Grey Matters by Clea Simon

Author:Clea Simon [Clea Simon]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Publisher: Severn House Publishers Ltd
Published: 2012-01-08T13:00:00+00:00

THIRTY-FOUR

New England in autumn has its own particular kind of gloom. Everyone thinks of the foliage, those riotous weeks of September and early October, when each tree seems to be competing with its neighbor to be the most extravagant. In those heady early fall days, the chill in the air is welcome, the newly clear blue of the sky a stage-set backdrop to the impossible reds and oranges of the maples, oaks, and silver-barked beech trees. For Dulcie, that wild flurry of color coincided with the excitement of a new term, and the brightness of her adopted city perfectly complemented the feeling she had about coming to the university. This is autumn, the world seemed to shout. Can’t you taste it?

But no matter how beautiful the season started, it always turned out the same by November. Just when the workload began to get heavy, the days grew grey, dull, and lifeless. It was enough to make one believe in the pathetic fallacy, Dulcie thought, as she descended the front steps. No Chris, no Mr Grey. Her new kitten wouldn’t talk to her and her thesis was mired in, well, mire. Life was truly imitating art.

‘Hey, Dulcie!’ A friendly voice broke into Dulcie’s gloom and she turned to see her neighbor Helene gesturing from her street-level front door. ‘Have a minute?’

Dulcie found herself smiling. Her broad, and sometimes loud, neighbor had a heart even bigger than the rest of her. A city hospital nurse, she’d looked after Dulcie through the crises of the last summer, and Dulcie had come to appreciate the sweet woman behind the gruff manner. Since Helene had adopted two kittens, litter mates, Dulcie had found herself dropping by more often – the spunky felines doing more to bridge the town–gown gap than a dozen university symposiums.

‘What’s up, Helene?’ Dulcie trotted down the three steps that led into the ground-floor apartment.

‘I wanted to show you something.’ Helene beckoned Dulcie back into the kitchen. ‘Julius has a new trick.’

Dulcie had been planning on going to the library, and she seriously doubted that either Julius or his brother Murray had invented any original moves. But it was pleasant to be in someone else’s life for a while, particularly when that life was spic and span, smelling vaguely of orange oil. ‘So, where’s the wonder cat?’

Helene turned toward Dulcie, a grin splitting her wide brown face. ‘Check it out!’

She stepped back and Dulcie looked past her to the windowsill. There sat Julius, an orange tabby, proudly holding a pot holder in his mouth. At his feet, tucked into the sill, were a catnip mouse, a kitchen sponge, and a shredded piece of fur that had probably once been a toy mouse.

‘He’s a hunter-gatherer!’ Helene sounded as proud as if her six-month-old kitten had mastered the piano.

Dulcie tried to smile, she really did. But looking at that marmalade kitten, his white legs just beginning to get that leggy adolescent look, she had to fight back the tears. Mr Grey had liked to fetch, too, bringing a wide assortment of items to lay at his human’s feet.

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