A/N: I know, I know, I know, I'm writing way too many stories right now and I'm very, very sorry, but I absolutely love CATS, and I had to make a story for it. Enjoy!
Chapter One: Gus
"Gus is the Cat at the theatre door…" my Auntie's words rung in my head as I passed the Adelphi Theater. A matinee of some show I longed to see was playing inside, and the outside was temporarily abandoned, giving me the needed space to peer closely at the entrance.
Huddled in the corner by the door was a Cat that had jogged my memory of my Auntie's stories, who did indeed look how she described Gus the Theater Cat.
He was a shaking mess, with graying tabby fur that looked as dirty as the rug in my tiny flat from this distance, with big, sad black eyes and an impossibly thin frame. I felt a stab of pity in my heart as I looked to him and it was then that a strong gust of wind swept over the streets, making the poor old Cat shake.
"The poor thing." I said quietly to myself, my stomach twisting like crazy. I hesitated, and then sighed, taking a few small steps towards him.
He meowed when I got down on my knees and whistled lightly, making him look up at me. I gave him a smile and he said something more in Cattish, and then seems to shrink away, like he was frightened of me.
"Oh, don't be scared." I told him in my most gentle voice, trying not to make him afraid. "I won't hurt you, are you hungry?" I asked and I received another meow in response that I took as a 'yes'. "I don't have much" I began, looking in my bag, but I dug to the bottom and smiled when I pulled out a creamer from the café I'd just been to down the road. I held it out to him, and crept forward a little, bit, sniffing my hand.
I removed the plastic seal and put in of the ground. He seemed less cautious if I wasn't holding it, and lowered his head to lap up the cream in a few mere seconds. I reached into my bag again and pulled out another, doing the same until I completely ran out.
Still, the old Cat looked up at me with a starved expression and a little bit of my heart broke. He looked too sad for words, and very, very hungry. I knew that snow was forecasted tonight and my stomach flopped in guilt; I knew I couldn't leave him out here.
I did the only thing a sensible, completely sane individual with an utter love for animals could do; I emptied the contents of my purse such as my wallet, keys and cellphone, into my pockets and held out the bag for the old Cat.
"If you'd like, you could come home with me." I told him and he shrunk away a little bit in fright. I whistled softly again, calling back his attention, and moved a little backwards to give him more space. "I have more food at home." I told him with a wink and this seemed to make him quite happy, for he instantly scampered forward and crawled into my bag, flopping on his side and scratching at the lining a little bit to make himself more comfortable.
I winced at the sounds of ripping fabric, but I didn't care, I'd gotten that bag for six euros in France when I'd visited as part of a school trip last semester for the sake of buying something; I was just glad that it was being put to good use.
I smiled down at him and strung my bag over my shoulder, resuming my pace and direction towards my flat in the giant apartment complex around the corner. I made a modest living, and lived in a modest space; one bedroom, a bathroom and a kitchen, which was pretty much all I needed. The apartment building itself was nice, Mrs. Tammick, the landlady, was quite nice, but Mr. Cedric Hanson was an absolute horror.
The young, sleek man was on the right side of thirty, being exactly thirty-one, with impossible good looks and a neat, trim air about him. He was a perfectionist, and seemed to have his eye on me ever since I walked past him when I was getting the mail and he saw that I'd bought cleaning supplies.
That afternoon, he'd stopped by and caught me scrubbing my small living room floor, making him go into a passionate monologue about the joys of a tidy home. I waited until he was done, as it seemed rude to interrupt, and then politely told him slowly that I cleaned yearly, and this cleaning was way overdue.
He wrinkled his nose, turned on his heel and left at once, leaving me to snicker quietly as I mopped and swept and polished my filthy abode. That was two years ago, when I was twenty-four, and I had mature greatly, kind-of, maybe… okay not really, but I had begun to clean my home every six weeks, which was a major step-up.
I entered the main lobby of the building with its white-washed walls and mailboxes for all the tenants. It was dead as a ghost town, with nobody loitering about, despite the fact that family from all over had been meeting for Christmas holidays the day before like crazy.
I looked down at the old Cat, who didn't look nearly as frightened as I thought he would, and I reached my hand into my torn-up bag, giving him a light pat on the head and a scratch behind the ear. He seemed to like this very much because he coughed once, and then began to purr like he was much, much younger, albeit it was a tad wheezy.
I gave him another smile before retracting my hand and digging through the pockets of my winter coat, pulling out my keys with a triumphant giggle and opening my mail box with one of them. I growled lightly when I pulled out the two things I hated to see; ad's and bills. I shoved them in my pockets and slammed my mailbox shut, knowing that the happy time to pay my taxes was drawing nearer.
I tried to put on a positive attitude for my new friend in my purse, but he wasn't having any of it, he poked it head out of the bag and pushed his face up against my hand, trying to get me to cheer up and pet him at the same time. It worked, for the smile soon returned to my lips, and I began to scratch behind his ear again.
