The Cat Who Hugs

I want to tell you an absolutely true story that won't make you cry and involves some magic. This is part of a longer story, that, sadly, involved a lot of tears and me doing my Nurse Ratched imitation, but this is, by far, the most interesting part.

This is not a fairy tale, although it begins like one.  Once upon a time, (January, actually) there was a woman who needed a cat.  Some people who loved her found her a little cat who had come to a shelter from a hoarding situation.  There were 28 cats in that house.  Some of the cats were sick and some were injured.  This cat, in fact, had suffered a punctured eye at some point and had scar tissue covering most of the eye.  And yet, with all of this, this was a sweet, loving little creature who could be held and petted and kissed.  She didn't have a name yet, was terrified to the point of paralysis and had just moved into her new home when the woman made a mistake.  She left the door open long enough for the sweet little cat to bolt out into the darkness of downtown Ithaca.

Here comes the story: 

We heard of her escape the next morning and dashed into town to begin searching. We split up at first, each doing separate "Here kitty, kitty, kitty's" and peering under anything big enough to hide a small, frightened cat. Often I would hear an answering meow and would try to track it, just to lose it in a morass of construction materials and plastic kid's stuff that had been left in a backyard.  I was wearing my pink "pussy" hat and Carolyn was wearing her "Rise Up Ithaca" hat, which might be the reason that one old guy was pretty nasty when we knocked on his door.  In the midst of crawling under porches I met a rather round tuxedo cat who was the source of the answering meows.  I would "Here kitty, kitty, kitty", and he would answer, "Yes?  You called?".  He began walking with us as we searched, chatting all the while.  As we were knocking on all of the doors in the neighborhood, asking for people to keep an eye out for her, we met the woman to whom the tuxedo cat belonged.  She told us that his name was Wilson.

We searched all of the garages that were open, put up signs and talked to many people who lived around that block.  Most of them were wonderful and one woman offered one of her own cats if we never found the one we had lost! I left my phone number with everyone.  And I chatted with Wilson.

We had been home an hour or two when I got a call that she had been sighted, so I dashed back to the neighborhood and searched with Jeremy, who had heard a distressed kitty cry right outside his house.  More searching, now with flashlights.  Wilson accompanied me for much of this.  Finally, I told him, "Look Wilson, I know that you can find her much better than we can. Please please please find her and bring her home.  The woman in that house, (and I pointed it out) "really needs this kitty home.  And the kitty needs to be there.  She's going to die out here in the cold.  Please Wilson, please bring her home."  I was sobbing by this time.

I left, feeling pretty discouraged.  

Moving into a hug with Carolyn

The next morning, the first thing I saw was a text.  It said that at midnight, our friend heard meowing at her front door, and when she  opened the door, in scooted her cat.  She said that a "big black cat" had cornered the cat on her front stoop.  WILSON to the rescue!  And when we got there to make sure that everything was okay, we leaned something new about this frightened, hiding cat.  

She hugs.  She puts those soft little white paws around your neck and moves in to snuggle.  And so, she got a name.  

Hugger.

I thanked Wilson for saving the day.  He asked me to leave food out on the stoop sometimes.  I said that it was a deal.