The Cat Lady

Luke stared down at the dirt-stained, neon green golf ball. It was the final hole, and he needed a hole-in-one to win. The windmill before him creaked with age as the blades spun slowly, the plastic tunnel he was aiming for a black hole behind the blades. Bringing the club head back, Luke was ready. Of course, as was his luck, Luke’s cell phone vibrated insistently in his pocket and threw off his aim.

“Damnit!” he said quietly as he watched the golf ball veer to the left and fall into mini-golf oblivion.

Alan laughed loudly behind him. Luke turned to him with a look of humored annoyance followed by a roll of his eyes. His best friend had been introduced to Jay and Silent Bob not long ago, and Alan now broke out into Jay’s wacky dance.

“Fifteen bucks, little man! Put that shit in my hand! If that money doesn’t show, then you owe me, owe me, owe! My jungle love, yeah!”

“Shut up, dude!” Luke laughed.

He pulled out his cell phone and opened the message that cost him the game. It was his mother. Come home, now, please, it read. He sighed. Luke’s mother was so protective of him, and it drove him crazy. “I’m fifteen, mom!” he would tell her more often than he felt he should. “Don’t you think it’s time to take off the leash?” he would continue, the cynicism thick in his voice. Logan, Ohio was a small town where nothing happened. But still she protected him, and she wasn’t one to be crossed.

“I gotta go, Alan.”

“Mother again, huh?”

“Yeah…” Luke answered, his eyes falling to the ground.

The boys walked slowly out of Adventure Golf, quietly returning their clubs to the counter and heading to their bikes. They shook hands in the way that teenage boys do and pulled their bikes from the rack. Suddenly, they were blinded by bright headlights. Behind the headlights an engine roared to life, gutteral and deafening. Then came a voice all too familiar to Luke.

“Wilkins… you little shit stain! Come’ere!” The voice was slightly slurred, angry, and arrogant. It projected from the black sihlouette now bearing down on Luke and Alan.

“Ah, shit…” Luke said under his breath. He looked hurriedly at Alan. “Get outta here, man. I got this.”

“You’re a glutton for punishment, dude.” And in the blink of an eye, Alan was off, crossing the parking lot and heading towards the river.

“Johnny Callahan,” said Luke to the approaching figure. “Drinkin’ and drivin’ again, eh, Port-O-John?”

Luke saw the right hook coming from a mile away, and he easily ducked it. Just as easily, he evaded the left hook and pushed the bike into Johnny’s crotch. It wasn’t enough to double his attacker over, but Luke made sure that it sent the right message.

Johnny Callahan was seventeen, expelled from school over drug use and violence exposed by Luke himself. Johnny never forgave him. But it didn’t stop Johnny from becoming a neighborhood cancer as he swaggered his “badass” all over town, doing just enough to piss people off, but not enough to draw the attention of the police. He worked for his deadbeat father at a garage at the edge of town. They were a quite a pair, Port-O-John and Bumbling Billy Joe, falling quickly from grace after the tragic passing of Johnny’s mother, Carolyn, from lung cancer. Though Luke felt sorry for his attacker, he wasn’t about to take any shit from him, either. Luke’s father always told him to treat others the way that they treat you. Port-O-John was an asshole, so, Luke would treat him like one.

Luke ducked a couple of more punches, using his bike as an obstruction, and looked for way to escape the situation. Then he heard the click of the pistol.

“Jesus, Johnny, what the hell are you doin’?” asked Luke, a searing hot ball of lead now burning in his gut.

“You son of a bitch! I’m tired of your mouth!” Johnny answered, spittle flying from lips. He held the six-shooter with a wavering hand, his drunk eyes unable to completely focus on the point blank target of his rage.

“You started all of this, man. And now you wanna kill me?!”

Johnny’s eyes grew big, and he smiled menacingly. “Why shouldn’t I, shit stain? Look what you did to my life! A life for a life, right, shit stain?!”

The drunken kid locked his elbow, preparing it for the recoil. Luke began to panic, the question of whether or not Johnny had it in him answered. Luke, outwardly, appeared calm, but, inwardly, his mind raced for anything that could give him a moment to escape.

Luke craned his neck and looked over Johnny’s shoulder. “Somebody’s comin’…” he said.

