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“Oh, hey,” she said. “I think I twisted my ankle again. And it’s all because of that horrible Olaf Poley. Can you believe he’s actually throwing rocks at my window now?”

Suddenly two hands closed around her neck with surprising strength. She tried to fight back but to no avail. And as she started to lose consciousness, she remembered Tracy’s words from their very first session: ‘You need to work on your upper-body strength, missy! Train those noodles you call muscles until they’re strong as iron bands!’

Oh, how she wished now she’d followed Tracy’s advice.

Chapter 1

I woke up from a strange sound.Thump, thump, thump. I could feel it in the pit of my stomach. As if some giant hand had grabbed the house and was shaking it all about.

And then I realized what it was.

“Earthquake!” I shouted as loud as I could. “Earthquake!”

And I was up and moving with great alacrity in the direction of the exit. I halted when a small inner voice told me I’d forgotten something. Something critical. I’d totally neglected to make sure my human was awake and responding to my cry of alarm.

So ignoring danger to life and limb, I turned back and checked on Odelia. Imagine my surprise when I saw that only Chase still occupied the bed, the covers pulled all the way up to his ears, blissfully sleeping the sleep of the dead in spite of my urgent plea.

“Earthquake!” I tooted in his ears. “Wake up, Chase—there’s an earthquake!”

And to add credence to my words, I placed my paws on the burly copper and started massaging his mighty chest, not stinting on the odd claw extending from the odd paw.

“Not now, Max,” Chase muttered, then turned to his other side and kept on sleeping.

“But Chase! You have to wake up! There’s an earthquake and if you don’t get up right now the house will fall on top of our heads!”

“That’s nice,” Chase muttered, even though I’m sure he couldn’t possibly have understood what I’d just said. Chase is one of those humans who can’t comprehend cats. Well, I guess most humans fall into that category. Only Odelia, Chase’s girlfriend and my very own personal human, canspeak to me, as well as her mother and grandmother.

My gaze briefly raked the spot where Odelia should have been, and I reached out a tentative paw to touch the sheet. Still warm, so she must have gotten up just now. So why hadn’t she alerted her boyfriend of the impending doom? Or me, for that matter?

And then, as I glanced around some more, I saw that there was one other individual missing from the picture: my best friend Dooley. I wasn’t worried about him, though, as Dooley has the luxury of calling two homes his home, both Odelia’s and her mom’s, and had presumably opted to keep his own human next door company this particular night.

I decided to go in search of Odelia, as she seemed to be the only one who’d be able to rouse Chase from the land of slumber and into full wakefulness.

The loud noise that I’d identified as an earthquake had changed in pitch, and as I hurried out of the bedroom and into the corridor, suddenly I realized my mistake. It wasn’t an earthquake but… music. Loud, thumping music. The kind that humans like to dance to.

Quickly putting two and two together I deduced that Odelia had gotten up early and was using these quiet moments before the dawn to perform some of that aerobics, as she calls it. She dresses up in fluorescent lycra and jumps around in sync with the music, watching other women donning similar attire do the same on her big TV screen.

So I waddled down the stairs, and the moment I arrived in the living room I discovered I’d been right on the money: there, jumping up and down and swinging her arms, was Odelia, dressed in pink, moving along to the beat of some very peculiar music.

And next to her sat Dooley, bobbing his head as if in approval of these proceedings.

I sidled up to him, after giving Odelia a once-over to determine if she was still of sound mind and body or had been bitten by some exotic bug and gone off her rocker. With humans you never know. They act sane and sensible one minute, and nuts the next.

“Have you been up long?” I asked as I hopped onto the couch and joined my friend.

“I woke up when Odelia got out of bed,” said Dooley, who, judging from the way he was still bobbing his head to the beat, seemed to enjoy the extravaganza.

“I thought it was an earthquake,” I intimated. “Until I realized it was Odelia.”

“She’s getting good at this aerobics thing, isn’t she?” said Dooley proudly. “She’s almost as good as those very lively ladies on TV.”

Those lively ladies were kicking their legs so high into the air I winced, afraid something might give and they’d lose a limb or two.

“Yeah, she’s improving with leaps and bounds,” I agreed, though I still wasn’t entirely sure whether the aerobics thing was good for her or detrimental to her health. “Why does she do it, though? I mean, what’s the point of all this jumping and sweating?”