The cat bolted into the backyard when Wife cracked the screen door open to blow smoke up into the blue sky. We’d recently implemented a policy against marijuana indoors. The floors were shag carpet in every room. The smell of pot had taken up permanent residence in the fibers like an invasion of fleas.

“You let the fucking cat out again,” I said to Wife, and stood up off the couch. With each step toward her, my kidneys ached with dehydration. I’d had maybe a dozen beers the night before and no water or sleep to speak of. My eyes burned with the same fervor of the acid rising from my stomach and into my esophagus. “Did you see where he went?”

Wife puffed her cheeks, filled the air with more smoke. Once the cloud fell away, and her face was clear of haze, she used a black nail to clean the bowl of her pipe, tilting it on the edge and letting everything spill out onto the floor. Her eyes didn’t leave the rain of ash, even when she brought her lips to the mouthpiece and blew the last few flakes from the chamber.

“It’s an animal,” Wife said. It took me a full minute to realize she could even be talking about the tiny innocent kitten we’d found hiding in a bush at the park across the street. “It belongs outside with the birds and bugs and everything else with teeth.”

“He’s not an animal,” I said. What I didn’t say was he was the only living thing I knew for sure would never leave me behind. Before he died, my father had cats he didn’t know how to care for. Fleas were one issue. Another was his drinking and kicking them with his steel-toed boots. I learned to hide them in the closet under the stairs, on nights when I could feel his anger building slowly along with the pile of dead soldiers in the corner from his case of Coors. Even after my father was long gone, those little lives clung to me like flowering vines in need of water to keep from shriveling up in the heat. “He’s a cat,” I told Wife. “He needs people like us to take care of him.”

“Well no shit. That’s why he always comes back.”

“He doesn’t always come back. He’s never even been outside before now.”

“We found him outside.”

“You know what I mean.”

“All I’m saying is he’ll survive out there on his own two feet.”

“Not necessarily.”

“Some cats are smart as toddlers. Plus he has claws.”

“Claws aren’t enough. He needs us,” I said, and pushed past Wife out the screen door.

Our neighbor Noodle was out back sitting in a lawn chair, drinking IPAs in the sun. He shared the other half of our duplex; we all shared the yard. Our house was across the street from the Little State School. Poor college students had always lived here before we did. The yard was full of junk left behind along with the fervor of youth: Old grills and mini-fridges, long wooden tables for beer pong, red solo cups, condoms. You could hardly see the ground you were supposed to walk on through the mess of juvenescence.

We, ourselves, were only twenty three—Wife and me. But life was getting more serious now. Money, suddenly, was a very dire issue. We were no longer children moving through days and months and years without a care in the world or a plan for the future. We wanted to do more than simply survive, but it was hard to get ahead. The stress of constant failure had come in between us. Infidelity was involved, but it was nothing we couldn’t recover from. Our relationship was young, like we were still young. Moving in together seemed like a natural solution to all our problems—both romantic and economic—a two-for-one deal kind of a thing.

Maybe six months had passed since we’d moved into the duplex, but Noodle had lived here three years, since Landlord finally evicted the college kids with a grandfathered lease, because of some faceless liability. In the middle of the yard, Noodle had moved the junk out of the way, over the years, and laid pavers without sand so they were off-level on the hard-packed clay, where his chair and bright orange cooler of beer lived day and night. The other thing Noodle did was build a garden bed. Junk piled up on all sides of the bed like a wall to keep out small thieves. On the other side of the wall was swiss chard, carrots, butter lettuce, basil, tomatoes in cages, and mammoth sunflowers gaping their mouths at the sun.

Beyond the garden, bird seed littered the bare earth in patches between piles of junk. Each day, hundreds of birds made their way to Noodle’s little oasis. Sparrows, finches, waxwings, robins, doves, scrub jays—even hawks that hovered in the elm canopy and hunted them all down. Sometimes, when you opened the back door and stepped out into the light of day, the sensation of their fluttering wings brought to mind the feeling of angels drawn closer and closer to heaven. I passed out once on whippets, having stood up too fast off the couch before swinging the back door open, enjoying a head rush with my eyes closed and my head leaned back too far on my neck, picturing a beam of light drawing me up into the clouds with those birds and little women with white wings. It was the closest I’d ever been to experiencing hope.

