The Cat Sitter's Whiskers (2 page)

I remember thinking it was a little rude of him not to ask first, like he didn't even care one bit if I wanted to be kissed or not, but I was so overcome with the excitement of it all that I didn't dwell on it. At the clicking sound of Mrs. White's high heels approaching, we both leapt up and threw ourselves against the lockers, just in time for Mrs. White to swing the door open and call us back in.

I was in such shock that I could barely concentrate, and I don't remember which of us won, just that it turned out I was Rosa Parks and Levi was Amerigo Vespucci. After class, Levi must have bragged to his friends about what had happened, because by the time the school bell rang at the end of the day we were officially a couple.

Everybody was talking about it—well … everybody except me and Levi. We just continued on as if nothing had happened, and within a few weeks the whole thing was forgotten.

Of course, I should have recognized his car—a lovingly restored Buick LeSabre convertible that he'd bought senior year with money he'd saved from his paper route—but it was too dark and foggy. I hoisted my backpack over my shoulder and waited. He'd probably pulled over to look at his delivery list or make a quick phone call, but I noticed the engine was making a funny hiccuping noise every once in a while—as if it might stall any minute—so I figured I'd better check on him just in case he was having car trouble.

I wheeled my bike around, but when I got about even with the back bumper he pulled forward and headed off down the Key, leaving me in a cloud of sooty exhaust.

So much for being a good Samaritan.

I pulled my phone out to check the time. It was already 5:15.

In the dead of summer, when it feels like the Florida sun has a personal beef with you, a lot of full-time residents hop on a plane and escape to cooler climates for as long as their bank accounts allow, but since most pets, especially those of the feline persuasion, aren't exactly thrilled with the idea of air travel, that means it's usually the busiest time of year for me. I knew if I didn't get a move on I'd never stay on schedule, plus I figured if Levi was having car trouble he certainly didn't need me. He was a big boy and could take care of himself.

The parakeets had quieted down again, but I knew any minute there'd be a chorus of birds announcing the new day. For now, though, they were probably still snoozing away in their leafy beds.

Looking back, if I'd known what was right around the corner I would have gone back to bed myself. In fact, if I'd known what was coming my way I'd have gladly hopped aboard a spaceship, flown clear across the universe, and submitted myself to any and all experiments those slimy aliens could come up with.

But that's not what I did. Instead, I slipped my phone down in my back pocket, stood up on the pedals, and headed out for a brand-new day.

 

2

I hate the word
widow
. It makes me think of black spiders or gaunt-faced spinsters wasting away in a decrepit old shack down by the river, but I might as well tell you right off the bat that I am one. My husband Todd and my daughter Christy were both killed in a freak car accident about five years ago. I could tell you the exact number of months, weeks, days and hours that have passed since then, but I know I'd come off a little “tetched,” as my grandmother used to say, so let's just pretend the numbers are getting mushy around the edges.

Christy was three years old. You'd think my memory would be frozen, that I'd still see her as the same scrawny, independent, headstrong little girl she was on the day she died. But no. In my mind, she's almost nine now. She has a burgeoning collection of silver dollars—one for every baby tooth she's lost—and any day now she'll put in a request for her own smartphone. We have words like
widow
and
orphan
to describe people who've lost loved ones, but there's no word for a mother who's lost a child.

That's because it never stops.

Up until the day my world shattered, five years, blah-blah months, so-and-so days, and whatchamacallit hours ago, I was a deputy with the Sarasota Sheriff's Department. I was good at my job.
Real
good. I traveled the streets in my patrol cruiser, my mirrored sunglasses perched on my nose, my department-issued SIG Sauer 9mm handgun tucked securely in my side holster. Protecting children, catching criminals, rescuing tree-bound kittens … you know the type. Just another blond badass, making the world a better place.

But the day Todd and Christy died, a little switch flipped in my head—a
crazy
switch. I'll spare you the details, but let's just say all parties involved agreed it would be best if I took a little break from law enforcement. This is Florida. There are enough maniacs walking around with guns as it is.

