billy's holiday

A sense of embarrassment, with a soupcon of shame, has held me back from completing the story of Billy. Readers may recall that we found a new home for Billy, in a most missionary fashion. However, we had a concern that Billy’s owner might be out there somewhere, so we posted some signs in the neighbourhood. Indeed, we did get a call from Billy’s original owner and the whole picture became more clear. First of all, this person seemed to not understand that Billy’s name was Billy, and insisted on calling her “Puddy.” Some people have a tenuous grip on reality.

It turned out that our landlord had given us bad information – Billy had not been left behind at all. She had been taken to her owner’s new apartment, but then left to hang out at our place, possibly because of a hysterical new mother cat next door to her new abode, or possibly because our house is an irresistible black hole of love. Eventually, we got the person who had subletted Billy to bring her back. Billy, it seems, was as confused as her owner given that she appeared to respond to the name “Puddy.” It is unclear to me why none of the central players in this episode are able to figure out that Billy’s name is Billy. It seems quite simple to me.

Anyway, Billy’s owner is what they call here in Australia a “nutter.” I sense she means well, but conversing with her is akin to Stephen Leacock’s famous quote, “He flung himself from the room, flung himself upon his horse, and rode madly off in all directions.” After some well-intentioned efforts to cross the communication gap, Billy went home.

Well, home can mean so many things. Billy was back three days later. I am reminded of all this because we just went to check on Billy due to a higher-than-normal volume of caterwauling. Billy just left a dead mouse at our door. It is possible that she is attempting to apologize for faking her own disappearance like that. “In Georgia, they threaten to throw people in jail for shit like that,” I told her. But she was nonresponsive, puzzled over our hesitation in devouring the mouse.

The truth is that I’m glad Billy is back, and that we know where she belongs (here), and that we know her mailing address (the nutter’s place), and that the subletter took her to the vet and had her tapeworm dealt with, and that the nutter paid for the vet bills, and that the nutter knows where she is, and that Billy is not going to starve because we found out the other neighbours have been feeding her too, and that sweet, gentle cats remind me not to be so goddam cynical all the time.