Sable's Escape

A woman who transforms to a cat at night. Enjoy!

I haven’t told my husband what I am, and that’s funny because I’m not a certain what it is. The cat is me. I am me. I am me, human, and a cat. The two co-exist in my world like chocolate milk. They are not separate things. My soul resides in both forms. That I am sure of, as sure as my name is Sadie Tallow.

 

The sheets are warm but there’s a damp spot under my thigh that I failed to avoid. We’d make love on his side next time. Grant’s muscular arm was over my shoulder and it slid away as I turned towards the edge and escaped from him in one graceful move. My feet touched the cool hardwoods as I sat up. Grant groaned and rolled over, snoring again. I grinned in the darkness.

 

I knew the layout of my own two-bedroom house like a blind woman. This is the routine. I went to the kitchen and pushed up the window over the sink. A slight breeze blew the thin curtains. Fall was rustling leaves outside, but hadn’t done a good job of chasing summer away yet. The September night was beautiful.

 

I pulled my night shirt over my head and dumped it onto the floor. I kicked it up and stuffed it into the utility drawer that was half-full of junk including bills and crap; Grant would never go in there.

 

The sliding glass door was off the kitchen and I carefully undid the latch and slid outside. Now this part always scared me. Going into the backyard stark naked always felt somewhat uncomfortable.

 

Still here I was on the deck. The cool wind blew over my skin and tightened it into gooseflesh. My long blonde hair wisped about my face. Then the tingle grew to the point my extremities grew weak. I stumbled into the center of the deck away from the furniture so I didn‘t hurt myself during the transformation. 

 

I could always control it until I went onto the deck on hands and knees, as if the act was a surrender of some sort. The moon shown through an old oak in the backyard Grant and I planted together. I slumped down onto the cold wood of the deck. I didn’t feel the impact, as if skin and guts were spilt out of a pitcher, no connected bones within the bag of fleshy pale skin and hair.

 

I imagine if anyone saw me transform, they would be horrified. Yet the very act itself tickles, doesn’t hurt.

 

My vision went red, then to black. The shrinking pile of flesh grows midnight black fur, and it feels like wheat grass sprouting from every pore. The bones reform like a child building a puzzle under my skin. Ears sprout and elongate. My vision comes back in contrasting shades of grey. A moment later I look up at the same moon and see it a whole new way. I smell the pine and the cedar deck woods. I hear an aimless lonely yowl down the alley. The call is for me no doubt. I strut in circles, getting my cat balance and composure.

 

I have done this for fourteen years and it seems normal to me now. Yet it wasn’t normal, because Grant knew nothing of this talent or life, and I’m deathly afraid to tell him. Our whole relationship was so comfortable, even in its newness. Our love was a human spark he had lit in me that spread so quickly! We were married in months, and he moved into my place.

 

Yet now at the edge of the deck, in my cat form, there was a whole life I owned that Grant wasn’t a part of. Even worse he was so separate from it her feelings for him were extinguished with the change in her body. The physiological changes from being a human to a cat were evident in more than love, they transcended all of her actions. It made it easier though. She could be her wild self without reserves. Which in the wild the uninhibited instinctual nature was a necessity to her cat survival, right?

 

I pad out off the deck in two bounds. Cross the lawn in a black shadowy streak. I stop briefly at the oak and smell its trunk. The potent, but familiar tasty scent of another stray was undeniably marked; a familiar male owned by one of the neighbors. He was a big orange tabby suitably named  Rusty.

 

I went to it slipping through a broken slat in the fence. Once Grant fixed it I’d have to scale the fence, which wasn’t easy on the nails, but a doable six feet. The unfamiliar male yowled again. The sound raked my body with frisky eagerness. It was unfixed desire for fun down by the lake that was only several blocks away. Rusty knew the way well. I let out my own throaty call.

 

The second driveway down he sat in the shadow of a large green trash receptacle on wheels. There he was like a proud tiger, orange stripes and all. Funny enough I think I fed him in the garage two mornings ago in my human form and commented on his appetite. Tonight he’d surely make up the favor, but I’d make him work for it. I let out a hiss, than ran west towards a long greenbelt that had a creek running through it.

 

I knew he was in pursuit. I could feel him behind me. I cut through taller grasses that would hide me from anything unexpected. When I broke out of the field on the opposite side I saw the creek, and a bridge that spanned across it.

 

I darted under the bridge. It was so dark and cold. A pack of coyotes howled in not so far distance and I felt some hairs on my tail stand on end. My big tabby counterpart padded past me, playfully rubbing against my side and I felt a bit bold again about going to the lake. These excursions didn’t come without danger.

 

I smelt him. He announced his presence with a low growl. I answered with a kittenish mew. He bounded down the side of the creek into the darkness with two strong leaps. I followed, the second leap plummeting my spry body into the deepest shadows of the creek that led to the lakeside.

Author's Note

Just a sample of my work, and the stuff that's coming down the pike. I love critique reviews and I reciprocate. If you have ideas on what I can do or a direction for this piece I'm all ears!

Reviews

[lisa m.]

Your voice is amazing. The power of description within your story is spot on. Please Keep Going...there are so many paranormal avenues you could take. I would hate to suggest any, as I'm sure your ideas will be far more in tune with how the story line should progress. I'll be looking for the rest! Great Work!!

[Joyrider]

Good job tiger. The narration is intriguing.looking forward for the rest of it