We walked over from the hippie house, Peter in a box. He was only a couple of months old, but the kids who lived there wanted to get the kittens into good homes, and Suze begged them not to give him away yet.
“Do you think she’ll say yes?” Suze asked.
I really didn’t think she would. Even my grandmother had limits to the nice things she’d do for other people, and she already had a cat, a gray mouser who presented us with dead or half-living rodents weekly. “I don’t know,” I said.
Suze got tears in her eyes. “But he’s so cute and he loves me!”
“He does.”
We found Beryl in the studio, as ever, where she was bent over her table drawing the intricate details of a dragonfly wing. “Hello, girls,” she said, straightening. “What have we here?”
Suze carried the box over. “This is Peter”—a name she took from Anne Frank’s diary. “I love him so much and my dad won’t let me keep any kind of animal, and maybe I wouldn’t want a kitten around him anyway.”
“Oh, baby.” Beryl set aside her pencil and gave Peter her full attention. She lifted him from the box and settled him on her shoulder. “He’s a cutie pie, isn’t he?” Peter lifted a paw and gently touched her lips, purring. She stroked his tummy. “You want me to adopt him, is that it?”
“Not exactly,” Suze said. “I want him to be my cat, but he has to live here. I’ll buy his food and get him fixed and all that.”
I leaned on the table, lacing Peter’s tail through my fingers. It twitched in my hand. I wanted the cat to stay, but it felt like Suze always got the best of Beryl these days. If I’d asked her to keep a kitten for me, would she have done it? I didn’t think she would have.
But then, my father wasn’t whipping me with a belt for minor infractions, either. Or any infraction for that matter. Maybe, I thought, kissing Peter’s tiny nose, I should get over myself.
Suze waited. You could see on her face that she didn’t think it would work, but then Beryl said, “I don’t mind. He can live here and be your cat.”
Suze burst into tears, crying so hard she had to put her face down on her hands on the table. Beryl set Peter down and he frolicked right over and dived into Suze’s hair. She picked him up, laughing and crying at once, and kissed him all over his face. He set his paws on either side of her chin and licked her tears.
Beryl came out from behind the table and nudged Suze into a hug. “It’s all right, sweetie. Everything is going to be okay.”
A swell of unspeakable jealousy rose in my chest, warring with my wish to be empathetic. I loved Suze, and I hated that her life was so hard, but Amma was mine, and now Suze was taking her. It wasn’t fair.
But at that moment Peter leaped on my hand, wrapping his paws around my arm and digging his tiny sharp claws into my skin, then thumping his back feet against me. It made me laugh. I picked him up and cuddled him, kissing his soft kitten self, happy that he would live here now and be safe and I could see him all the time.
Suze lifted her head and wiped her face. Even then, I knew she wasn’t crying over her cat.
In the modern day, Yul Brynner trills, and Jasmine laughs. I want to cry over both of those lonely girls, for everything they were about to lose.
THEN
MAYBE I’M AMAZED
October 12, 19—
Dear Suze,
The diary came today, so fast! I really liked reading your story, but I hate that your dad beat you with a switch. That’s not okay! I think that qualifies as child abuse.
So is Joel cute? Is he like a boyfriend or just a friend who is a boy?
I started my comic book project. Ms. Alexander is helping me plan it and make a storyboard. I made two friends in art class, and they’re coming over to swim on Friday night. My mom loves it when I have people over so she can do her big entertainment thing and make popcorn and buy root beer and play music over her precious sound system.
Honestly, I don’t always know if people like me for me or if they think it’s cool to swim inside. At least I know I can trust you. You like me for who I am.
That’s all for today,
Love,
Phoebe
October 16, 19—
Dear Suze,
I hate everybody but you. My so-called friends came over on Friday night but they didn’t talk to me the whole time. They only talked to each other. I didn’t even know what to do. My mom thinks it’s my fault, like I’m not being properly friendly, but what does that mean? I think they’re bitches and I’m not going to have anyone over again.