My leg bounced up and down. I tried to quell my nervousness, but the minutes ticked down slowly while I waited. I wasn’t afraid of dying or being hurt. If anyone knocked on the bathroom door, I wouldn’t hesitate to shoot them through it. The minutes of waiting were still terrifying.
I counted down four minutes and twenty-four seconds before someone knocked faintly on my bedroom door. I jumped up and pressed my ear against the bathroom door. “Police! Are you in there, Miss Asche?” I barely heard the shouts.
I’d allowed enough time for them to arrive at my apartment. The likelihood the police were out there was high, so I unlatched the bathroom lock. “I’m in here, and I have a gun! When you got my apartment key from my landlord, he was supposed to give you a safe word. Do you know it?” I called through the door.
The voice replied correctly, though muffled. “Desk Chair!” I unlocked the door, gun pointed at the floor. Officers streamed in around me and checked my room over, even though I’d been locked in. Arch came in behind them. “There’s nobody here, Ellie. What happened?” I raised my eyebrows at him. I hadn’t expected him to be there with the police.
I let out a sigh of relief and walked over to my dresser to put my gun up. “How bad is it out there? Is anything damaged?” I sat on the bed, exhausted.
A short, pudgy officer walked over to me to give his information. “Miss Asche, did you see an intruder?”
I shook my head. “No, a strange sound woke me. I didn’t realize what it was until I heard a crash in the kitchen. I hit my panic button, grabbed my gun, and tiptoed over to lock my bedroom door. Then, I hid in the bathroom behindthatlocked door until you came.”
Satan ran into my bedroom and jumped up on the bed beside me. I snatched him up. “I’m so glad you’re safe, kitty-boy!”
“Ma’am,” the officer said. “We saw no sign of forced entry. Your alarm was still engaged. There’s no damage or mess in the house. The only sign of anything unusual is your kitchen garbage can has been knocked over, and the contents strewn across the floor.” He fought a smile as I stared at him, floored. “Have you had your cat for long?”
I turned my head to peer down at Satan. He was curled up in my arms, purring, contentment on his evil face. “Satan! You didn’t?” I scolded him. He twitched his tail at me.
“Ma’am?” I gazed at the officer. “Satan?” He stood there with laughter in his eyes, judging my poor kitty’s name.
“Yes. He’s the evilest kitty alive, would you look at him.” I scratched his head, and he laid his ears back and purred louder. “You think my cat knocked over the trash can, and it freaked me out so I hit the panic button and caused this entire ruckus?”
The officer nodded his head, valiantly fighting laughter. The room cleared of any other officers, and Arch’s face barely contained his mirth. I put Satan down to check out the apartment.
They were right. The only problem was the trash can in the kitchen. “You can both go ahead and laugh. You’re right. It was Satan.”
Not only did Arch and the officer crack up with belly-busting laughter, it came from the hall, too. I stuck my head out my front door. Four more officers stood out there, doubled over, laughing their stress away.
I turned to the officer inside. “At least I provided some comic relief for your officers today.” My cheeks were fireballs. Embarrassed didn’t begin to cover my emotions.
“Please don’t feel bad.” The officer finally contained his levity enough to speak to me again. “I’ve got three cats. You learn to recognize two sounds. One, the sound of the garbage can crashing to the floor. And two, the sound a cat makes before they throw up. It’s distinctive.”
I thanked him for coming out and apologized for my overreaction to my new cat’s shenanigans. When he left, I turned to Arch with my hands covering my mouth. “I absolutely can’t believe that happened,” I mumbled through my fingers.
His laughter renewed. He gasped out around his guffaws, “That cat caused you to call the police! I can’t wait to tell Wes, he’ll love this.” He collapsed onto my couch, still chuckling.
“How’d you even know they were here? Were they being loud?” How did he manage to show up at the perfect moment?
His eyes widened. He hadn’t expected me to ask him that. “Yeah, okay.” He sighed. “My power went out, and I was bored.”
Nodding at him, I encouraged him to continue. What didn’t he want to tell me?
“I… had my front door open, hoping to hear you get up and get your paper. I was going to bug you to let me come over and hang out here. My apartment was getting hot.” He scratched his ankle idly and rolled his eyes. “I was hoping if you saw my door open, too, you’d come in to see why, and then invite me over so I wouldn’t have to ask. There. Now, you know.”
It was my turn to laugh at him. “That’s nothing to be embarrassed about! If your power is out, come by and bum my TV or raid my fridge. Do you need to move anything from your fridge to mine?”
He laughed. “No, I talked to the power company, and they should be out within a couple of hours to turn it on. Turns out, I forgot to pay the bill.” He smiled sheepishly at me. “Sometimes being an adult is hard, and I miss stuff.”
I snorted. “We all do. Last month I almost forgot to pay my cell phone bill. It happens.” I walked toward the kitchen. “You hungry?”
“Yes, please,” he replied in a small voice as he followed me. He sat on one of the stools I kept on the living room side of the wall separating the living room from the kitchen. It was a great place to sit and talk to the cook without getting in their way.
I preheated the oven to make some frozen biscuits before walking out of the kitchen. “Be back,” I said. I went to my bathroom to check I wasn’t too scary after my morning fake-ordeal. Thankfully, my hair was only a little wild, and I didn’t have any gross goop in my eyes. I was wearing respectable pajamas but changed into lounging clothes anyway. After brushing my teeth and hair, I made my way to the living room.
By the time I came out, Arch turned the TV on to the morning news. I sighed to myself.He belongs on my couch. I blinked my eyes and shook off the familiarity of him being comfortable in my home.
“How do you like your eggs, Arch?” I desperately needed a grocery store run, but I could make do with a few things on hand. At least I had plenty of eggs.
