juniper and kismet
kittens don't have tails when they're born.
juniper didn't know this until she was nineteen and the stray cat she and her friends had been feeding ran into the friend's closet and gave birth to three helpless fuzzy worms. their eyes and ears were small sealed slits; this she had been prepared for. but the pointed bony nub in place of a normal twitchy tail was so unexpected that, for the first week or so, she didn't even notice it. when she did, though, she found it bewitching, like everything else about the babies. she was so enchanted with them you might have thought she had given birth to them all on her own. they and their actual mama, a monstrous calico with a sticky patch of road rash overlaying what would turn out to be a broken right hip, lived in a large low cardboard box in juniper's bedroom, and every spare second juniper had was spent sitting on the floor in front of this box, watching the kittens squirm and mewl and suckle and yawn and tie their three bodies into a tight twist of celtic knotwork under their mum's outstretched limb.
she had decided to keep mama kitty and one little one. she made the decision right away and didn't think about it again, because thinking about it would mean choosing the one, and it just couldn't be done.
the babies didn't leave the box for their first few weeks of life, but as they got bigger and their eyes and ears opened, their tails still conical stumps that could not yet serve any purpose, they tottered from end to opposite end of it until they wore themselves out. juniper and mama cat would watch them together, each purring proudly in her own way, until the kittens fell together and slept in a corner.
this had gone on one day, and at the end of it, all four cats fat and warm and contentedly snoozing in their big blanketed box, juniper thought again to herself that there was not a way to decide. she didn't want to touch them, being afraid of waking them, but she dangled one hand, her right hand, over the edge of the box closest to her and furthest from them.
one kitten woke up. his eyes, incredibly blue, classic swimming pool blue, rolled towards her as he yawned, his tongue furling and unfurling like a party favor between the beginnings of teeth like large grains of white sand. she saw a perfectly round deep brown freckle in the exact center of the roof of his mouth, identical to the one in his mother's. he stretched clumsily and began to walk in her direction even more clumsily, some two of his four legs crossing over each other and tripping him every few steps. when he fell he looked to her again and stood back up, and the other cats never woke up, and juniper never moved, only looked back at him as he made his arduous twenty-four-inch journey to her hand, which he sat down in front of and reached up with one tiny paw to touch. he tilted his very small head up towards her much larger one, which was holding its breath, and he meowed once, high-pitched and infantile, perfect.
"okay," juniper whispered to her kitten, "you can stay."
juniper didn't know this until she was nineteen and the stray cat she and her friends had been feeding ran into the friend's closet and gave birth to three helpless fuzzy worms. their eyes and ears were small sealed slits; this she had been prepared for. but the pointed bony nub in place of a normal twitchy tail was so unexpected that, for the first week or so, she didn't even notice it. when she did, though, she found it bewitching, like everything else about the babies. she was so enchanted with them you might have thought she had given birth to them all on her own. they and their actual mama, a monstrous calico with a sticky patch of road rash overlaying what would turn out to be a broken right hip, lived in a large low cardboard box in juniper's bedroom, and every spare second juniper had was spent sitting on the floor in front of this box, watching the kittens squirm and mewl and suckle and yawn and tie their three bodies into a tight twist of celtic knotwork under their mum's outstretched limb.
she had decided to keep mama kitty and one little one. she made the decision right away and didn't think about it again, because thinking about it would mean choosing the one, and it just couldn't be done.
the babies didn't leave the box for their first few weeks of life, but as they got bigger and their eyes and ears opened, their tails still conical stumps that could not yet serve any purpose, they tottered from end to opposite end of it until they wore themselves out. juniper and mama cat would watch them together, each purring proudly in her own way, until the kittens fell together and slept in a corner.
this had gone on one day, and at the end of it, all four cats fat and warm and contentedly snoozing in their big blanketed box, juniper thought again to herself that there was not a way to decide. she didn't want to touch them, being afraid of waking them, but she dangled one hand, her right hand, over the edge of the box closest to her and furthest from them.
one kitten woke up. his eyes, incredibly blue, classic swimming pool blue, rolled towards her as he yawned, his tongue furling and unfurling like a party favor between the beginnings of teeth like large grains of white sand. she saw a perfectly round deep brown freckle in the exact center of the roof of his mouth, identical to the one in his mother's. he stretched clumsily and began to walk in her direction even more clumsily, some two of his four legs crossing over each other and tripping him every few steps. when he fell he looked to her again and stood back up, and the other cats never woke up, and juniper never moved, only looked back at him as he made his arduous twenty-four-inch journey to her hand, which he sat down in front of and reached up with one tiny paw to touch. he tilted his very small head up towards her much larger one, which was holding its breath, and he meowed once, high-pitched and infantile, perfect.
"okay," juniper whispered to her kitten, "you can stay."
posted by juniper pearl at 6:26 PM
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