Page 22 of Karma Kitty Christmas
“I’m sorry for the lecture on the leftovers,” he said as he locked the door. Mid-May had fallen with full force, and even at nearly eight in the evening, the heat coming off the pavement was suffocating.
“That?” Luca’s perpetual goodwill was untarnished. “Naw, I figure most teachers do that at one time or another. I mean, don’t you people have to takeclassesin how to give instructions? I dated a guy in the credential program once, a few years ago. He had this bit when he was pretending to give instructions on how to wipe your own ass—I can’t do it like he did, but it made me laugh until I cried. And then one nighthecried for real, because apparently the whole thing was taking over his brain. You got a tough gig—control issues, they gotta be a blowback, right?”
Isaac gazed at him wistfully, forgetting for the moment that they were going to go get one of the most wonderful things to happen in Isaac’s life in a really long time.
Except for Luca coming to talk to him the week before. That had been wonderful too.
“Do you know how badly I needed to hear that when I was starting out?” he asked, his eyes almost shiny. “I thought I was some sort of mutant, and Todd….” He snapped his teeth together and gestured to Luca to get into the Sportage.
For a moment they were silent as he piloted through the quiet, still-sun-dappled streets to the vet’s office. Then Luca spoke.
“Look, Isaac?”
“Yeah?”
“I get that you’re trying not to bitch about your late husband too much. But I don’t think it’s doing you any goodnotbitching about him. I mean, therehadto be some good about the guy, but you’re never going to see it for all the resentment you’re holding on to.”
Isaac sighed. “Yeah.”
“So maybe, when you’re mad at him, you just keep saying whatever he did that pissed you off. And then, even if it’s not to me, you finish off with a thing he did you liked. Then you won’t feel so guilty, but you won’t feel so… soobligatedto hold on to all the bad stuff. What do you think?”
And Isaac’s eyes grew hot. “I think you’re a genius,” he croaked. “And that’s super good advice. But you’ve got to… I don’t know, remind me, I guess. If someday all I do is talk about Todd, you’ve got to tell me to stop. I’m… I’m afraid I’ll get stuck on loop. Like I was when he was alive. It was all about Todd. I got up in the morning, and I couldn’t set a certain alarm because of Todd. I couldn’t sing in the shower because of Todd. I could only eat fruit and yogurt because Todd couldn’t stand it if I ate toast and peanut butter instead. I-I want to think about somebodyelse, because God, he’s been gone for a year and a half, andwouldn’t it be great if I could remember who I was without him?”
Luca’s voice was infinitely gentle. “Is he the reason you never got a cat?”
“Yeah,” Isaac sighed.
“Then how about you tell me more about this cat?”
Isaac brightened. “He’s orange,” he said happily. “Did I tell you the girl at the vet counter told me that orange cats have three collective brain cells, and they only get partial custody? So you never know if you’re going to get the smart orange cat or the idiot orange cat who just sits and bakes in all the catnip.”
“Sounds like me, post–high school,” Luca said. “I think me and this cat are already destined to be friends.”
“I was too cool to smoke pot,” Isaac said primly. “Not when gummies tasted better, and I could get the ones with the extra THC.”
Luca’s hearty laughter was what he remembered about the trip to the veterinarian. And then he got the box with his new best friend, Euclid, who seemed a little dopier but just as sweet and poised as he had been when he’d been eating Isaac’s sandwich, and as much as he liked Luca, Euclid sort of sucked up all the attention.
“What do you think?” Isaac said as they belted themselves back in the Kia, the cat purring—purring—in the box behind them.
“I think you’ve needed a Mr. Euclid all your life,” Luca said. “This could be a once-in-a-lifetime orange cat.”
Isaac smiled, feeling almost as happy and almost as dopey as the cat. “I wonder if he likes to play?”
Learning to Play in Summer
LUCA SATcross-legged on Isaac’s floor, enjoying the new brightly colored area rug very much as he taught Mr. Euclid to fetch a catnip mouse with a bell on its tail. The cat absolutely crushed the game, right up until the catnipreallykicked in, whereupon he simply lay there, eyes half closed, drool dribbling from his thin cat lips, absorbing all the pretty cat colors in the room.
“You put the cat in a coma,” Allegra said. “Achievementunlocked.”
Luca chuckled and turned to her, a little dismayed but mostly pleased to see that she’d taken the simple scarf Isaac had givenhimto create and had whipped out the vertical part and was now working on the horizontal part. Because the yarn made its own stripes—and because Isaac had promised to teach his sister how to make squares for the end and middle—it was going to be a great scarf. Different. It wouldn’t look like a beginner scarf at all, but like something bold and fun and very feminine.
And his sister was so delighted with it that even the fact thatshewas the one who would probably be helping with her own blanket wasn’t enough to make Luca regret asking Isaac.
Hell, getting Allegra moved into Luca’s apartment had made a difference in her life. She’d been funnier and freer and moreAllegrathan she had been in the last year, and Luca thought of Isaac’s lingering anger at Todd the Terrible, and he couldn’t help it.
Lucawanted to vent about the guy. Todd, who made fun of Isaac’s yarn hobby and his students and his job. Todd, whowouldn’t let him help decorate the house. Todd, who wouldn’t let him cook because he might not do it perfectly.
Todd, who made him feel like it was his job to be the quiet little house-husband, because forever ago, Isaac had been young and lost and had needed direction.
