Dewey's Nine Lives

SEVEN

Marshmallow

“He was a tough cat. For a cat that was a runt and so weak, he ended up being a pretty strong man. He reminds me of Grizzly Adams a little bit. You know, big heart but you can’t see it on the outside. Marshmallow rarely showed his true colors.”

“Only to you, huh?”

“Only to me.”

I’ve known Kristie Graham her whole life. I was beside her at her communion. I attended her high school graduation. I did the floral arrangements at her wedding. I even changed her diapers. When she was younger, of course, when she was just a sweet baby girl. When I started college in Minnesota in my thirties, after a bad marriage to an alcoholic that left my life and finances shattered, Kristie’s mother, Trudy, was one of my first new friends. While I attended class, she’d often babysit for my daughter, Jodi. When I wasn’t working, we’d sit for hours and drink coffee while our children played. That’s what Kristie remembers, anyway, that her mother and I drank gallons of coffee. She was only four or five years old at the time, so her memories are pretty scattershot. She remembers that my washing machine didn’t spin, so I stirred my laundry with a big wooden spoon (maybe once, for about a week). She remembers that my rusted car never seemed to run (only occasionally); that I bawled my eyes out when Elvis died (not true; it was her mom who cried); and that I was, in her words, “a very hardworking, hard, hardworking woman.” (I’ll agree with that one. I had to be!)

I simply remember a wonderful girl. Trudy’s oldest daughter, Kellie, was Jodi’s age. She was a beautiful, outgoing kid. Kristie, three years younger, was just as beautiful and outgoing, but she never felt she could compare to her sister—even though Kristie was the one who would eventually become homecoming queen. So at the age of three, she went the other way. Kristie became the snot-nosed kid of our little coffee club. Literally. That girl always had something encrusted beneath her nose. If you put her in a clean white dress to have her picture taken at Sears, she walked out of the car covered in dark smudges. It didn’t matter how clean the car was. She found a way to ruin the dress. And I’m not making this up. The picture happened. Even Kristie admits (with some pride, I think) that back then, she was always covered with “runny booger dirt.” I guess that’s why I called her Pigpen. I loved that kid. Pigpen was my term of endearment.

But the thing I remember most about Pigpen Kristie wasn’t her dirty face and soiled dresses. It was the way we had fun. She and Kellie were the laughing-est, goofing-est, playing-est kids I’ve ever met. I remember Kristie and a few others convincing (or possibly forcing) Susan, the daughter of another friend, to slide down the laundry chute. Thank goodness there was a pile of laundry at the bottom, because it was a twelve-foot drop. I remember being the “house mom” for big slumber parties of eleven or twelve preteen girls, and always having to come in at 2:00 in the morning to tell them to pipe the heck down. I remember being snowed in during a ferocious blizzard and coaxing Kristie, Kellie, and Jodi to dance and lip-sync to 1970s soft rock songs. Then Trudy and I put on costumes and “sang” a few 1950s girl-group hits. We laughed for years about the Weekend of the Blizzard when, as always, we girls made the best of a tough situation.

I also remember Kristie’s cat, Marshmallow. He was a huge, fluffy, off-white fellow who, really and truly, resembled a marshmallow. Not that I saw him much. I usually only glimpsed his tail as he was running away. I liked him, but I’m not sure Marshmallow would have been special to me if it weren’t for one thing: He was special to Kristie. If ever a child loved a cat, it was Kristie Graham. She loved her Marshmallow. The girl talked about him all the time.

So when I thought about stories for this book, I thought of Marshmallow. I thought of how much Kristie loved him, how much he was a part of her life, how important it all seemed to her, and how much he loved her in return. Kristie and Marshmallow’s relationship was the closest thing I’d ever known to what Dewey and I shared. That is part of Dewey’s legacy, of course: the opportunity to tell stories about other special cats and special girls. The opportunity to show the world that those kind of wonderful relationships are happening everywhere, all the time, and that it’s okay—in fact, it’s perfectly normal—for a cat to be your very best friend.

I also knew Kristie could tell a funny story. I expected her to make me laugh. And she did. What I didn’t expect was for it to touch me so deeply. I knew Kristie’s life hadn’t been perfect. She’d had hard times. Who doesn’t? That’s life. As Kristie told me: “It was an awe-some journey. I wouldn’t be where I am today without going through all this so I count it as a blessing, obviously.” I do, too. I count it a blessing to have known her. I love Kristie and Kellie and their mother to the bottom of my heart. Their presence upgraded my life to first class, even if my washing machine didn’t spin and my car broke down. But Kristie’s story still surprised me. I expected her to be smart, but I guess I never expected her to be wise. I mean, the girl’s only thirty-five. What’s she trying to pull?

So, Kristie, let me step aside, for once, and let you tell your tale in your own words. How many stories have been in this book so far? Six? Seven? It’s time for my coffee break anyway.

I’ve been blessed. That’s what I always say. I’m so blessed, in fact, that I put a list of my blessings in my Christmas card every year. It looks like this:

I am blessed because all of my kids like mac and cheese, hot dogs, and frozen pizza.

I am blessed that both boys think, talk, and act rough and tough but still sleep with their favorite Teddy.

I am blessed because every day I receive four credit card applications in the mail. Some would call this junk mail; I call it “free envelopes.”

