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It's Like This, Cat (Version 2)

<h1>18</h1> <div class="tei-figure"><ANTIMG src="images/image18.png" width-obs="529" height-obs="450" alt="Illustration: Raised champagne glasses toasting Cat." /></div> The two stray kittens gradually make themselves at home. Somehow or other Cat has taught them that he’s in charge here, and he just chases them for fun now and again, when he’s not busy sleeping. As for keeping cats in my room, that’s pretty well forgotten. For one thing, Mom really likes them. She sneaks the kittens saucers of cream and bits of real hamburger when no one’s looking, and she likes talking to them in the kitchen. She doesn’t pick them up, but just having them in the room sure doesn’t give her asthma. The only time we have any trouble from the cats is one evening when Pop comes home and the two kittens skid down the hall between his legs, with Cat after them. He scales his hat at the lot of them and roars down the hall to me, “Hey, Davey! When are you getting rid of these cats? I’m not fixing to start an annex to Kate’s cat home!” “I’m sure Davey will find homes for them,” Mom says soothingly, but getting a little short of breath, the way she does any time she’s afraid one of us is losing his temper. In fact, one thing this cat business seems to have established is that me and Pop fighting is the main cause of Mom’s asthma. So we both try to do a little better, and a lot of things we used to argue and fight about, like my jazz records, we just kid each other about now. But now and then we still work up to a real hassle. I’ve been taking a history course the first semester at school. It’s a real lemon—just a lot of preaching about government and citizenship. The second semester I switch to a music course. This is O.K. with the school—but not with Pop. Right away when I bring home my new program, he says, “How come you’re taking one less course this half?” I explain that I’m taking music, and also biology, algebra, English, and French. “Music!” he snorts. “That’s recreation, not a course. Do it on your own time!” “Pop, it’s a course. You think the school signs me up for an hour of home record playing?” “They might,” he grunts. “You’re not going to loaf your way through school if I have anything to say about it.” “Loaf!” I yelp. “Four major academic subjects is more than lots of the guys take.” Mom comes and suggests that Pop better go over to school with me and talk it over at the school office. He does, and for once I win a round—I keep music for this semester. But he makes sure that next year I’m signed up all year for five majors: English, French, math, chemistry, and European history. I’ll be lucky if I have time to breathe. I go down to the flower shop to grouse to Tom. It’s after Valentine’s Day, and business is slack and the boss is out. “Why does Pop have to come butting into my business at school? Doesn’t he even think the school knows what it’s doing?” “Aw, heck,” says Tom, “your father’s the one has to see you get into college or get a job. Sometimes schools do let kids take a lot of soft courses, and then they’re out on a limb later.” “Huh. He just likes to boss everything I do.” “So—he cares.” “Huh.” I’m not very ready to buy this, but then I remember Tom’s father, who doesn’t care. It makes me think. “Besides,” says Tom, “half the reason you and your father are always bickering is that you’re so much alike.” “Me? Like him?” “Sure. You’re both impatient and curious, got to poke into everything. As long as there’s a bone on the floor, the two of you worry it.” Mr. Palumbo comes back to the shop then, and Tom gets busy with the plants. I go home, wondering if I really am at all like Pop. I never thought of it before. It’s funny about fights. Pop and I can go along real smooth and easy for a while, and I think: Well, he really isn’t a bad guy, and I’m growing up, we can see eye to eye—all that stuff. Then, whoosh! I hardly know what starts it, but a fight boils up, and we’re both breathing fire like dragons on the loose. We get a holiday Washington’s Birthday, which is good because there’s a TV program on Tuesday, the night before the holiday, that I hardly ever get to watch. It’s called Out Beyond, and the people in it are very real, not just good guys and bad guys. There’s always one character moving around, keeping you on the edge of your chair, and by the time it all winds up in a surprise ending, you find this character is not a real person, he’s supernatural. The program goes on till eleven o’clock, and Mom won’t let me watch it on school nights. I get the pillows comfortably arranged on the floor, with a big bottle of soda and a bag of popcorn within easy reach. The story starts off with some nature shots of a farm and mountains in the background and this little kid playing with his grandfather. There’s a lot of people in it, but gradually you get more and more suspicious of dear old grandpa. He’s taking the kid for a walk when a thunderstorm blows up. Right then, of course, we have to have the alternate sponsor. He signs off, finally, and up comes Pop. “Here, Davey old boy, we can do better than that tonight. The Governor and the Mayor are on a TV debate about New York City school