Page 9 of Grumpy Boss's Secret

I reached the cat shelter a few minutes later. It was a small building between a parking garage and an independently owned grocery store.

"Cute," I said aloud, looking up at the pink lettering painted inside the large front window: Happy Endings Cat Shelter.

I pushed open the door, which had been painted the same pink as the window letters. A bell jangled over my head. Well, cats don't smell great. I should have seen that coming. Or, smelled it coming. Anyway. The shop was long and narrow, and the walls were lined with large cages stacked three high. Inside the cages were, obviously, cats.

“Hi!” said a woman at the back of the store, waving to me. She had a buzz cut of blond hair and wore a purple blouse. “Are you here to get a cat?”

"I'm hoping to," I said, smiling at her. I looked at the crate to my right. Inside, a grey cat with a fluffy face glared at me as if he was hoping the floor might open up and swallow me.

"Hi, cutie," I said.

He kept glaring. The woman stepped out from behind her desk and walked over to me. She offered her hand.

“I’m Susan,” she said. “I’m one of the volunteers here. We’re a volunteer-run organization,” she said proudly.

"That's great," I said, beaming at her, although I wondered if it might smell better if people were paid to deep-clean those cages.

“What kind of cat are you looking for?” she asked me. “Can I interest you in any of our bonded pairs?”

"Oh, just one for now," I said. "And honestly, I should really wait a few weeks before adopting. I will be out of town for a week this month, and I'm staying in a furnished apartment until I find a permanent place."

I suddenly realized that I shouldn't look for a permanent apartment yet. I may want to quit my job if Ian proves this frustrating. And if I wasn't staying in Seattle, should I even get a cat? I brushed the thoughts aside. I was being silly. Ian wasn't that bad. Right? Then how come the idea of him made my skin feel hot?

"Oh, that's fine," Susan said. "You can always adopt a cat now, and as long as you show us proof of an upcoming lease – you know, for somewhere that allows cats – you can keep it here until you move."

"Sounds perfect," I said. "Much better than keeping a cat hidden in my bathroom for a few weeks."

"Well, actually, some of our more skittish cats will want that," she said. "For a week or so. They'll want to stay in a quiet, enclosed space while they get used to their new home. But moving them to a new location afterwards obviously isn't ideal."

Really? Wow. Maybe I didn’t have the patience for a cat.

“I’ll have you meet all of our single cats,” she said. “You can just go from cage to cage and open the doors yourself. If it has a red stop sign hanging on it, don’t try to pet the cat, but you can hold your hand out for them to smell. All the single cats’ cages are marked with a yellow dot.”

I smiled. Single cats. That was cute.

Susan returned to her desk, trusting her fur babies with me, and I walked up to the first cage with a yellow dot.

"Hey, Laurence," I read out loud, looking at the name tag attached to the bars. A calico cat with a torn ear blinked back at me. He lifted his nose slightly towards me.

“I like him,” I said to Susan.

She smiled, looking up from her paperwork. “When you find the right cat, you’ll know,” she said. “You’ll just get a feeling in your gut, like: this is my cat.”

“Okay,” I said politely, smiling, but I didn’t believe her. Life didn’t work out that way. We don’t just get magical sixth senses about who or what is supposed to be in our life.

Cautiously, I opened Laurence's cage. I started to put my hand in slowly. Laurence hissed.

“Oh, okay then,” I said, retreating. “I guess he doesn’t like me back.”

“Laurence is finicky,” Susan said. “You can try him again later.”

Hmm. That sounds like Ian. I wandered down the line of cages. I wanted to test out Susan's theory. I wanted it to be true – I would just know when I found my cat. Would I know just by looking at it?

I circled the room. They were all cute. Some of them seemed shy, some of them seemed eager, and most of them were asleep. There were a few that I liked the look of – maybe that's all Susan was talking about. I opened a few cages and petted the cats inside. I thought I might get a grey tabby named Ernie. Then I stopped at a cell in the middle of the room, where a black and white cat was sleeping.

"Hey, Potato," I said, reading and laughing at the nametag. "Can I meet you?"

The cat lifted her head. She also had part of an ear missing, and her left eye was discolored and half-closed.

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