I am blessed that my children live on the edge and will do anything if it’s a dare and not a sin. Like drinking “Mom’s special sauce” for five bucks. Chocolate syrup, ketchup, mustard, and pickle juice.

I am blessed that when Reagan wakes up, she yells “Lucas, D.J., I’m awake, come get me,” and I can get another five minutes of sleep.

I’m blessed that my kids love worms and bugs, since I do, too. I’m blessed that they eat tomatoes and beans straight from my garden, and dig up baby carrots, and bite right into peppers, because I did that, too. I’m blessed that Sioux City is cold enough in the winter for snow forts and hot enough in the summer to throw up a temporary swimming pool in the backyard. I’m blessed that my kids are constantly grass stained and hate to wear shoes, even though my daughter has Fred Flintstone feet just like my husband. (I wonder how that’s going to look in high heels.)

I’m blessed that Lucas is the kindest, most empathetic kid I’ve ever met. I’m blessed that my middle boy, D.J., is so strong-willed that he refused to use his real name, which is Dawson, and everybody said fine. “Why didn’t you name me Bruce Wayne or Cowboy D.J.?” he used to whine. He was in a Batman/cowboy phase; he dressed like one or the other every day for three years. I had no trouble pushing Batman through the supermarket in a shopping cart, but I finally had to get his kindergarten teacher to tell him cowboys weren’t allowed in school. My three-year-old daughter, Reagan, meanwhile, is a mermaid. She wears orange hair from the dollar store and three-size-too-big tap shoes from the Goodwill and calls my husband Eric (his real name is Steven), since that’s the prince from The Little Mermaid. “My prince is home!” she yells every evening when he walks in the door. And then they dance. Reagan never dances with me. “Sorry, Mommy,” she says, “you’re Ursula.” (Ursula’s the sea witch). But I’m still blessed, because she’s eight years younger than D.J., and I thought the next time I heard the patter of baby feet I’d be a grandmother.

I’m blessed with Steven, the man of my dreams. We’ve been married for thirteen years, and I still get butterflies in my tummy when I am getting ready to go on a date. Alone. With a boy. Hee Hee. And when he takes me out, he lets me order “the usual”: a grilled cheese sandwich with crinkle fries. He never tries to change me. He just laughs and says, “You’re a cheap date, honey.” And I say, “Lucky for you.”

I’m blessed because I have a nice house. Because I have a purposeful job, mentoring fifty-two kids with learning disabilities from age sixteen to twenty-four. A job where I can use my experiences to help people I care about, and where their courage and warmth helps me, too. I’m blessed because when my dog Molly died at seventeen, I cried so hard I thought I never wanted another animal. But some of the kids I mentor volunteer at the Siouxland Humane Society, and they introduced me to another dog, and now I have Princess to jog with every morning.

I’m blessed because last fall I ran the Sioux City marathon, and I did it the right way. I even gained weight on purpose to compete in the over-150-pound category, where I finished third. Which was amazing! But that wasn’t why I was blessed. I was blessed because every two miles my husband, sister, and even my dad were there to hand me water and cheer me on, and each time they were crying because they were so proud of me, because they knew how hard I had worked and how far I had come.

Where did I come from? How did I get here? Those aren’t questions I’ve often asked. I’m blessed by God. Every time I hear my three-year-old pray, I’m reminded of that. But it took hard work, too. I always knew that, because I’m the one who did the work. It wasn’t until I started thinking about this book, though, that I realized that maybe Robert Frost was right. Maybe there are two roads that diverge in the yellow woods of our lives, and I . . .

I married my cat.

And that has made all the difference.

If you want an explanation of that, and I hope you do, then we probably need to go back to the beginning, which in this case is 1984, when I was a dirty snot-covered (and proud of it!) nine-year-old kid living in Worthington, Minnesota, a pretty little town on a lake. I was a tomboy, I guess you could say, because I loved gardening with my dad and digging for worms and racing beetles in the palms of my hands. When my mom told me pigtails looked nice, I cut my hair off in the middle of the night and hid it in my jewelry box. I loved sugar, so I would sneak into the pantry and drink all the Hershey’s chocolate syrup straight out of the can. Then I’d walk around with chocolate sauce smeared all over my face, denying my crime. You know, that kid. Never worried about a thing.

But in the summer of 1983, Grandpa got sick with colon cancer. He was a big man from a very small town, Whittemore, Iowa, where he owned a meat locker, and to me he was about a hundred feet tall. He was very outspoken, and he had huge raw hands from cutting meat all his life. When my mom and older sister and I moved to Whittemore to take care of him, I was excited because it was like a vacation. And Grandpa was a hero to me. I still remember skating down the street every day to the diner, plopping into my seat, and saying, “I’ll have the usual, please”—grilled cheese with crinkle fries, of course—and feeling like I was some kind of grown-up. But the cancer cut Grandpa down so quickly that he started to wither before my eyes. I could see, even as a child, his big hands trembled. They couldn’t hold me anymore. My mom was strong-willed. She always said, “I have big shoulders. I can handle anything.” When my grandpa stopped fighting, I saw her fear for the first time.

When I got home to Minnesota two weeks later, I found out my cat had died. I’d left Puff at home with my dad in Worthington, but when we came back after the funeral, he told me Puff had died. I looked at him and nodded. Then I went to my room and cried. I was nine years old. What else could I do?

