Why You Shouldn’t Get Cats

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Since ancient times, people have believed that animals serve as indicators of unclean forces and protect humans from the evil offspring of the invisible world. Even cat and dog owners who call themselves atheists usually have a couple of stories in reserve about the inexplicable behavior of their pets. We all know that if a cat stares at one spot — it sees something devilish; if a cat hisses at empty space — it sees something devilish; if a dog howls for no reason — it sees something devilish; if it growls — same thing. Sometimes friendly, sweet dogs that aren’t bothered by guests at all and let a random passerby pet them will, for some reason, tuck their tails and growl at an apparently normal person… Sometimes even at someone familiar.

We feel safer with them. If they don’t protect us, at least they warn us, right?

No. Not always.

It all depends on the pet’s nature. On whether it loves you or not. On whether it stands for good or for evil. Animals can be both guardians and conduits.

And now, the story itself.

I have a cat. Correction — had one. A three-year-old gray beast with green eyes and white socks on her paws. I picked her up off the street in ten-degree frost. Back then she was still a teenager — about six months old. I never saw her in the pack of yard cats, so she must have come from somewhere else. In any case, the local feline gang didn’t accept her. She huddled near the entrance, trying to crawl into the narrow basement window, but other cats — who had long made it their shelter — invariably hissed at her from inside. Without thinking much, I grabbed the squirming cat and took her home. She spent the first night on top of a wardrobe, coming down only to eat. But gradually she got used to me and my apartment, and later even slept with me on the bed. The vet said the cat was healthy and gave her all the necessary vaccinations.

But her character was completely inconsistent. Truly feline. She never allowed herself to be petted — only if she wanted it herself. Then she would jump onto my lap or onto the keyboard; she even had the nerve to crawl under my blanket at three in the morning and demand to be scratched behind the ear. She also never got used to using the litter box at home — no matter how I tried to train her. She relieved herself outside. Sometimes she disappeared for several days. At first I worried terribly, even thought she’d been run over by a car, torn apart by a dog, or locked somewhere in a basement and dying of thirst. That last fear wasn’t unfounded — the cat loved crawling around basements. A couple of times she was even locked in there, though never for more than a few hours. Still, whenever she was gone for a long time, I ran around the street like a madman, pressed my ear to basement doors, and called for her. But she always came back as if nothing had happened. Правда, sometimes for some reason she no longer had her collar. Why would anyone steal a cat collar? That drove me crazy. She went through collars like gloves.

Then I found out that my cat, apparently, wasn’t just mine, but also my neighbor’s and some old woman from the next building. She didn’t just eat there — she stayed overnight. That shocked me and even hurt a little. Was she unhappy with me? I fed her — look how plump she’d become; I scratched her when she wanted; I played with her — she had plenty of toys; she could sleep wherever she wanted; there were no forbidden places in the house — except the dining table. So why did she need to go to some neighbors and old ladies? But there was nothing I could do about it. I tried talking to the neighbor, asking her to send the cat back to me; she nodded but didn’t listen. How could you refuse such a green-eyed cutie?

One day she returned from another of her roaming sprees. For some reason she stood on the threshold for a long time, but I got tired of waiting and dragged her inside by the scruff of the neck. She was covered in some kind of soot, grime. But that wasn’t new. Better soot than gasoline or tar, which she’d smeared herself with while crawling under cars.

But from that day on, strange things started happening in the apartment. For example, one day all the knives went dull. Another day my hot water disappeared — though everyone else in the building had it. As soon as I called a plumber, the pipes warmed up again. Electrical appliances turned on and off by themselves — once at night I jolted awake when the computer turned on by itself. The kettle boiled on its own, the microwave switched on, water started running. One day all my bed linen turned out to be stitched together with red threads and sewn into one piece, like a sleeping bag. I was too lazy to rip out the threads, so I just threw it away and put on new bedding. All the needles disappeared somewhere. Maybe the cat scattered them and shoved them under the dresser? I was already seriously uneasy. The incident with the red threads especially threw me off. If I could still somehow explain the rest (I just hadn’t sharpened the knives in a long time; the cat turned on the computer by stepping on the keyboard; the hot water — well, how should I, a humanities guy, know all the intricacies of plumbing?) and calm myself down, this was beyond my understanding. The cat behaved as usual.

