The Night The Cat Exploded

 

(photo: 29th September, 2020 - proof that Piper is alive and well, albeit exhausted after an afternoon spent lying in a sunbeam, watching ducks & birds & chipmunks!)

I wasn’t sure what had woken me, but I was groggily awake, for about the sixth time that night. My husband was asleep beside me in bed, but there were a lot of lights on downstairs, which was odd.

Maybe I’d left them on - the last email I’d read the previous evening had stung. Someone who had known my husband long before I’d met him, but hadn’t seen him for almost two years, had written, “You were complaining so much I thought he was really sick. It’s good to know he’s fine.”  He was not “fine” and I didn’t think I’d been complaining, least of all to that person. A recent phone chat between them had lasted all of three minutes, with my husband doing all of the listening, none of the talking. 

But, as is so often the case, the negative voice drowned out all others. Was I overreacting? Imagining? Was he healthier than I thought? Was I complaining a lot? Was my concern making things worse? What if- What if-

I didn’t notice the smell until I got downstairs. In the corner of the brightly lit kitchen was a mound of  . . . My first thought was that the cat had exploded.  

It only took seconds to realise the cat was fine, and meowing loudly as if to tell me something had to be done.  

Something did have to be done. My husband had found the light switches, but he’d not only missed the toilet, he’d missed the washroom. Both of them. The one right beside our bedroom, and the one downstairs.

Fully awake, I looked back. He’d walked through the mess he’d left, tracking it across the kitchen floor, and up the carpeted stairs. There were handprints on the walls, and bannister, and . . . how could there be such a big pile on the floor, when so much had been spread round the house? 

I considered taking a photograph of the excrement to text to the person who was convinced that I was exaggerating our struggles. Instead I cleaned the kitchen floor, and the hallway, and tackled the stairs, and then woke my husband to clean and change him. I put fresh sheets on the bed, I bleached the walls and counters in the kitchen, and I started a load of laundry. My husband and the cat curled up and both went back to sleep. I had another go at scrubbing the carpet on the stairs. By then the sun was rising, so I made myself a coffee.  

What if he’d gone outside instead of coming back upstairs? What if I’d slept through? What if- What if-

I scrolled through an online support group, not even sure if I had a question to ask.  ‘I’m writing an article about caregiving,’ one member had posted. ‘Title ideas, please?’ You Will Need Patience, someone had offered. Yes, I thought, thumbs up. There Will Be Imaginary Friends, another person wrote. Yup, I thought, also thumbs up. There Will Be Sh*t, suggested a third person. I gave that one a heart, then Skyped a friend in England because it was already mid-morning there.

‘Hey,’ she said. ‘Good news?’

‘Good news. The cat has not exploded,’ I answered, and told her about the previous hour of my life.  

‘Oh crap,’ she said. ‘Whoops, no pun intended.’

‘Huh. Maybe I’ll laugh about this one day.’

‘Laugh about it now, Lou,’ she suggested. ‘I'm laughing! Laugh with me. And know that every text I send you this week is going to include a poop emoji.’  

I didn’t manage to laugh about all the accidents and all the laundry, every time. But I had a lock installed on the front door, so that if I ever slept through his waking again, I knew he wouldn’t be in danger of leaving the house. And I do know there are far worse things in life than cleaning up a mess. And I am thankful, weird as it is, the original poop emoji with steam and flies has been replaced with a much cuter version. 

 💩 💩 💩