“And just what do you think I can teach you, Coop?”
“To forget,” he whispers, so close I can feel the breath on my face. His hand brushes my waist as he walks away and I practically have to tame my vagina with a whip and chair to keep her back.
“Good night, Ali-Cat,” he calls over his shoulder.
“Cooper,” I shout, and he stops in his tracks, his arms shoved in his pockets. He doesn’t turn to face me. “If I agree to go on tour, I won’t be your distraction.”
“We’ll see,” he says, and then he wanders inside. I climb into the cab and shut the door, maybe a little too forcefully.
Could I survive a tour with Taint? Never mind the tour—could I survive the night without running back in there to have sex with him?
Arrogant son-of-a-bitch.
“Where are we headed?” the driver asks.
“Brewster Street, Decker’s Studios.”
A few minutes later we pull up in the studio lot. The taxi driver clicks a button on the metre and fiddles with his money before reaching towards the back of the cab with his hand outstretched. “Here’s your change.”
“Keep it. I’m not going anywhere.”And I might be destitute, but I don’t want the rock star’s money.
I climb out of the cab and walk back to my car, preparing to spend another night with only the bastard cat to keep me company.
In the morning, I take Cat to a nearby shelter. The woman looks at me as if I’m a heartless bitch, and I don’t blame her. I am. Embarrassed and a little sad that my Grams’ cat is more than likely going to be put down—because I don’t know anyone who would take her—I give the woman my sob story. I think she takes pity on me because she says she’ll try her best to rehouse her.
When I get back to the car, I cry my eyes out because that stupid cat was one of the only things I had left that belonged to my Grams. I still haven’t made a decision as to what I’m going to do, but I know either way I can’t keep her. I’m pretty sure she’s the spawn of Satan, so you’d be excused for thinking that I don’t want to keep her—and it’s true, I don’t—but that doesn’t mean that giving her away was easy.
I sit on a bench at a park and watch a couple of kids kick a football around the field. Gradually, more and more families arrive and soon there’s a soccer match in full swing. Normally, that many children would make me want to stick pins in my ears. I hate children, almost as much as I hate moths, and I really, really hate moths, what with their freaky powdery wings and those creepy red eyes. I shudder, glancing up at the tree above me, expecting an entire flock of them to descend and attack, because we all know those scary little fuckers are telepathic. Just as I’m preparing to be eaten alive, my phone dings in my pocket. I pull it out and see I have a text from Cooper.
Coop: Here kitty, kitty, where are you?
Um, is he psychic?
Ali: Just left the pound. Surrendered my Grams’ cat today, so that’s kind of appropriate, actually.
My phone rings immediately. I stare at the number on the screen and after a second I hit the answer button.
“Ali?” Coop says. “I’m so fucking sorry. I feel like an arsehole.”
“You are an arsehole.” I chuckle half-heartedly.
“Why did you surrender her?”
“Because I’m living out of my car.” For some reason admitting this to him is sort of freeing. “Keeping her in there was cruel.”
“Where did you take her?”
“Renbury Farm,” I say. “It’s fine. You know I hated that cat.”
“Yeah, I figured that, what with you calling her the bitch cat and all.”
“Right, I just … She’s probably going to be euthanised and it just, it sucks that the last thing I have of my grandmother is about to be as dead as she is.”
“You don’t own anything else of hers?”
“A few pieces of jewellery.”That I had to pawn to feed and clothe myself these last few weeks.“The bank took anything worth any money. It’s not like she had an estate, and everything else was sold or donated. I didn’t think to keep anything else until it was too late.” I pause, letting out a deep breath. “I was going through some stuff.”
“What stuff?” he asks, his tone low and coaxing. It takes me a little by surprise.