Three weeks ago, Mademoiselle Kinky spend the night outside. It's not the first time but it rarely happens and I always worry a little. But this time, when she came in, her usually so quick seemed really confused, dilated pupils and her nose full of mucus.
I told myself, she catched a cold, she's never been sick in 8 years, it was bound to happen!
It was a big cold though, because she stopped eating and drinking. Seb's cat had that once but as soon as we got some food in her with plastic syringes she was back on her feet.
But it's now been three weeks :(
The confusion seems gone from her stare though and I find again the cat I love so much.
Smart like I've seen no other cat and with not too annoying diva habits that make her completely adorable.
When she wants to get on the sofa, she waits on the floor that we invite her to do so. She doesn't take well to mockery. She always rests herself with pizazz, often imitating the Firefox logo when she sleeps (she's a cat with taste after all and doesn't take too well to IE
).
When I'm at the computer for too long, she lays on the keyboard and gives me this innocent look that we both know to be completely fake but everytime it makes my heart melt. But never as much as when she takes her cute little paw dressed with a white sock and brushes my cheek gently asking me to pet her. Even those who have an aversion to cats cannot stay indifferent to this oh so delicate request of affection.
I must say that the fact that she's incredibly pretty does help to convince even the strongest opposition to the feline kind. With peaches and cream hair akin to angora, big intelligent eyes of a rare sage color and a tail that looks like an enormous feather making me think sometimes that she is a magical being somewhere between a cat and a squirel, she definitely ranks amongst the prettiest cats that I've seen.
Anyway, I could keep on talking about this cat that I love for a long time, but I won't make you suffer through more details and will return to the present story.
After three weeks of feeding Kinky and many complaints from her part, and though she does seem better, we decide to go to the vet (usually I do business with a mobile vet but they are closed) as she lost a lot of weight. SĂ©bastien and I are pretty convinced that we'll be told that the worst has passed, but you never know.
It's Saturday evening so the clinic is empty. It's always surprising to see that pets never have problems on a Saturday evening but I'll refrain myself from making anthropologic comments, that's not why we're here.
The vet examines Mademoiselle Kinky and announces in less than 2 minutes that she is dying and that we do not really have any chances of saving her. Her liver is not functioning properly and she is jaundiced. According to him the cause is emotional, the cat must have lived something that has destabilized her.
I've always been proud to be in control of my emotions in public settings, for the first time of my life, no time to control anything and I start to cry inconsolably.
In between sobs, I ask all sorts of questions through a curtain of tears.
Less than 5% of chances, says the vet. We have to force feed her highly nutritive food and hope to unchoke her liver.
It's crazy how some small numbers can be huge at times. 5% is so much more than 0!
So I go home, armed with my 5%, my good intentions and all the love in the world.
SĂ©bastien and me start force feeding her and it breaks my heart. Mademoiselle Kinky, proud lady that she is finds it excessively difficult to be forced to do anything, especially since it does take away a bit of her dignity when the food falls all over her while she vehemently protest this disagreeable invasion.
But after the "meal" she does seem to be much better. She purrs like there is no tomorrow and I let her sleep next to my head, like before Seb moved in (he is slightly asthmatic) and she lays her head on my hand. We're pretty cute :)
Unfortunately, in the days to come it all goes to hell.
Her system finds it real hard to be overloaded with proteins and she spends her days sleeping with a facial expression that seems to say : "dear lord, make it so that this ends" like the one I make when I eat way too much pasta because I was too gluttonous.
Now is added to her misfortune that fact that she vomits and it takes away a tad more of her feline dignity. She doesn't throw up as much as she eats so that's positive and we keep on going.
I make her a comfy little bed on some fake fur and make her an appeasing play list. What's better to appease the soul of a diva than some Enya?
But through all of that, the jaundice seems to show signs of defeat, and her ears and gums are getting back to a healthier pink. Isa: 1, evil vet: 0. I do the little dance of happiness but with a bit of a frown because I am worried for my baby. I tell myself it's worst before getting better, the jaundice out of the way she'll get back her strength...but my heart is starting to sink in a sea of sadness, because her glances of despair make me capsize. I try to swim towards the shore of hope but it feels so far...