 

 

“The cat went that-a-way,” Noodle said without looking at me, pointing to a pile of ten-inch blue PVC pipe in the corner of the yard. As I shut the screen door, four mourning doves scattered up into the trees, and when Noodle turned to watch them his hair fell over his face. “Ran into one of them long tubes with cobwebs. Took one of my little sparrows with him, too.”

“Little fucker,” I said.

“He’s gonna be hiding in there a while. He knows my wrath’s waiting for him on the outside,” Noodle said, and let out a laugh with something terribly bitter cocooned within, reaching one hand into his cooler. He held out a lukewarm beer and drew me over to him with a soft tilt of his head. “I’m thinking we might as well wait him out.”

“I guess I’ll have just one,” I said, though I’d downed three beers of my own shortly after waking up.

“That’s the spirit,” Noodle said. “Got one for your lady too if she wants to show herself.”

Noodle flashed me what was left of his teeth. He had an eye for Wife. She had that effect on people from The Neighborhood. Men often shouted things out the windows of their cars, or at least stared at her skinny ass through the tint of the glass. She had the kind of hard-won husk of beauty that grows out of a childhood with little money or joy. But I could hardly look at her now without thinking about Fat Fuck, the landlord from our old neighborhood. I’d caught him eating her pussy after the third month in a row we were short on rent, kneeling in worship at the edge of the bed we shared with her thin thighs suffocating his face. After I hit him in the back of the head with a wine bottle and Wife slipped into the shower to rinse off whatever had been shared between them, I leaned over and smelled the little crescent of fluid that had sunk into the sheets where Fat Fuck’s tongue had reached inside of her. I don’t know why. I thought it might teach me something. The smell. But it was exactly what you might expect. We’re all so filthy and full of gunk held at bay by simple circumstance—who can blame a person for trying to flush it all out?

“Wife’s not coming outside,” I said to Noodle, and set my beer down in a little pile of bird seed. The little balls and chunks of corn stuck to moisture beading on the can. “She just now got high. She’ll probably take a nap.”

“It’s morning,” Noodle said.

“We don’t sleep much at night these days.”

“You don’t have to explain to me. I know what you’re getting at. But that little thing,” Noodle’s eyes rolled toward the PVC pipes, where our little black cat lay hidden in the shadows. “You gotta keep your eyes open or he’ll get away from you.”

“We try to watch over him. He’s a sneaky guy.”

“He frightened all my beautiful birds,” Noodle went on, and gestured with both hands as if there was a single bird in the yard at that moment. I looked around at all the junk. The wind tossed an old rusted refrigerator’s door open and shut. The heads of the mammoth sunflowers bobbed and looked down upon us as though the million seeds would sprout little black pupils. “If it were my cat, he would be in deep shit, stealing someone else’s bird and—Christ—swallowing it whole. I love each and every one of my babies. Children is just a word. Everyone has to take care of something. That’s our job as human beings. You’re responsible for passing life on in whatever way you can.” He burped and fondled the beer-ballooned stomach that put wrinkles in his white shirt, tickled by the long, gray-blonde dreads that fell from his head and framed his blue eyes. “These birds keep me on my toes. The flowers and veggies too. This is my kingdom. I owe each one of these creatures my life. Even the raccoons and squirrels and rats and bullshit.”

“Raccoons?” I said. I’d never seen one. Not once in my life. I never knew they lived in The City. I imagined them in thick forests full of bears and people with guns.

“They only come out at night.” Noodle spoke with the arrogant nonchalance of a tenured professor. “If you flick on the spotlight, you can see their little black masks and hands.”

“Do they ever get into the garden?”

“No way, man. They’re after the seed. All these little creatures are after the seed. They go through 35 pounds a week, two big bags, sometimes even more. I throw it all over the yard, even where you can’t see it.”

“I can see it,” I said, and tapped the side of my beer with one finger, scattering the seed that had clung to the rim. Noodle watched it fly through the air like snow.