A few days later, another cat showed up at our side door. She was a calico, and she had the wildest mix of colors I have ever seen. No stripes or patterns, just a crazy quilt that made her look like a bunch of parts of different cats stitched together. Her ears were missing, like maybe they had frozen off. Her tail was a stump. She was ugly and beat up and undesirable in every way . . . so obviously I started feeding her. I gave her milk and a name and even a few dinner scraps I managed to slide into my pockets. So of course she kept coming back.

“Kristie,” my dad finally said after noticing Bowser hanging around the side door, “why are you feeding that cat?”

“Gwampa sent me dis cat,” I told him. I had a little kid lisp back then; I was all “wed woses are pwetty” in those days. But I puffed myself up and said, “Gwampa wants me to have dis cat, Daddy.”

Typical for a nine-year-old, right? A little parental manipulation? Maybe, but I believed it to be true. And I still do. If there’s a void that someone should fill, but they aren’t, God sends an animal. Bowser was sent. And Grandpa had something to do with it.

My dad was a lot like me. Or maybe I was a lot like him, at least when it came to nature. He was a farm boy. He loved to be outside, loved to garden, loved animals. I was the kid who held beetles in her hand and stuck worms up her nose to scare her Care Bears-loving sister. My mom took my sister’s side; she was not an animal lover. My dad understood. Plus, he might have been a little guilty about Puff. I don’t think he expected me to take the cat’s death so hard.

Whatever the reason, it was pretty easy to convince my dad to let me keep Bowser. He put a heat lamp in the garage for her, because the Minnesota winter was brutally cold (the heat lamp was the only way to keep her water from freezing, even in the garage), and Bowser was not, under any circumstances, on Mom’s orders, coming into the house. After the heat lamp was in place, Dad moved the old dresser, where he kept his tools, underneath it and put a cardboard box and a blanket on top. A few weeks later, Bowser had kittens, which surprised us both. She gave birth to them outside, right underneath my bedroom window. You aren’t supposed to move newborn kittens, but my dad decided to transport them from the window well to the box in the garage. After all, we had a cat condo, penthouse floor. Why would they want to roll in the dirt?

Marshmallow, I must admit, wasn’t the best kitten in the litter. In fact, he was probably the worst. He was the runt. He was shy. His hair was poofy, like he was rocking one of the bad perms floating around my small-town Minnesota elementary school in the fall of 1984. He was almost pure white. Almost, I say, because unfortunately his fur had a yellowish undercoat that made him look stained. Think of a sheep. Then think of a sheep floating in a giant ball of static. Or think of a dandelion with its white seed fronds sticking straight out, ready to fly. That was Marshmallow.

As part of the condo project, my dad ran a board from the dresser to the ground. Bowser would stand at the bottom and coax her kittens down one at a time, like a momma bird teaching her babies to fly. Marshmallow was always last. He would stand at the top of the plank with his eyes bugging out, shaking with fear. His mother would meow. His brothers and sisters would get bored and start fighting each other. Marshmallow would just stand there shaking.

“Come on, Mawshmawow,” I’d coax him. “Wun down. Just wun down. It’s easy.”

Finally, he’d take one tiny step, then sort of collapse and slide-tumble in slow motion down the board to the floor. “That’s okay, Mawshmawow,” I’d tell him. “You’ll wun tomowow.”

But when it was time to give the kittens away, Marshmallow still wasn’t weaned, and he still hadn’t worked up the courage to walk (or wun). He was still sliding in slow motion from his drawer to the ground. So my parents let me keep him. I think they figured, in his condition, he wouldn’t last long.

“Don’t give that cat milk,” my dad said, when he saw me sneaking the carton out of the refrigerator. “He’ll get a taste for it, and that stuff is expensive.”

So, like a doting mother, I whipped up a substitute: water and flour. It sure looked like milk, but Marshmallow took one sniff and looked at me crooked.

“What’s wong, Mawshmawow? You don’t wike it? You need to dwink to get stwong, Mawshmawow. I need you.”

He never did drink that wet flour, but Marshmallow got strong. When the snow melted in the spring, he started following his mother around the yard. And I followed them. Pretty soon, we were crossing the road to the median near the golf course (in my little kid perspective, it was a forest), where we would turn over leaves and rocks to see what was underneath. “Look at this wowm, Mawshmawow,” I’d say, letting the worm crawl along my wrist and down my arm. “Look at this wock. Look at this buttafwy.”

That year, I was finally old enough to walk to school by myself. Marshmallow followed me to the corner, then watched as I disappeared down the block. When I came home, he was always waiting for me at the corner. “Mawshmawow!” I’d yell, running across the last yard. I didn’t care who saw me with Marshmallow. I was proud of him. When my grandmother, who often came for long visits, told me she saw him traipse down to the corner at exactly 2:30 every day, I was even more proud. “Mawshmawow waits faw me aftaw school,” I told my friends. I bet they thought that was cool, but I can’t remember for sure.

In the fall, I raked the leaves into a big pile and buried Marshmallow underneath them. He’d peak through an opening, wiggle his behind, then spring with his arms outstretched, like he was surprising me. Or hunting me. Marshmallow was a terrific hunter. I’d come careening down the sidewalk on my bike, and whenever I passed the pine tree he’d leap out of the shadows at my tires. I suppose I should have slowed down, since he could have been badly injured under the tires, but instead I just yelled, “Watch out Mawshmawow, coming fwough!!” and pedaled faster. Then I’d throw down my bike, bury my legs in the leaves, wiggle my little toes, and wait for Marshmallow to pounce on them. When we were finally worn out, we’d lay down on the ground next to each other. I’d lay there for a full minute, staring at the sky. The peaceful, quiet sky. Then, all of a sudden, Marshmallow would pounce on my face.

