After losing my job, I spent three days ignoring my mother’s calls.
Every voicemail asked when I would send money for my brother’s wedding. Not one asked whether I was okay.
I had spent years handing over most of my paychecks to my family. Now I had no job, almost no savings, and no one I could turn to.
That was how I ended up on the roof of my apartment building, ready to end my life.
But just as I stepped toward the edge, a tuxedo cat sprawled across my feet and exposed its soft white belly.
[A North Shore winter will freeze a cat to death. Human, hurry up and take Cat home!]
[Heat, a fireplace, all the tuna Cat can eat… Cat supposes those will do.]
I spent the last three hundred dollars in my account getting it vaccinated and dewormed.
Once inside, the kitten stared around my empty basement apartment. [Meow?]
“You can stay for a few days. I’ll find you a good home.”
That night, I rolled over in a daze and suddenly found myself pressed against a warm, soft belly.
[Fine. Since you’re too stingy even to turn on the heat, Cat will keep you warm instead.]
[After all, you’re the first human Cat has ever raised.]
The Cat Who Spent Nine Lives Saving Me Chapter 16 Domino’s POV Winter was very cold. Cold enough to kill a cat. When Cat was born, none of Cat’s brothers and sisters survived the blizzard. Cat alone remained, stumbling toward a trailer. Someone saw Cat, picked up a rock, and threw it. Humans were terrifying. […]
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The Cat Who Spent Nine Lives Saving Me Chapter 15 [So Mom didn’t even check whether Cat was still breathing before starting to mourn?] In the observation room at the animal hospital, I occupied a folding cot while Domino and Sunny, whose leg was in a cast, each had a recovery mat. Domino moved to
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The Cat Who Spent Nine Lives Saving Me Chapter 14 The hospital livestream stirred up controversy. I disabled gifts on my livestreams, kept only scheduled consultations and my pet-store business, and applied for an emergency protective order. My attorney sent formal notice that if my parents continued to harass me, I would recover the loans
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The Cat Who Spent Nine Lives Saving Me Chapter 13 Sunny barked outside Maeve’s door until she came out. Maeve and Rowan broke into my apartment and called an ambulance. Not long after my fever broke, my parents and Nolan stormed into my hospital room with a phone held aloft. They started a livestream accusing
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The Cat Who Spent Nine Lives Saving Me Chapter 12 My mother sat in the kitchen, tapping the table smugly. “So now you’ve learned to keep things behind my back? If you can lie when you’re this young, will you abandon your parents when you grow up?” I searched the whole house, then dropped to
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The Cat Who Spent Nine Lives Saving Me Chapter 11 Sunny stood between us while Domino arched his back and hissed. At last, my mother dragged her injured leg out the door. I hung up the CLOSED sign, pulled the curtains tight, and curled into the corner of my bedroom. Why would a mother not
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The Cat Who Spent Nine Lives Saving Me Chapter 10 I thought our happy life had finally begun. But on the morning of December twenty-seventh, pounding on the door woke me. Sunny charged at the door, barking furiously. Silence fell outside for a moment, followed by my mother’s shrill voice. “Elara Wynn, you couldn’t even
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The Cat Who Spent Nine Lives Saving Me Chapter 09 I hung a holly wreath on the door, then took them with me to finish my last few pet-sitting visits. The first home had a British Shorthair who began following Domino around and sniffing him the moment he arrived. [So you’re the boss around here?
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The Cat Who Spent Nine Lives Saving Me Chapter 08 I put on a popular dance track. Domino strutted down an imaginary catwalk and landed a flawless backflip in front of the camera, while Sunny carried scattered toys back to the basket one by one. In my furry costume, I twisted awkwardly to the beat.
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The Cat Who Spent Nine Lives Saving Me Chapter 07 They promoted my business on the community page. With Christmas approaching, my pet-sitting schedule was full, but the shop’s rent, insurance, and the strays’ medical bills still piled up like snow. While I worried over it, Domino tapped a pet livestream on TikTok with one
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