Page 2 of Catastrophically Yours
"She's not exactly the spontaneous type who takes in strays." Sadie's voice carried the careful tone of someone trying to sugar-coat medicine. "She has systems. Routines. A very specific way of doing things. But she's also incredibly reliable, and once she commits to something, she follows through."
"Systems," Drew repeated flatly.
"Like, she runs the same route every morning at exactly six-thirty. She meal preps on Sundays. Her books are organized by genre, then chronologically by publication date within each genre."
Drew slumped against the window frame, watching her reflection overlap with the street scene below. "She's going to take one look at me and my chaos cat and slam the door in our faces."
"Maybe. Or maybe she'll surprise you. People usually do, when they get the chance."
The afternoon light was fading now, painting everything in soft grays and amber. Drew had always loved this time of day—the golden hour when anything seemed possible. When the harsh edges of reality softened into something manageable. But today, it just felt like time running out.
Pickle appeared at her feet, wrapping his considerable bulk around her ankles and purring like a small engine. His timing was impeccable, as always. Just when the weight of everything threatened to crush her, he showed up with his ridiculous confidence and unwavering affection.
"I'll take rigid and organized over sleeping in my car," Drew said finally.
"I'll text you her address. But Drew?" Sadie's voice carried a note of warning. "Don't lead with the cat thing. Maybe it's better to ask forgiveness than permission. She's softer than she seems, but first impressions matter with her."
After hanging up, Drew stood in the growing dusk of her former home, phone in hand, staring at the address Sadie had sent. The apartment building looked sleek and modern in the Google Street View image—all clean lines and architectural confidence. The kind of place where people had their livestogether, where late rent notices were an abstract concept and security deposits weren't measured in blood sacrifice.
She began stuffing her possessions into the battered duffel bag that had seen her through countless moves, each one smaller than the last. Her clothes went in first—vintage band tees, flannel shirts, the Doc Martens that had walked thousands of miles of city sidewalks. Then the important things: her grandmother's recipe box, inherited and filled with handwritten cards in careful cursive. The photograph of her parents from before everything got complicated. Her laptop, held together with duct tape and determination.
Luna went into her hard case, the worn Taylor acoustic guitar that had been her constant companion since college. Sometimes Drew felt like her entire identity lived in the space between those strings—every song she'd written, every late night in coffee shops where she'd played for tips and the chance that someone might actually listen.
Her hands shook slightly as she packed, the reality of what she was doing settling into her bones like winter cold. Moving in with a complete stranger. Someone who probably had never missed a rent payment in her life, never laid awake calculating which bills could be delayed another week, never chosen between groceries and guitar strings.
Pickle's supplies went into a separate bag—the good food that cost more per pound than Drew's own meals, toys that had been systematically destroyed and replaced, the catnip mouse that had somehow survived two years of aggressive snuggling. Everything that kept him healthy and happy and officially qualified as an emotional support animal.
The apartment looked even more hollow with her things gone. Drew walked through each room one last time, her footsteps echoing against bare walls. The kitchen where she'd learned to make pasta seventeen different ways because pastawas cheap and filling. The corner where her reading chair used to sit, creating a pocket of warmth in the endless city winter. The spot by the window where Pickle liked to judge pedestrians and plot their downfall.
"Here goes nothing," she whispered to the empty air.
The keys felt heavier than they should as she locked the door for the last time, sliding them under the superintendent's door downstairs along with a note she didn't have the heart to reread. Three years of her life reduced to a forwarding address she didn't have yet and the hope that someone she'd never met might have enough compassion to help a stranger and her judgmental cat.
The subway platform buzzed with evening commuters heading home to lives that made sense, carrying briefcases and confident expressions and the comfortable weight of knowing where they'd sleep tonight. Drew clutched Pickle's carrier as the train rattled toward an unfamiliar neighborhood, watching her reflection fragment in the dark windows.
"You better be on your best behavior," she murmured to the carrier, where Pickle had gone ominously quiet. "No knocking things over. No attitude. No judging her organizational systems or whatever weird way organized people live."
A soft meow drifted from the carrier—whether agreement or protest, she couldn't tell.
Twenty minutes later, Drew stood on the sidewalk outside a building that looked even more intimidating in person. Clean brick facade, well-maintained entryway, the kind of security system that probably required actual identification rather than confident walking. The kind of place where people had jobs with titles like "senior analyst" and "portfolio manager" instead of "musician, sort of, sometimes."
She checked the address twice, then checked it again. Apartment 4B. Drew pressed the buzzer and waited, watchingher breath fog in the cooling air while Pickle shifted restlessly in his carrier.
This stranger—this Piper person with her color-coded lists and alphabetized existence—represented her last hope. The final number on a list that had dwindled to nothing. Drew closed her eyes and listened to the sounds of the city around her: distant traffic, someone cooking dinner with too much garlic, a dog barking three floors up.
The intercom crackled to life, and a voice emerged—crisp, professional, with the measured cadence of someone who thought before speaking.
"Can I help you?"
Drew's mouth went dry. She looked down at Pickle's carrier, then up at the building that might become home, and took a breath that tasted like possibility and desperation in equal measure.
"Hi. I'm Drew. Sadie's friend? I know this is going to sound crazy, but I was hoping we could talk."
TWO
CONTROLLED VARIABLES
The meditation timer chimed at 6:15 AM sharp, ending Piper's daily fifteen-minute session. She opened her eyes to her bedroom's familiar clean lines—white walls, minimalist furniture, blackout curtains that guaranteed exactly eight hours of sleep. The routine that followed needed no conscious thought: twenty minutes on the treadmill, shower at 102 degrees, steel-cut oats with three-quarters cup of mixed berries.