“Why do you have scratches near your eyes?” my teachers asked me.

“That’s my cat Mashmawow,” I’d say. “He thinks my eyelashes are spidahs.”

“Be careful, Kristie,” they said. “He could hurt you.”

Marshmallow hurt me? No way.

The next year, when Marshmallow was two, his mother, Bowser, was hit by a car. It happened, just like with Puff, when I was out of town. I was distraught. Bowser was my cat. She was Marshmallow’s mommy. My grandpa had sent her to me because I was alone. And I loved her. I insisted we bury her underneath my window, where she had given birth to Marshmallow and those other long-forgotten kittens.

After his mother died, Marshmallow changed. I don’t know if he was depressed or lonely, but I know that’s when he started talking to me. You might find this strange, but I always talked to my cat. I told him about my day, about school, about my toys and my parents arguing, you know, kid stuff. Marshmallow listened, but Marshmallow never talked back. Not until his mother died. Then he started jumping onto my window ledge and talking to me.

Meow, meow, Marshmallow would say to attract my attention.

“Hi, Mawshmawow, how are you?” I’d say, putting down my homework.

Meow.

“Yeah, I’m good, too.”

Meow, meow.

“I’ve been at school. What have you been doing?”

Meow. Meow, meow.

“Yeah, I got my math homework done.”

Meow.

“Yeah, I found my socks.”

Meow meow meow.

“No, I have my shoes. They still don’t fit.”

Sometimes, I’d sneak Marshmallow, who Mom never allowed into the house, into my bedroom. My Pigpen tendencies spread to my personal space as well as to my Sears dresses, and my room was . . . well, a pigpen. I mean, you couldn’t see the floor. Marshmallow hated walking on that layer of filth, but he loved climbing on top of me. The problem was crossing my lavender bedspread. That bedspread drove Marshmallow bonkers, because his claws would jab through it with each step. Watching Marshmallow walk across my lavender bedspread was like watching someone cross a pool of freshly chewed bubble gum. Every step, the bedspread stuck to his claws and he had to pull away with an exaggerated pop. Even when he reached me, Marshmallow never stayed long. After ten minutes, he always headed back through the bedspread minefield, meowing to be free. We were both more comfortable down in the “forest” with the worms and the beetles than inside my messy room.

By the third summer, Marshmallow was in his prime. Remember that fragile, timid cat, the poofy runt who tumbled in slow motion—on purpose!—down that scary, three-foot-high board? Well, forget it, because he wasn’t like that anymore. Marshmallow was a big old man cat. We’d still go out on our walks in the forest, and I’d show him the beetles and butterflies I found in the yard, but he also had his own sport. Every few days, Marshmallow dragged himself onto the step outside our front door and meowed until I came out. There, at his feet, would be a mangled squirrel. Or bird. Or baby rabbit. But I knew Marshmallow didn’t mean anything by it. He was just a cat, honing his survival skills. So it didn’t bother me. It was in his nature, you know?

Our neighbor, a duck hunter, wasn’t as tolerant. He approached me and Marshmallow one day, in full hunting regalia, shotgun on his arm, and pointed to a nest in his yard. “If your cat ever kills those cardinals,” he said, “I’m going to shoot it, because those are beautiful birds.”

This was the same man who hung a bird feeder on the edge of our yard, on the lowest branch of a tree, right next to a spot where Marshmallow could hide. I mean, it was practically a baited trap. It was a slaughterhouse over there.

So I put my hands on my hips, stuck out my dirty snot-covered lip, and said, “If you kill ducks, I’m gonna shoot you, because dose are beautiful bodes.” What could the poor man do against the righteous indignation of a dirt-encrusted, Elmer Fudd-sounding, cat-adoring fifth-grade girl? He just stared at us, the mangy kid and her mangy cat, and then walked away, shaking his head.

About a week later, Marshmallow killed a duck. He caught it on the golf course, snapped its neck, and laid it on our front step like a chef presenting his prize soufflé. I didn’t mind. I had such a blind spot for Marshmallow, I would have let him get away with . . . well, with murder. Of a duck.

My Barbie-loving older sister wasn’t as understanding. “Oh my god,” she yelled when she saw the carcass. “There’s a dead duck at the front door! Oh my god, there’s blood on the fence! Dad. Dad! Dad!! DAD!!! There’s a dead . . . duck . . . at . . . the . . . door!”

Needless to say, high-fashion, beautiful, girly-girl sister didn’t understand mangy, murdering Marshmallow’s unique charm. Like my mom, she wasn’t an animal lover, and she preferred dressing up to hunting worms and playing in the leaves. But I have to give her credit: She wasn’t a fan of my cat, but she more than tolerated him. She even appreciated him at times. She saw our connection, and although she didn’t want or need that herself, she was happy for me. She knew Marshmallow was my best friend.

“Hey, Kristie,” she’d say. “Your cat is at the window again. I can hear him meowing. Are you sure he’s not hungry?”

