A Lot Of Chutzpah

“We really should take the kitty with us.”

“That creature can survive without people for a few weeks. She won’t miss us at all.”

I vaguely noticed as the humans gazed at me, the woman with concern, the man with contempt. He scowled at me, picked up the matching suitcases and went on out the door. The female approached quietly. Lifting me tenderly, she set me outside on the porch.

Although I knew the reason that they wanted to leave me behind, I waited patiently as she tried to explain.

“Sorry Wonder, we’re going on a very long vacation and you can’t possibly accompany... well, I won’t expect for you to understand, so I’ll leave you now and hope you can fend for yourself.” The lady waved and entered her car. They drove away, leaving skid marks and dust to mark their exit.

For a while, I lay down comfortably and took a nap. The afternoon passed as I lounged lazily in the warm sunshine.
******************************
“So Wonder, I hear that your humans have left. What are you gonna do about food and shelter and stuff like that?” A cat of different colors, black, brown, gray, and white, padded up and interrupted my dreaming.

“Spots, it is nice to see you, too,” I said with a yawn and a stretch. “Did you really come all the way from across the street to ask me that?”

“Yes,” he sniffed, “I was just wondering, that’s all. The last time I saw a cat left outside, I saw her get taken away.”

Spots was being silly, as usual. He didn’t seem to see how obviously I couldn’t get caught.

“Spots, honey, didn’t you notice my new necklace?” I shook my head and jangled the new identification tags attached to my bright red plastic collar.

“A...collar,” he said with disdain. Spots turned away and spat. It was very clear how much he disapproved of it.

“A collar,” I said firmly. “Actually, I think it makes me look better. It accentuates my eyes.” When I had first gotten collared, I studied myself in the mirror, trying to find something good about it. It was definitely a change of color from the black collars I wore before. They were usually hidden in my dark fur, to my relief, so others couldn’t see.

Then, the woman had bought me a new collar. It horrified me so much that I hid to avoid receiving the too bright collar.

They finally wrestled it on me and came out scratched and bit, but triumphant. “Oh, how beautiful it looks on her! Red against black is so elegant,” the woman sighed. “Now the authorities can see she has owners.”

The man was still dabbing his wounds with alcohol, winching every time he did. “Stupid cat,” he muttered. I hissed and sauntered away to lick my fur back into place.

I smiled to myself and suddenly snapped to the present as Spots’ voice broke the silence.

Disbelievingly he said, “You really like that thing?”

I slipped past him, into the thick grass of the front yard. My fur and the shadows mingled and I was virtually invisible.

“That collar gives you away and causes your eyes to seem even brighter,” Spots said with disgust. “How are you gonna hunt like that?”

Exasperated, I left him to his thoughts.
******************************
The night was cool and as my paws left the turf, the coldness of concrete made me shiver. I strolled towards a house where an elderly lady habitually set out a plate of table scraps and a big bowl of milk. Many of the strays used her shed as a hangout.

“So, the snob has come to visit, has she? And look, she openly shows she needs humans to care for her.” A thin, dirty, white cat sneered and jumped down lightly as I approached. Her eyes slitted and her hackles were slightly raised.

The last thing I wanted was to fight and I told her so. “Oh, blow it out your ears. I just came for the food.”

She blinked in surprise as I went ahead and ate some of the leftover chicken and drank a bit of the milk. The eyes of cats lining the shed wall watched as I began to walk away.

“Wait a second,” a voice called softly, “what do they call you?”

I halted all movement and called back, “They call me Wonder,” and went on my way.
******************************
“That was fool-hardy, to say the least. I can’t believe you had the gall to go down there. It’s a wonder they didn’t tear you apart then and there.”

Spots paced back and forth lecturing me about the dangers of wandering down to the stray’s hangout. Don’t ever start a fight with them, don’t make them mad, don’t ever talk to them, he explained loudly, too loudly in fact.

“I can take care of myself." I batted around a wad of tissue that escaped the trash earlier. As I absentmindedly hit it over to Spots, he pounced on it with such speed, I was startled.

When I looked up, I saw a skinny tan cat limping our way. Spots stopped pushing the tissue ball around as he caught sight of the other cat. He hissed and jumped in front of me as if to protect me from assault.

‘Males,’ I thought, ‘as if he can do anything to hurt me.’

