“That ridiculous cat.”
“He looks like a Hector.”
“He absolutely does not.”
“He looks like a general.”
“He looks like dessert.”
Roger stared at her.
For the first time since Elaine died, conversation with another person felt effortless.
Beatrice smiled.
“So he’s been eating at your house at four-fifteen.”
“Then coming here at six.”
“Yes.”
“And possibly visiting six other people in between.”
“Almost certainly.”
They sat in amused silence.
Then Roger remembered the fall.
His smile faded.
“What happened?”
Beatrice looked toward the window.
“My hip has been weak for months.”
“Arthritis?”
“And an old fracture.”
She sighed.
“That evening, Honey was at the kitchen window.”
“He doesn’t come through the hall?”
“No.”
“My apartment has a fire escape outside the kitchen.”
Roger knew.
“He comes up there?”
“Somehow.”
“I have stopped asking.”
Beatrice continued.
“He was meowing.”
“Louder than usual.”
“I was in the living room.”
“I stood to open the window.”
Her fingers tightened on the blanket.
“My hip gave way.”
“I fell.”
Roger’s chest tightened.
“I hit the cabinet.”
“Then the floor.”
“Could you reach the phone?”
“No.”
“It was on the coffee table.”
“Did you call out?”
“For hours.”
Her voice became quieter.
“I thought someone would hear.”
Roger looked down.
“Did anyone?”
She shook her head.
“The television was on.”
“I suppose that made it worse.”
Roger felt a painful pressure behind his ribs.
“How long?”
“The doctors think somewhere around thirty hours.”
“Thirty?”
Beatrice nodded.
“I lost track.”
“After a while, I just slept.”
Roger could barely imagine it.
Then she smiled faintly.
“But Honey kept coming.”
Roger looked up.
“The cat?”
“The first night.”
“He meowed outside the kitchen.”
“I couldn’t get up.”
“He stayed.”
“For hours.”
“The next morning I heard him again.”
Beatrice swallowed.
“Then he disappeared.”
Roger understood.
“He came to find someone.”
Beatrice nodded.
“Apparently he found you.”
Roger sat back.
A cat.
A small animal with no key, no phone, no understanding of emergency services.
Hector had realized one person stopped responding.
Then gone to the only other person he trusted enough to ask.
Roger.
Beatrice looked at him.
“You saved my life.”
“No.”
He shook his head.
“Hector did.”
“You climbed five floors.”
“That nearly killed me.”
Beatrice laughed softly.
“Then perhaps he saved both of us.”
Roger stayed forty minutes.
The next day, he returned.
No flowers.
Crossword puzzle.
Beatrice looked at it.
“Better.”
“I thought you hated flowers.”
“I don’t hate flowers.”
“You told the nurse you didn’t need another bouquet.”
“That was after my niece sent something large enough to block the television.”
Roger sat.
“How are you?”
“Alive.”
“That’s encouraging.”
The doctors had found a fractured hip.
Not catastrophic, but serious.
Beatrice needed surgery.
Then rehabilitation.
She was lucky the head injury was minor.
Lucky the dehydration had not become worse.
Lucky no blood clot had formed while she lay immobile.
Lucky.
Everyone kept saying lucky.
Roger knew luck had blue eyes and a ridiculous amount of confidence.
He visited every afternoon.