Molly's Gaze

When my mother began renting the house that we currently live in, a stray cat adopted us. She was a skittish little thing when she first found us, and terribly sick, too--for the first few months she was with us, her eyes were constantly filled with gunk and puss. We figured that someone had attempted to drown her in the creek by our house. We took very good care of her, though, and eventually, her eyes cleared up, and she seemed to trust and love us.

If you met her today, you would have never guessed how sick and scrawny she was when we first saw her. She has the most gorgeous amber eyes that glow like wise little lamps in the light, and she has long, white whiskers sprouting from her dainty little snout. Her sleek, tabby coat is a beautiful and bright shade of orange. We call her Molly.

Molly has a few strange habits, much like many other cats around the world do. Her purr, for example, is loud and squeaky. You can hear her happiness from across the room. She has a thing for shoes, too. When my mother has guests over, Molly will roll around on the person's shoes, sometimes licking the soles while she sniffs at them. Oh, and she really seems to hate the rug that lays in the middle of our livingroom floor. It's a huge and gaudy floral thing, and I really don't blame Molly for hating it and wanting to shred it to bits with her tiny little claws. And of course, as I'm sure many other cats do, she has this strange way of staring of into space.

When Molly finds something to stare at, I very seldom find what it is she's looking for. Sometimes it's a ladybug creeping along a window pane. Molly loves to look at pretty things like ladybugs. But there are so many times that I've seen her concentrate--with all of her might--on something unseen. More often than not, this will happen in my living room. There are a few times that I've witnessed Molly become startled by whatever it is that she had locked eyes with, expressed by the bushing of her tail and the arching of her back.

Some people believe that cats have access to senses that humans cannot feel. Did you know that?

I suppose the reason for me writing right now is because of something I've recently taken into consideration.

Rumors about my house used to circulate my small town. Some gossipy old ladies believed that the previous owners used to hold cult gatherings in the nights. When ever someone would try to bring those old stories up to me, I would blow them off with a roll of my eyes and insist that the women that started that rumor were old and senile, and that nothing they said should be taken seriously.

Then this morning while I was vacuuming, I noticed my cat sitting at the foot of my staircase, her tail wrapped around her front paws. Normally when she hears the vacuum, she takes shelter under a bed from the noise, so I was a little puzzled when she sat perfectly still while the monsterous machine gobbled the dust and crumbs from my livingroom rug. It took me a second to notice that she was doing it again. The staring.

I never explained why my mother bought that ugly rug in the first place, did I? Well, when we first moved here, there was an enormous stain that wouldn't come up from the copper-colored carpet.