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“Yeah, he should,” said Pussy. She was dragging her heels as if the weight of the world rested on her slender shoulders. Finally we passed the stairwell: concrete stairs set in a concrete wall, and then finally into the kitchen—all concrete floors and walls and plenty of gleaming steel. “Inhere,” she said.

We now found ourselves in a side kitchen, completely devoted to Pussy and her needs. There were large plastic bins hooked to the far wall, with some kind of receptacles below.

“Just follow my lead,” she said, and pushed her snout against what looked like a lever. A few pieces of kibble came dropping down into the receptacle and she gave us a sad look as if saying: Well, there you go. “All the different types of kibble are here,” she said with as much zip and zestas a funeral home director. “You’ve got your chicken, your turkey, your rabbit… And if you want brands, you’ll find them all there—every label under the sun.”

What fascinated me, though, was that all the kibble consisted of different shades of gray.

“Don’t tell me Leo got the kibble painted gray,” I said, amazed.

“Yeah, he got the stuff specially made by the manufacturers. They cooked up batches of the stuff just for him—or me, I guess.”

“Jeez,” I said, but still eagerly thumped my snout against one of the levers of what looked like prime gourmet kibble, and out tumbled several nuggets. I eagerly gobbled them up, then spewed them out again. “Yuck!” I said. “What is this flavor?”

“Ash, I guess,” said Pussy. “Leo didn’t believe in flavor. Or smell. He said we needed to get rid of our unnatural attachment to taste. He liked a clean palate, so his imagination could run rampant. He didn’t like color, or taste, or beautiful music or anything that could interfere with his ability to create.”

“Oh, my Lord,” I said, eyeing the poor cat with unadulterated pity. “What a sad, sad life you must have lived.”

“Hey, at least I’m one of the richest cats in the world,” she said without enthusiasm.

“Well, your days of living life without taste or color or sound or smell will be over now, right?” I said.

“Wanna bet?” she said. “With my luck I’ll probably end up living with someone even worse than Leo.”

We ate in silence, and even though the stuff was utterly tasteless and odorless, I still ate my fill. The stomach wants what it wants, right?

And here I thought I knew how the other half lived, I thought as I watched Pussy drink from what looked like a silver salver filled to the brim with crystal-clear water—probably sterilized, if the rest was any indication.

“You should stick around,” said Pussy finally. “There’s going to be a big meeting tonight. All the important people are going to be there.”

“What important people?” I asked.

“Oh, I don’t know. Lawyers and board members and shareholders and executives and such. I’ll bet they’ll decide my fate at the meeting, so I probably shouldn’t miss it for the world, but…” She hesitated and gave me a forlorn look. “Could you do me a great, big, gigantic favor?”

“Anything,” I said.

“Could you attend the meeting for me? And then tell me what they decided?”

“I don’t understand.”

“It’s too much for me,” she said. “I’m sure these are pretty horrible people. As lifeless and colorless and soulless as the rest of this place. And I simply can’t bear to listen to them while they discuss my future. I need you to tell me about the parts that are important for me to know. Only the facts.”

“Sure, no problem,” I said. “But aren’t they going to notice us and kick us out?”

“No, they won’t,” she said with a wan smile. “You’ll see.”

And with these mysterious words she left us.

“How very sad,” said Dooley.

“Yeah,” I said. “And to think that I actually used to envy her. When we watched her Instagram pictures I always thought she had it made.”

“Me too,” said Dooley. “The richest, most spoiled cat in the world. Poor, poor Pussy.”

“Poor Pussy,” I agreed, and then gobbled up some more kibble. It was utterly tasteless and odorless, but it still hit the spot, especially since I hadn’t eaten anything since that morning.

“So we’ll stick around and listen in on this meeting?” Dooley asked.

“I think we owe it to Pussy, don’t you?”

“Isn’t this against union rules?”

“I don’t think so. It’s got nothing to do with the case, right? We’re only doing this as a personal favor to Pussy.”