“Not all of it,” Noodle said. “All this junk’s like a habitat. It keeps the critters safe and makes them work for their food. None of this shit should be easy in life.” This time, when Noodle gestured with his hands, it seemed he was trying to capture the whole Neighborhood between his palms. “Work is what keeps you going. Alive. Our whole world’s like an ecosystem. I’m just doing my part to pass on the good will. That’s my job. You know what I’m saying?”

“There he is,” I said, pointing my finger toward the PVC pipe. Noodle’s eyes followed the folds of my knuckles. The cat’s little black head was poking out of a long blue tube right in the center of the pile. If I wasn’t searching for him, he could’ve watched us for hours without our noticing. He was silent. Cunning. But once he was far enough out of the tube for the light to strike his yellow eyes, the lanky silhouette he cast was clear as day. My little child. “He’s getting ready to make his move.”

“Here, kitty,” Noodle said, slurring. He picked up some of the birdseed and held it out toward my boy. It all fell through his fingers and danced on the pavers like hail before finally settling down. “What’s the little guy’s name?”

“He doesn’t have one,” I said. “We just call him cat.”

“That’s a shame,” Noodle said, but I thought he was wrong. To me, a name was something you either grew into or grew out of. It told the world who you would be before anyone even knew who you actually were. Think: Benjamin vs Chad. Hunter vs Sage. My feeling was always that a name should be an award earned later in life, like a trophy for finally figuring out what it meant to be you, or what your life was all about. My own name was like a box I’d outgrown so long ago it had split open and now belonged out in all the piles of trash our yard held. Though I also felt it was impossible to think of a single word with me for the definition besides fuck up. But that was actually two words.

I told Noodle what I was thinking.

“You’re onto something here,” he said, and fingered his grey mustache as though he was deep in thought. “I named my first kid Chester and I always knew he’d turn out a pussy. What a shame.” Noodle shook his head in disgust.

“You have kids?”

“Not anymore,” Noodle said. “Plus Chester changed his name. First and last.”

“Makes sense,” I said, and wondered where Noodle’s name came from. It wasn’t his brain—his noodle—and he wasn’t exactly skinny—stringy—either. But somehow it fit like a glove. Maybe it was the way his blue eyes moved in his head, wriggling along the lines of certainty he’d drawn out over so many years of living.

“Come to think of it, what’s even your name,” Noodle said to me. I guess we were on the same exact track in our minds. “I don’t think I’ve ever had the pleasure.”

“You know my name,” I said, and tapped my index finger on Noodle’s forehead like I might hear an echo, or at least a kind of knocking between my own ears. “It’s somewhere in there. I’m gonna go get some cat treats for this boy.” I downed my beer and met eyes with the cat, then stood up slowly, backing toward the door. He froze, and his pupils were like marbles rolling as they followed my every move. “That little guy can’t resist the shaking of a bag.”

“Who can?” Noodle said, and laughed, then brought an index finger to his right nostril, as though he was ready to snort a line with a flock of children at the Little State School.

 

 

When I walked inside, Wife was pouring herself a glass of Cab and microwaving a pepperoni hot pocket. The light from the microwave cast an ethereal glow over her face. Her eyes shone gray like clouds split open by sunlight. The moisture on her lips seemed to sizzle. Blood rushed not into my penis, but all the way down to the tips of my toes. She was the kind of woman who always found herself in light that made the best parts of her glow. I envied that about her. It seemed sometimes like whatever was good or nice about me was shoved way deep in a dark tube filled with cobwebs even longer than the blue one the cat was hiding inside of.

“Let me guess,” Wife said, eyes red from pot. “You got drunk with Noodle instead of finding your precious little cat.”

“The cat’s in a tube,” I said. “I’m gonna call him out with treats.”

“He doesn’t have any treats. We ran out last week.”

“Shit.”

“We have some canned tuna from Poor Groceries.”

“He doesn’t like fish. Only chicken.”

“Noodle has all those damn birds out in the yard. They’re basically his children or at least his pets. Can’t he, like, catch one and use it as bait?”

