Emotional Squatter's Rights

An Excerpt from Lydia's Lantern

I meant to write a new Alchemy of Meow dispatch this week. But a cat threw up on my draft (I’m looking at you, Newbery), and the words were unreadable, and the notebook unusable. I generally start by writing long-hand in my notebook, then, when the words come, I turn to the computer.

I tried to write on the computer but—the words appear to have unionized! Who knew such a thing could happen!

So, instead of forcing them onto the page in tiny protest hats, I’m opening the memoir door again. Before Newbery, Hugo, Nebula, and Callie became the four unreliable narrators of this household, there was Lydia—a blind, hearing-impaired cat who could see more clearly than most sighted beings I have known.

Lydia’s Lantern is the book I am writing about her: a record of what remains illuminated after someone we love is gone.

This excerpt is from the opening chapter, “The Cat Who Came Back Through the Clouds.”

I was still ensconced in my treehouse room when, at some point—blurred and unmarked—a new housemate arrived. A short-term rental. Warm, bright, and exuberant, she brought with her a cat named Nyla, a multi-colored beauty. I thought Nyla was the perfect match for her young human.

Nyla was everything Lydia wasn’t: alert, agile, with the glossy sheen of health. She didn’t stumble. She didn’t bonk. She sashayed into rooms like she owned the floor plan.

Almost immediately, she poked into my room, sniffed, and left. Her face peering from under the noren felt like the harbinger of spring. I wondered if she’d stay. She did.

She stayed longer and longer each time until finally, just like Lydia before her, she started to sleep in my room overnight. She stretched out near me, not on top of me the way Lydia did. Apparently, she didn’t intend to steal my breath.

Nyla went down to the basement for meals and the litter box. Sometimes, she’d spend time with her real guardian. But mostly, she spent her time in my room. I worried that the new housemate would object. But she didn’t. She was busy with school and her boyfriend and said she was grateful that Nyla had found a friend.

I was grateful, too.

I made sure to place her name prominently on my daily list of gratitude.

Not only was Nyla free of disabilities, she was an utterly charming, loveable, adoptable cat. She was a cat you could take home to meet your mom.

But Lydia?

She was a visitation.

My mother would say I was out of my mind. Most of the time, I’d say she was right.

Her verdict aside, it happened at last.

Lyda came back.

I don’t remember the moment I learned she’d be returning, but I recall the glorious feeling of my heart soaring like a wild bird freed from its captor. And then the moment after, the unease. Because Nyla was still in the house. In my room. On my futon. Next to my chest.

Her young guardian was due to move out soon, but there would be a short overlap with Lydia. The timing was awkward.

How do you explain emotional squatter’s rights to a blind cat?

Sure enough, Lydia arrived like she always did—unannounced, determined, inevitable. She stepped through the noren curtain, paused, sniffed. I’m sure she smelled the betrayal.

Her fur rose.

Then came the hiss and the growl. Sounds I’d never heard from her before—feral, guttural, ancient.

She leapt.

A full arcing jump with claws outstretched, straight for the interloper.

Or that was the intent.

But she missed completely.

Wildly.

By a mile.

Lydia landed and flailed around, looking bemused, a little confused, as she searched for the intruder, still sputtering with indignation. But her meaning was clear: this space was hers.

Nyla, wide-eyed, frightened, and frozen, just stared like she couldn’t process what had just happened.

Time forgot to breathe.

I stood stunned, caught between the impulse to sweep Lydia in my arms, and the urge to soothe Nyla and reassure her.

Then the spell broke, and sweet Nyla, terrified and confused, scurried away.

Lydia glared at the empty space she’d just conquered. She had made her point. She reclaimed her territory.

Even in failure, Lydia won her battle.