Page 44 of Saint Céline
I pressed my hand against my mouth. Across the courtyard, students laughed over coffee cups and backpacks and normal lives.
“She’s confused,” Mrs. Montgomery said quietly. “Animals understand absence more than people think.”
Yes. They did. I remembered Miss Astoria waiting outside my bedroom door as a teenager if I stayed out too late. Cryingoutside the bathroom when Katherine locked herself inside during panic attacks. Curling against my stomach every single time my father appeared in my head unexpectedly, like she could smell the fear on me.
“I miss her,” I said before I could stop myself.
The words came out smaller than I intended.
Mrs. Montgomery inhaled sharply. “Oh, sweetheart.”
“I was actually going to call you,” she continued after a moment. “I just didn’t want you to feel obligated.”
Obligated. As if obligation had not built half my life.
“What do you mean?”
“She’s unhappy here now.”
I went very still. The wind off the cliffs moved sharply through my hair.
“She keeps scratching at the guest house door,” Mrs. Montgomery continued softly. “Mira says she sits there for hours sometimes.”
“She misses you,” Mrs. Montgomery said.
Something inside my chest cracked quietly down the middle.
I stared out toward the ocean. Then carefully responded, “Would you want me to take her?”
The silence afterward felt enormous.
“Oh,” Mrs. Montgomery whispered.
I heard it then. Relief. Immediate and devastating.
“Yes,” she said quickly. “Yes, if you’d like that.”
Like.As if I would not have crawled across broken glass for that cat.
“She’s always really been yours anyway.”
The words landed strangely. Dangerously. Because part of me had always known that was true. And part of Katherine had known it too.
“When can I come by?” I asked.
“Anytime, sweetheart.”
“I can stop by tonight after class.”
“All right.” Mrs. Montgomery’s voice trembled faintly now. “She’ll be so happy to see you.”
We hung up a minute later. I stayed leaning against the wall outside Westgrave long after the call ended. Students passed around me in waves. Someone somewhere was playing music too loudly from an open dorm window. The ocean below the cliffs crashed violently against the rocks. And for the first time in weeks, I wanted something simple. Not status. Not survival. Not control. Just my cat.
“You look less haunted.”
Professor Moreau’s voice behind me nearly stopped my heart. I turned too quickly. He stood a few feet away, holding a stack of student evaluations, dark coat open against the wind, expression unreadable except for the faintest trace of amusement at having startled me.
“You need therapy,” I said immediately.