After wallowing in my own wacko for about a year, I finally managed to stand upright and fraternize with the human race again. I have Michael, my older brother, to thank for that. He'd always taken care of me, even when we were little kids, but that whole year he barely left my side. I remember watching his hands as he laid out lunch for me and set the tray down on my bed. I remember him gently waving a spoonful of homemade soup under my nose and whispering, “Mmmm, soup!” as if I were a brain-addled infant barely capable of feeding myself … which basically is what I was.

I don't know what I would have done without him.

The sky had lightened by the time I biked into the village, enough that all the leaves were glittering with dew. There'd only been one other car on the road the whole way into town, but it had stayed back at least half a mile, not going much faster than I was, which meant it was probably Levi. I knew he started his route on the south end of the Key and worked his way up.

I didn't have much farther to go, just a couple more blocks and left on Island Circle Road to my first client of the day: Barney Feldman, an eight-year-old Maine Coon. Mr. Feldman (only his closest friends call him Barney) lords over the two thousand square feet of his domain like a pirate guarding a treasure ship, which makes sense when you consider that Maine Coons are believed to have descended from cats that traveled around the world on Viking ships in the eleventh century.

He lives with his owners, Buster and Linda Keller, in a decidedly nondescript three-bedroom ranch house. It's all white stucco, with a simple lean-to carport off the right side and a poured concrete driveway in front, cracked and buckling in its old age. If you didn't know better, you'd assume it was just an old tear-down waiting for somebody to snatch it up for a few thousand dollars and put a proper house in its place. But this is Siesta Key, and the beach is only a two-minute walk away. The Kellers bought their home ten years ago for roughly half a million dollars. There's no telling what it's worth today.

As I rolled up the driveway, I didn't think Levi had beat me there, but I glanced around for the newspaper just in case. Then I remembered Mrs. Keller saying that, like a lot of people, they got all their news online now, which was bad for the
Herald-Tribune
but great for me, since it meant I wouldn't have to worry about collecting the newspapers while they were away.

I propped the bike up next to the front door and fished around in my backpack for my chatelaine, the big brass ring I keep all my keys on. It seems like every client I've ever had wants me to keep a key to their home just in case there's an emergency. I've never sat down and done an official count, but there must be at least a couple hundred keys on it, if not more. It's about as heavy as a bucket of clams. At first it was hard to keep track of them all, but eventually I worked out a system. Each key is individually numbered with a permanent marker, and then I have a list that matches each key to its owner, which I keep in the same notebook where I write down all my alarm codes and pet instructions.

There was a time when I carried that notebook around with me, but after a while it just seemed too risky. If the wrong person got their hands on both my chatelaine and my notes, they could make off with half the valuables on this island, so I keep it hidden in my apartment for now. I'd tell you where, but then you'd be suspect number one if it ever went missing, so let's just say it's in a safe place.

As I was unlocking the door, I thought I heard a car in the street behind me, but by the time I had the door open and looked back, it was gone. I punched in the code for the alarm system, dropped my stuff on the white leather bench next to the front door, and knelt down to untie my sneakers.

The Kellers have a strict no-shoes policy, which I thought was kind of silly until I saw the inside of their house. You wouldn't think a place so drab and boring on the outside could be so elegantly stunning on the inside, but it is. The furniture is all sleek and modern and covered in soothing shades of sand and fawn and bird's-egg-blue, with bleached hardwood floors buffed to a shiny gloss and walls painted a soft milky gray. It's like walking through the dunes at dusk.

As I kicked my sneakers off, hopping around on one foot and then the other, I noticed there was a small box on the floor, tucked back under the bench at the far end. It had a white address label on top, but no postage, and there were some red
FRAGILE
stickers on both ends. I made a mental note to ask Mrs. Keller if she'd meant to mail it. I knew they'd been in a rush when they left the night before because she'd called to apologize for leaving the house in such a mess.

Of course, for Mrs. Keller,
mess
probably just meant a couple of unwashed coffee cups in the sink.

