“Wren.”Raven responded with a voice she had used since Wren was a child.One that saiddon’t mess with me, kid.She’d thought she could retire that voice now that Wren was grown.But Wren was reverting to some previous version of herself, and Raven had to play the parent once again.
“Okay.”Wren stomped back to her room, grabbed a pile of sheets, and loaded them into the washing machine.
“Happy?”Wren asked.
“Thank you,” said Raven coolly.“Let’s go see those kittens.It’s time for their next meal soon.”
Wren followed her mother into the Cat’s Meow.“I’d forgotten this smell,” she said.
“The smell of cats?”
“I guess it’s the combination of cleaning solution, vinegar, and cedar shavings,” said Wren.“Never really noticed it before.”
“Probably because you became nose blind,” said Raven, pushing open the door to the cattery and the sound of meows.
“How many do you have now?”asked Wren, walking along the row of cats, stopping to peer in and to pet a few paws that reached through the cage.
“Counting the seven we’re looking after in the back, thirty-four.”
“Almost capacity,” said Wren.
“Which is why I’ve been so pleased with the new Pages and Paws initiative.”Raven went to the fridge to get the formula she had mixed earlier that morning, and put it into the microwave.“Otherwise, who knows where these little ones would have landed.”She reached into the enclosure where the mother cat was lying.
“She’s so thin,” said Wren.
“Yes.If we hadn’t managed to get her this week, she might not have made it.”She picked up a kitten from the other side of the enclosure and handed it to Wren.“This one seems to be the runt, though there are three that are smaller than the others.”
Wren took the tiny creature in her hand and held it up to look at it more closely.“They must be a week old at most,” said Wren, taking the syringe from Raven and making her way over to a nearby table to sit down.
Raven took out a second kitten and joined her.
They worked together in silence for a while, each dropping kitten formula into a grateful kitten mouth.
“Why did I believe him, Mom?”Wren asked quietly, her eyes directed on the kitten.
Raven held her tongue, wanting to jump in and solve the problem but knowing that this would not be helpful.“Want to tell me what happened?”
“Not really.”Wren took the kitten back to the rest and scooped another into her hand.
“That’s fine.When you’re ready, you know I’m here.”She took a different syringe from the counter and sat down again.
“I thought I was in love,” Wren said finally.“Or maybe it was because at first he seemed to understand me.Listened to me when I told him about my problems at school.Helped me get a summer job, and a friend of his helped us move to Calgary.He was really nice.At first.”
Raven’s stomach tightened, and the tiny kitten in her hands squirmed and mewled.
“She’s still hungry,” Wren said, nodding at the kitten.
“Yes.”Raven loaded up the syringe with more formula and put a few more drops into the kitten’s mouth.“Sorry about that little one.”
She fell again into the familiar rhythm of feeding the kitten.“So what happened?”
“He had issues that I guess he didn’t want to tell me about.I tried to understand, listen to him, but he would just clam up.He said that I couldn’t possibly know what he was going through.That I had no idea what it was like to have to work and pay rent.No idea what responsibility was really like.”
“And you believed him?”
“Well, he was right about that.You’ve always helped me pay for my education, and I haven’t had to work except during the summer.”
“That’s because school is a full-time job,” said Raven.