reorganization.” At first I figure he’s kidding, so I just growl, “Who cares?” He switches the channel. I jump up, tipping over the bottle of soda on the way. “Pop, that’s not fair! I’m right in the middle of a program, and I been waiting weeks to watch it because Mom won’t let me on school nights!” Pop goes right on tuning his channel. “Do you good to listen to a real program for a change. There’ll be another western on tomorrow night.” That’s the last straw. I shout, “See? You don’t even know what you’re talking about! It’s not a western.” Pop looks at me prissily. “You’re getting altogether too upset about these programs. Stop it and behave yourself. Go get a sponge to mop up the soda.” “It’s your fault! Mop it up yourself!” I’m too mad now to care what I say. I charge down the hall to my room and slam the door. I hear the TV going for a few minutes, then Pop turns it off and goes in the kitchen to talk to Mom. In a little while he comes down and knocks on my door. Knocks—that’s something. Usually he just barges in. “Look here now, Dave, we’ve got to straighten a few things out quietly. Your mother says she told you you could watch that program, whatever it was. So O.K., go ahead, you can finish it.” “Yeah, it’s about over by now.” I’m still sore, and besides Pop’s still standing in my door, so I figure there’s a hitch in this somewhere. “But anyway, you shouldn’t get so sore about an old television program that you shout ‘Mop it up yourself’ at me.” “Hmm.” “Hmm, nothing.” “Well, I don’t think you should turn a guy’s TV program off in the middle without even finding out about it.” Pop says “Hmm” this time, and we both stand and simmer down. I look at my watch. It’s a quarter to eleven. I say, “Well, O.K. I might as well see the end. Sorry I got sore.” Pop moves out of the doorway. He says, “Hereafter I will only turn off your TV programs before they start, not in the middle.” Just as I get the TV on and settle down, the doorbell rings. “Goodness, who could that be so late?” says Mom. Pop goes to the door. It’s Tom, and Hilda is with him. I turn off the television set—I’ve lost track of what’s happening, and it doesn’t seem to be the grandfather who’s the spook after all. It’s the first time Hilda has been to our house, and Tom introduces her around. Then there’s one of those moments of complete silence, with everyone looking embarrassed, before we all start to speak at once. “Hilda came to the beach with us,” I say. “I told Tom we shouldn’t come so late,” says Hilda. Pop says, “Not late at all. Come in and sit down.” Hilda sits on the sofa, where Cat is curled up. He looks at her, puts his head back and goes on sleeping. Mom brings coffee and cookies in from the kitchen, and I pour the rest of the popcorn into a bowl and pass it around. Tom stirs his coffee vigorously and takes one sip and puts the cup down. “Reason we came so late,” he says, “Hilda and I have been talking all evening. We want to get married.” Pop doesn’t look as surprised as I do. “Congratulations!” he says. Tom says, “Thanks” and looks at Hilda, and she blushes. Really. Tom drinks a little more coffee and then he goes on: “The trouble is, I can’t get married on this flower-shop job.” “Doesn’t pay enough?” Pop asks. “Well, it’s not just the pay. The job isn’t getting me anywhere I want to go. So that’s what we’ve been talking about all evening. Finally we went up to Times Square and talked to the guys in the Army and Navy and Air Force recruiting office. You know, I’d get drafted in a year or two, anyway. I’ve decided to enlist in the Army.” “Goodness, you may get sent way out West for years and years!” says Mom. “No, not if I enlist in the Army. That’s for three years. But I can choose what specialist school I want to go into, and there’s this Air Defense Command—it’s something to do with missiles. In that I can also choose what metropolitan area I want to be stationed in. I can choose New York, and we could get married, and I might even be able to go on taking college course at night school, with the Army paying for most of it.” Pop says, “You sound like the recruiting officer himself. You sure of all this?” “I’ll have to check some more,” says Tom. “The recruiting officer, as a matter of fact, tried to persuade me to shoot for officers’ training and go into the Army as a career. But then I would be sent all over, and anyway, I don’t think Army life would be any good for Hilda.” “I can see you have put in a busy evening,” says Pop. “Well, shove back the coffee cups, and I’ll break out that bottle of champagne that’s been sitting in the icebox since Christmas.” I go and retrieve my spilled bottle of soda. There’s still enough left for one big glass. Pop brings out the champagne, and the cork blows and hits the ceiling. Cat jumps off the sofa and stands, half crouched and tail twitching, ready to take cover. Pop fills little glasses for them and raises his to Tom and Hilda. “Here’s to you—a long, happy life!” We drink, and then I raise my glass of soda. “Here’s to Cat! Tom wouldn’t even be standing here if it wasn’t for Cat.” That’s true, and we all drink to Cat. He sits down and licks his right front paw. <div style="break-after:column;"></div>

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