My first thought wasn’t about mysticism at all, but that I’d gone crazy. After all, I was an atheist. Was. That I myself turned on the appliances, the water. That the hot water hadn’t been turned off at all — it just seemed cold to me. But the threads… I can barely sew a button on. I could never make such neat, even seams. And so many of them — it would’ve taken me a whole day.

The jokes ended when I found the missing needles inside my pillow. And if I hadn’t spilled tea on the bed, I would’ve lain down to sleep… and a needle would’ve gone into my neck like a knife through butter. And when I brought a match to the gas stove in the morning, a small flame flared up in front of me — as if someone had released gas in the kitchen shortly before.

There was no way to blame all these tricks on the cat. I started being afraid of everything in the apartment. When I turned on the water, I always checked first whether it was boiling hot. I shook and checked every inch of my bedding and clothes. I checked electrical appliances a hundred times — had I turned off the iron, the computer? You know how in horror movies the phone rings and on the other end there’s silence, or heavy breathing, or worse — threatening voices? I had nothing like that. Instead, the phone simply didn’t work at night. During the day everything was fine, but at night it wasn’t. Okay, I barely used the landline anyway. It was the era of mobile phones. But still… creepy. It became hard to breathe. The air felt stale, sour — like after a lot of people have been in a room.

After I heard a female voice from the bathroom, humming “Wild World” over the noise of a running hairdryer, I stopped spending nights in the apartment. Mostly I slept at work, sometimes at friends’ places. I said I was doing renovations. I was afraid to tell anyone — I didn’t want to end up in a psych ward. Only during the day did I come home, let the cat inside, feed her, and leave again. Every time I returned to the apartment, there was chaos. Furniture overturned, carpets rolled up, books scattered, the kitchen in complete disarray. But I no longer paid attention. I just fed the cat and left.

This went on for about a week.

On the street I witnessed three huge dogs nearly tearing my cat apart. They were baring their teeth, ready to turn my cowering kitty into mince, but I drove them away with a stick. Carrying the terrified cat in my arms, I brought her home. At home I found that all the furniture had been rearranged. Nothing was scattered; everything was neatly placed, but not in its old spots. As if a new family had moved in and arranged the furniture to their own taste.

The cat seemed to still be in shock, so overcoming my fear, I stayed the night with her. I woke up because it was hard to breathe. I opened my eyes — the cat was sitting on me, staring straight into my eyes. Then she jumped off, dashed into the hallway, ran to the door, and screamed, demanding to be let out. As soon as I opened the door, the cat shot out into the corridor and began wailing wildly. I hissed at her — afraid she’d wake all the neighbors. But it was useless — she kept meowing. And suddenly such a wild draft arose that I simply couldn’t close the door. Wind with a savage howl rushed out of my apartment into the stairwell, and on the stairs sat the cat, continuing to meow. All this lasted about thirty seconds, and for all thirty seconds I couldn’t close the door. Finally, everything stopped. The cat looked at me, then went downstairs. I let her out onto the street.

After that she disappeared. And all the strange things in the apartment disappeared too.

Three months later I saw her coming out of the entrance of a neighboring building. The same green eyes, the same smoky-gray fur, four white socks. Only a new collar. Light blue. I called out to her. She turned and looked at me. But she didn’t come over. She sat down on a bench and waited. I decided to wait too. From around the corner appeared that very old woman who used to feed my cat. She was carrying shopping bags. The cat ran toward her.

“Oh, my good girl. Hungry, are you? I bought you some pâté…”

The old woman opened the door and went inside. The cat followed her. I stood there a bit longer, then left.

Poor old woman. I wonder why the cat spared me. Because I saved her from the dogs? And if I hadn’t? What would’ve happened then?

I still see the cat from time to time. She still lives with that old woman. And probably with a bunch of other people too. She has to house her friends somewhere. She doesn’t respond to me. Pretends not to recognize me. Or maybe she really has forgotten.

And the furniture, by the way,

I never rearranged.

I like it better this way.