It wasn’t until the seventh grade that the fighting started. And I mean serious fighting. Every day, Kellie and I would scream at each other as loud as we could, with all the windows open so the neighbors could hear. We would literally beat each other with curling irons and hair dryers. We’d have scorch marks on our foreheads and bruises on our arms. Afterward, we’d stand side by side at the mirror, trying to fix ourselves, and she’d say out the side of her mouth, “You’re so ugly.”

“No, you’re so ugly,” I’d say. Having gotten over my speech problem, I could spit every letter at her. “You’re the ugly one. Not me.”

“No I’m not. And you know it.”

Meow, Marshmallow would say, scratching at the screen to be let into my bedroom. It’s been twenty-five years, but I still get emotional when I see that old screen in my childhood room. That screen, with Marshmallow’s claw marks still visible, is a memorial to my youth.

Meow. Me-owww.

“I know, she’s an idiot.”

Meow meow.

“You’re right. I look fine.”

Mee-ow, Marshmallow would say, crawling onto my lap. I don’t know if your cat does this, but every time he purred, Marshmallow kneaded with his claws, like he was nursing. It was painful, but it also felt good.

“I know, you’re right, nobody deserved to be spoken to that way.”

Meow, meow. Meow.

“I know, Marshmallow. I hear it, too. They should just get divorced and get it over with.”

I suppose it seems odd, talking to my cat that way. No, confiding in my cat that way. Needing my cat that way. Finding comfort in his meows. But Marshmallow was my primary defender, you know? He told me I looked good. He agreed when I said everything was fine.

Even if I was the tallest girl in the sixth grade.

Even if, in seventh grade, a group of older girls stole the new jeans I was so proud of out of my locker. Along with my underwear. And my shoes.

Even if, every time they passed me in the hall, those same girls slammed me against the wall and told me not to even look at some boy they liked. Until my older sister cornered them in the mall, that is, and told them whatever pain they caused me, she would give them double in high school.

She may have beaten me with a curling iron. She may have yelled and cursed me. But my big sister loved me. Even I knew that, even at the time. Those fights were our way of dealing with our fears and frustrations. They were our way of talking about the fact that all Mom seemed to do was yell, and all Dad seemed to do was drink. Starting at ten or eleven years old, I often stayed up past midnight, doing my homework on the living room sofa and waiting for my father to come home drunk. My mother handled it with anger. I was the caregiver. Kellie . . . she took it out on her little sister. But she was there for me, too. Not like Marshmallow, of course. But she was there.

“You really think that cat talks to you, don’t you?” my dad asked me once.

“He does, Dad,” I said. “I can hear the way he meows. He talks to me.”

And he’s the only one.

Even when we didn’t talk, Marshmallow comforted me. On the nights I was waiting up for my dad, I would watch through the window as Marshmallow sauntered across the front yard and disappeared into the trees across the road. An hour or so later, I’d hear a bump against the glass and there he’d be, sitting on the windowsill. When I was lifeguarding at the swimming pool down the road, I’d watch him hunt field mice in the long weeds of the fish hatchery for hours on end. (Yes, we lived in a neighborhood with a golf course, swimming pool, and fish hatchery—but it was perfectly normal and middle class, I swear.) When I broke my leg playing basketball, he’d sharpen his claws on my cast. There were shredded pieces of plaster hanging off in every direction by the time Marshmallow strolled away. How could I feel sorry for myself after that?

He wasn’t needy. He never followed me to school anymore, or raced after me when I drove down the street. We never rolled in the leaves or hunted worms either, but whenever I lathered up with tanning oil and sunbathed in the yard, Marshmallow was at my side. And whenever I tried to give myself a pedicure while sunbathing, he was there to sniff my hot-pink toes and shed hair in my wet polish, making the task impossible. More and more, though, he was content to be a spectator in my life. We still talked, mostly about sports (at which I excelled) and boys (at which I also excelled but didn’t know it), but he always let me take the lead. He had his own life, out there in the weeds, and I had mine. But when I needed him, Marshmallow was there. My father moved out, then moved back in, then moved out again. In frustration, I took to punishing myself every day with a long run. When I came home, Marshmallow was always waiting for me on the front step. He never let me down.

He also inspected every boy I dated. Every single one. I laugh now because, to me, Marshmallow was and always will be the most beautiful cat in the world. From an outside perspective, though, he was overweight and arthritic. He had a cyst on his face—it looked sort of like a giant blister—that give him an aura of decay and disease. His poofy yellow-white hair, never particularly attractive, was patchy and matted. And I mean really matted. That cat had big, grubby clumps all over his body. Imagine sticking twenty separate pieces of bubble gum on an extra-furry cat. Then twisting the hairs in the gum. Then waiting two weeks for them to get good and dirty. That’s what Marshmallow looked like during my high school years. We shaved him every spring, a trauma that made him look like a wounded rat and sent him flying into the garage rafters to hide for days. But Minnesota in the winter was too cold for a shaved cat, so he was always fat, hairy, and clumpy by the time the leaves fell and the homecoming dance arrived. He might have been, even I will admit, the ugliest cat in Worthington, Minnesota.

And every time a boy came for a date, the first thing I did was pick up Marshmallow, kiss him on the nose (right next to that cyst), shove him into my date’s face, and say, “This is my cat, Marshmallow. Isn’t he the cutest?”

Meee-owwwww, Marshmallow would drone, his breath reeking of contempt and cat food.

The boy would look at my overweight, nicotine-stain-looking, tangle-hair-not-licking, lopsided, lethargic, cyst-on-the-face cat and just . . . stare. Every single one of them must have thought: What is this? Some kind of test?

