Take a bottle of Coors, relax and read this little story about a Norman Rockwell kind of town...and its pets.

Hello there folks!!!
Things have calmed down in our little town after that one-for-all Bouncing Brides “I gonna give a wedding to you! in the bowling-alley going bust /church which resulted on yours truly paying fifty smackers fine because his missus were giving black eyes without the simple detail of anyone asking for one.
Marty’s fine was two-hundred, because the missus had attacked a lawman “causing bodily harm” but taking in consideration that the aforementioned officer was off-duty and had not identified himself as such despite wearing the uniform of one.
To pay some kind of penance mi missus had filled, without been asked, my cooler by the porch with plenty of Coors, perhaps the best beer in the world, like that other cat-piss with pretension of call herself a beer does.
Day’s temperature had been slowly crawling down from those 100-Fahrenheit lines as a mean cold breeze now and then went by uninvited.
The line of trees beyond the back yard was getting kind of thin, like a balding Bernie, the proud owner of the Royal Promenade, the pit-stop for the running on thirsty, but not the proud father of Bernie Junior that had going around dipping his little junior in two places at once and now was faced with two mothers to be, and the worst case of tug-of-war represented by two mean Mother in Law ready and able to start breaking things, bones included.

Well, I will say that even if Marty’s not a happy Father-in-Law he got his will and got her daughter itched and calling herself Mrs. Bernie Junior, which didn’t make any happier our hapless Deputy Sheriff being no match to Marty’s size nor mean enough to assert authority.
The preacher thought that maybe he should try his luck and reverse the church to a bowling alley, because as a church for wedding it gave him bad vibes (he had lost one of his front teeth trying to sort out, peacefully, the warring amazons.
Time as passed and buried hatchets remained buried perhaps until a couple of missus got the same idea no way they could come away with, and there will be a lot of bleeding noses and eye shining to satisfy everybody.
For my part, I learned that if you begin laughing when the coffin is still open someone could take offense and start world war fourth (I thing that that younger Texan is spoiling for W.W, III, so I wouldn’t try to but in with mine), as I did in the church, got on the wrong side of my missus and pulled the trigger giving a start to one more Fight of the Century.
To make amendments with my friends, I had invited them for a BBQ with Coors, a bottle of Barolo wine for Joe and two bottles of Wild Turkey (bourbon courtesy from Bernie Senior for adding, as he put it, levity to a sad sad occasion)
I don’t know why the butcher thought that I was the responsible for the unscathed condition of his wife (a specimen of the very very heavy weight division, like anyone with a bad rheumatism would try to toss her anywhere) but he had come the day before with meat, sausages and a lot more as a gesture of thanks and will no hear that it was too much and I didn’t nothing and…
We got plenty for BBQ and even a morsel or two to Willard’s dog Tiger (my neighbor next door if you need to ask)
As I sat there after loading the big-family size grill with oak coals (they smoke the meat you won’t believe) I sat in my rocking chair, to wait for the invited to come around, filling my empty bladder with cold beers (Coors to you) and minding my own business as I Tiger, Willard’s dog, was flat on the dirt facing my way, with his head on the dirt between his paws, just eyeing me and perhaps wondering when the damn barbeque would start smoking so he could get some juicy sausage for a change.
Life was good.

But not “that” good, because the orange cant came into view like I moved wearing a bell or something, despite I move like a shadow, if you don’t believe me I can direct you to some Vietcong in that jungle that didn’t believe either and got their chatter-box all messed up.
Thinking of that, I should try to sneak on the damn cat to teach him a lesson not to come to where he wasn’t invite.
Not to do any harm to him, just to scare the shit out of him and telling him to beat it and leave me in peace to taste my beer alone, after all, I have already a nagging one on my life, and who needs two of a kind?
I didn’t drank too many beers, so I wasn’t seeing double; but there they were, the orange cat coming with an orange lady trailing on his tail.
He, as usual, sat facing me with the composure of a well educated, if scrawny, aristocrat, coming to see how one of his vassals was coping with life.
She, like some oriental wife, sat behind also facing me, (maybe he had told her that the old geezer was better looking than a alley homeless) but there they sat.
I wasn’t to bother; I am not one of those throwing a shoe at anything that meows at any time (love my shoes, can hit anything with them, even the wall of a barn if I should try), so why sweat?
I just ignored them as I rocked the chair from and back, from and back, letting the beer to soak all those thirsty small devils wondering if I should shave tomorrow or wait until the missus asked “who are you?” one morning, when far far away, by the tree lines kissing the back frontier of my property who should be coming, swaggering like that mellifluous cartoon Casanova cat with whiskers curved up a la French, but our big fat black cat…
That should be interesting I thought.

That black dude was approaching with mesmerized eyes glued to my spectators, not taking evasive maneuvers nor trying to come unseen, just coming.
Perhaps he had already forgotten that the orange cat wasn’t a pushover anymore, or, the coal devil was just feeling horny.
They said the she cats in heat spry their Chanel #5 so any male born under the sign of Felix would go ga-ga and practice the gallop on five legs.
Abruptly I had my Coors frozen half way up going to my lips, mesmerized by the unfolding tableau of “here are we again” kind of the Fight of the Century rerun, my money was on the scrawny weird colored one, I am a sucker for the underdogs, even if the underdog try to mess with my beer drinking.
Maybe the weak breeze took the scent of the black one to the front row or the orange mini tiger had an extra eye somewhere on his back because suddenly he lowered some his head opening wide a mouth, full of sharp little teeth, hissing like a pissed off cobra and launching himself around his lady like a Nascar driver towards the black cat, distracted perhaps contemplating the feminine rear, got spooked by the sudden aggressive movement and automatically retreated a couple of feet taking as you go that curl-me-up of any cat not wanting or be able to get the hell from an embarrassing situation.
A few tentative jabs that didn’t scare even the air they disturbed, the orange cat double pissed off by the black cat bullying before and now trying to put his moves on his lady was working himself madder by the minute as they were circling around the, apparently uninterested in the fray, lady.
As the black heavy cat got bolder towards the orange one…

…she couldn’t sit there faking being uninterested anymore when her man was confronting a alley’s two bit fat Casanova that for the size of him where a few pounds heavier, that was trying to put his moves on her but not pissed off like her sudden orange fury, that she was told had licked that black shining devil once before.
She didn’t move, she watched the warriors, spines upward and on their toes like four legged ballerinas and tails pointing skyward, going slowly around her, hissing and whooshing like two asthmatic old snakes until the black cat was pointing at her with his rear eye, tail right up and family jewels in sight.
Then and only then she moved, with a roundhouse of a whack from her left paw, with hooked claws all the way out, she rang using the black cat jingle-bells.
His horrified howling reached the highest C note pitch anyone or anything can utter with that unadulterated agony from mauled jewels and he was airborne like he had jumped on a going off Claymore Landmine.
The orange cat knew what that kind of howling meant and cowardly curled to protect his own beloved ones, just in case.
His lady, regally, sat there looking with a mild kind of interest at the departing bully, with a social life disrupted for some time (sit soon, he wouldn’t for sure), receding towards the far away line of trees, not quiet leaping but more with a bouncing kind of retreat…a Bouncing Casanova Lover.


© Georg Edvard Mateos 2008