A Funeral for Buster or a Cat Resurrected an Unfortunate Experience with my Wife's Cat

Greetings, again dear readers!

Earlier, you met my wife's kitten, Buster, in this previous post. Buster....the Ride From Hell.

So, forge ahead, or turn back and catch up with us, the adventure continues!

A year or so passed and the freshness of being newlyweds wore off. Buster, the kitten, became a member of our little family.

He never liked me, after that wild ride home, always growling if I tried to pet him. He liked to sit in Lesa's lap while she watched TV. I think the only reason he let me sit next to her was the fact that I am the fella that cleaned his litter box!

As far as I could tell, he never caught a mouse either. He just ate and pooped. Completely worthless and not a bit guilty about not contributing a thing to the development of the family.

I suspected he moonlighted as a bouncer at the nightclub the rats had established in the attic. He was suspiciously missing when they opened for business each night.

At suppertime he could beat you to his dish every time. He'd come running with his tail up in the air, the tip of it pointed forward as if to say, "Watch out boys I'm going THAT way!"

That cat would be all up under your feet and meowing as fast as he could get a meow out, only kibbles in his mouth would shut him up.

We didn't like each other, but we both loved the girl, and she loved us too, so we called a cease fire and worked out a peace treaty.

Well, it so happened that the little lady and I found ourselves in a position to build a new home. I had a little piece of land I had acquired, before our marriage, and had a spot chosen that she agreed would be suitable to erect a nest on, so we took that fork in the road and moved ahead. I sooooo wanted to get away from the night club scene and become domestic.

To make all this happen, we had to move into the vacant upstairs of my parents spacious home. I insisted on paying my Mom some rent while we waited on the contractor to finish our new house. She didn't mind the extra income and my parents didn't mind the kitten coming along, they liked him.

Early in our marriage we had taken some savings and bought a small business for my wife. She rose each morning and opened shop at 6 AM, worked eight hours and turned it over to a trusted worker at 2PM. It was my job to close at 10PM each night.

On the night of this unhappy incident, it was pouring, I don't mean just your ordinary, water the daisies, sort of down pour either! Folks, I'm here to tell you, it was falling Noah's flood!

I grabbed a big umbrella from the stand by the door and ran out into the weather. I don't have a clue why I took an umbrella, it didn't diminish the dampness a bit, on account of it raining sideways!

At the store, I helped Mrs. Clark, our faithful employee, paddle out to her car and start off down the river, uh..road.

I clambered into my vehicle, thoroughly water logged, I turned the heat wide open, (Did I mention it was cold too? It was cold too!), then started for home. I got to my Mom's driveway and, right there, in the street was a run over cat.

My first thought was "poor kitty, I hope it didn't suffer." As I turned in I looked out the window and I thought I recognized the gray fur of a familiar nemesis. I stopped the truck and backed up, so the lights would shine on the carcass.

"Hmmmmm, looks like Buster, doesn't it?" I asked myself.

It was tempting to just drive on and deal with it in the morning but, if you knew how much that puss meant to my wife you'd have done what I did too. I didn't want her to discover his little body, road pizza'd, the next morning, so I climbed out in the driving rain and picked the cat up by the tail and slung it into the bed of my truck cradled his little broken body in my arms and placed him on the floorboard.

Back at the house I fetched a shovel and dug a hole in the muck to bury the unfortunate kitty. I thought how devastated my wife would be when she heard the bad news. I think I shed a tear when I pitched gently put his little corpse into the mirky water.

We'll never know for sure, on account of the rain was hitting me in the face so hard, you couldn't have distinguished a tear from the Pacific Ocean!

I struggled into the house and put my shoulder against the door to shut it against the elements.

My Mom sat at the bar in her kitchen, reading. She looked up at me, soaked and muddy, with litter plastered on my face, and said, "Good heavens, what happened to you?"

I told her of Buster's demise and asked her not to tell my wife, because I wanted to break the news to her gently, besides she would lay awake all night and cry and I was tired and miserable enough.

The next morning, Lesa opened the back door and in sashays, Buster! He was quite put out, because he had to sleep in the barn.

She fed him and before she left she talked with my Mom.

"Helen, I let Buster in, would you tell Chip to let him out before he leaves?"

My mother stared at her and ask, "The cat's in the house?"

"Yeah?"

"Your husband buried that animal last night, he found him dead on the road and told me not to tell you because you would be upset!"

"He looks alive to me," she said, looking down at the cat rubbing against her legs.

Those two saw an opportunity for some fun at my expense.

Up the stairs they went.

"Chip, could you look at Buster's leg, it looked like he hurt himself yesterday and it doesn't look at all well this morning?"

I sat straight up in the bed!

All I could think of is the shovelfuls of mud I heaped on him somehow thumped his little heart back to pumping and he somehow clawed his way out of a cold grave!

"He's in the house,?" I asked, somewhat astonished.

About that time, the deceased leaped from the floor and onto the bed!

I almost crawled up the headboard!

I don't care whose @#%$ cat I buried, but if I ever find out, I'm going to send them a bill for the funeral!

I hope you enjoyed this little tale, and thanks for reading!

CARRY ON!

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