The Cat We Almost Rescued

Sorry, I don't have a picture of the cat. 50mm, f/1.4, ISO 100, 1/1000s.

For the first time in a long time, Evan and I were behaving like REAL PEOPLE. People who have dinner parties. I was so proud of us. Not only had we cooked a real dinner, with multiple courses, from scratch, but we were also schmoozing with the best of them.

If you had been a fly on the wall you might have been persuaded that we did such a thing every night. And thought nothing of it.

But then somewhere in between "pass the caprese salad" and "would you like a touch more wine?" there was a bit of an interruption. A banging at the door. Evan went to investigate, we carried on. Until he burst back into the room and said tersely, "Jess, take the cat downstairs. Alec's at the door with a cat." (For the uninitiated: Alec is Evan's brother.)

Imagining a sick, injured, abandoned cat, I followed instructions. Once our Mouse was safely stowed, I went to check out the newcomer, only to find Evan and Alec both still outside, now lying facedown on the asphalt outside next to a car. Apparently the cat had squirmed out of Alec's arms and sought shelter under the nearest vehicle. Eventually we lured it out with some salmon treats, I grabbed it, and we got it inside. Then we checked the collar and called the emergency numbers on it. I could only imagine the relief of the owners that someone had found their cat and was taking care of it. I mean, if we lost Mouse I'd be in pieces! The area of San Francisco we live in is all asphalt and concrete, cars and stoplights. There are pretty much no street cats.

Well, no one picked up at either number so Evan left a couple of rambling messages, trying to explain the situation without making it seem like we had stolen the cat. We put out some water for the cat, and pet it a bit. Under the circumstances, it was doing pretty well.

Then Evan tried calling again. And someone picked up! I was picturing their relief until Evan said, "So we should just put him outside again?" Turns out, we weren't heroes at all. Apparently there are some outdoor cats in our area after all. And we had just captured one, but not rescued it.

A bit sheepish, we shooed it out the door. It sat on the step for a few moments, unsure why it was getting the boot. And then it trotted away, into the night.