“He likes to tell me what to do, but no, as long as I don’t screw anything up, I think he’ll be okay with it. He knows I can use the money.” Griffin drained his glass. “Enough serious stuff. Which cat would you take, if you could adopt one?”
“Just one?” I laughed and looked around the room. Cats snoozed on perches and lurked inside climbers and sat in the big front windows, watching the people and cars go by. “I never had a cat as a kid either. Alice was allergic. Now? Something mellow, maybe. A cat that would be happy to just snooze in my lap and eat treats. I’m pretty wiped out by the end of the day. I couldn’t handle a high-energy cat like Jack.” As I spoke, the orange kitten leaped from a perch onto a fluffy white cat, then raced off across the room with the white cat in pursuit.
“Willow, then,” the server said as they paused by our table, a loaded tray in hand. “Or Santa. Or Mango. He’s pretty chill, if you don’t mind a cat that drools when you pet him.”
“Which one’s Willow?” Griffin asked.
The server gestured with their chin, setting their long hair swinging. “That tortoiseshell on the green climber. You can pick her up. She likes it.”
“Stay there,” Griffin told me. He pushed back his chair, crossed the room, and spent a moment introducing himself to the dozing tortoiseshell. Then he scooped her up, brought her over, and set her on my knees. “There you go. Lap buddy.”
I stroked the cat’s soft cheeks and ran my fingers over her ears. She head-butted my hand when I stopped, and purred like a chainsaw, her soft body vibrating against my legs. I kept petting her, whispering baby talk. She half-closed her eyes.
Griffin sprawled in his chair watching me. “I think she likes you.”
“She’s a cutie. I don’t know what Mom would say.” I ran my fingers down Willow’s back and she arched into my touch. “Although it might not be a bad thing for Mom to have a pet in the house. I get my taking-care-of-everyone genes from Mom.When Alice got sick, she focused everything on her, and since then, well… a cat might not be a bad idea.”
“I didn’t bring you here to pressure you into rescuing a stray,” Griffin protested. “Although knowing you, maybe that was inevitable.”
I kept stroking Willow, the rhythm soothing us both. “We have therapy dogs come to Wellhaven sometimes. I should’ve thought of it for Mom sooner.” Not a dog, with the demands that would make on her, but a cat. This cat, maybe, who only shifted position to stretch out more bonelessly across my lap. “What do you think, Willow? Would you like to be spoiled within an inch of your life and brighten Mom’s days?”
Willow purred louder.
“If you mean it, we can ask about their adoption procedure,” Griffin suggested.
People said you should never get a pet on the spur of the moment, but the more I thought about it with Willow vibrating under my hands, the more sense a cat made. “Yeah, let’s do that.”
We’d paid for our drinks when we got them, so I eased Willow into my arms and got up. Griffin led the way to the front and asked the young woman behind the counter, “These cats are all looking for homes, right? What’s the procedure to adopt one?”
Her face brightened. “Yes, part of our mission is to find loving homes for them, as well as to brighten the days of people who can’t have a cat. We start with a home survey form you fill out.” She pulled a clipboard out from under the counter and set it in front of him.
“Here.” Griffin turned to me. “Give me your fur baby and you write.”
I had most of the info filled in when a middle-aged man hustled up to us, his attention on Griffin. “Hi, I’m Quentin. I run Kits & Cups. Are you Griffin Marsh?”
“Yes.”
“Oh, wow, that’s cool.” Quentin’s wide-eyed enthusiasm took years off his face. “That’s awesome. Are you thinking about adopting one of our cats? That’s Willow. She’s the sweetest giant ball of fluff you could ever meet.”
“She’s cute, for sure.” Griffin lifted her against his bearded cheek and she blinked, unfazed.
“Can I…” Quentin fumbled out his phone. “Would it be okay if I took a picture of you with the cats? For promo? I can’t pay you anything to use your name.”
“I don’t need to be paid,” Griffin said. “I’d love to help. But you do know, my name isn’t exactly clean these days after that distracted driving conviction. There might be better celebrities you could ask.”
“I’m a huge fan,” Quentin told him. “Everyone makes mistakes.” I could see that Griffin wanted to protest, to point out how awful his mistake was, but Quentin barreled on. “I’d love to have you pose with a few cats. We could put the pics on social media, maybe print a poster for the café window.”
“I could do a benefit concert in here some evening,” Griffin offered. “If it wouldn’t disturb the cats. Maybe just the soft acoustic stuff and we could tell everyone not to clap.”
“Oh my God.” Quentin practically bounced up and down. “That would be incredible. I could take the shy ones home for the evening.”
“We’ll talk about it,” Griffin said. “You want some pictures? Maybe with the menu board behind me?”
I watched, smiling, as Griffin posed for a dozen shots with Willow, full face, then profile, then kissing her furry forehead. Then Quentin suggested a couple of other cats and Griffin passed Willow to me. “That’s too damned cute,” I murmured into her soft tortoiseshell fur as Griffin held up a matched pair of half-grown tuxedo kittens for more pics, then posed with a regal ginger tom. “There should be some law against the guy you’re trying to resist doing uber-cute things with cats.”
“He is pretty hot for his age, isn’t he?” the woman behind the counter murmured. “Silver fox.”
“Too damned true.”