“That’s not the same as chicken.”

“So? Cats eat birds all the time.”

“It’s not that simple.”

“I guess they can fly. Noodle’s probably too old and slow to catch one. Or drunk.”

“No, like—Noodle loves those birds. He takes care of them. He would never harm a single one with a gun to his head. They’re not like stupid fat chickens. They’re his family.”

“You can’t take care of a bird. That’s a wild animal.”

“Not really. They trust him. That’s why they stick around.”

“You’re not your father, you know,” Wife said, just out of the blue, and did not meet my eyes. She stared into her wine, where I thought she might catch the reflection of her own pale face. She went on. “That cat’s not running away because—”

“That’s not what I’m saying.”

“What are you saying?”

“Noodle feeds his birds 35 pounds a week.”

“Of what?”

“Bird seed.”

“That’s more than I could eat.” Wife sipped her cab. “Fat little chickens, aren’t they?”

“Chicken…” I said, and a lightbulb flickered on somewhere inside of me. I let my fingers make fists and shoved them into the air above my head. “Oh shit. Chicken!”

“No one could eat that much chicken,” Wife said. “Much less a bunch of seeds.”

“No,” I said. “I finally found it! The cat’s name is Chicken.”

“Chicken…”

I drew a breath deep in my lungs. For the first time in a long time, I was certain about something that mattered—knew I could change the shape of a life for good. The cat’s name was Chicken. I knew what I knew. I didn’t need to explain myself to anyone, but I tried.

“The cat’s always scared,” I said, then turned away from Wife and busted through the screen door. Noodle stood on the other side of the yard above the PVC pipes. Chicken was dangling from his hand. “Noodle,” I said beaming. “You caught Chicken.” But as I walked closer to him I could see the blood coating his forearms, the long tracts dug into his skin from Chicken’s sharp claws. He held Chicken out before him and I could see his body was limp like produce pulled too early. His tail hung down toward the ground, and his pink tongue was loose in his mouth. I spun around and fell flat on my ass in the dirt, pulling my knees to my chest. The smell pouring from my pits suddenly told me I was shirtless. Through the screen door, I watched Wife pour another glass of wine. I couldn’t bring myself to turn around and meet Chicken’s blank eyes as he dangled from Noodle’s fingers.

“Noodle—Jesus, what the fuck!” I yelled using the deep, scary voice of a father. I didn’t know I could possibly sound so threatening. Wife ran up to the back door when she heard my big voice fill the yard. I shut my eyes and a flurry of my own father’s fists jabbed out from some memory and drove themselves hard into my closed lids. It was a feeling in my stomach then like if you poured molten lead over my organs and cast them in a hard, cold shell to be displayed to strangers seeking some beautiful work of art, but finding only disappointment. “Noodle. Fuck. What happened to Chicken?”

“Who’s Chicken?”

“The cat.”

“This guy? Well—” Noodle paused. I turned over my shoulder and tried to meet his bloodshot eyes but they wouldn’t stop moving in his head. “He’s got claws. That’s what happened. To keep it plain and simple.”

“So—you just, you killed him? You killed my fucking cat Noodle? Are you crazy?”

“Call the police,” Wife shouted from inside, and laughed.

It was no secret Wife could be cruel. Even so, there was no question we would live and one day die together. What we had wasn’t special. It wasn’t entirely practical, either, aside from the money we saved on rent by living together. We weren’t the type of people to consider our lives of any value. But still, we needed each other deeply. Like, for example—shortly after Fat Fuck wandered his way to the hospital down the road, bleeding profusely from where the wine bottle had hit him, I tried to write a note to Wife with a Sharpie on the cardboard left over from a six pack, which was the only paper we could afford. It seemed right that I should tell her what she meant to me at that moment. But the words in my mind spun around and around and turned to static, so as best I could, I drew a picture of myself in a raincoat on a bright, sunny day filled with blooming flowers and animals frolicking. Wife, I guess, was that dark coat.

“Police, police!” Wife said again, cupping one hand around the edge of her mouth. “We’re harboring a murderer over here!”

