A nugget of fur and razors sleeps against my leg as I write.
A long battle was fought to get her to this point. I have the war wounds to prove it. I might not look like the victor, considering I appear to have battled a thornbush, but I can confidently say I have won over this wee cat. Her heart is now mine.
It’s not like we needed another cat, but another is here.
Our initial plan was to tame the wildling enough to find her a new home, but we failed to consider our other cats might fall so deeply in love with her, and her with them, that separating the new pack would be cruel.
If anyone is keeping count besides us, this makes six.
For those who live in a large and very old building as we do, it makes sense to have cats. Although only two of ours actually work, while the others are merely decorative, they are all an excellent source of heat in the winter. They also do a fine job of slowing traffic between our bed and the fridge. It’s like having multiple speedbumps, offering a little extra time to perhaps rethink the trip.
It has taken months for the new one to learn how to speedbump, but she has now claimed a spot near my side of the bed, suggesting I need to be slowed more often than Don.
We started calling her Stubbs, prompted by what we believed were super short legs. It turned out that was just her odd way of walking, hunkered down low and fearful. She walks normally now, on normal-length legs, but the name seems to have stuck.
Stubb’s start was a rough one. A feral pair of cats began to visit our porch last year. The female, a terrified calico, would run and hide if she saw me a full block away, but her mate was bolder, perhaps due to hunger. Eventually, she had a litter of three — two calicos and a gray tabby — under nearby stairs. From time to time, we would see them eating the dry food I put on our porch, then a month or so after they were born, the tabby kitten disappeared. We assumed a wild animal had killed her.
And then, a few weeks later, the kitten reappeared, skinny and weak. We guessed she had been trapped somewhere, since she was now smaller than her siblings, yet fierce enough to fight them to get to the food. She tried so hard to nurse alongside the other two, but her mother would whap her on the head and pull away. We kept thinking they would start to accept her, but it wasn’t happening. The entire family would snuggle together in a box, while she was left to shiver alone.
Don broke before me. He was the one who brought her inside.
Our cat crew ran to greet her. They lavished her with attention and affection, which I suspect she needed even more than food. But it was our most recent cat to arrive, Tate, who fell the hardest. Although we don’t really know anyone’s age, we knew he wasn’t much older than she.
The two of them wrestle and play for hours and then fall asleep in each other’s arms.
There is no rehoming cats who do that.
Getting her to love us was far more difficult. She would hiss, spit, cower and hide. Ears back, spine hunched, eyes squinting. Claws at the ready.
Our strategy was to ignore her; to walk past without acknowledging her many threats. This seemed to make her feel safe, perhaps invisible. She hung around more but still gave us the side eye. I gradually got her accustomed to taking treats from me, which at some point evolved into her tackling my hand to wrestle it, much like she wrestled with Tate. Those razor nails hurt, but I play through the pain.
Because when we’re done playing, she collapses against me and purrs.
A nugget of fur and razors that we didn’t need but can’t live without.
