I began to back away from him, I know this mood, but he seized me in strong hands, gripped me to his side like a vice. He locked the door, thunk, thunk, thunk, then took me to the kitchen, the world swooping tipsily as he staggered. He reached up to a high cupboard and took something from it. The knife was broad and shining. I could hear the slight snick as the blade cut air. I fought hard, now, trying to reach him with my claws and teeth.

He pinched the fur on the scruff of my neck, pulled it up. The knife made a soft pretty sound as it sawed through. The air was full of dark scatters of my silky coat. He sneezed but went on, cutting chunks of fur from my neck, my back, the tip of my tail. Somehow he was holding me and the knife and grabbing handfuls of fur all at once. He gets focused when he’s drunk.

Then everything stopped. The arm holding me went rigid. Ted’s face froze and his eyes were gone. I slipped from his grip, carefully avoiding the blade where it hovered, an inch from my spine. I left him standing in the kitchen like a statue, knife in his clenched fist. Soft tufts of fur floated on the air.

I crept away from him. The cord followed me, dirty yellow now and thin like an old shoelace.

The air is cold on the shorn patches in my coat. I can forgive his attacks on my dignity, on my feelings. The LORD would want me to. But there are limits. He should not have messed with my looks. I am stinking, stinking mad. Forgive me, LORD, but he is just a selfish piece of ess aitch eye tee. Ted must learn that his actions have consequences.

I go to the living room and jump up on the bookshelf. I push the bottle of bourbon off. It smashes on the floor in thousands of beautiful shards. The stink is strong as gas. My eyes water. For a moment it reminds me uncomfortably of something, some dream I had, maybe, about being locked up in a dark place, and a murderer was pouring acid onto me … My tail switches—whether it was a dream or a TV show, the memory makes me feel bad.