stephanie thomas berry

Really I had no intention of acquiring more pets after we adopted Toby back in October. But then I hadn’t planned on being exposed to such cute and hungry–and doomed–kittens at the gas station. That’s when I brough Spark and Shadow home. So last week, before I had any idea that a kitten named Frost even existed, I was opening the door to let Spark out. Spark is very skittish, though once you manage to “catch and cuddle” he’s fine. So I was trying to encourage the little bugger to go out the door. “Come on, Spark,” I meant to say, but instead I said, “Come on, Frost.” I puzzled at that for a moment, wondering where the name “Frost” came from, and then Spark slipped out the door and I went about my business. A few days later, some friends of Alex come over for dinner–a whole crew, really, including her friend’s mother, whose name is Mattie. Mattie and I were talking in the kitchen about cats.

As Mattie talked I was thinking of my cat Cleo, gone now some three years or so. I was replaying in my head the last moment we had together, how the cold of death was creeping up her body, how her eyes were closed. I was sitting next to her when she opened her eyes, her pupils wide deep pools of black, and she lifted her paw and gently placed it on top of my hand. The message in that touch was so profound, so deep–a good-bye, and so much more, something I will not ever forget… I remembered, too, how some months later, sitting by the stream, I felt, and saw through the corners of my eyes, the golden body of Cleo sitting next to me. Instinctively I had turned, and of course the vision dissipated, but she was there, with me, and I knew it.

It was these things I was thinking of as Mattie proceeded to show me pictures of her cats on her cell phone, including pictures of a batch of kittens. I’m looking, only half-interested in the pictures, until she clicks on a picture and says, “and this is Frost.”

The next day I went to claim Frost, to which Mattie had agreed. I brought him home and carried him up to my bed to snuggle with him. As I lay in bed, with this little kitten curled up sleeping with me, I thought again of Cleo, and opened up that door of my love for her, and my sorrow at her passing. And through this open door a new kitten slipped into my heart. I cannot help but wonder if Frost and Cleo might be one and the same.

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