Don’t Love, Don’t Lose

“A tab? I don’t have a tab.”

“You do now, unless you want to turn her over to a shelter? Most of the shelters are pretty overrun. I know one has space, but it’s a kill shelter, so if she’s not adopted in…”

Jasmine knew she should just wash her hands of the whole thing and turn the damn cat over to the shelter. She had enough to worry about. She didn’t need anything more.

“No, no shelter for her. She’s Lucy. I’ll take care of her. I… All right, I have a tab. And a schedule, or whatever else it is. Do you have a cat package?”

“A cat package?”

The vet sounded amused. A door opened, and she heard barking and yowling. The door closed, and the sounds were closed off.

“You know, things a first time cat owner needs? A carrier, cat food, litter box, litter, a book to tell us what we should do, a grooming schedule – the whole thing.”

“Well, we don’t have one, but now that you mention it, we probably should. When you come to pick her up, I’ll tell you what you need. The pet shop closes by seven.”

“Oh… I’ll be there by six-thirty, then. Thank you, Dr. Coleman. I appreciate this.”

“No, we appreciate you. I know I turned the screw a little to keep you from turning her over to the shelter. But Lucy is a good girl. She gets along with people, she’s good with other cats, and she tolerates dogs. She’s an excellent companion cat, I think. Or she will be, once you get her used to being indoors. I think she might have been abandoned.”

“What!”

“I looked through lost cat notices, online and off. There’s nothing that looks like Lucy. But she’s about four years old, and she does need vaccinations, but she’s been vaccinated before. She hasn’t had any of the dangerous illnesses. She’s not particularly malnourished. And she’s very good with people. She’s used to being indoors. She doesn’t like your laundry basket, but she’s fine with the cat carrier. I didn’t just do a local search – I did a statewide one. Lucy has a distinctive marking on her ear. She’d be easy to identify. So altogether, I think she’s been abandoned. There’s nobody looking for her.”

A cat with nobody, thought Jasmine, and that was that.

“She doesn’t need anybody looking for her anymore. She has me. I’ll be there by six-thirty.”

For the rest of the day, Jasmine worked better. She always did better after she made up her mind.

She had a cat now.

Wait till she told Rita and Aunt Della.

Aunt Della – drat again! She hadn’t called her aunt that day. She needed to get cracking on the program.

Jasmine collected the cat and went home, a little dazed by how much stuff a cat apparently needed. Lucy had seemed happy to see her, but Jasmine wasn’t sure how you judged a cat’s happiness. She hadn’t scratched, so she supposed it was a good sign.

“You’re an expensive one, do you know? I don’t see why you need three scratching posts. You’d better not go for my stuff.”

She hadn’t needed three scratching posts. But Jasmine had bought them anyway, because knowing that Lucy had been abandoned once – well, she knew what it was like to be left behind. She didn’t want any creature to ever feel it.

Wasn’t that why she had never let anybody in? If you didn’t let them in, they wouldn’t leave. It was a preemptive strike.

But that night, with Lucy curled up on her feet – Lucy didn’t seem to mind the lumps, and Jasmine liked the comforting weight and warmth – she found that her mind was clearer and sharper.

“Looks like you’re good for my work, Lucy. I’ve got this cracked now. I have what the great Anthony Malone needs. Now I just need to meet him and size him up. I’m not going to give this to him unless he coughs up good money, and unless I’m sure that he won’t use this for anything other than what it’s intended for. If I don’t approve of him completely, he’s not getting his hands on it, no matter what Della says.”

Jasmine stretched, tried to feed Lucy cat food, managed to get her medicine down disguised in tuna, and settled down to sleep.

Maybe it wasn’t too bad to have the cat curled up in its…

The bed shifted a little bit. As if she knew where she belonged, Lucy stalked her way over to Jasmine’s feet and curled up in that little crook, warm and snug.

Jasmine didn’t move her.

Maybe Lucy knew where she belonged. Maybe she would, too.