Cleo

I’d heard people say kittens were playful and could be almost as demanding as new babies. Almost? Babies stay in their bassinets, for heaven’s sake. They don’t go out of their way to attack your hair or send you flying through the air with the prospect of spending the rest of your days in a wheelchair. This kitten’s behavior was beyond any normality curve—human, animal or vegetable. She was uncontrollable, destructive, possibly psychotic and a sock fetishist to boot. In less than twenty-four hours she’d changed from helpless, charming aristocrat to crazed feral.

We chased after her down the hall, leaping over socks and supermarket bags, but Cleo was nowhere to be seen. We stopped and listened. All that could be heard was the sound of our labored breathing.

I peered through the crack of Rob’s door. Curled on his pillow was the personification of kittenly cuteness. She mewed affectionately, stretched, and gave the prettiest yawn. Cleo had morphed back into the creature we’d fallen in love with.

Rob moved towards her. Cleo’s eyes snapped wide open. Glaring, she pinned her ears back and lashed the pillowcase with her tail. Before either of us could get any closer she sprang to her feet and flitted mischievously across the room. Rob flung himself to the floor, trying to pin her down in a rugby tackle. She slithered through his grasp, leapt on top of his bookshelf and scrambled out of reach up the Smurf curtains, using her claws for crampons.

Swinging from Smurfland, the kitten was deaf to my concerns for the interior decor. Nevertheless, a glimpse towards the ceiling confirmed she couldn’t climb any higher. Descending meekly into our arms, however, wasn’t an option. In less than a breath, she dropped onto my shoulder, a mere springboard from which she then plunged to the floor.

Back on the carpet, she leapt in wild circles around the room, bouncing off the window ledge, the bed, the bookshelf. This was not a kitten. It was a dynamo with enough energy to power a discotheque. Even watching her was exhausting.

It wasn’t going to last. We weren’t cat people. Our house no longer belonged to us. Cleo had invaded and turned us into prisoners. Even though she was tiny, her personality filled every corner of every room. If she wasn’t stealing socks from the laundry basket or chewing the covers of precious books she was hiding in a shopping basket waiting to ambush us.

Admittedly, the trouble she was causing had provided diversion from our pain. Every moment spent worrying what part of the house she was destroying was one not steeped in grief. But I was a barely functioning human being and in no condition to deal with the undiluted force of nature that was Cleo.

The only thing more unnerving than her presence was her sudden, inexplicable absence. “Where’s Cleo?” I muttered after resurrecting the rubber plant and disposing of the turds. The house was too quiet. Rob found her eating potato peelings inside the kitchen cupboard that contained our rubbish bin.

I’d once read somewhere that cats sleep seventeen hours a day. Presumably kittens needed more than that. Going by the damage to our surroundings, Cleo must’ve slept a total of three hours in the past twenty-four. Some other kitten in a blissfully calm household had surely stolen Cleo’s designated downtime and grabbed it for itself. It’d be pigging out on hours of extra sleep, dozing on a cushion in a patch of sunlight somewhere, not causing any trouble. Its stress-free, thoroughly spoiled owner would look at its plump, snoring form and wonder at its passive nature.

I couldn’t stand another minute of that kitten. I persuaded Rob to leave the house with me for an hour or two. The only terms he’d agree to was a visit to a pet shop that sold stuff for kittens.

We crept around the abandoned supermarket bags toward the front door. I turned the lock smoothly to avoid loud clicks that might draw attention to our escape. Just as I shuffled Rob out ahead of me, the supermarket bag closest to the door suddenly inflated to twice its size, exploded to life and emitted a terrifying yowl. A miniature panther pounced from its depths and dug its teeth in my ankles.

I tried to shake her off. The kitten was several notches below us on the Darwinian scale. She had no right—let alone the brains and technology—to detain us. Nevertheless, she was having a damn good try.

Rob picked up a sock and shook it. Cleo was immediately mesmerized. Ferocity: 10. Attention span: 0. She leapt and danced after the hosiery. When Rob threw it to the other end of the hall she scurried after it.

We slid out the front door as Cleo’s tail disappeared into the shadows. She’s only a cat, for heaven’s sake! my mother’s voice lectured inside my head. But I hadn’t felt so guilty since I’d tried leaving the boys at a day-care center that was clearly run by a direct descendent of Adolf Hitler.