF A CAT.
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