A cat appears!

Maria, aka “Mussolin-a”

In my third semester of my MFA program, my mentor wrote on a story, “I begin to believe you can’t write a story without a cat in it.” I eliminated the cat from the story I was drafting when I read his note and I have tried not to over-use cats ever since. But they do sneak in…. I mentioned a cat in May 1’s story but only as part of a simile. A cat appeared in the story I wrote for May 3 but it was only just a mention, the cat didn’t even get a name. Ditto May 5. But a cat with a name shows up, here. I think waiting a whole week to include a cat-as-character shows excellent restraint.

Working Title: Madame Asbury, Knower of All Secrets
1st Sentence: Her first pair of gloves were crisp white linen.
Favorite Sentence: A dirty palm would flutter in the cradle of her sweating, velvet hand, while she flung words she had learned from old movies and silly paperbacks her mother had left untended, while she traced life lines and counted creases and soothed or baffled or bedeviled, whatever her mood of the day.
Word Length: 1,707