Summer was an exquisite time. With school finished, Emily was at home each day, and together we played in the yard and explored the nearby meadows. I frisked about like a puppy, chasing butterflies and grasshoppers. Emily and I took turns hiding in the tall unmown grass and leaping out to surprise each other. Again and again I retrieved the ball that I had trained her to throw.
Now and then the pair of cats deigned to join us out of doors, but they always pretended to think that our games were boring and juvenile, and after a short romp they inevitably found a sunny spot in which to languish, yawning.
At the end of that idyllic summer, Emily's front teeth reap-peared, she got new shoes, and it was time for her to return to school. Each morning I trotted beside her on the dirt road, returning to the little brick farmhouse only after I had seen her safely to the edge of the schoolyard. There I waited, relaxing in the yard, guarding my household, during the day. Occasionally I chased a squirrel for amusement. I could see Bert and Ernie luxuriating on a windowsill, watching my playful antics with bored disdain. The cats rarely came outdoors. They were too concerned about muddying their paws or dampening their sleek fur with dew. Never in my life before or since have I met such a pair of vain and lazy creatures. Even so, I had an odd affection for the pair.
If the weather was unpleasant, I had simply to scratch politely at the kitchen door and Emily's mother would invite me inside. My bowl was always full of fresh water, and the kitchen smelled of herbs and newly baked bread.
What a happy, undemanding life! I remembered my lucrative days as a supermodel with no regret that they were ended, though I thought still of the photographer, when we were struggling to find our way in the world. I remembered dear Jack with affection and a touch of grief, but the days of shivering under flattened tin, of foraging for food in dumpsters, held no nostalgia for me. My earliest memories, of my sweet mother, remained a source of tender thoughts, and I forgave her for leaving us alone. I rarely thought of my quarrelsome, boisterous brothers at all.
It was only Wispy for whom I still yearned. Sometimes, watching Bert and Ernie, observing their admiration of and attachment to each other (egotistical though it was, since they were identical), I fell victim to an overwhelming sense of loss. Once, long ago, I had a sister!
Oh, can you imagine how I have...
I couldn't quite get the second line right, since the only rhyme I could think of, kissed her, wasn't really accurate. But I enjoyed working on it, toying with the words in my mind as I lay drowsily in the sunny yard.
One morning it was raining. Dutifully I walked Emily to school. She was wearing a shiny slicker and boots and taking pleasure in wading through some of the puddles that had appeared in the uneven road. I tend to be somewhat fastidious about my appearance, and damp fur is extremely unattractive, so I did not take much pleasure in the morning walk. Once, back in the city, I had seen a Weimaraner dressed in a raincoat; it had seemed foolish at the time, but now, dripping as I was, I began to wonder whether perhaps a doggy slicker might not actually be a desirable thing.
Back at the house, I scratched at the door and was grateful, as Emily's mother dried me with a thick towel. She had been making cookies; I could smell the dough. I shook myself to rearrange and fluff my still-damp fur. On the kitchen counter, a small television was turned on. I am not a television fan, although I do enjoy reruns of the old Lassie shows. There is something about Lassie—the keen intelligence, the aristocratic bearing—that reminds me of my mother.
Actually, that's what I was thinking at that moment: how much this scene was like an old Lassie rerun, with the dog entering the kitchen of the farmhouse, where Mom was baking cookies. Of course, there were no Siamese cats in the life of Lassie, and at this moment, Bert and Ernie were watching me through slitted eyes from their spot on the windowsill. There was also no television, I was thinking as I smoothed my own fur with my tongue, in Lassie's kitchen.
I circled my spot on the braided kitchen rug, lay down, and yawned.
Suddenly I heard, in whining unison from the cats, "It's Keeeeeeper!"
At the same moment I heard Emilys mother say in a startled voice, "Keeper!"
I raised my head, of course. Never before had the three of them at once called out my name.
To my surprise, they were not looking at me. They were staring at the television. Not wanting to leave my comfy spot on the rug, I craned my neck to get a better look at the small screen. A commercial was playing. I could see the rear end of a dog, its tail dangling in obvious discontent, walking away with a sort of contemptuous gait. Then the camera showed a woman tasting some low-fat yogurt, its brand clearly visible on the label, from a small carton. The woman licked her lips and smiled. "Well," she said to the camera, "I like it just fine!"
Emily's mother started to laugh. She closed the oven door after sliding the tray of cookies inside. She reached over and clicked the television off. The cats rearranged themselves, examined their paws, and closed their eyes again.
"That dog looked just like you, Keeper!" Emily's mother said. "Did you see him? He sneaked a taste of the yogurt, and then he made a face. Did you see how he sort of sneered and walked away?"
Stay!: Keeper's Story
I hadn't seen anything except the rear end of the dog. It had looked, except for a bent section of the tail and a small patch of discolored fur on the hip, astonishingly like my own rear end, which I confess I have viewed occasionally in a mirror by twisting my body around carefully. From the description of the dog's facial expression, I could picture the sneer. It had been my famous sneer.
But I was quite certain the dog was not me. I had never made a yogurt commercial. The photographer had found a way to replace me with an imposter, a look-alike, a wannabe.
Or...? Could it possibly be? My mind raced.
I searched my recollections from those earliest days, so long ago. I recreated visually the scenes from the alley: our cozy home behind the trash cans, our little litter cuddled there together. There I could see Wispy in my memory, the smallest among us, struggling always to find her place. She had looked so undernourished, so bedraggled, so appealing in her homeliness, with her fur unkempt and her tail not quite straight.
Suddenly I remembered with certainty and recognition the small patch of discolored fur on Wispy's left hip.
In disbelief I rushed over to the television set as if I could will the commercial to run again. But the screen was blank, the set dark and silent. Emily's mother had left the room. The only sounds in the farmhouse kitchen were the faint hum of the refrigerator, the snores of the two Siamese cats, and the rain falling against the windows.