I looked towards the broken elevator with regret and sighed, turning towards the steep stairs and inhaling deeply before taking the first step. I lived in the sixteenth floor because of the beautiful view I had, but recently afterwards, the elevator broke down and it hadn't been repaired since. I was huffing and puffing by the fifth floor, silently promising myself that I would use that gym membership one day as I stopped to catch my breath before continuing on.
When I reached the ninth floor, I tiptoed as quietly as possible past Cedric Hanson's door, number 980, and made a break for the stairs, doing a little mental-jig in celebration of my lack of getting caught by the creepiest man alive on this or any other planet in the universe.
I reached the door of my flat, breathing rapidly and cursing my lack of stamina before opening the door and almost falling into my living room. Not too much could be said about where I lived, although shit-hole did come to mind to those who dared set foot in it.
The ceiling had a few cracks here and there, making me very glad that there was one more floor above me, removing all chances of rain getting in, while the walls were bland and gray. I'd been carefully instructed not to change the wallpaper at all, as my landlady felt very much attached to its boring-ness, and I had reason to believe that it made my personality blander every second I looked at it, but I sucked it up and tried to incorporate my style in my own way.
The kitchen, with its grease-trap stove and dirty sink, was suitable for nothing except possibly setting take-away food on the counter tops. The oven would turn on when it wanted to, sometime in the middle of the night in which I'd make a mad dash to it and throw a bucket of water at it to calm the fire, and sometimes I'd have to eat frigid soup for dinner. Gross.
I did have a nice couch though, with a pretty, old-fashioned stone fire place directly in front of it that crackled brightly and made the drab room seem less-so.
I pulled my hat off of my head and set my bag carefully down on the ground as not to hurt my new friend, and pulled off my jacket, hanging it up in the closet. I turned to find that my bag was empty and began to freak out for a few milliseconds until I realized that the sharp Cat was already sitting in front of my pantry where I kept the tuna.
I shook my head and jogged over to the cupboard and opened it up, fetching a can of white tuna from the top shelf and the can opener from the cutlery drawer. I grabbed two shallow bowls at the last second as well as my carton of cream and set it all on the counter top, with the old Cat meowing from my ankle-area.
I didn't quite know what he wanted, but when he reached up his paw to bat at one of the handles of the drawers, I knew he wanted to see what I was doing. Why it didn't occur to me that he was way past his jumping days sooner, I'll never know, and I immediately bent down, held out my hand so I wouldn't scare him, and then gently hooked my arms around his thin frame and lifted him up to the counter.
He sniffed the can opener curiously, and looked at me expectantly, as if telling em to hurry up. This amused me for some reason and I nodded, picking up the can opener and attempting to free the tuna from its metal prison.
It took a good five minutes or so, and the elderly Cat was quite impatient, but finally, I was able to pry the lid off and get the contents into the bowl. The wizened Cat had been working up quite a fuss at the wait, and I couldn't blame him, he looked very hungry.
"You've still got a bit of fight left in you, haven't you?" I asked him rhetorically as he began to eat his dinner. I knew it was true, that he was still young at heart, and it made me proud to be able to see it. I watched him while he devoured his fish, as he didn't seem as tense when he did so, and his paws stopped shaking, a feature of him that almost made me cry the first time I saw it, but he never let his guard down, he was still on the edge and I knew he didn't trust me.
When he was done, he licked his chops and then looked to the carton of cream that I'd ignored and then to the second bowl, and then to me, as if trying to tell me to hurry along with it. I complied respectfully, and poured him a bowl of cream for dessert, which he happily lapped up.
The first time I'd seen him, I was a tad afraid that he could have fleas or worse, but when I looked at him perched on my counter-top, I noticed just how clean he really was. True, his coat was shabby and thin, but he seemed to take very good care of it, like he hadn't fully let himself go yet.
He finished up and yawned while I put the dish in the sink to wash later. He looked at the ground, and then to me expectantly and I quickly did as he silently asked. I again held my hand out so as not to scare him, and helped him to the ground.
He padded out of the kitchen at a somewhat slower pace than someone younger would have, and began to explore the living room. It was the only room I liked, with my big, brow, cushy couch and posters everywhere. He seemed to like the TV, because he jumped up onto the table that was supporting it and began to sniff the screen with interest, making me smile.
"Do you want to watch a movie?" I asked and he meowed positively, making me smile even wider and head over to my bookshelf of movies. "Here" I began, selecting a film from the many I had. "You like theater right? How about The Phantom of the Opera, it had Ramin Karimloo."
He meowed again, and for some reason, it almost made sense that he would know who Ramin was, as the elderly Cat had been sitting outside the Adelphi door where Love Never Dies was playing.
I popped it into the DVD player, and took a flying leap, landing on the couch, flopping down and facing the screen. The old Cat jumped up on the coffee table, and then onto the couch, staying a little bit away from me.
I understood that he didn't yet trust me, but it did hurt a little bit.
"Hey, Cat?" I asked as the beginning credits began to roll and he looked up at me. "How do you feel about the name Gus?"