Strange Life of a Cat

“Go away!”

Accompanying this scream was the pen holder from the desk next to the window. It was aimed at the cats.

However, the cats were too quick. The pen holder and all the pens inside fell with a thud.

The window was drawn shut and the steamy scene Zheng Tan wanted to watch was now hidden from his prying eyes.

Shaking his head, Zheng Tan turned to leave.

Tiger headed towards the window again and looked intently at a marker that fell from the pen holder. He fiddled with it with his paw then jumped around it like a kangaroo. Eventually he layed down and started playing with it like it was his new found toy.

Sheriff watched for a while, then decided to join Tiger.

Zheng Tan sighed. To these cats, the ‘action’ they saw inside earlier meant nothing. It wasn’t even comparable to a marker in terms of raising interest.

He lay down on the lawn basking in the morning sunlight, then jumped on to a tree and waited for Mama Jiao to come back. Though he had his security entrance card, he didn’t want to stay home when no one was there.

Spending a month outside had its effects. He couldn’t just lay idle at home anymore.

He was due at Mr.Guo’s pet shop this afternoon. Mr. Guo had learnt about his return yesterday and was coming to pick Zheng Tan up later today.

Zheng Tan’s absence had been grievously felt during the past month. The photo shoots were not going well at all. Mr. Guo was used to Zheng Tan’s efficiency. When the cats from the store stepped in, not only was he driven mad with frustration, his staff was losing their patience as well.

They finally understood how difficult it was to make films with animals.

It wasn’t enough to just bribe with food to get the animals to follow instruction. Any insignificant factor could ruin all their hard work. Mr. Guo had raised the standard for his ads and the cats in his store were just not up to par.

They had started on a high, which meant with Zheng Tan gone, Mr. Guo needed to spend much more time, energy and money to create an ad that was even presentable.

The good things was most of the ads were in the form of picture. The videos were abysmal and there was simply no point in wasting money trying to salvage them. Mr. Guo had told people that his ‘star’ had been taken home by its owners and he didn’t know when it would return.

Hearing that Zheng Tan was back, Mr. Guo wanted to get him to start working again right away but got held up.

Mama Jiao didn’t have classes that afternoon and decided take a half day off to bring Zheng Tan there herself. Mr. Guo said to bring Zheng Tan in early so he could get used to the place again and to give him a thorough checkup.

When the cat just got back, Mama Jiao felt that it looked and seemed normal. It was eating a bit more and very excited. Other than that, it seemed unchanged. It wasn’t wounded and its temperature was normal.

The cat had spent a very long time with Fang Shaokang, who never mentioned it getting ill. Mama Jiao didn’t feel it was necessary to take the cat to Mr. Guo’s. After all, a trip there meant work for the cat.

She heard of the difficulties Mr.Guo was facing. She wanted to help, but also wanted her cat to get some rest first. So she was trying to delay. She didn’t expect Mr. Guo to catch wind so soon.

It had been a while since Zheng Tan last been to the pet center. He didn’t see Li Yuanba nor Nougat. They had just gone off for a walk.

The checkup proved Zheng Tan to be healthy. Mama Jiao could now put her heart back in her stomach. She went with them to the studio to watch the photoshoot.

The staff welcomed Zheng Tan with such enthusiasm it was as if he was their savior. The past month had been torture. They used to think this black cat was simply a tad smarter than the rest. Now, they had learnt through bitter experience how wrong they were.

Mama Jiao beamed with pride as the staff around her praised her cat.

Today, they only did some simple stuff to get Zheng Tan accustomed to the process again. In the future he would come once every two weeks like usual. Mr. Guo would notify them if adjustments were needed.

Normally, ads didn’t need to be shot this frequently. However, Mr. Guo had his own plans. It didn’t matter to Zheng Tan. He didn’t have anything to do anyways and this gave him the opportunity to earn a few extra bucks.

Leaving the pet center, Mama Jiao took him to the University hospital.

The University Hospital was located near a residential quarter, which was home to some teachers and most of the hospital staff. Some students rented here too. The rent was high so the few students who lived there either came from wealthy families or were doing post graduate degrees.

At that moment, in room 302 of the residential building was Bai Yang, third year grad student in the school of management. He was furiously typing up a paper. After interning at a rigorous market research company, he had lots of data to process.

He wished to complete a few reports by the end of the term. After he graduated, these reports, if published, would form a portfolio for himself. It would show the world what he was capable of. He and his peers all tried their best.

As he was busy typing away, a cat jumped on his desk.

The cat had a yellow tail and yellow fur on its back. It had stripes but its belly was white. It seemed about 8 month pregnant.

The cat meowed. Bai Yang ignored it.