“I didn’t kill anyone,” Noodle said without flinching. “He brought this life upon himself.”

“Life…what life?” I said, and Noodle took his eyes away from Wife. “He’s dead.”

“I don’t need any cats in my yard,” Noodle said. “I’ve spent years building a life for myself and these birds, digging out of all this junk. Your cat put all my babies in imminent danger. Look what he did to my fucking arms!” He held out his arms with care as though they held self-inflicted wounds reflected in a mirror. “He’s a little hunter, this guy. He would torment all my loves if I’d let him, and then eat them. I know all these fucking birds by name. They need me. Unlike you and this motherfucking cocksucking cat.”

When I saw Noodle was about to toss Chicken out into the junk, I turned away from him again in time to only hear the sound of Chicken’s limp body rattling the scrap metal. Tears rimmed my eyes. Wife was still framed by the screen door. She was smiling. Her bony hip was pushed out sideways. The edge of her glass of Cab was pressed into the dimple on her chin. When I looked close, I could see the outline of her dark nipples through her wife beater. I couldn’t imagine what was on her mind. But when I breathed in I could smell the smell of the stain on our sheets left over from whatever was between her and Fat Fuck. There was no way my saliva and her cum smelled the same when mixed together as theirs, no way me and Fat Fuck both sent the same kinds of things spilling out of a woman like Wife. Fat fuck’s youthful vigor was long gone. He was bald. He must’ve been forty. Plus he was rich—an owner of land, a shepherd of tenants—and couldn’t possibly understand the hurt that had taken up residence in Wife’s heart, over the years, couldn’t possibly know how to make her feel something. Even if Wife and me were dead broke, I couldn’t accept that the stroke of his tongue was powerful enough to absolve her of the usual suffering of the lower class. But I swear, to my nose, there was no difference in the smell of that stain. None. Maybe we were all the same, after everything. All that gunk…I turned back toward Noodle. Blood was spilling from his forearms. He was swimming through the junk, trying to dig Chicken out of the mess left over from prior tenants—years of mess, so many years some of the residents who once owned the junk must have died by then—from overdose or something worse.

“I’m sorry, man, I’m sorry,” Noodle said, his eyes clear now. “I’m not drunk…I shouldn’t have done that. I’m no good with pain no more. I’ve had too much. I just—react sometimes.”

“Noodle,” I said. “Fuck. Noodle.”

“My name’s not Noodle.” Noodle shook his head. He had his palms pressed together against his chest like he was about to dive into something deep—the junk, or at least a tight string of words that would matter in retrospect. I followed his eyes around the yard, the garden. Not a bird in sight. Not even a distant chirp. But they weren’t scared off by Chicken. I knew that now. Especially since Noodle had murdered him. They saw what Noodle’s hands could do and had no choice but to run for their lives.

“I’m not Noodle,” Noodle said, his arms buried between two black microwaves, searching for Chicken beneath it all. “I’m Christopher.” Without breathing, he closed his eyes and shook his head hard. “Christopher would never do something like this. He’s a good boy. He loves his mother. He brings her ice cream after school. He knows her favorite flavors. He massages her feet with Vaseline. And he tucks in his little sister every night before bed. Every night. And when Dale gets home from work, Christopher takes what Dale gives him and never says a word.” Noodle’s teeth chattered. “Chrisopher’s mother doesn’t know what Dale does. His mother loves Dale. Christopher loves his mother. He wants to take care of her.” Noodle stuttered and sent a short breath breaking through his teeth. My spine felt cold like a sharp tongue of wind had run along the bone. Whoever this Christopher was, he was as much to blame as Noodle for my poor dead cat.

“Noodle,” I said. “You killed Chicken, you fuck.”

“Christopher,” Noodle said, and the pain in his face pierced a hole inside of me I never knew was there. The letters that, when drawn together, made the shape of his name took the form, between my ears, of a boy—a small child with fluttering white wings, rising toward golden clouds where something small might burrow into the mist and hide from whatever was watching from the shadows, ready to pounce.

“My name is Christopher,” Noodle said, and I believed him.