It was nearly Spring when the old cat came to my porch to die, yet the winter chill kept the air frozen and still like the ice glazed over a pond. He was ancient and grizzled and hoary white as the snowy field he shambled across to get to my door. His steps faltered on the uneven ground so that I thought he might trip and fall. I'd never seen a cat look as if it might trip and fall, so I stared and agonized and held my breath as he picked his way over the lumpy soil and frosted grass, his frail thin limbs quavering like a marionette puppet.
At last he reached the threshold, looked up at me for a split second without stopping and, sensing my approval, my invitation, he strode directly into the porch. He exhausted the last of his strength jumping onto my old couch and fell dead asleep. I pulled up a chair to watch him, fascinated. I felt somehow honored that he had chosen to spend his last time in my company.
When the old one woke he ate a bite or two of the food I'd placed close to him and drank just a little water and some watered milk. He was too weak to rise, and could barely move his head to reach the sustenance. But when he was done he struggled to his feet like a baby doe and staggered dutifully to the other side of the couch, where he lost control of his bowels on a tattered old blanket. I took the blanket to the trash and brought him a new one. When I returned he was already asleep. I swaddled him like an infant and sat down again to watch his shallow breathing.
His chest rose and fell almost imperceptibly, his ribs a chiaroscuro lattice of shadows on pale blanched ashen fur. Every bone of his body, even his spine, showed through his thin skin. He was like a cartoon caricature of a skeletal cat, bold lines drawn on a form that was left the white of the page beneath.
And yet in his slumber there was nobility about him, even somehow vitality, or perhaps just the lingering memory of the strength of his youth. He had the sagely air of an experienced king; the doddering feline who had soiled my couch was unimaginable immediately as it was done. His history could be seen stretching out behind him through too many days to count, days of the foray and the hunt, days tracking and finding a female in heat, days spent lounging and lolling in the Summer sun that was a distant memory on this Winter day. All the days and wisdom of his life were there in the furrows of his brow, the brow that now knitted in his sleep with the simple effort of drawing breath. I sat back and felt oddly content in his presence, despite the cold of the air as the day grew late.
I left him at last and went inside, feeling sad and wistful as I faded into sleep.
I awoke the next morning and hurried to the porch to see if he was still alive. The night's respite must have revitalized him, for he was stirring, even rising. As I watched in amazement he leapt lithely from the couch, shook himself, stretched, and began to walk outside.
"Wait," I yelled after him. "You can't go! You... you can't even walk--how are you walking?"
If he heard me he paid no mind. He was different now. He was still painfully frail and sickly, but now his body rose proud and tall like a white sail buoyed up by a fierce wind. He held his head high and regal, and all of the distinguished princely magnificence was back in his bearing as he marched toward the field.
I called to him again, but he was somewhere else, somewhere back in a day long gone by. He was hunting again, one last time, pausing at the edge of the grass ready to pounce, sniffing the breeze and feeling alive and connected to nature and to everything living.
At last he sighed, a long final sigh through smiling lips, his eyes happy but glazed and gazing at things that I was not privileged to see.
He began a slow jaunt to the woods, where I knew he would find a burrow or the hollow beneath a log. He would settle in, but only for a rest, just for a brief nap, before his spirit would rise vibrant and whole again... leaving his body behind.
I let him go then and turned to walk back to the porch. The clouds parted to reveal the sun and the air grew warm.
Spring had come at last.
Originally published online at Flashquake, Summer 2003 issue.