My Lucy

"Oh, please, come here sweet kitty!" I called to the tiny Calico stray in the big bush next to our desert apartment in Barstow, California. She was absolutely beautiful and so feisty! I reached into the plastic baggie of cut up steak I'd snuck off of my dinner plate and tried to lure her out. My face was getting scratched with the branches from the bush. My arms were bleeding, I didn't care. I would save this little baby.

She sniffed towards my outstretched hand towards the steak. She would take a few steps forward but back away quickly growling at me. She was scared and I knew why. People around here were incredibly mean to animals and she was the last surviving kitten of her litter. She finally reached out enough to get a bite of the steak. I didn't grab her. I let her eat, watching her as she growled at me, chewing as if she'd never had food before.

I offered a few more bites. She took them greedily. "Oh no. I'm almost out!" It was now or never. I reached out and grabbed her pinning her to the ground carefully and lifted her up to me. She struggled to get away and scratched at me but it was ok, I was expecting it. I pressed her up against my chest and began to try and comfort her. "Shh." The growling stopped but her tiny heart was beating rapidly. I began to stroke her back and she stopped struggling to get away.

I took her into the house to show my mom. "Please, Mom! Pleeeease! Let me keep her!" My mom didn't reply at first. "Please! I begged! She will sleep in my room. I will keep her litter box clean! I will clean up any mess she makes! Please, Mom!" Still no reply. I took my tiny sweet kitten to my room and gave her a tour. "This is our bed." I told her, sitting her down gently. She made herself right at home, sitting in the center of the bed and staring at me with her big yellow green eyes.

I got her a bowl of water and some tuna. She ate quickly, still side eyeing me like I was gonna steal her meal. I reached my hand out to pet her and she growled again, flinching at my movement. She was still scared. "It's ok, Kitty. I won't hurt you. We are gonna be best friends!" She slept in my bed that night, and every night after. My mom never did say whether or not I could keep her, but she was mine now.

That was twenty one years ago and I can still remember it like it just happened. Lucy was my very first pet and still holds a very special place in my heart. I was just 11 years old the summer that sweet little Calico came into my life. We had moved for what felt like the thousandth time to a tiny little pea green duplex in a town I despised. I had seen a few stray animals running around and the pound was always taking them. You hoped the pound would get them before the local boys did, because they would shoot them with BB guns and laugh about it and there was nothing I could do to stop them.

We had only lived at the house for a few weeks when I saw a fluffy gray cat running in and out of the bushes that lined the side of our house. I had tried to call her over a few times with no luck, and had scared her away multiple times when I saw the van from the local pound driving down the street. She was very clearly pregnant and I wanted so badly to help her, but she would never come to me. Eventually she hid somewhere and gave birth and I had to sit helpless watching as tiny kittens disappeared one by one. I had tried every single day to catch them and had only succeeded once. I gave the little gray kitten to my neighbors.

Lucy was the last of the litter and I was sure she was meant to be my pet. Her mom was no where to be found and all the other kittens were long gone but Lucy still hung around. I fed her every chance I got, waiting for the chance to make her mine. The day I finally caught her was the first happy day I had at that stupid new house. She was named before I even caught her. Her beautiful orange spots were what I noticed first about her Calico pattern. She was always my Lucy. After the beautiful Lucille Ball, of course.

That cat was the best pet I could have ever imagined having. She loved me so much, and I her. She was so unique! That first day that I caught her, I would shush her. This became the sound she couldn't resist. To get her out from under my bed or just to get her to come snuggle, I simply had to go "Shh" and Lucy would come up and purr and rub her face on mine. I quickly found out I was highly allergic to cats, but no one could love her as much as I did and I would not allow that to take her from me. So it began, my daily dose of Benadryl just to be able to love My Lucy.

We were inseparable for years and she always had my back. I know how crazy that sounds, she was just a cat, right? Well this cat was feisty. We saw many families move in and out of the other side of the duplex we stayed at. Our first neighbors were great, but as the town got worse, so did the neighbors. Eventually we were unfortunate enough to have a bunch of people with a lot of pit bulls move in. They made their dogs mean and hung heavy chains off of them to "build muscle". The dog's weren't friendly, not that I could blame them. It was the owner's fault.