The cat moved to the edge of the table seeing that Bai Yang was not responding. It looked at the stuff on the table.

A pencil.

It raised its paw and with a flicker–

Bam!

The pencil fell off the table, its tip breaking.

The cat looked at the fallen pencil then back onto the desk top.

An eraser.

Off it went to join the pencil.

The eraser bounced on the ground. The cat focused again on the table.

There was half a cup of warm coffee still lying on the table.

The cat went to sniff it, then turned its attention to the computer after deciding it was not interested in coffee. It saw the clicker move around the screen and started its attempt to catch the moving ‘bug’.

Bai Yang shoved it away. “Go play by yourself.” He went back to his paper.

The cat wasn’t giving up that easily. It started walking on the keyboard and blocking the screen. Bai Yang carried if off the table. ” Go sleep in your bed.”

“Meow.”

The cat saw that Bai Yang was ignoring it again so it went to the other side of the table. It jumped back up. There was piggy bank on that side, next to it was a wooden pen holder. The two items had only a tiny distance in between. Instead of walking around the items, the cat decided to squeeze through, knocking the pen holder over in the process. It elegantly made its way towards Bai Yang.

There was a pen in the open notebook. The cat looked at it.

Sure enough, the pen was on the ground the next second.

Bai Yang finished with the excel spreadsheet he was working on. Just when he was planning to write down a few conclusions, he noticed his pen missing. Then he looked at the ground. There was his pen, pencil, eraser and some furry toys that got there somehow.

With a sigh, Bai Yang bent down to retrieve his pen.

The cat took its chance to start ‘combing’ the back of Bai Yang’s head.

“Are you done?!” Bai Yang was losing his temper.

“Meow.”

“Don’t you meow me!” Bai Yang rubbed his temples. He was regretting agreeing to catsit for Li Xiaoxi already.

This cat was Diudiu, Li Xiaoxi named it.

Diudiu was one of that cats that were adopted by students then abandoned again. When Li Xiaoxi found it, it was covered in soy milk and dust. It was extremely skinny and curled into a ball on the lawn. It was shivering in the wind. It ran off whenever it saw people.

It warmed up to Li Xiaoxi after she fed it a few times. Eventually, she brought it home.

Li Xiaoxi had helped a lot when Mama Jiao was in the hospital. Later, she helped as well when Mama Jiao went back for checkups.

Papa Jiao knew her mentor well and Mama Jiao liked her. They chatted a few times and Mama Jiao found out she adopted a stray cat. She had been over to see the cat a few times as well.

The cat was timid at first, but somehow, it had changed.

It broke cups, slashed bedsheets and caused general mayhem.

The cat was neutered and didn’t meow a lot. Even if the door was open, it stayed indoors, probably because it was scared of the outside world.

Diudiu was immensely curious at everything after getting used to the room. When Bai Yang was making coffee, it went to sniff the liquid. Though it didn’t lick it but its whiskers touched the coffee and it left fur floating in the cup.

Bai Yang couldn’t bring himself to drink the coffee anymore. What was worse was that the cat pushed the cup. If not for Bai Yang’s quick reflexes, the cup would surely have shattered.

Li Xiaoxi would chastise Bai Yang if he so much as broke a cup lid. The cat had ruined three cups in its short two weeks here. Li Xiaoxi didn’t say a word when the two chatted online. When the two got the chance to Skype, the cat had demanded ‘screen time’.

As for the cat’s scratching habits, it ignored the scratching post, but liked everything else. The curtains, the bedsheets, the sofa, the clothes and the jeans Bai Yang was wearing all had holes and scratch marks.

When he went to bed at night, he would wake up suddenly after feeling something heavy on his chest. It was easy to have nightmares when there was a weight on his chest. When Bai Yang woke up, he saw the fur ball snuggled on his chest.

Sometimes the cat got under the sheets. Not only did it do that, but if would run from the head of the bed to the end. It would jump around and around before it finally calmed down for bed.

What frustrated him the most was whenever he watched anything ‘X’ rated in the hopes of, well, ‘relieving’ himself, the cat would sit on his lap. How was he supposed to do anything with a cat on is lap.

Even if he could, he didn’t dare. The little idiot would scratch him for sure.

Apparently when cats got lonely, they would come over for some snuggle time. It sounded all sweet and cute, but in reality, Bai Yang was too busy to snuggle when the cat was lonely. Watching the cat cause all sorts of trouble in the hope of getting attention, Bai Yang had to suppress the urge to slap the cat. He had promised his girlfriend to look after it well.

She had said that Professor Jiao’s cat was sweet and understanding. It came to visit Mrs. Gu when she was in the hospital and dropped off and picked up the kids from school.

However, she didn’t know there was a thing called ‘other people’s cats’.