Leonard (My Life as a Cat), Carlie Sorosiak [7 ebook reader .txt] 📗

think of another way. Even if I got you to Yellowstone much earlier, what would I do? I couldn’t stay with you for the month, and I couldn’t leave you there—not with all the wild animals. Bears and house cats aren’t usually friends.” She twisted her lips. “I could tell Norma you’re an alien, and that we need to get you home sooner . . . but we’ve never had a conversation about anything serious. I wouldn’t even know where to begin. What if she thinks I’m making it all up? Or that I’ve lost it? What if she sends me back to my mom, because she doesn’t want to talk it through? And if that happens, what would happen to you? I couldn’t live with myself if—”

Just then, there was a knock at the bathroom door, and the rasp of Norma’s voice behind it: “Olive? You on the phone?”

Olive bolted up from the tub. “Um, yes! Yes, I am! I’m talking on the phone.”

Norma paused on the other side of the door. “Is it your mom?”

“Yep! My mom!”

“All right, then. Tell her I said hello.”

“I will!” Olive said, much louder than necessary.

“Remember we’re leaving for the aquarium in a minute.”

“Yep!”

The two of us listened for Norma’s footsteps, clomping on the hardwood, back into the kitchen. Olive released a gusty breath. “That was too close. Norma’s one thing, but in public, if someone catches us talking, it could turn out really bad. Do you remember E.T.? I don’t want the government to come and take you away, or study you, or . . . worse.”

Worse? Immediately, I thought of every warning I’d ever received. Never trust a human.

“The raincoat’s fine,” Olive said, “but we can’t talk like this outside of the house, okay?” She leaned in, adjusting the stiff fabric. “Here, you missed a button.”

I wore my raincoat to the aquarium, partly because I looked quite snazzy in it. It also added a shield to my fur, protecting me from danger.

“Leonard, my friend,” Q said, greeting us in the lobby. “Wowee, that is some outfit.”

“He’s normal!” Olive practically shouted, then lowered her voice. “I mean, lots of cats wear outfits.”

“’Course,” Q said, like this was normal indeed. “Now, who wants to feed some stingrays?”

All around us were tourists, cameras swinging from their necks. I noticed that quite a few of them were looking at me—a cat in a raincoat, on a leash, in an aquarium. I considered that maybe I should be making a better effort to blend in. Would these people really try to hurt me if they understood what I was? If they knew about my home planet? Just in case, I curled up, lifting one of my hind legs straight into the air, and proceeded to groom myself—licking my fur in swift strokes, nibbling at the soft underside of my belly. This was quite difficult to do in a raincoat, but I still managed, like a real cat would.

Olive gently pulled at my leash, and together we wove through the growing crowd. Q led us into the shark tunnel, where we paused to find Steve and Martin, circling rhythmically above us. “I’ve worked here every day for twenty years,” Q said, “and these guys still amaze me.”

Out of curiosity I rose onto my hind legs, pressing my front paws against the tank, avoiding a nose bump this time. The glass extended all the way to the floor, so I had a clear view of everything—fine-grained sand, mountains of coral, fish darting in schools. They were speaking to one another, too: changing their shape as a group, communicating with body language and sound. Through the glass, I could hear them croaking, purring, popping.

The whole school noticed me then, a hundred sets of eyes gazing in my direction. I flexed my back, standing taller. Maybe they’d never seen a cat. Or maybe they identified something different about me, something not quite ordinary. Because gradually they swam over, until they were inches from the glass. I was vaguely aware of the humans around me, turning to one another and whispering, but mostly I was trying not to be rude. Earlier in the week, I’d witnessed Q speaking to the fish; I figured that I should do the same.

You, they were asking. You, you, you?

Hardly the most intelligent conversation, but I responded in kind: purring through the glass, bobbing my head. Yes, I said. Yes, yes, yes.

Here? they said. Here, here?

Yes! I said. Yes, yes.

This continued for, oh, I don’t know. Two minutes? Three? Not long in the scope of things, but soon there was a gentle tap on my back. Olive bent down to my level.

“People are staring,” she said nervously, picking me up and striding away, my neck craned over her shoulder. Someone flashed a camera. Someone waved. I told myself that a cat shouldn’t wave back.

“I’m serious, Leonard,” Olive said in the staff room. “We have to be much more careful. People can never find out about you.” She plopped us down, eyes wide. It took her a long while to say her next words, but when she did, they ran together, fast and blurted. “Can-you-talk-to-fish?”

Startled, my whiskers twitched. Was it really so extraordinary? Hadn’t Q spoken with them, too? I nodded, then readjusted my raincoat, which had slipped to the side.

“Every time I think that things can’t get any stranger . . .” Olive said, leaning against the wall.

Q knocked on the staff room door, strutting in. “Leonard, my man, you’re about to cause a riot. They love you out there.” He paused, thinking. “We need to get this cat a T-shirt. Make him a real employee. Leonard, I’m telling you, you’re going places.”

So we went to the gift shop, where Olive selected an extremely small size, fit for a human toddler. On it was a stingray, coasting through blue waters, which was very appealing, indeed.

It was hours before we could speak privately, back at the beach house. Norma was lighting citronella torches on the