And it was. Sort of. If a boy didn’t like my cat, I didn’t want to date him.

Or that’s what I told myself. I actually ended up dating a boy for two and a half years who did not like my cat. His father was a community leader. My father was a drinker. He was a good-looking charmer. I was the anorexic younger sister of the prettiest girl in school. And I mean rail thin, serious intervention, intensive-therapy anorexic, the kind that pounded her frustrations and insecurities out with long runs and refused to eat more than a mouthful or two. On the outside, I was happy. I loved to laugh (still do). I was gregarious and athletic. I moved easily between social groups and counted almost everyone in the school as a friend. I was the homecoming queen, for goodness’ sake! Who is happier in high school than the homecoming queen?

But on the inside, I was tearing myself apart. Anorexia made me feel like it was the first day of school every day. Do you know that feeling when you can’t sleep, when you are too busy analyzing everything that might happen the next day? When you are obsessed with the need to look exactly right, with the feeling that everyone can read your thoughts and is watching your every move? The sweaty palms. The heart palpitations. The horrible moment when you feel yourself falling on the ice or skidding into a car accident. That moment was my life twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week. There was no calm, no resolve, just fear. Always. Fear that someone might see that I was not perfect, that I made mistakes.

Everybody thought my boyfriend was perfect. They said he was good for someone like me. You know, someone with a . . . food problem. My mom loved him. My dad loved him. My sister loved him. They were scared for me, I can see that now. They thought I might die from my disorder. They thought he was saving my life. When I tried to break up with him the first time, even my PE teacher pulled me aside and told me I had to stay with him. For my own good.

My boyfriend knew I had to stay with him, too. “You’ll never find anyone as good as me.” That was his favorite thing to say to me.

I don’t think he meant any harm. He was just a kid, dealing with his own problems. But by then, I had summoned the strength to put myself into therapy. My mother scoffed. She thought I was weak, or at least that’s what I thought at the time, when my disease kept telling me everyone thought I was a loser. I found out later she never scoffed; she was proud of me. My father? He lost his job and had to cancel my health insurance because, he said, the treatments were too expensive. Thankfully, my godmother in Texas cashed in her profit sharing from American Airlines; her retirement money paid for my care. And that care told me I didn’t need a boyfriend who said a girl like me should be thankful for a guy like him.

But how does an insecure, anorexic girl cut loose a guy like that? With the help of her cat, of course. Because for two and a half years, I kept telling myself: He doesn’t like Marshmallow. He’s not the one. He doesn’t like Marshmallow. Every time he said, “Don’t pet that stupid cat. We’re going out to eat, in public, and you’ll have cat hair on your sweater,” it hardened my resolve a little bit more. I mean, I’d been petting Marshmallow since I was in the second grade. I never noticed it, but I must have had cat hair on my clothes every day for ten years. I had been, since second grade, a walking ball of Marshmallow. I was covered in him. He was part of who I was. If a boy didn’t like Marshmallow’s hair on my sweater, I told myself, then he didn’t like me. Finally breaking up with my high school boyfriend because of cat hair was the last, most important act of my childhood.

I’ve often wondered why I married my husband. I mean, I love him, I know that. But why him? Steven is one of the quietest men I’ve ever known. He only speaks when he’s spoken to, and then only to relay the appropriate information. Unless he’s talking to me. The two of us talk all the time. We have no secrets; I know everything about my husband, and he knows everything about me. But very few other people know him. Not like I do, anyway. They see him. He’s the big outdoor type, a serious hunter and excellent athlete. They see that side of him, but they don’t know the man. They don’t know that he’s a snuggler, too. They don’t know how he puts his arm around me when I’m upset. They don’t know that he goes everywhere with me. He doesn’t buy me flowers, but that’s fine, because I don’t want that. Don’t buy me gifts, I tell him, just be there for me. I don’t want the jazz. I don’t want the huge house. I don’t want the big rings. I just want a pal I can walk through life with.

They say a girl always wants to marry their father. But does she, really? My dad was a drinker. He was very social. He cheated on my mom. Repeatedly. When I was a kid, she went away with Vicki and a few other friends every few months for a woman’s weekend. Kellie and I used to joke that they were her man-hating weekends, because she’d always fight with my father when she returned.

“I was with people who loved me this weekend,” she’d yell. “I was with people who cared.” I joked; I fought with my sister; but only because I was scared. I never wanted to be torn apart like that.

Steven never drinks. He never goes out with the boys, much less any girls. His parents, as far as I know, have never touched a drop of alcohol. They don’t yell. When he was growing up, they didn’t watch television. Steven and I do watch television (who doesn’t?), but we never fight. We’ve had disagreements, but in fifteen years of marriage, we’ve never had a yelling argument.

Oh my, Kristie, I said to myself, as I thought about my life, you married your cat.

It’s so true. I didn’t realize it until I started thinking about this book, but it’s true. All my life, I was looking for a man like Marshmallow. The other men in my life let me down. They hurt and abandoned me. So I latched on to Marshmallow. Not consciously, of course, not on purpose, but that scraggly runt was my beau ideal. Someone who listened. Someone who talked with me. Someone who was tough and outdoorsy, not soft. Not clingy or needy. Not house-broken. I wanted a man who was comfortable with himself, even if he wasn’t the golden boy. A man who built me up instead of tearing me down. Who was confident enough to let me have my space, but in love with me enough to always be there when I needed him. And someone I loved in the exact same way.