Johnny relaxed his arm and turned his head to look. Luke took the chance. He raised the front end of his bike and rammed the front tire into Port-O-John’s chest. In a moment, he was speeding away and heading for the open field between the mini golf course and the Arby’s. As two gunshots rang out in the night, Luke thanked his lucky stars that Johnny was drunk and couldn’t shoot straight. He could hear screams rising behind him.

Route 664 approached quickly, and Luke decided to take the chance of crossing without really looking. The only squealing of tires he heard, though, were on Johnny’s 1987 Chevy Monte Carlo. It was a beefy car, make no mistake. And Luke knew that he had no chance of outrunning him.

For Luke, it felt like he was biking through mud as time slowed to a crawl. The noise of the blood rushing past his ears sounded like rapids. He chose to bike through the fields that ran behind the Walmart, knowing that it would be slow going. He heard Johnny’s car make the left onto 664 and speed on to Old McArthur Road. Luke guessed that he would take the high ground and wait for him on the Route 33 overpass. After a few minutes, he decided to ditch his bike behind the Walmart and take his chances on foot. Sure, it was much slower, but it was also easier to stay hidden from sight.

The low rumble of the Monte grew steadily louder as Luke approached the overpass along the treeline, but he was able to make it under the overpass without detection. He drew his breaths in quiet gasps. Port-O-John had always been a scourge for Luke, but this is the first time Luke had ever felt endangered by him. Something told him that, this time, Johnny would actually try to kill him.

The westbound lane of Route 33 was clear, so Luke quickly and easily made it to the median strip. The eastbound lane was relatively busy, though, forcing him to wait and time his crossing. It was then that Luke spotted the cat on the other side of the roadway. The passing traffic had no effect on the animal, it simply sat quiet and unmoving, staring at him. It reminded Luke of the family cat that had dies a couple of years before; it was fluffy and gray with bright blue eyes and a permanent scowl.

Coming back to the moment, Luke found his spot and readied himself for the sprint. The crossing was easier than he expected, but, regardless of being at least a hundred feet away, a vehicle honked at him. It was all Johnny needed. As the Monte Carlo’s engine roared in earnest, the cat took one last look at Luke and bounded off to the left. Luke got the strange feeling that he should follow it.

He found himself sprinting through somebody’s front yard, the sound of the highway traffic somewhat muffled through the trees to his left. For as fast as Luke was running though, it felt like the yard lengthened with every step. Tires squealed and headlights flashed as Johnny yanked the car into the yard, the splitting of wood cracking through night air as he broke through fence. The headlights were full on Luke as he fled to the side of the house whose lights began to turn on at the sound of Monte Carlo.

He rounded to the back of the house, but Johnny was hot on his heels and closing fast. Luke momentarily hoped that the Monte wouldn’t be able to navigate around the house, but further revving and crunching told him that it was hopeless. Johnny was going for broke, the beautiful muscle car be damned.

Luke barely made it to the next treeline, Johnny’s car coming within just a couple of feet of running him over. He didn’t see that fluffly gray cat had now been joined by several others of varying coats and sizes, their meows were drowned out by the screaming V8. Johnny, having barely missed Luke, drove the Monte to a curve in the treeline that lay ahead. Without bothering to turn off the engine, Luke heard the car door open and then slam shut.

“What the hell is going on back there?!” The voice of an old man said as Luke stopped and tried to catch his breath.

A gunshot rang out in the trees, and Luke heard the sound of birds taking flight for fear of the loud noise.

“Esther, call the police!” yelled the old man. No doubt he was on his way back into the house.

“Where are you, shit stain?!” yelled Johnny into the trees. “I got a 9mm friend who wants to say ‘hi’ to you.”

Luke closed his eyes, trying not to let the fear overwhelm him. He took a deep breath and said, “Why are you doing this, Johnny? Are you really that insecure?” Really? Luke asked himself. He wants to kill you and you’re still gonna be a smartass?!

As he looked around though, Luke noticed that there must’ve been nearly twenty cats surrounding him. Completely baffled, he couldn’t shake the feeling that they were there to protect him, somehow. It gave him a bump of unexpected courage.

