The Cat With No Eyes

Warning: The following story contains details about serious topics such as addiction and suicide.

I have enough of my irritating siblings and ask my father if I can play outside with my friend. “Of course,” he replies. It’s odd he approved this time, it’s currently a quarter to 7 in the evening.

I pull the garage door’s handle and step into the dark outside to smell the sweet oceanic air that flowed into the Hampton neighborhood from downtown. Only this time, it smells remotely rustic today, with a metallic tinge to it similar to the arid smell of iron.

From my view to the left, just two blocks north was my best friend’s house I traveled to using my bike. From that point on, there was a vast yet trifling glimpse of the city on the edge of a horizon that could only be seen standing behind a set of rails. From my right, there appeared to be a golden field of daisies and marigolds separating me from my half of the neighborhood from the other.

I quickly seat myself in an upright manner on my bike seat, and cycle my way to my friend. I enjoyed bike rides like this: alone, wind in the hair, feet pedaling rapidly and excitedly, city lights at a faraway angle. I slowed to a stop and got off and walked up Evelina’s porch, and rang the doorbell. I waited and waited as I heard scuffling and a voice exclaiming “She’s here!” from the other side of the front door. My eyes dart from here to there as my cool and slimy body caresses the crisp, dry mid-winter air. My eyes eventually fix upon a point in space located atop the Hampton neighborhood’s main street hill.

A small yet familiar figure was huddled at the topmost point of the hill. From its droopy bitten ears, to its raccoon tail and furthermore to its large emerald green necklace it wears around its hairy neck, I didn’t mistake it in the slightest to be “the Cat with No Eyes”.

There is not much to say and not much to hear about the Cat with No Eyes. The Cat with No Eyes has no eyes, along with no name or family or personality or identity as a whole. It has no origin, it makes no noise, and it moves without any effort. But you must run when it meows.

The front door opened and the exhilarated Evelina made her entrance towards me as per usual and signals me inside. I look back to where I last looked before. The Cat with No Eyes doesn’t exist.

I sat myself at the foot of my friend’s bed stool, and glanced up at her. She glances back at me in agreement. Of course, we would do it, we were determined. Evelina dives her head outside her bedroom door to view the hallway from both sides. She then walks back inside and proceeds to fish out her cigarette cache from under the bed. I take a joint and she takes one and we both inhale as much as possible. I want to feel different, I want to feel energetic, I want to explore. I want to escape – escape this human body and leave this world that so enslaves me to the confines of reality, and fly – fly to skies that have never been touched before. I feel so alive. I feel alive, alive, alive, alive…

I didn’t wake up for a while until I heard it. The sound: it sounded very unexpected, like the object didn’t make the noise it looked to have made, except the object in question cannot be seen at all. It was an abomination of a noise, a noise so abhorrent that it stretched the mere physics of its sound waves, a noise so detestable it portrayed the culmination of many visual representations depicting the depths of the Underworld. It was an old mighty Hades’ bass drum. It was a groan of disgust, a cry of anguish, a yelp of pain, a scream of oppression. It was the meow that left the mouth of the Cat with No Eyes.

I jolted awake to find poor, sweet, innocent Evelina collapsed on the floor. I regret putting her into this.

I get up, run, and rush out the front door and pedal my bike faster than ever before. I am being chased but I don’t know what it is. It’s a simple morning yet an invisible wave of darkness and shame is slowly engulfing the neighborhood and coming for my presence. The dark waves spread over the street like wildfire, galloping full force towards me, its tongue coming to lick the youth from my glazed face. It was the Cat with No Eyes.

I bike and bike home thinking of the various possibilities that so happen to occur. Everyone will be worried about me, they will ground me once they find me, I will be shunned from the world, I will be closed behind doors forever. Forever.

When I reach home, park my bike, and slam the front door behind me, no one is inside. My house, my living room, my kitchen, my backyard, my everything had a low light and resolution to it. Gloomy and depressed is the air that surrounds me. “Hello?” I cry out into the open, no one answers. No one can answer because my cry would be absorbed quickly by the dark open around me. After a long time of waiting, I hear an answer: “Sweetie?” my father answers. His voice sounds like an echo and seems close to me. Peering into the direction of the reply. No one is there.

I decide to inch around the house to find where the voice is coming from. I freeze at what I immediately see in the far corner of the living room. I’m not terrified, I’m not afraid, but my body freezes in a state of shock.

There my father is with his casual attire – gray vest and beige shorts – turned away, hanging lifelessly by the ceiling.