Our door was green and the cats hung out just inside the garden trying to kill movement.   The woman bent over to pet one and the Calico scratched her.  Specks of blood hit the rocks.  The cat was Einstein and the  victim was Trudy.  Einstein was the first out of the box looking for food and water.  Six sisters and brothers got scattered around town, but that’s the way of cats: here and there, putting up self-identity struggles with humans who don’t share the same vision.

Across town a second woman, a Mexican woman, was hiding from a house deal with Trudy.  The Mexican had sold too cheaply or so said a few jealous relatives who kept their nails long and red.  That might have passed, but then the real sadness set in when the old woman on the corner, who peeled oranges with one of those hand-cranked blade…