“Mr. Feldman?”

I didn't exactly expect him to come running. Dogs like to greet you at the door and dance around your feet, bouncing this way and that while they tell you how
absolutely
fabulous you are, how
absolutely
overwhelmed with excitement they are, and how they
absolutely
adore you. Cats are a little different. They're glad you've arrived, but they're certainly not about to embarrass themselves with such demeaning displays of subservience.

Instead, they'll allow you to give them a few good scritches between the ears while they stretch themselves into a scary-cat shape, and then maybe they'll circle around your legs, purring loudly to let you know that you are indeed loved. I smiled to myself. Barney has his own particular way of greeting visitors. As I pulled my socks up around my ankles, I gave a little nod to the room.

“Good morning, everybody.”

That wasn't meant for Barney. That was my customary greeting for what was hanging on the walls all around me—Mrs. Keller's passion, or, as Mr. Keller refers to it, his “financial ruin.”

Masks. All kinds of masks. Big masks. Small masks. Wooden masks from India, sequined masks from New Orleans, feathered masks from Siberia, healing masks, ceremonial masks, tribal masks, voodoo masks, and dozens of other masks from parts of the world I've never even heard of.

They're all artfully arranged on the walls in every room of the house, including the laundry room, the hallways, the bathrooms—even the walk-in closet off the master bedroom. Some of them are quite simple, like the stone masks with blank oval mouths frozen in a perpetual
OH!
like a shocked smiley face. Others are more fancy affairs, with seashells for teeth and marbles for eyes, and headdresses adorned with brightly colored feathers and painted beads.

Mrs. Keller's latest addition was a big wooden mask from the Himalayas, hanging dead center in the middle of the wall facing the front door. I remembered how her voice had dropped to a conspiratorial whisper when she told me where she'd found it—in a “charming little gallery” on the outskirts of Tampa. She'd said the owner of the shop had had no idea how rare it was, and that it was probably worth a small fortune.

It was a man's face, intricately carved out of wood and painted with bright splashes of red, green, and banana-yellow, with gnashing teeth, arched eyebrows, and a string of tiny bleached-white bird skulls perched on the top of its head like a crown. Mrs. Keller said it was from a region in Tibet called Aroomy Choo Pinky, or something like that, but I just called him “Dick Cheney.”

The expression on his face was either a mischievous grin or a gruesome snarl, depending on the angle, and his sinister eyes seemed to follow me around the room, watching my every move.

I tipped my chin in his direction. “Hey, Mr. Cheney. How's it hangin'?”

He didn't answer.

Mrs. Keller had told me that when her husband found out how much she had paid for Dick Cheney, he nearly had a nervous breakdown. He accused her of systematically wasting away their retirement fund, and if she didn't get ahold of herself they'd end up living in an old refrigerator box down on the beach. To make up with him, she'd made a solemn promise: no more masks, which, I have to say, I was a little sorry to hear.

You'd think it would have been kind of creepy walking around with all those soulless faces staring out from the walls, but over time they've grown on me. Every time I take care of Mr. Feldman, I look forward to seeing Mrs. Keller's latest purchase. Each mask is stunning and beautiful in its own peculiar way, and I can see why she loves them so much. I'm not sure I could live with them 24/7, but they're wonderful to visit every once in a while.

I padded into the kitchen to get Barney Feldman's breakfast ready, taking care to steer clear of the credenza in the hallway just in case he was hiding underneath it. Maine Coons are known for their sweet disposition, but Mr. Feldman is not your typical Maine Coon. Don't get me wrong, he's an angel most of the time, but just like those Vikings his ancestors used to hang out with, he's got a mischievous streak of savagery in him.

Occasionally he likes to set up camp under the furniture and take sharp-clawed swipes at innocent passersby, which was why I had pulled my socks up, naively hopeful that they'd protect my ankles. The six-inch space under the hall credenza isn't exactly Barney's favorite staging ground, but I wasn't taking any chances. As I went by, I hugged the wall.