Anyway, it ain't over until it's over but I do decide to get buoy called Dre France Piette, Kinky's vet who would normally have taken care of her if I hadn't rushed to the polyclinic. So I take an appointment for as soon as possible please, which is tomorrow morning.
In the meantime, I keep swimming forward with my moral brass towards the distant shore.
Until I find my beloved cat hidden under the bed, before I go to sleep. One glance and I understand her silent message like if she had screamed.
The guilt machine turns on. Should I have called the vet sooner? The one I went to see on Saturday mentioned an emotional problem, did she miss me too much while I was gone for 5 days? Has my distraction of young entrepreneur made her feel ignored? Actually, I can summarize all my doubts with this question: am I a bad person that neglected her good friend by being egocentric?
My head full of those recriminations, I install her on the soda near me and I make us a bed there. She's no longer able to move and I fight to be strong and not to cry but rather smile profusely and tell her how much I love her.
I refuse to sleep, every second counts to tell her all the things I had to say in the next years.
The only time where I almost fall asleep, she pushes herself against me with the two joules she had left.
I'm so sorry sweetie. I'm staying with you, don't worry.
She starts to purr and all resolutions of keeping myself from crying are forgotten. I kiss her everywhere, tell her of my eternal love for her and I just hope she understands that all the fibers of my being love her. I try to calm down before I make her all wet of sadness, poor her. I gently comb her soft hair with my fingers and sometimes let myself grab her paws, even though I know she doesn't like it much.
It's crazy how time perception is strange because it's been the longest and shortest night of my life, but certainly one of the most difficult.
Comes morning and Dre Piette gets here. She examins Kinky and I can't help but notice how her exam is very different from the other vet (it lasts more 30 minutes than 5, if you know what I mean) and she finally tells me that Kinky is suffering from acute renal failure and that her death warrant was signed as soon as she came back home from her two days of absence, because she's never seen a cat recover from that. She explains that the jaundice is only a symptom and not a cause, so treating the jaundice couldn't help the cause of the problem: bacteria in her kidneys.
I am somewhat relieved to know that it wasn't an emotional problem.
But soon my relief gives way to my sadness and then anger, because having known that, I certainly wouldn't have forced her to live those debilitating moments. She would have died a week earlier with all her lucidity, her dignity and I would have avoided the emotional torture of seeing her go slowly, which bruised my heart in several places.
Fortunately, the empathy and compassion of Dre Piette act like a balm and we prepare ourselves for the euthanasia.
The whole time I pet her between sobs and tell her again how much I love her and that she was the best cat I could have hoped for. I wish her a good night during the barbituric injection.
In a way I'm lucky, as it's the first time someone I love dies. It's weird how the life or death of someone loved makes all the difference of the world in the weight of one's soul. When you love you feel filled, fulfilled and complete. Death makes you feel so empty...it's like if love is the healthy weight of the soul.
I know some will say: "it's only a cat!" but for me she is one of the rare beings that has never disappointed me. If friendship is a contract, she is one of those exceptional friends that respected her end of the bargain: I would pet her, scratch her behind the ears, offer her food, shelter and a place on the sofa next to me and in turn she decorated my condo with her beauty, but most important she gave me her unconditional love.
When I think about it, it hurts as my mind comes to a stop at the impossibility of a future and I have trouble understanding. I tend to rationalize my emotions a lot and there is nothing to rational about death except death is a part of life and I find myself lost, with no mechanism to cope with this situation.
Despite all this, believe me when I say that all those heavy tears are worth their weight of good moments and I cry them, happy to have known her. I know that time heals all wounds but that notion is of no comfort at the moment and all I can tell myself is that only someone lucky to have loved a lot can cry that much.
Sleep well my sweetie, I don't know if you are going somewhere but if it's the case, put my love in your luggage. I will wear yours like a necklace for the rest of my life, the most gorgeous and precious that can be.
Thank you.
