Follow the Feline

I don't like cats.

I never have. There was no real reason why I don't like them, not one I could ever explain when I'm asked about it at least. There was just something... off about them, something I knew but couldn't grasp. Like a tree falling in the middle of an empty forest; you know it makes a sound, but you can't prove it. Or maybe they don't make a sound, but you can't prove that either.

Cats are like that. Quiet, but so loud too, not that you can ever prove it. You never know one is approaching but you always know when one's around.

I can never hear the soft, air like footsteps of paws pattering against the concrete, the top of a wall, a roof, outside my windowsill, right behind me, slitted eyes looking and staring and watching—but I always know it's there. No matter how many corners I turn, how fast I walk, how tight I pull my curtains close, I always know.

My friends have always said I'm just paranoid, that I'm unknowingly falling for the age-old tale that cats are carriers of the devil, or something stupid like that. I don't think I am. I don't even believe in crap like the devil.

I just don't like cats. I never had. Simple as that.

So I can't tell you why I'm currently following one.

I shouldn't be. It's late, almost midnight—Exactly 11:40, my watch displays when I check—and I have school tomorrow. I can't risk sleeping in and missing the bus again, my mum would kill me. She probably will anyways. I was supposed to be home at 11.

I don't know what breed the cat was, but it was slim with long legs and neatly groomed fur. Its long tail swished with each step; steps I couldn't hear no matter how hard I strained my ears.

It was black. Too black. A black so dark it seemed more like a void when fur, pushing against and yet beckoning the dark. Or maybe it was blocking everything else out.

I blink, confused. I can't really see the concrete path beneath my feet. I blink again and I think I see grass, now, and the ground doesn't feel as firm as concrete under my feet anymore. That doesn't make sense. I was just walking on a path.

I go to look around, but the cat looks back at me, bright blue eyes locking onto mine and something cold like ice washings over me. I shiver, my breath fogging in front of my face but that shouldn't be possible, its summer right now and the nights don't get that cold-

I see those feline pupils expand, ink overtaking ice, and I'm not cold anymore.

The cat looks away, but I don't.

We keep walking, and I think my legs hurt but I'm not sure. The feeling is like water between my fingers, ungraspable, spilling from my hands before I have the time to really register it.

My foot gets caught on a root and I tumble to the ground. My arms catch myself before my face can smack onto the forest floor—there isn't a forest near my neighborhood—and I catch a glimpse of my watch. I can't read the time, the number swirling like fog and drifting away.

Meow.

I look up, and the cat is staring at me again. I don't move.

Meow, the cat echos again, and I get the feeling it's scolding me, scolding me like a mother would. Meow, Meow, get up, we're not done yet, up, up, keep going.

Too black fur blinding me and ice-warm eyes urging me on, I stand and then we're walking again.

I blink, and somehow it feels much later then it should be.

Leaves crunch underfoot and I realized I'm not wearing my shoes anymore. My feet ache in a distant way that feels me I haven't been wearing them for a while.

Something soft brushes against my leg and now there's another cat walking with us. A large, round one; fur like snow and so fluffy a dandelion would look like stone next to it.

Pprrrrr, and I see another, small and slim with a patchwork coat of greys and black.

Bright eyes appear in the dark, and there's five more lurking atop fallen trees, jumping from trunk to trunk as they follow along.

I can't hear a single one of them, and yet my ears are ringing.

I blink again, and now all I can see are cats.

We're not walking now. I'm standing still, too still, feeling warm in the way a felines eyes are, and cats surround me on all sides.

I see the black one in the sea of fur and eyes, looking, staring, watching, something like longing and pride in its tar-bound glaciers.

I go to speak, but I only hear a mrrww.

I raise my arm to my mouth, caution trying to claw at my mind, and see a paw instead of a hand.

I look around, and suddenly I'm much smaller. The cats are towering over me, I'm looking up at them now.

Meow, and the black cat is in front of me, but it's different. Its fur is still too dark, but it isn't overpowering everything. Its eyes are less like ice and now like a cooling breeze on a hot day.

Meow, but now I can understand it. Welcome home.

It—she curls around me, the black cat. She licks that patch of fur—fur?—between my ears, coiling her tail with mine—I'm not supposed to have a tail—and I feel her whiskers brush against my own. Kitten, welcome home.

I hear the other cats gushing over me, coming close, blinking slow and carefully, lovingly and softly, and as my slitted eyes droop, lulled to sleep by motherly affection by someone who is not my mother but somehow feels like she is, I realize something

I don't like cats.

But I think they've always liked me.