It was a regular November morning. The sun was shining and the wind was gently blowing; the leaves of the tree outside by the driveway fell sporadically but with such grace that they gave the impression of doing it deliberately, in a sort of whimsical fashion. On second thought––it was a beautiful November morning!
They all had left –for work or school– except for him, so the house had gradually gotten quiet again.
Every morning, for the past four months, right after waking up, Juan went out of the house, half-asleep, to check the mail––he was waiting on that check that seemed never to want to come. And every morning, for the past four months, when he went back inside, empty-handed and angry, he sat on the couch in the living room, grabbed his phone, and began scrolling: this video was funny, that pic was cool, this other post was stupid and so on… Every morning the same routine except that on this particular day, he didn’t think of him until he came across a video of a cat that looked as if he was actually doing crunches on the floor. He thought it hi-la-rious. He liked it, shared it, and even commented on it: “hahaha, dope,” he wrote.
It was then he consciously thought of him.
He hadn’t seen him this morning yet, had he?
He got up at once, because since he was the only one in the house the cat was his responsibility. He called out to him: “Pancho! Pancho! Panchooo!” but nothing happened. Dammit. He went into every room of the house, looked under every bed, blanket, pillow, into every box, corner, nook, even in the pantry, but the cat was nowhere to be found. Shit! He must’ve gone out when I went to check for the mail, he thought.
He bolted out of the house.
He looked in the front yard, in the garage, under the neighbors’ cars… Nothing.
“Where the fuck is he!?” He said, aloud. Then it occurred to him that the last couple of times the cat had run away, they had found him in the backyard, hiding behind that old shed.
This was no regular cat. Pancho was a melancholic type of cat. Owing to the fact that they didn’t want him running freely outside unless it was under supervision, Pancho spent most of his time behind closed doors. For another cat, a regular one, perhaps, this might have been more than OK, but for Pancho, it wasn’t––it made him both sad and restless.
He would spend hours on the ledge of a window looking outside as though he were daydreaming, or just waiting for someone, unaware of his presence, to open the door ever so slightly so he could scurry away. Be that as it may, they all ascribed his somber behavior to his still being very young, or in heat already. Soon they would understand, however, that he was only looking for a way out.
As Juan was walking towards the backyard he got a funny feeling in the pit of his stomach. He felt that this time he might not be able to find him. Why? He didn’t know, he just felt unlucky like that on that day.
Pancho was not behind the old shed. Juan began to look for him desperately now––he shook rocks, moved piles of wood, looked into trash bins, up on the trees, everywhere, but he just couldn’t find him. He thought then that the cat might have gone over the fence and into one of the houses on either side. Ok, but which one?
By one of the lateral walls of the backyard, there was a little garden demarcated by a small brick barrier. When standing on it, an average-sized man could look over the wall and into the neighbors’ house without the aid of a ladder. He knew this well because when he was a kid, very often his football would go over the wall, forcing him to get on those bricks to prop himself up against the fence, reach the top, and then descend into the neighbors’ backyard.
It had been years since he had done this last though, so this time he was now able to see without even having to stand on his toes, which he didn’t even notice as he was now worried sick about Pancho. Once up there he scanned the terrain as quickly as possible so as not to be seen and thought of as an intruder or something.
“There!” He shouted, unaware that he was by himself. “Oh, shit!”
Pancho was over there, hanging out the back wall of the neighbors’ backyard fence. But not hanging out as in passing the time, shooting the breeze with his fellow feline friends, no; he was literally hanging out the fence.
They’re going to kill me, was Juan’s first thought. He stared at the horrid scene for a little longer as if trying to will Pancho with his mind to wake up and stop playing the fool.
Juan finally came to and darted out the backyard to the front and around next door. He pounded on the neighbors’ door and explained quickly what had happened, and they immediately let him in.
He ran. But when he was near him he approached him slowly, nervously. Yes, it was definitely Pancho, no question. The same Pancho they had asked him to keep an eye on while they were gone. Jesus Christ! And now he was dead––limbs completely outstretched, claws fully out, eyes wide open, pupils fully dilated, his little tongue sticking out, his body emptied of his soul.
He now knew for certain that when he had gone out to check the mail, Pancho had snuck out behind his back with his leash still on. A stupid fucking leash they used to walk him every evening. He had gone over the fence of the house successfully, but when he had tried to get over the next one his leash had somehow gotten caught, thus pulling him down and keeping him hanging from his neck god knows how long before he found him.
Juan untangled him carefully, his body already loose as a noodle. He felt chills run through his spine as he held him like a baby––a dead baby. He carried him out of the neighbors’ house and into his. He reached for a blanket, threw it on the floor, and then placed Pancho on it. He looked at him for a while, still in disbelief. He finally covered him completely and then went out for a walk in hopes of shaking off that unbearable sensation death had aroused in him.
***
By the time he came back, the front door was open. As he came closer he heard the harrowing screams of his younger sister––the one who loved Pancho the most.
He stood outside, afraid to come in.
The wind was blowing more intensely, and, at times, it hallowed as if moaning.
The leaves continued to fall, Juan observed, yet dismally now, as if honoring the dead.
What had started as a beautiful November morning, would end up as a horrific day.
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Poor Pancho!
Poor indeed 😪