This morning, I thought I heard Mike rumbling down the stairs on his way to work. Now that Nick is in college, I don’t have to get up. Oh, he’s quiet until that last rush to get out of the door at which point, he has no idea how much noise those stairs make. Isn’t it funny how the bones of my house make more noise than its inhabitants now that Nick is gone?
So, I rushed out to say goodbye because when I sleep through, I feel a little bereft to wake up to an empty house.
“What are you doing up so early?” Mike will say.
“Saying goodbye to you,” I will reply. And then, I will tuck myself into his warm arms to say goodbye for the day. How much of our words have been said and ressaid over the years? Do you know what I mean? If you’ve lived with the same person for more than ten years, you might know. I love those repeated words.
But when I got to the bottom of the stairs, Mike wasn’t there. No lights were on. No slippers were falling onto the floor. His backpack was gone. Bereft. This had been happening sometimes, I thought I’d heard Mike leaving only to wake up to an empty house, well, empty except me, Teddy, and the cats. This morning, the cats, one at the top of the stairs and one half way down, stared at me expectantly.
Breakfast? They seemed to get the idea simultaneously.
Did I tell you that I stopped feeding the cats in the morning at all because they used to wake me up earlier and earlier. I was going to bed at 11:15 and getting up to feed them at 2:10.. In addition, they have two bowls on top of the washing machine that are almost constantly full of kibbles if they’re hungry between meals. They don’t need me to feed them in the morning. Now, I open a can of the extra good stuff just before I leave for work and I give them treats when I’m going to bed.
I stared back at them with blurry vision. I was only half awake, so I trundled back to my empty bed. Bereft. I crawled in. At least it was still warm.
Seth jumped up onto the bed, purring. That helped. I petted him for a bit, but he kept trying to lick my hand and he walked back and forth across my legs. Those were his 3am wake-up tactics. This wasn’t just love. He had an agenda. It always woke me up when he began to lick my hand.
Have you ever let a cat lick the back of your hand? It hurts! Those little spikes on a cat’s tongue are made for holding prey and tearing flesh. Could you imagine having a hundred tiny barbs in your mouth? If you think of it too long, the barbs, called papillae, are really creepy. And we keep these creatures in the house with us!
So, I tucked both hands under the covers and tried to go back to sleep. My breathing slowed. I felt Seth lay down on the bed. I found a comfortable position where I could feel Seth’s heat through the covers at my side. I began to see the swirling colors behind my closed eyelids.
Then, a thought bubble popped in my head.
Those cats had pounded down the stairs like Mike did in the morning to try to wake me up so I might feed them. They wanted me to open a can of food while I was still half-asleep. I lived with scheming little rats.
Thank you for listening, jules