The driver left. Two minutes later, she finally had the door open. Too many locks.
Lucky jumped onto the sofa at the smell of food, bracing on its forelegs, eyes following her. Right. She'd forgotten its breakfast.
A live fish, palm-sized, from the inlet in her space. A few sausages. She set the plate by her feet. Lucky bit into the fish's belly and ate eagerly, organs and all.
The sausages went in a few bites. It licked the plate clean, jumped up, and rubbed against her arm. She'd finished too. A stroke over its head.
Equipment delivery at three p.m. Time to buy gardening supplies first. Black hoodie on. Lucky jumped onto her shoulder and slipped into the hood.
Out of the elevator, a weather alert appeared on her phone. Heavy rain in B City too. She called a cab and crouched beside the road to wait.
She opened the headlines. No celebrity scandals now. Weather warnings from across the country. Country M's deep freeze.
The first story forecast nationwide heavy rain. The comments scoffed. Who were these so-called experts?
Expert had practically become an insult online. Still, some believed it. They had relatives with connections at the weather bureau, they said. The warning was real.
More apocalypse theories. This time, no bans. Perhaps people were starting to notice.
Lucky sprawled over her head, forelegs braced, looking around. Passing girls kept glancing at it.
Such a cute white cat. They wanted to pet it.
Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.
Her cab arrived. Plate checked, in she got. Pet store first.
Two poodles rushed her as she entered, paws on her legs, asking for attention. Lucky dropped to the floor, bared its teeth, and roared.
No meow. A low, rough rumble, like an engine turning over. The poodles retreated, flattening themselves against the floor.
She'd never kept a pet. She still knew cats weren't supposed to sound like that.
"Lucky. Come back." It rubbed against her feet, perfectly docile again. A boy in an apron came down the spiral stairs.
He glanced at the white animal in her arms. "Bath?"
"No. I need supplies."
He took her to the shelves at the back. "Samples. You can put it down, see which food it likes."
A dozen or so bowls. Lucky ignored the cat food and went straight to the dried fish and bones. Fish first. Bones next.
Crunch after crunch. The boy looked embarrassed. He crouched and set their bestseller in front of it.
Emma watched, then lifted Lucky toward him. "Could you check? I think something's wrong with my cat's throat."
He reached for its mouth. Another growl. He stopped. She opened the jaws herself.
Those teeth made him frown. Now he took a proper look. "Doesn't seem like a cat. More like..."
A thought, then doubt. Wrong color. Surely he was imagining things. A large predator's cub? Here in B City?
"Like what?" She waited for him to finish.
He half laughed. "One of Country M's jaguars. But yours has no spots. Wrong color too. I'm kidding. Ha."
A bad throat seemed more likely to him.
She kept her face calm and tucked Lucky back into her hood. It had spots. Faint, hard-to-see spots. Maybe because it was young.
Cat food was out, then. She pressed a hand to her forehead. What had she brought back? She'd only just sorted out her own endless pork supply.
"Lots of litter. Bones and dried fish too." Useful for her as well as Lucky.
Limited stock here. But his family had a factory. He gave her the address. Several other pet-supply factories stood alongside it.
She took a cab straight to a B City rental company. A large truck, then off to the factory.
Lucky sat quietly beside her, turning to look now and then. She took out a sausage and let it eat on its own.
It would grow. She bought dozens of pet dryers in several sizes, all sized for large dogs.
Litter by the metric ton. Ten-odd truckloads of it. Ten-odd more of dried fish and bones. Several factories' stockrooms emptied out.
Noon before she finished. She took out a meal and ate in the cab.
Lucky had another live fish and a few sausages.