Page 28 of Betting on the Brainiac

“Want me to hold the kittens so you can get that?” I ask.

She gathers them even closer. “No takebacks.”

“I promise I’m not stealing kittens. But it looks like your dad is calling.”

She buries her face in her armful of fur. “He’ll leave a message.”

All right, then.

It gets too quiet. She’s probably forgotten that I’m there, but I’m feeling foolish sitting on the stockroom floor with no kittensand no purpose. I clear my throat. “We probably need to call animal control. Or a rescue.”

She gives a sharp shake of her head, then brushes her cheek over the kittens. “My job is cat now.”

“Cool. What does that look like for you? Will you live in this stockroom?”

“Yeah. I’m never moving. I’ll make the owners keep the club closed until these kitties grow up.”

“Solid plan.”

She nuzzles another one, her eyes looking like my youngest sister’s always did on Christmas morning. “How come no one ever told me cats are so awesome?”

“Have you met the internet? Cats are the whole reason it exists.”

The mama cat gets up and pads over to sit beside me, her eyes never leaving her kittens.

“How old do you think they are?” Madison asks.

“To be honest, I don’t know a ton about cats. I’ll ask Google.”

Madison finally looks up. “You seemed so confident about what the mama cat needed. I thought you might be a cat pro.”

“Not really,” I say, already typing a search into my phone. “We had a couple of feral barn cats, but my mom is super allergic to them so we never had any in the house. The barn cats ate mice and did their thing without much help from us, so I don’t know.”

“You lived on a farm?” she asks.

“Not exactly. But we had a barn.” I lived on a horse ranch, but unless you’re talking to someone who also grew up on a horse ranch, people don’t picture the right thing, so I don’t clarify unless there’s plenty of time to explain. We fall silent while I skim the info in a link. “Good news. I have read an internet article and now I’m a cat rescue expert.”

“Educate me,” she says.

“I’m going to need to look at the babies to be sure. I promise not to steal them.”

“Fine. Come look.”

I scoot closer and peer at the black-and-white kitten, which—according to the article—is called a tuxedo. Its head is resting on the back of one of the all-grays, and it’s easiest to see. I pick it up and check its belly. “Have you seen any of them open their eyes?” When she shakes her head no, I read through the guide I found, comparing Tux to the size chart until I have an answer. “Giant head and folded up ears. Umbilical cord still attached. It looks like that one is maybe between one and three days old. What do you think?”

She looks at my phone screen, which shows a chart with the progression of kitten growth by day. She glances between it and her arms a few times. “Yeah, they can’t be older than three days. Does it say what we should do with them? Do we need to do anything about these cords?”

“It says not to cut them. And if the kittens are all nursing well, you don’t need to do much. If not, they’re supposed to be bottle fed every two hours with a special formula.” It already sounds overwhelming. How would we know if they’re nursing well? Where do you get kitten formula? “Maybe I should call a rescue and find out more.”

“Good idea.”

I find the name of a local cat rescue and have a true expert on the phone in less than a minute. After I explain the situation, the volunteer tells me what to check for to see if they’re healthy. “Basically,” he concludes, “you need to watch them nurse, and then you’ll have more information.”

“Then I can call you back with more questions?” I ask.

He laughs. “Definitely. Their care isn’t complicated unless you fall for them. Then it’s stressful, but I promise, in most cases, mother cats do a pretty good job without our help.”

We hang up, and the mama cat gets up and walks over to Madison, climbing up to rest her forepaws on Madison’s leg so she can eye her babies.

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