Elvis has Left the Building...

I'm going to be gone for a while. Probably for a few weeks. I just don't feel like I can write at this moment. Whenever I stay late to post a new entry, I feel guilty that I should be doing something else, something more important. And whenever I leave work on time to socialize or do whatever, I feel guilty because I haven't posted. The war of priorities rages on.

But right now, I do have something more important to do. My cat, Elvis, aka Demon Spawn from Hell, has disappeared and I'm having a really hard time holding it together.

I'm not sure when he got out of the apartment. He's always had a bit of the wanderlust, but I've always seen him sneak out the door and bolt down the hallway. It could have been Friday morning, when I left in a rush because I was late for work as usual. I'm laying good money that it was Friday night, when I came home from a rather crappy night out. The acquaintances I had been out with stranded me at the bar we'd been at, and the resulting phone call to get said acquaintances to pick me up and take me back to my car had left me quite distraught. (Understatement of the year. I was a freaking nut case. The abandonment issue and my friend's insistence that I just get my car in the morning had unsurfaced demons long thought dead and buried, and I was a sobbing mess by the time I hit my neighborhood.) Needless to say, I didn't open the door with the usual full body block I usually employ to keep my feline flatmate from doing laps between the fire doors.

By the time I got inside and finally calmed down, I realized that I hadn't been greeted with the the whiny yowl that loosely translates as, "WHERE THE HELL HAVE YOU BEEN? DIDN'T YOU REALIZE MY FOOD BOWL IS ALMOST EMPTY?" I checked in all his usual hiding places, becoming more panicked with each unsuccessful attempt at finding him.

I spent most of Saturday handling this crisis in my usual fashion: sit on the couch in paralytic fear and cry uncontrollably. Not an effective method, I know, but.... After some sympathetic phone calls from Roger Mexico and Rosencrantz, I finally sprang in to action and did a little investigative work. No one had seen him. I walked the halls of the apartment building, as well as the parking lot and the surrounding neighborhood. Nothing.

The signs go up tonight.

Needless to say, I've not slept very well for the past few nights. All of my dreams involved me finding him (and making me think that maybe this was reality, and he'd never been gone in the first place) or not finding him ever. Strange dreams of me walking the streets shaking a can of Pounce and a catnip toy.

I think I've run through every possibilty in my head. I open my door and there he is. I walk out to the parking lot, and find him huddled under someone's car. I get a phone call and he's been living with the hippies up the street all this time. I find him after a car has hit him. Or after one of the neighborhood outdoor cats has beaten the living shit out of him. The hippies up the street decide they want to keep him and don't call me. I call the SPCA, and there he is, pissed as hell. I call the SPCA, and they realize they just put him down. He's been in the apartment all this time, and I find him a few days later, dead in the back of a closet.

I hate the way my mind works.

Maybe it's crazy for me to get this worked up over a cat. No, that statement's completely insane. How can I not be this worked up? This was my first real pet (goldfish don't count). I remember going to pick him out at Scalphunter's house and taking him home in a K-Swiss shoebox. I remember my parents "helping" with name ideas. (Mom suggested nice happy names like Blackie, Inky, and Midnight. Dad suggested Dumb Ass since that would be what I would inevitably call him.) I remember the night he broke his leg and Game Night was called so we could find a vet that was open at 1:00 am. I remember the point when we though he was part hamster since he chewed up every piece of cardboard in the apartment. His first experience with carpeting after growing up in a hardwood floor apartment. His first introduction to snow. His weird addiction to the scent of patchouli. (An acquaintance came over for Game Night one night wearing patchouli oil. Elvis licked all the patchouli off his arm, bit him, and ran away. My cat has always been an excellent judge of men.) How he would play fetch, but only when I was trying to work on something really important and he wasn't the center of attention. How, when I was taking care of a friend's unfixed female, he would hide from her every time she went into heat. How he seemed to know when I needed extra attention, and would curl up with me whenever I was suffering from cramps or upset about a breakup. How he liked to play in the bathtub, then headbutt me at 3:00 am with a very wet cold head.

I miss my kitty. My apartment has been very quiet for the past few days. Too quiet. And looking at the empty food dish and unused cat toys hasn't helped.

Come home, Elvis. I won't complain about you coughing up hairballs late at night or shedding all over everything. I"ve got cans of Sliced Beef and Gravy (your favorite!) waiting for you, as well as some fresh catnip. I'll never make you eat that awful 9 Lives Turkey flavor again. I won't nudge you off the couch when you're blocking the TV. I'll clean the litterbox every day. I won't laugh at you for lacking opposable thumbs anymore. Whatever you want.

I seem to sleep better when I've got a cold wet kitty head thudding into my shoulder at late hours.