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The back door of the exam room swung open, announcing Kate’s return. The woman must play professional poker in her off time because her face gave away nothing.
“Well?” Sully asked, his nerves tightening like guitar strings. When had he suddenly gotten so attached to the fluffy creature on the exam table?
“Petunia,” Kate said.
“What?”
“Her name is Petunia.”
Sully wrinkled his nose. The cat was definitelynota Petunia.
“The chip company called the phone number associated with the account, but it was disconnected,” Kate continued.
“What does that mean?” Sully looked down at the cat… at Petunia. She turned her head and blinked slowly at him.
Kate crossed her arms over her chest. “Look, I, uh, negotiated with the representative. They aren’t supposed to give out the owner’s phone number, but I can be convincing when I want to be.”
She wouldn’t get any argument from Sully on that count. In a bar fight against a biker gang, he’d put all his money on Kate.
“I got the number. Tried it myself. Then put it through a search engine. I found an address.”
“Really?” Sully’s already considerable awe of the stern vet tech tripled.
“The Yucca Hills Animal Rescue is a great shelter,” Kate said, “but they can’t keep the animals indefinitely. Older cats, and especially ones with difficult dispositions, have a hard time getting adopted.” If Sully didn’t know better, he’d swear Kate’s hard exterior was cracking just the tiniest bit. “If there’s any chance of returning a pet to its guardian, I want to take it,” she said. “If you leave Petunia here, I can visit the address on my lunch break and see if the owner is still around.”
Without really understanding why, Sully placed a protective hand on the cat’s head. “I’d like to take Petunia over… if you don’t mind.”
Kate raised an eyebrow at him. Was that a flicker of an approving smile on her lips? “Be my guest.”
*
Fifteen minutes later, a long, sad meow warbled from the trap securely buckled in Sully’s passenger seat. The cat was beginning to rouse.
“Almost there, Petunia,” he said and then frowned. “Sorry about your name. Petunia. That’s a tragedy.” Maybe the name helped explain the cat’s sour disposition.
Following the directions on his phone’s map app, he turned his Mazda CX-9 onto a bumpy side street about 20 years past due for a re-pave. They were only two miles from where he’d first found the foul-tempered cat, but the landscape was notably different. Old, sprawling houses sat far back on large plots of land. He passed fenced yards holding goats and chickens. Another house included an attached horse stable. Down the street, a curious donkey poked its head over the top railing of a wooden fence.
This is what Sully loved about Yucca Hills, these hidden nooks on the outskirts of town that felt like a whole different world. While the northern part of the city was sprouting modern condos and big-box retailers like dandelions, the western side of town held onto its semi-rural spirit. People came to this part of Yucca Hills to spread out, put their own stamp on the land, and shake off a bit of the present-day hoopla.
Sully slowed his car to a crawl as he came to a property with a long, cracked driveway.
“You live here?” he asked Petunia. The place practically begged to play a haunted house in some indie college film. Weeds had long ago taken possession of the land, growing high and unruly. A rusted swing hung on fraying ropes from the limb of a massive tree. Brown paint flaked off in wide scabs from the exterior of the house, and the roof was pockmarked with missing shingles. A rusted gutter hung half-detached from the side of the house.
Yet, Sully’s newly trained eyes saw an ember of potential within the architectural dumpster fire before him. The house had good bones.
“It’d take some work,” he thought out loud. Okay, a loooooot of work, but he could be looking at another diamond buried deep in the rough. He shook the thought away. He was only here to facilitate a heartwarming cat reunion, not to expand his real estate portfolio.
“All right, Petunia, here we go,” he said to his passenger.
The cat meowed again as he unbuckled the cage and pulled it from the front seat. He made his careful way up the crumbling, uneven front porch. Sully rang the doorbell and heard its echo within the house. He waited… and waited.
“Looks like no one’s home,” Sully said, as a surprising sense of relief washed over him. Something deep in the pit of his stomach felt uncomfortable with the thought of leaving Petunia at a place like this. Just as he turned toward his car, the front door groaned open.
“Whatever you’re selling, I’m not interested,” a tired voice said. “Oh fuck, is that Petunia?”
Sully turned and faced a short, round man with thinning hair and eyes couched in puffy bags of exhaustion. Behind him, Sully caught sight of a hideous laminate foyer that transitioned into shag carpeting. An acrid stench wafted from the house that included hints of old pickle mixed with damp newspaper and rotting meat.
A high, piercing shriek erupted behind the man. He turned back into the house. “Brady, you hit your sister one more time and I’m locking you in the basement.”
