It’s me and four cats. Day two on the road. Driving highway all day clouds your head and blears your eyes. Legs and back are stiff. I’m not hungry or thirsty, though for the last nine hours I’ve had nothing but a couple of sips of water, one large coffee, a bottle of diet soda, two small energy bars, and an egg salad sandwich.
Was not looking for complications, though when you’re on the road for several days at a time, you do your best to anticipate wrenches.
I just want to get the cats out of their carriers, feed and water them, and let them roam around a bit while I doze. Watching them explore the room will assuage my guilt at forcing them into their carriers, messing with their schedules, driving them halfway across the country when they were perfectly content back in their little house among the other little houses among the cornfields of central Iowa.
When we pulled into the hotel parking lot, the sun was just beginning to set and the air, comfortable all day, was starting to chill. It was that time of day when it gets dark and cold pretty fast. Late May. The anniversary of my grandmother’s death. That thought shoots out of nowhere. It’s been twenty-three years but still feels like it just happened.
While the other kitties dart from their carriers, Gus stays in his. The last three hours, he’s been mewing, breathing a bit heavily. At the last gas stop, I zipped open his carrier to give him some treats. He poked his little head out. I thought for a second about removing him from the carrier and cuddling him a bit, but immediately my head created this movie reel where, me exhausted and him energized, he leaps from my arms and runs into traffic. So I pushed his little head back in, it’s soft and slightly larger than the palm of my hand, and told him we only had a few more hours.
Got into the habit, when my daughters were young, of making sure that from the driver’s seat I could always see them, either by turning my head quickly or by looking in the rear-view mirror. I’m the same with my cats. From the mirror, I could see all four of them. Shortly after we got back on the road after that last stop, Gus made a sound that I’d never heard come from him before. Part yelp. Part meow. Soon after, he began mouth breathing. I’m an experienced enough cat person to know that this is not good, and warrants investigating.
We still had 150 miles left of our drive. He was fine at the last rest stop, when he tried to get out of the carrier and I’d pushed him back in. I convinced myself that the reason he was mouth breathing was because he was stressed and that everything would be fine once we got to the hotel.
But Gus stayed in his carrier. Finally, I shook him from it. He lay on his side on the floor breathing heavily. I picked him up and put him on my shoulder. He whined as though he was in pain. His body writhed. I put him down on the cool tiles on the bathroom floor. He lies still, his only movement the heaving of his chest.
Not sure what the term is for when you are utterly exhausted, yet you go into hyperdrive. Not a second wind. Definitely an out of body thing. My phone was at less than 10 percent, so I plugged it into the wall. I started up my laptop and googled emergency vets, part of me wondering if I was overreacting, and part of me wishing I’d done this search hours ago.
The animal hospital answers on the second ring and tells me to bring in Gus immediately. I bundle Gus in some clothes and get him in the car. Dazed, worn out. That was me. Can’t even begin to imagine how the poor little guy was feeling. Luckily, the vet was only four miles and two highways away. Made it in ten minutes to a shopping plaza with two other businesses, an insurance place – closed for the evening, and a pot store.
I knew nothing about this place or these veterinarians. I was 800 miles away from one home and 400 miles away from another in a strange place among other strange places. I was in such a rush I hadn’t googled reviews or medical backgrounds. For all I knew these people were drug addicts and murderers practicing vet medicine without licenses.
These nameless, faceless office people waited while I filled out paperwork, and my credit card approved their $500 base fee. Then they took Gus. I wasn’t allowed to go with them.
At that point I was still thinking that Gus would be okay, that maybe he was just dehydrated or stressed. I was telling myself that this was all a waste of time and money. There were two other people in the waiting room. Silence. Plate glass windows showed how dark it was outside. Hardly any cars in the lot. Felt like we were the last people on earth. The silence was overwhelming. There was too much time to think. My phone was charging at the one electrical plug I could find, next to a coffee maker. I could have gotten a free coffee, but to say I was already over wired at that point would be an understatement. No seat nearby so I was pacing, but not for long.
Within ten minutes, the vet beckoned me to follow her, past closed doors into a small examination room. Where’s Gus?
She starts by immediately crashing all my hopes. Do you have any support with you?
I said no and I’m strong and I give her the back of the matchbook summary: I’m a marathoner, raised two kids on my own and also cared, usually alone, for sick then dying loved ones for ten years. I repeat: I’m strong.
She tells me Gus isn’t good. There’s something wrong with his heart and I need to make some decisions because he’s suffering.
Strong me starts swaying. She helps me sit down and gets me a cup of water.
Me, wondering where she got her vet degree and if she got off on killing pets: “How certain are you?”
She rattled off the tests they’d done on him and said she was 100 percent sure that Gus was dying, but they could do more tests if I wanted.
What I said, roughly:
“I don’t know you. I don’t know this place. You don’t know me or my cat. He was fine this morning. I need more answers.”
I handed her my credit card, which she would need to charge in order to authorize more tests. I asked to see Gus but was told it wasn’t possible just yet. He was hooked up to an IV and was in an oxygenated incubator. I asked if maybe possibly the stress that he was under right now, being with strange people in a strange place, might be the real problem.
Her answer: No.
This was followed by an hour of pacing, phone charging, googling the vet and clinic reviews, and searching out reasons for sudden cardiac failure in felines.
When the vet returned with the test results, I knew it was over.
They gave me Gus, wrapped in a blanket, and told me to take all the time I needed. I asked if he was in pain. When they said that, yes he was, I said give me just a minute. I didn’t want him suffering any more than he already was. At this point for him, every breath was torture.
I stayed with him as they administered the medicine. As he took his last breaths, I told him what I hope he already knew: that he was a good boy who deserved better than this. I said other things too, but that’s between him and me.
I left with a hefty credit card bill, and a sandwich-sized baggy full of Gus’s fur. Drove back to the hotel I don’t know how. Gave the other three cats lots of treats and cuddles. Imagined my grandmother meeting up with Gus and welcoming him into her cozy heaven apartment, walls decorated with my daughters’ finger paintings. I dreamt she was keeping watch over all my other pets gone too soon and saying to them, when they saunter into the kitchen after a good night’s sleep, “Did you dream about the kitty and doggy?” which is a weird little phrase she used all the time with my kids.
Slept a little.
The next day drove the last leg of the trip. I don’t remember anything about that day which must mean it was uneventful which was the best thing I could hope for at that point.
Gus, on the other hand, was everything I could hope for. Someday I’ll write about how he stole my heart, flooded my house – he truly did this is not an exaggeration, called me mom – he did I am convinced of this, and was simply the best cat ever.