“Hello there,” I said, stepping around Spots. I examined the cat from a distance and saw he had recently been in a fight. The cat’s fur was ripped out in various places, revealing scars of past battles and more recent marks that bled but would soon heal. He just stood there, swaying, watching us both with clear, blue eyes.

“You better be careful, Wonder. It’s one of those strays.” Spots sidled up to me and hissed at the stranger once again.

The stranger’s gaze fell upon me and he uttered, “How wonderful.” Then, he collapsed right on the lawn, mostly hidden by the jungle of grass that had sprouted due to the neglect of the humans. I cautiously inched my way forward, ready to jump away if I had to. The stranger stayed motionless and was still not responsive when I finally reached him. Spots crept up warily and extended his claws, ready to strike if I had any trouble.

The cat was all tan with a few white hairs blended in. When I touched him with my paw, I felt his leanness and felt a stab of pity. He was the biggest tomcat I had ever seen though, despite his thinness. Then I wondered, ‘What in the world caused him to come here?’

“Well?!! Is he dead?”

The harshness in Spots’ voice made me glance his way. He obviously had a thing against strays. I looked down at the stranger and started to lick his fur against the grain to stimulate his skin and make him warmer. After I finished, I went to get some food that Spots had brought over and left it by the stranger’s head.

“Let’s leave him there to recover by himself. We’ll watch him from the porch. Really, Spots, he’s in no condition to fight back." Spots was still in his battle stance but soon relaxed after I gave him a look.

We watched as the tan cat began to recover. He shook his whole body, making him look even more fluffed out than before. No animal ever enjoys when their fur is brushed backwards, and the tan stranger was no exception.

“Jeez, it will take forever to lick this fur back. Why didn’t you just leave me to collapse gracefully and get back up with at least a small bit of my dignity? Look, now I’m a freakin' fuzz-ball!” He started to lick his fur thoroughly, twisting in almost impossible angles, trying to reach the more remote areas of his poor body before resorting to using his paw.

Spots just watched him with a predator’s interest, evaluating the other cat for any visible weaknesses. I, on the other paw, tried to assess how much he had eaten in the past few days. It wasn’t much.

“Well, you don’t have to stare,” the cat said, breaking the silence abruptly. “I just wanted to see who Wonder was. She caused quite a ruckus down at The Shed. They kept saying... how much... chutzpah she had.” He still continued to lick his fur as he spoke, to my annoyance.

“I should have believed what they said about you, but I thought they could've been exaggerating. Look at you, though. You are black as the darkest depths of a pit, with a blazing red collar and the greenest eyes, green as the healthiest grass.”

“The healthiest grass?”

“That’s what they said.”

What could I say? He was very flattering and when he finally finished cleaning himself, he turned out to be pretty attractive.

Spots grew angrier as he saw how I was being taken in by his words. His fur just kept rising higher and higher, almost straight on end when I said, “Why should I even speak to you? We don't know you. I'm glad not all strays are bad but I can't understand why you would come all the way here just to see me.”

As Spots calmed down, the tan cat’s eyes narrowed and he held my gaze. I gazed back. He sighed and shrugged saying, “Okay, I’m called Blue. For my eyes, you know. I really did want to see who had enough audacity to get past Great White and eat from our dish of scraps. Everyone was amazed that she let you go. Decided to follow you back here but was held back by a gang of house cats.” He hissed loudly at the thought.

"Why... did they detain you?" My eyes widened at a half-formed thought. "You didn't try to fight all of them, did you? You fought your way to me just to satisfy your curiosity? You stupid, stubborn male! Don't you know the saying: 'Curiosity can kill a cat?'" I stared at him dumbfounded as he nodded.

"I really wanted to see you. You had so much confidence and poise, I decided that you were worth looking for. A house cat with street smarts and guts enough to come down to that part of town is definitely someone to look out for. Besides, you're beautiful." Blue looked at me with admiration in his eyes, a look that embarrassed me and made Spots hiss once again.

Another thought flitted through my head. What would others say if I aquainted myself with this tomcat. Well, I would see. Spots could already see, to his dissatisfaction, how I wasn't trying to ward off Blue's advances. Well, they said I had chutzpah and I was willing to make that reputation stick.

"So, Blue, why don't you come over here and tell me all about yourself?" I said coyly as Spots slunk away into the darkness. It was going to be an interesting night.

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