Carried Away

I’ve been told a million times not to let the cat out, but I’m also no match for his speed and agility. Have you ever tried to herd a cat? Thus the expression like herding cats.

Even more troubling, I’m not sure if he’s stuck up there or he’s choosing to ignore me. He doesn’t look scared. Just the opposite, in fact. He’s sprawled out on that branch like he’s king of the damn jungle.

I’m two minutes from grabbing a ladder because my grandmother cannot find out. She’s in town, at the senior center for her weekly card game, and isn’t expected back for another hour. She will freak if something happens to this cat. When Maeve, the female, died two years ago, I saw my Nan cry for the very first time in my entire life. She took to her bed for two days and wouldn’t eat.

Nothing can happen to this cat––ever.

“Elvis please. I’m begging you.” Turning his nose up, he looks disinclined to grant me any mercy. “Seriously, if you don’t come down from there right this minute I’m going to go get a ladder! Get the hell down right this minute you!”

“Something tells me that’s not gonna work.” Turner walks up to stand next to me with two large paintings hanging from his hands. Landscapes. The first is the Adirondack Mountains in fall. The second is another winter scene. Both equally stunning.

He’s dressed in black track pants and a thermal again. And unfortunately my body chooses this special moment to remind me that Turner, the Scrooge, is an incredibly sexy man…wonderful.

He catches me staring, and I look away, back up at the cat, heat inexplicably crawling up my neck. Turner’s attention follows. Elvis, of course, is in the midst of licking his balls again.

“He does it all the time. It’s gross,” I glumly inform him. “Especially since he looks at me when he does it.

Turner makes a noise, and I turn to examine his profile. His expression is as serious as always, but I detect a subtle note of humor there, his lips pressed together to stifle a smile.

Well, well. What have we here…

“How did he get out?”

“I don’t know,” is my automatic reply. Which earns me a side-eye. “Okay, I may know something about it. Look, can we call a time-out on the Cold War? Tomorrow you can go back to hating my guts and stomping around as if I murdered your firstborn, but I need help right now. My grandmother will have a heart attack if she sees him up there.”

His dark blue eyes catch mine, searching for something. “I don’t hate your guts.”

Dare I say he looks puzzled. And he actually sounds genuine. That’s a two for two in the credibility department. For a moment, it knocks me off center, makes me doubt myself. What am I missing here?

“Agree to disagree,” I throw out, trying to get back on track. Because I have a cat to rescue. I can’t be standing here trying to solve the mysteries of what is going on in this guy’s head. “So…will you help me?”

He gives me a brief nod and walks over to the porch of the Hemingway, places the paintings against the door under the overhang. When he returns, he walks around the tree getting a measure of it.

He can’t be serious.

“Don’t be ridiculous, Turner. You can’t climb that thing. It’s too cold and slippery. And the ground is hard when you fall.” The ground is covered in snow and not the fresh kind. It’s days old with a thin layer of ice on it.

Turner takes a moment out of his busy schedule to scowl at me, then goes back to inspecting the tree.

“I don’t want to end up in the hospital when you hurt yourself,” I warn.

“Do you want my help or what?” Mr. Charm volleys back, giving me a look.

“Yes,” I mutter, biting back another comment.

Against my wise counsel, Turner takes a running jump up the trunk, grabs the lowest branch, and walks up the trunk. Once he gets horizontal, he vaults up on the branch and straddles it. All this while Elvis and I watch in rapt fascination. Dressed in black workout gear and sneakers, he looks like a hot ninja. And I’m suddenly feeling a lot warmer than I was ten minutes ago.

“You were saying?” he yells down, gloating.

“I was saying that that branch is not strong enough to hold your weight!” My heart is beating a mile a minute the way it does when danger is imminent but I can’t pinpoint where it is. Call it female intuition. Or that I have a pair of functioning eyes and a brain.

“You weigh too much––like two fifty or something,” I holler. “And that branch is thin! Get down. I can call the fire department. The freaking cat is a champion whatnot, a blue ribbon winner. They might come out for a celebrity.”