“It’s payback, bitch! You ruined my life, now I’m gonna take yours!” Another gunshot rang out through the trees.

Then she appeared… Luke hadn’t connected the cats to the legend, but, when your life is in danger, these things can sometimes slip the mind. The Cat Lady?! From the time of his grandfather, the town of Logan has been haunted by a lady in white, known as the Cat Lady, as her appearance was always preceeded by the appearance of a pack of cats. It was said that she was a helpful spirit, her and her cats looking out for those in danger. It never crossed his mind that this was the wooded area that she was said to haunt. Some had suspected that it was a worker from the pet orphanage in the forest’s center, but that wouldn’t make sense after nearly seventy years. Nevertheless, there she stood, silent, unmoving, and smiling at Luke like a kindly aunt.

She stood only five feet tall, but her presence was commanding, the dark depths of her eyes giving away her age and wisdom. The cats surrounding them began to lift their voices in unison, lending additional power to the Cat Lady’s formidable presence. A bullet ripped into a tree to his right, and it brought Luke back to the present and his rather dire situation. Johnny had been speaking this entire time, but Luke could only now hear him.

“… and you left me to rot with my drunk old man! Ya know, he beats me every night! Even if I do nothin’ wrong, I get an ass whoopin’,” another gunshot rang out. “Do you have any clue how humiliating that is, shit stain? Then I have to listen to you try to humiliate me, too! Not anymore! Tonight, you pay the price!” One more gunshot.

Johnny stepped into view, the pistol leveled at Luke’s head. Luke could see the tear streaks going down Johnny’s face. He was startled to see a moment of humanity in Johnny’s world, but the malice belied that humanity. Luke could clearly see that no amount of anguish and low self-esteem would prevent him from doing what he set out to do. To kill him… Johnny’s die had been cast, and the future was inevitable. “Time to say goodbye, shit stain,” he said quietly, readying himself to shoot.

“You don’t want to do that, Johnny,” the Cat Lady said, her voice sweet and commanding.

He flinched at her words, dropping his aim as he looked to her in amazement. That same moment the growl of the cats began to rise in unison, the menace clear. The Cat Lady’s white robes swished quietly as she stepped towards Johnny and placed herself between him and Luke.

“Luke is not at fault for anything that has happened in your life,” she continued, her voice now scolding and full of scorn. “You reap what you sow, boy. Your father taught you poorly, and now you shall suffer the consequences.”

Johnny raised the pistol again, but this time his target was the Cat Lady. The bullet did nothing to her, and Johnny shot two more times with the same result. She turned to Luke, the look on her face a mixture of happiness and sorrow.

“I’m sorry that this is the only place that I can save you.”

She returned her gaze to Johnny, effusing her full power into the small clearing. Luke, nor Johnny, had taken notice to the cats now surrounding him. Johnny was frozen in fear, but even that couldn’t diminish the hate that coursed through him.

“I’ll drag you all to Hell with me!”

But the Cat Lady was on him in a flash, and she held him by the throat as her cats attacked in a single wave. The horror was too much for Luke to take, and he doubled over, retching the contents of his stomach onto the forest floor. He clamped his eyes shut and waited for the sound of the cats to end.

Luke felt the warm touch of the Cat Lady on his shoulders.

“Go now,” she said tenderly. “He’ll never bother you again.”

He looked deep into her eyes. Luke wasn’t sure what he saw there, but he was thankful for her. He tried to speak but couldn’t. The sirens approached as Luke tried to find the reason for the Cat Lady’s intervention.

“Go!” she said.

Luke hugged her and took off into the woods, his need to get home to his parents was like the human body’s need for air. All the police would find in the small clearing was a ravaged human body and a pile of puke twenty feet away. It would baffle the department for years to come. Luke would tell his parents that he was nearly hit by a car while riding his bike, making no mention of either Port-O-John or the Cat Lady. The town of Logan, Ohio would be better off in the years to come; better off, at least, then most of the Logans out there.

In many of them, Luke was able to escape from Johnny, but the criminal teen would wreak havoc upon him and the town for many years. In most of them, Johnny did what he set out to do, and Luke’s parents, Ned and Lacey Wilkins, would forever mourn the early death of their teenage boy.