Mommy Kitty

Where she had come from, no one ever knew. None asked, and she talked very little about her background. One day, she had suddenly appeared, staying first at one home and then another. She took from one food bowl and then another. Most of the creatures, all pets of men, didn’t care. They had more than enough. One small nondescript tabby cat made no difference to them. Occasionally, one of the dogs could be heard barking as they chased her away, but she would be back. When they weren’t looking, of course.

But it was different with Buttons. She made it very clear that an interloper would not be tolerated. Buttons was even smaller than the cat, and possibly younger. The small Scottie still had her baby teeth, but she never hesitated to use them as everyone knew. Particularly Sally, whom Buttons had just met. They had become very close friends very quickly and fought long and furious battles, only now and then actually nipping one another. Their teeth were very sharp, as puppies’ teeth are. So care was the word of the day. Have fun. Lots of it. Rough and tumble, but no hurting.

Buttons did not include the cat among her friends. In a short time, everyone else would call her Mommy Kitty, for obvious reasons. She was always pregnant. Buttons didn’t care about the situation at all. Something was wrong, but she couldn’t tell what it was. Maybe just a dog-versus-cat kind—of thing. She didn’t know, and was always too busy to figure it out. Nonetheless, the black Scottie clearly remembered the first day. Too many birds and then the cat.

Crispin Chatterbox inquisitively cocked his head to one side for about the tenth time in the last thirty seconds, thinking to himself, “Well, here we go again.”

Crispin was like all grackles—nosy, noisy, and generally disliked. He was of less-than-normal size and always on the move. He impatiently hopped from one foot to the other, fretfully waiting for the action below to come to some fruition.

The object of his dancing stare lay roughly five and one half feet below him. A remarkable object it was, perched as it was on the rounded rear end of a small black dog furiously digging in the soft, red dirt of a beautifully organized garden.

Like a black, twisted worm, it bounced to and fro, carving crazy pirouettes in the air as dirt flew from between the dog’s hind legs. Small woofing noises were emitted at regular intervals, puffing out in jets of dirt which hung in the air about the rapidly enlarging hole.

A haughty crackling comment at Crispin’s side abruptly interrupted the grackle’s watchfulness and almost caused him to almost stop his dance in midair.

“I see that Button Benttail is at it again. Really, I don’t see what is so interesting about the silly activities of a mud-covered ground mutt. After all, it’s only bound to get her into more trouble.”

Crispin had immediately jerked around to face his unwelcome guest, who was, as expected, none other than that miserable, but very large, J. Wellington Blackbird. JW (as he insisted on being addressed) was of southern descent, born on a large plantation situated on a tributary of the mighty Mississippi River, and ready, willing and able, as they say, to enlarge on any topic whether his input was requested or not. Blackie (as most birds called him behind his back) lifted his left wing and preened himself, stylishly lifting one foot as he did so. Given to unwelcome snide comments about almost everything he surveyed, Blackie raised one eyebrow and looked down his nose at Crispin.

“Well, my little friend,” and he curled his bill just the slightest, “what you see in the Benttail, I’ll never know.”

Crispin’s small voice cracked as he angrily rose to his friend’s defense. Quite literally because it was necessary for Crispin to fan his wings and repeatedly hop into the air to be at eyelevel with Blackie.

“You don’t understand. What Buttons is doing is very important.”

Of course, Crispin had no idea what Buttons was doing, or why, or for what purpose. But being a true friend, it made no difference. All that was important was that if Button wanted to do it, then it was fine with Crispin. No friend to the nasty Blackie, Crispin would have come to Buttons’s defense no matter what.

Blackie bent down, twisting his head to fix Crispin with one lofty and elevated eyebrow above a startlingly black eye.

“Well,” he snorted.

Crispin fanned his wings even more rapidly. How he hated that arrogant snort.

“Well,” came the snort again. “Just what is she doing?”

Blackie raised one claw and carefully scratched his beak, only partially hiding his smile which twisted and curled his lip. This, Blackie knew, would agitate Crispin even more.

The deliberate and silent gibe went home, as Blackie had anticipated. Crispin hopped backwards on the fence, momentarily seeking an avenue of escape, then straightened. He wouldn’t give Blackie the satisfaction of flying away. And, he certainly wouldn’t leave his friend who maintained her vigorous assault on the dirt.

“She . . . she was going to . . .” He didn’t finish his explanation for another voice broke in.

“Hey, Cris.” It was the furry voice of Bonnie Cottontail coming from beneath a small and heavily laden rose bush. “How long is she going to take?”

There was hardly a pause, and another voice added, “And who’s that gosh-awful big, black bird?”

Blackie preened himself once again, and ever so slightly bent downward to gaze upon the small rabbits who sat lazily, scratching themselves in the early morning sun. He smiled to himself, the warmth of their awe slowly spreading through his body.

“Hurumph, well-spoken for small bunnies,” he thought to himself.

Another voice broke in. High-pitched and squeaky, it was whispered in a thunderous undertone to the small bunnies gathered about him. “Nuts, he ain’t all that big, less’n you take in the big words, the big voice, and the big opinion he has of himself. I’ve seen grackles almost that size.”

Now, it was JW’s turn to hop and fume in midair. Glaring at the rat-tailed squirrel, he fumed, “Don’t you think it’s a bit early for the runtiest runt of squirrels to be out of his bed, my tiniest friend, Ignatius?”

“Well, you know more about beds than most of us, seeing as how you rob ’em often enough.” Iggy, as he preferred to be called, was always ready for a good fight, so long as it didn’t come to any rough stuff. After all, he really wasn’t built for it, being rather stringy and small.

JW was about to launch another verbal thrust when he was interrupted. Several things happened at the same time. Crispin took quickly to the air, the bunny rabbits turned tail and disappeared, as did Iggy who headed for the nearest tree, and JW, turning, was face to face with a long, lean cat whose tail was slowly whipping back and forth. The cat lay crouched scant inches from JW.

The large blackbird knew he had been negligent, but still he squawked, “Drat, you, Crispin, it’s your fault. Your fault, you know.” JW knew very well it was his own fault. No bird allowed any cat within several feet, for as fast as he could take to the air, the cat would be upon him before he could reach safety. JW began to inch backwards, but came up against the corner fence post which served only to further hinder any possible escape. The cat smoothly followed, licking its thin lips.

JW was large, but the cat was within a foot now, and was quite obviously enjoying itself. Mealtime was at hand, and this particular morsel would go down with even greater satisfaction than most. JW’s snide comments had often been directed at the cat and now was payoff time.

The cat’s belly touched the top rail of the fence in anticipation of its lethal leap, when Buttons burst from her hole on the outside of the fence. She had been watching the action as she made the hole just big enough for her to escape the fenced yard. As she rose from the hole, she barked furiously, leaping up against the fence, her stout, but small, body causing the fence to sway ever so slightly.