Page 54 of Kitten

I wanted to take it back. It seemed dramatic to call my mother sick when James’s mother had spent two birthdays in a hospital. “I mean, she’s fine. She’s just not very well. I can’t explain. She doesn’t eat. She needed me. I told her I was coming home for good, and then I left her. She’s all alone, she hates being alone in that house.”

“I didn’t know that,” James said. “I’m sorry.”

I said nothing.

“I’m sorry,” he repeated. “I’m not trying to upset you. But what you’re saying, it’s pretty intense. You didn’t have to deal with that on your own, I could’ve helped you.”

“Don’t act like she’s such a burden,” I said, and then immediately regretted introducing the idea that my mother could be a burden.

James took my hands, which had flown up to pull at my hair. “I’m not trying to fight you. We’re on the same side.”

“We shouldn’t be talking about her like this.”

“You’re very protective of your mother. It’s like you think you have to baby her. And I understand it better now that you’ve told me more. But it’s okay to talk about her, to feel things about her. You’re human, she’s human. You can’t live your life protecting her from that.”

My mother wasn’t human, she was my mother. It waspointless to discuss any further. I could see now that his understanding of her would forever be filtered through his disapproval.

“James,” I said, and something in my voice must have changed, because his expression shifted. “I have something to tell you.”

James’s eyes narrowed. In them I could see the reflection of the window behind me.

“What?”

I paused. In that moment I knew that only I could puncture the pause, and this meant I could also extend it. I could make it last long enough for me to memorize the way he looked them, newly young, as if Holme had restored the fat in his cheeks. “I’m really sorry about this.”

“You’re scaring me. Sorry about what?”

I told him. He didn’t believe me, so I took him to the bedroom. First, a brief silence. Then a sharp intake of breath. Recoiling beneath the doorframe, looking at me, he said, as if this were the most unbelievable part: “You tucked her in.”

“I thought she might be cold.”

“Cold?She’s dead.”

Then he started to breathe very quickly. His body gave a great jerk forward, then back. “No, but why’ve you done this”—he gestured at Silver’s tucked body—“why didn’t you say anything?”

“I’m sorry,” I said. “I was waiting for the right moment.”

“You thought the right moment to tell me my cat died was a full day after it happened? Fuck, are you actuallymentally unwell?” Then he stepped back, once, twice, until he was in the hallway, out of sight.

I followed James into the guest bathroom. The fur around the drain had dried, fine as dandelion fluff. “You bathed her,” he said.

I nodded.

“Why did you keep her here? How long has she been lying there? God.”

“She was cold,” I said, this time with less conviction.

Then James began to cry. At first I didn’t understand what was happening. He lifted his hands to cover his face, as if embarrassed, and lowered to sit on the floor. Numbly I slid down next to him. The porcelain of the tub vibrated with his breathing, cool against my neck. Just atop the crest of his right ear were two freckles, one of them perfectly circular and dark, the other one small, curved like a comma. I hadn’t noticed them before. I stroked the gully where his ear met his neck, the way I did with Silver, the way my mother used to do when she braided my hair. He flinched. “Sorry,” we said in unison, then again, simultaneously: “Sorry.”

I wondered what might’ve happened if I told James the news earlier, as soon as Bruno found Silver on the beach. Whether he would’ve been angry, or devastated, or even worried about me—like he always was, like Isabelle predicted he would be. Certainly he wouldn’t have cried, at least not in front of me. He would’ve compartmentalized the information, dealt with the aftermath. Buried her, packed the bags. He would’ve accepted the news, romanticized it,even. She always loved the sea! There would be no dead body to evidence the loss, no fight with girlfriend ringing in his mind. Are you actually mentally unwell? Probably. I have something to tell you.

But this was the reality. I made it happen. I had to accept it.

When James lowered his hands, his cheeks were fever-red.

“I’m really sorry. I unlocked the door.” It was terrible to say this aloud, nearly insulting. There was just a syllable of a difference between Silver dead and Silver alive.

Small twitch of his head, an acknowledgment. “Was it an accident?”