The Guest Cat by Takashi Hiraide

Author:Takashi Hiraide
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi, azw3
Publisher: New Directions Publishing
Published: 2013-12-08T16:00:00+00:00

16

March arrived.

On a Saturday evening, the two of us hurried under a nearly full moon to the opening reception being held at the gallery for the painter of “Lightning Catcher,” heading down Lightning Alley in the direction that cut east. The gallery was not really that far, but the train would take us on a roundabout route back into the city center, a trip which would require an hour to complete. The shortest and most direct route would be by bicycle, which would have us arriving in only thirty minutes.

Holding our bicycles we passed through the small side gate and pushed them as far as the lightning-shaped corner where we turned. There at the boundary of the next door neighbor’s house, we saw Chibi slip through a tear in the wire mesh covering a gap in the wooden fence. As soon as she touched ground she turned her back toward us and circled around toward the southern, outer wall of the guesthouse, traveling through the slender fibers of the wild grass. From there we imagined her alighting on the open veranda, then passing through her private entrance in the floor-level window, which only she could get through, and finally entering the room with the wooden floor.

We had never before seen her on her border crossing from that angle. And we had never seen her heading toward our house from behind. My wife and I looked at each other as if to say so this is how she slips quietly out of her own house and comes over to give us a visit. The desire to go back home flitted across the back of my mind, but was crushed in the end by the need to go.

At the gallery, an opening party was being held where one could meet and talk with the artist. Since I had written something for the catalogue, I had been sent a small original print by the artist as a gift. But somehow I felt ill at ease.

After the opening party we had coffee with close friends — a book designer and an editor. I told them about our situation, how we would soon be forced to move, and told them about the cat who visited us repeatedly. I guess I just let open the floodgates, even telling them about how my last ray of hope was that I might win the lottery so that we could buy the guesthouse. I explained that in reality, the land likely cost three times more than what we could ever afford, even on the off-chance that the owners would be willing to divide the property so that our little house would be left on its own.

At 9:30 we left the coffee shop and again mounted our bikes, one following the other like a miniature caravan, and thirty minutes later arrived at Lightning Alley, entering from the back way on the east side, and finally returned home.

Evidence of Chibi’s having come over while we were out was scanty, but there were definite traces.

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