I couldn't even get excited about Christmas, my favorite holiday. I was missing Spooky too much. On Christmas Eve, we decorated our tree and hung up our stockings. We hung Samantha's on the hearth right next to mine. Spooky's lay in the box.
"I guess we shouldn't hang up Spooky's stocking," I said to my mother.
"I don't see why not," she replied. "If Spooky comes home in time for Christmas, he'd be very sad not to find his stocking. And if he doesn't come home, Samantha can have his stocking stuffers."
I knew my mom was trying to make me feel better. But that day I'd officially given up hope. Spooky had been gone sixteen days. If he hadn't come home by now, I couldn't imagine we'd ever see him again.
On most Christmas Eves, I went to bed with thoughts of Christmas morning prancing around my mind, eager to go to sleep so I could wake up early and open presents. But this year, my heart was heavy and even the thought of opening presents couldn't cheer me up.
When Christmas morning arrived, for the first time in my life I didn't wake up at the crack of dawn. I didn't rush downstairs to see what Santa had brought. Instead, in my blue mood, I woke up later than usual and stayed in bed. "If I can't have Spooky, I don't want anything," I told myself, saying it out loud to emphasize the point. I just felt like wallowing in my misery.
At about 9:OO, my mother tapped on my door. "Janine, are you okay?" she called. She opened the door a crack and stuck her head in. "I have something1 that I think will cheer you up."
"I don't want any Christmas presents," I told her morosely.
"I think you'll want this." She opened the door wide and to my amazement, a dirty gray cat was in her arms. She put him down gently on my bed and he came right up and nuzzled my face.
"Spooky, you're home!" I hollered, hugging him around the neck, my tears flowing into his fur. I let him go and took a look at him. His once sleek coat was dirty, with some tufts of hair missing. He was very thin. Some of his pads were raw, and closer inspection revealed that several of his claws were missing. One of his ears had a chink taken out of it. But he was alive. And he was in my arms.
"I opened the door this morning for the paper, and there he was," my mom told me. "He and Samantha walked in just like every morning." She told me that she had fed him—and that he was ravenous—before bringing him upstairs.
As we opened presents that morning—who could ask for a better Christmas present than Spooky's return?—we discussed what might have happened to our cat. Each of us had a theory (Larry thought he'd been abducted by aliens), but the one that seemed to make sense was that he'd somehow jumped into someone's car and been driven a distance away. Maybe he was trying to get away from something. Or maybe he found a car that smelled particularly interesting—he was always the inquisitive type. Perhaps someone picked him up thinking he was a stray and drove him to a distant home.
However it happened, we liked to think that when he finally had a chance to get away, he just started heading home. And that it took him all those days to get there. Who knew what adventures he'd been on in those two weeks. All we knew is that we were glad to have him home.
Spooky slept on my bed for about twenty-four hours, his belly full and his body and soul clearly exhausted. Samantha slept with him, though she took a nap break to have dinner. That night, my father didn't ask Spooky to sleep outside. He slept right in bed with me, capping my very best Christmas ever.
I'd like to say that we learned a lesson and never let Spooky and Samantha go outside again. But the truth is that they were let out at will. Thankfully, they were both on the porch each and every morning until the end of their lives. But whenever I start feeling sorry that my twenty-first-century cat, Joe, can't go outside, I think about Spooky and what he must have gone through during the seventeen days he was gone. Then I hug Joe and make sure he's happy inside.
My Mother's Cat
Renie Burghardt
My family lived in Hungary during World War II. When my nineteen-year-old mother died two weeks after giving birth to me, I inherited her cat, Paprika. He was a gentle giant with deep-orange stripes and yellow eyes that gazed at me tolerantly as I dragged him around wherever I went. Paprika was ten years old when I came into this world. He had been held and loved by my mother for all ten years of his life, while I had never known her, so I considered him my link to her. Each time I hugged Paprika tightly to my chest, I warmed to the knowledge that my mother had held him, too.
"Did you love her a lot?" I often asked Paprika as we snuggled on my bed.
"Meow!" he would answer, rubbing my chin with his pink nose.
"Do you miss her?"
"Meow!" Paprika's large yellow eyes gazed at me with a sad expression.
"I miss her, too, even though I didn't know her. But Grandma says Mother is in heaven and watching over us from there. Since you and I are both her orphans, I know it makes her happy that we have each other." I would always say these words to Paprika, for they were most comforting thoughts to me.
"Meow!" Paprika would respond, climbing on my chest and purring.
"And it makes me so very happy that we have each other," I would tell Paprika.
I'd hold him close, tears welling up in my eyes. Paprika would reach up with his orange paw and touch my face gently. I was convinced that this cat understood me, and I knew that I understood him. His love and devotion were always obvious.
My maternal grandparents raised me because the war had taken my young father away, too. He served in the army and visited me occasionally, but I could not live with him. As I grew older, the fighting intensified. Soon we were forced to become migrants in search of safer surroundings.
In the spring of I944> when I was eight years old, Paprika and I snuggled in the back of a wooden wagon as we traveled around Hungary. During the numerous air raids of those terrible times, we had to scramble to find safety in a cellar, a closet, or a ditch. Paprika always stayed in my arms, for I refused to go anywhere without him. How could I ever be separated from him? After all, one of the first stories my grandparents ever told me was that my dying mother had begged them to take care of her cat as well as her baby.
After Christmas of 1944 , when we were almost killed in a bombing, Grandfather decided that we would be safer in a rural area. We soon settled into a small house that had a cemetery as its neighbor. Grandfather and some helpful neighbors built a bunker for us nearby.
On an early spring day in 1945> we spent the entire night in that bunker. Paprika was with me, of course, because I refused to leave without my cat. Warplanes buzzed, tanks rumbled, and bombs whistled and exploded over our heads all night. I clung to Paprika, my grandmother held on to both of us, and we prayed the entire time. Paprika never panicked in that bunker. He just stayed in my arms, comforting me with his presence.
Finally everything grew deathly still, and Grandfather decided that it would be safe for us to return to the house. Cautiously, we crept into the light of early dawn and headed across the field. The brush crackled under our feet as we walked. I shivered, holding Paprika tightly. Suddenly there was a rustle in the bushes ahead. Two men jumped out and pointed machine guns at us.
"Stoi!" one of the men shouted. We knew the word meant "Stop!"
"Russians!" Grandfather whispered. "Stand very still and keep quiet."
But Paprika, who had never left me through all the traveling and the bombings, suddenly leapt out of my arms. So instead of obeying Grandfather, I darted between the soldiers and scooped up the cat. The tall, dark-haired young soldier approached me. I cringed, holding Paprika against my chest. To my astonishment, the soldier reached out and gently petted my cat.