Does anyone else see that black cloud following me?

(Note:  Immediate family members might want to give this one a miss, at least for a while.)

I went over to my parents' house tonight to check on things (okay, okay, it was also to watch "Mad Men" on OnDemand because I don't have cable) while they're on vacation.  I went home and fed the cats, checked on Louie (he seems okay, but he's still so thin), and Sam and I stopped at the dry cleaner's and the dog park, and then drove over to the house.  Their cat Isaac met me in the driveway, in a frenzy of meowing.  He always gets anxious when there's no one home, and the neighbor across the street who cat-sits has been known in the past to indulge Isaac's begging with an entire canister of cat treats in a single week, turning him into a treat monster for days afterward.

So I wasn't concerned.  I went inside, fed the dog and got him some water (hot weather today!), picked Isaac up and gave him a treat, scavenged for a snack (there's something about looking in other people's cupboards when they're not home...I think it takes me back to babysitting, after the kids went to bed and I got hungry waiting for the parents to get home), and went in the living room to watch TV.  I gave ZaSu, their other cat, a pat as she slept in the chair with her back to me.

Which is how I discovered--

--that she was dead.

One hand in the air above her, I froze for a long moment, the kind that lasts so long that it stretches time out like an elastic band.  Finally, a thought appeared:  what THE HELL was I going to do?  My parents were away, and I couldn't just leave her there, but I couldn't bring myself to officially look.  Finally I saw that the neighbor across the street, who is the sweetest man and would do anything you needed him to (I'm guessing that includes a ride to the airport or a kidney), was outside in his car.  I ran out and asked for his help.  I called my parents to break the news, while he drove to the store for a suitable box.  My parents were so sorry, and said to do whatever I thought was best.  So I found the number for a local emergency vet clinic, and called to see if they could take her.  They could.  I got directions.

I stood in the kitchen for a moment, looking down at my directions to the clinic written in green marker on several post-its, the first thing I could find.  We've had Zazz since I was 16.  She was only a month old.  One of the other neighbors was trying to find a home for her, because his friend had been illegally keeping a cat in his apartment and it had kittens.  She was the tiniest thing; she fit in the pocket of my bathrobe, and slept by my head, purring.  When she was six months old, she broke her leg--while sleeping on the tailpipe of the neighbor's truck, which he did not notice before taking it out for a spin.  She was resilient, though.  She survived, but she's had a pin in her hip ever since, and she has always hobbled a little.

Our neighbor came back into the house with a box from the store.  A box that said "Bud Light Lime" on it in bright green letters.  I was sad about our cat, upset enough that I couldn't be the one to wrap her and gently place her in the box (bless you, dear neighbor, for taking that on).  But there was a part of me that floated briefly overhead and saw that there was an element of the ridiculous in the two of us solemnly carrying a beer case out of the house.

Our neighbor drove me down to the clinic, and we took the box inside.  He carried it for me, and with great sensitivity set it down.  I had said goodbye with a final pat outside, not because I wanted to, exactly, but because I knew I would regret it if I didn't.  She looked almost asleep, peaceful, quiet, but I could feel when I stroked her that she wasn't there anymore.

Inside, the nurse looked up questioningly, and I explained that I had called a little earlier--"Oh, about a cat," she said, and came around the corner to take the box from us, just as the vet came out from the back room.  Someone made a remark about the fact that it was a Bud Light box, and the vet asked jovially if we had brought pizza, too.  The nurse laughed.  When they were both gone, my neighbor and I looked at each other.  "Did that seem a little insensitive?" I hissed.  "I know!" he said. 

I whispered that when I had called the clinic and choked up as I explained that my family's cat had just died, the lady on the phone had just said, "Okay," in a matter-of-fact tone.  I know you must get to be a little jaded working in a place like that, or you'd probably want to go home and slit your own wrists every night, but I would have settled for a little forced sympathy from her.  They taught us at the call center years ago that just because you've heard it all a thousand times, the person calling you is experiencing it for the first time.

Just then, the vet came back out, his face white.  "I'm so sorry," he said with genuine emotion.  "I didn't realize your cat was dead."  We nodded that it was okay.

And just like that, it was finished.  I handed over my debit card and signed a treatment release form.  The neighbor drove me home and gave me another hug (or I gave him one--I could tell he felt guilty for "letting" this happen on his watch, so I found myself comforting and reassuring him that she lived a good long life and went so peacefully in her sleep in her favorite chair, that we couldn't have asked for better for her, and he shouldn't blame himself at all).

I went inside and gave Isaac a huge handful of treats.  I hugged Sam for a long time, as long as he let me.  I stayed and watched my show so that Isaac would be hopefully be comforted by my presence.  (Incidentally, Mad Men might not be the best choice for an evening of grief--someone died this week, and it's a maudlin show in the best of times.)  Another neighbor called, having gotten the news from the other neighbor and seen my car still in the driveway.  She wanted to make sure I was okay.  We complain about the neighbors sometimes, but when something real happens, everyone is there for each other.  And she's a dog person.

The last of my childhood pets is gone.  I'm sad, but she lived a good long life and she was old and it was just time.  These are the things we tell ourselves, when we don't have other words, but they seem true to me tonight.  She was a good cat.