Isn’t it strange that someone like that existed? Isn’t it strange that I found a man as perfect as my cat?

And isn’t it strange that Steven was the one person in my life Marshmallow never liked? He wasn’t a cat person, for one thing, and cats can sense that. Steven had a man’s love for dogs, and particularly his yellow Labrador, Molly, who was two years old when we married and moved to Sioux City, Iowa. But that’s not it. My boyfriends all hated my cat. It took me years to realize this, since I had such a soft spot for that lopsided, matted kitten, but it’s true. Maybe they were jealous of him. Maybe they thought I was strange for talking about him so much. Maybe they just thought he was ugly or that I had too much cat hair on my prom dress. I guess I thought that was the way relationships worked. I spent my youth saying I wanted a man who loved Marshmallow, and then dating the exact opposite kinds of guys.

But Steven . . . he didn’t hate Marshmallow. No way. I’m not saying Steven loved him, but he was more like my sister. He didn’t have a connection with Marshmallow, but he was happy that I had such a strong one. He didn’t exactly jump for joy, but he didn’t argue when I insisted Marshmallow move to Sioux City and share our new lives. He knew how much Marshmallow meant to me.

And besides, Steven thought, just like my parents back in 1984, that Marshmallow wasn’t going to live long. He was eleven years old by then, which is not particularly old for a cat, but his hair was so stained and matted, he looked fifty-three. He had degenerative arthritis and sort of shamble-staggered when he walked. His energy was low; his appetite pathetic; his commitment to personal hygiene nonexistent. Worst of all, the cyst on his face had developed an abscess, so the left side of his nose appeared to be collapsing. The vet said he was too weak for surgery; the hole in his face wasn’t life-threatening, but the procedure to remove it might kill him. Even I wasn’t sure Marshmallow had long to live. But I knew, no matter how many days he had left, I was going to make them as comfortable and pleasurable as possible.

Steven tried. I have to give him that. He really tried. He got down on the floor every few days and said, “Come here, Marshmallow. Come here, buddy. Let me pet you.” Marshmallow would throw him a contemptuous glance—yeah, whatever, “buddy”—and walk away.

Being ignored wasn’t bad, though, compared to our one and only attempt to groom him. Now that Marshmallow was slowing down, I (foolishly) thought that I might be able to cut a few unsightly tangles out of his fur. I convinced Steven to hold him, while I chopped. Well, Marshmallow may have been old, but his claws were still sharp. He clamped on to Steven’s hands with his front claws, pulled his back legs up, and started cutting into his forearms with a series of kicks. He wasn’t trying to get away. I want to make that very clear. Marshmallow had been waiting for his chance to pay Steven back—for moving him to Sioux City, for taking me from him, for any number of unknown slights only the cat understood—and he wasn’t letting go. He shredded Steven’s arms with his back claws, just like he shredded the cast on my broken leg all those years before.

Steven finally tossed Marshmallow off and marched, tight-lipped and bloody, to the basement. He came back a few minutes later in his Carhartt jacket, hockey mask, and hunting gloves. “I’m ready,” he said, pounding his pads like a hockey goalie. Steven wasn’t going to let Marshmallow beat him.

But he did. Marshmallow won, of course. He wiggled and scratched so ferociously and for so long that we finally gave up and left him alone with his tangles. Marshmallow may have been slow and arthritic, but he was still the boss. That was obvious. When Marshmallow entered a room, Steven’s huge Labrador, Molly (a real man’s dog most of the time!) would almost bow to him. Molly wasn’t scared; it was more an unspoken respect for this wise old cat. After a dozen years of outdoor living, Marshmallow had that aura about him. He was a survivor. A bad boy. A cool cat. He may have been retired, but he was still the Don. He was content to sit all day under a house plant by the front door, hardly moving, but we weren’t fooled. Marshmallow knew—and approved—everything that went down in our house.

Like my jogging, for instance. With hard work and a loving husband (and my unbelievable cat, of course!), I had conquered my eating disorder. I had even turned the experience to my advantage, using it to reach and teach my learning-disabled teens and young adults. (Do you understand now why I felt so blessed to have gained weight, on purpose, to compete in a higher division of the marathon? And why my husband—and even my father—had tears in their eyes as they cheered me on? I mean, I might have only finished third, but . . . I won! Forever.) I’m not sick anymore, but that doesn’t mean I don’t take care of my body. I eat well, and I jog every day. Molly learned that last part fast. Every morning, she practically chased me to the front door with her leash jangling in her mouth. While I laced up my shoes and Molly worked herself into a frenzy, complete with flying slobber, Marshmallow lay under his plant watching us. Like the Godfather, he didn’t have to talk; everyone knew what he was thinking. The only reason I’m letting you go out with her, dog, is because I’m too old. One day, dog, you may be called upon to return this favor I now give to you.

When Molly and I left, Marshmallow hauled himself to the top of the sofa, where he could watch for us out the front window. When we returned, he always lumbered down to the floor and watched me stretch. This time, he would talk, talk, talk. That was a great thing about Marshmallow. No matter how old and tired, he never stopped talking to me.

After two years, he even taught Molly to find her voice. She started with a whimper, like an old door opening on squeaky hinges. Then she added a rumbling ah-rer, ah-rer, ah-rer, like a weed whacker straining through a pile of thick brush. I came home for lunch every afternoon, and the three of us would sit in my kitchen, chatting away.