One day when I was walking in from getting the mail, the pit bull they had at the time got through the gate and came towards me, growling. I was scared to move because I didn't want him to attack. He stood staring at me. If he was gonna attack, he would have by now, right? I took a step forward and so did he. That's when Lucy came flying at him. She had pushed her way out of the screen door and was standing between that pit bull and I. "No, Lucy!" I screamed, fearing the worst. She clawed and hissed and bit. She batted over and over again at his face and I did everything I could to save her. The neighbors came out and grabbed their dog. Lucy was still growling, safe in my arms.

I'm not sure if the dog would have actually attacked or not, and I felt bad that Lucy had clawed up his face so bad. But I was also really impressed that my skinny little Calico had taken on a very buff pit bull.. and lived. That wasn't the only time she ever did it either. I moved out when I was sixteen. I moved in with someone I thought was a good person, I quickly learned how wrong I was. His family made me put Lucy outside, they didn't want cats in the house. I had to sneak her in through the window and lock the bedroom door.

When he would come home from work, he would throw her back outside and he wouldn't let me bring her inside either. We fought about it, and I would still bring her in which would result in him yelling at me and threatening to poison her. He finally went after me physically and Lucy growled and attacked him too, leaving a trail of bloody claw marks on his arm. He deserved it.

I eventually was able to get out of that relationship and still had my Lucy by my side. She was my first real friend and the only soul who was there with me every step of the way when I felt I had nobody to reach out to. She was always there, listening. She would cuddle up with me and purr. She always slept in my bed with me. There was never a night I went to sleep without Lucy cuddled up right by my side. She would even come with me when I finally decided to up and leave California and travel all the way to Texas with my fiancé.

She would be there to cuddle on my pregnant belly, the same way I cuddled on hers when she had carried litters of kittens over the years. (She had carried five litters of kittens in her lifetime.) To purr next to me while we slept at home alone while my fiancé worked nights. To cuddle each other through the Texas storms that neither one of us were used to. To even meet my first born child, who she loved so much.

This video was taken when my first born was about 2 months old. Lucy loved her so much, she would usually try to get a little too close. Also, if you look in the background of this video, you can see a full grown Peanut lounging in front of the T.V.

I was twenty five when I gave birth to my first child. Lucy was getting old. I could see how tired she was getting. She still acted like that feisty kitten I had always known and loved, but her eyes were tired. Her meow was weak. She wasn't eating much. According to this article I found on Google, cat years are way different than dog years.

The first year of a cat's life is said to be equivalent to fifteen human years. The second is is only worth about eight or nine and they change each year. Lucy lived to be fifteen in human years. The chart doesn't even show what that is in cat years. But if it stays on average of about four years to every one human year, that would mean she was seventy two years old in cat years.

On May 5, 2015, My Lucy crossed the Rainbow Bridge. We had taken her to the vet because she was having trouble eating. Everything she ate came right back up. She wouldn't even drink water. She was hiding away and would let me love her if I came and found her hiding spots but wouldn't come to me even if I would make the shh sound she loved so much. The vet told us that her kidneys were failing. He told us that's what happens when cats reach a certain age and that there was nothing we could really do for her other than keep her comfortable. He told us how much pain she was probably in and that he would recommend putting her down so she wasn't suffering.

It was one of the hardest things I ever had to do. We stayed with her until the end. It was really hard to accept that she was gone and for weeks, I kept seeing her out of the corner of my eye. Even once years later, I saw her and even called out to her before realizing she was (and had been gone) for over three years.

It will be six years that Lucy has been gone this May and I still haven't been able to get another cat. I don't feel like I'm ready yet. She was my best friend! I imagine one day I will want another pet, I know that pet too will have a special place in my heart. However, that spot that was filled by My Lucy will always be hers and hers alone.