“How was your morning, guys?”

Meow.

Ah-rer.

“Yeah, my day’s going pretty well, too.”

Me-oww.

“It’s the usual, peanut butter and jelly.”

Ah-rer-rer.

“No, you can’t have any.”

Meow, meow. Me-oww.

Ah-rrreerrrrr.

“Oh no,” my husband said, when he realized what was happening. “Not the dog, too.”

A few years later, I got pregnant. “I buy food for that cat,” my husband grumbled, when he found out a pregnant woman shouldn’t clean a litter box. “I clean up his vomit. Now I scoop his poops. And all he does is ignore me. Why can’t he be more like Molly?”

Yeah, whatever, Marshmallow sighed, lifting his head for a moment and then drifting back to sleep under his beloved plant.

I will always cherish, until the moment I die, the night I went into labor with my son Luke. There is an interminable stretch of time, on the edge of motherhood, when it’s too soon to go to the hospital and too uncomfortable and exhilarating to relax. So I paced the living room, fighting the tightening in my belly and trying to focus on my breathing. By this time, Marshmallow was sixteen years old. He had lived with Steven and me for four years. He was stiff, arthritic, and nearly deaf. I hadn’t seen him move from under his plant, except for food or his litter box, in more than a year. But he got up that evening and walked with me. He always came to my side when I was sick, but this was different. Marshmallow walked with me every step for two hours, meowing the whole time. Molly, hunkered down near the sofa, eventually added her voice, ah-rer, ah-rer, meow, meow, breathe, breathe, meow, until the room echoed with sound. And love. Uninhibited, animal love. I was having a conversation with my two pets, while walking in labor on my swollen, calloused feet, and I couldn’t have been happier. I couldn’t have wished for better support.

When I brought Luke home, Marshmallow surprised me again. He moved out from under his plant and started sleeping under my son’s bed. When Luke was in the living room, Marshmallow shambled in and sat by his carrier. People told me, “You have to be careful with a cat. They will pounce on a baby’s chest.”

I thought, Marshmallow? Are you kidding me? He wouldn’t hurt Luke. And even if he wanted to . . . have you looked at that cat? He’s seventeen years old. He can barely walk. He hasn’t pounced since I was in high school.

After Luke’s birth, Marshmallow’s health continued to decline. Five years after our move to Sioux City, he stopped being able to walk to his litter box. He couldn’t climb up or down stairs. Some days, he could barely make it to his food dish, and he suddenly seemed forgetful. There were times when, I was sure, the Godfather had no idea where he was. Arthritis had twisted every joint in his legs. His hearing was gone. His face was a mess. I knew he was in pain. And I didn’t need a veterinarian to tell me it was time. It wasn’t a hard decision. Not at all. At ten years old, I had watched my grandfather eaten away, in great pain, day after day. Marshmallow was such a good buddy. I couldn’t let a friend of mine suffer.

I took a day off from work. I turned off the television. I held my infant son on my hip, so that I could lift Marshmallow into the center of my lap. As I petted him, I watched the loose hair float up into the streaming sunlight and settle over everything, even my sweater. “Mawshmawow,” I said to my infant son in baby talk, imitating that little child from so long ago. “This is Mawshmawow. Wemember him.”

I looked from my son to my cat to the sunlight shining through the window, still thick with fur. My window. My house. My adult world. The room was quiet, except for a gentle purring. Even at seventeen, Marshmallow was kneading his claws into my leg. I felt the slight pain, and I smiled. A sad day, but a sweet moment, sitting on the sofa with the ones I loved.

I opened my photo album. There I was in a purple zippy wind jacket with my straggly hair, the little girl I used to be. Marshmallow was just a kitten, and I was holding him up to the camera. I was so proud of him. You could see it in my face. I was so proud. It was just a Polaroid, it was starting to fade, but you could see the happiness in my face. We didn’t own a Polaroid camera, so our neighbor, Katherine, must have taken the picture. She was an older lady. She loved Marshmallow. She watched us from her window, or when she was gardening, and I’m sure she heard our conversations, too. I’m sure she heard my parents arguing, and my sister and I beating out our fear on each other. She took the picture and gave it to me, I’m sure, because I was just a little girl, and I was so proud of my cat.

I flipped the pages. There were pictures of me and Marshmallow buried in the leaves. Me and Marshmallow in the backyard. There was a section with nothing but me, in a series of formal dresses, holding Marshmallow. I took a picture with Marshmallow, I remembered, before every school dance I ever attended. Me and Marshmallow lying on our blanket in the sun. Me and Marshmallow when I graduated from high school. Me in my wedding dress, smiling, holding my cat. “Mom,” I remembered saying over and over again throughout the years. “Go get the camera, Mom. I want a picture with Marshmallow.”

It’s hard for me to think about that day. I’m sorry, you probably think I’m weird, but it’s hard. I won’t talk about his death. I just can’t. Because I miss him. Even fifteen years later, I miss my Marshmallow. But there was so much joy in his life. So much joy. He was with me from ten years old to twenty-seven, and it was an awe-some journey. I wouldn’t be where I am today without it, so I count it as a blessing. Obviously. Even the bad parts were a blessing. I mean, how many people get seventeen years with an animal, you know? How many people ever get to experience that kind of love?