What the Cat Knows

Mara stood before the bathroom mirror, scissors in hand. The gray had started at her temples three years ago, the same year Julian left. Now it marched like an insurgent army through strands that had once been the color of summer wheat. She thought about cutting it all off—starting fresh, as if a shorter bob could somehow shed the weight of the life she'd almost built with him.

The cat, Barnaby, wound through her legs, purring like a small engine. He was Julian's cat originally, a rescue with one shredded ear and a judgmental stare. Barnaby had chosen Mara after Julian packed his boxes, as if the animal understood something about loyalty that the man hadn't.

"You're hungry, aren't you?" Mara sighed. "Always hungry. Never satisfied."

She set down the scissors and followed him to the kitchen. Her sister Elena had brought groceries yesterday—pity in the form of fresh produce. There sat a papaya, alien and bulbous on the counter. Julian had loved them. He'd eaten them with lime and chili, standing bare-chested in their kitchen, juice running down his chin, laughing about some office drama she couldn't quite remember now.

Mara sliced the papaya open. Black seeds spilled like secrets. The flesh was shockingly orange inside, too bright, too alive for this gray Tuesday morning. She took a bite anyway, let the sweetness fill her mouth until it almost, almost masked the taste of all the mornings she'd woken up alone.

Barnaby meowed, impatient.

"Alright, alright." She opened a can of tuna, his favorite, and watched him eat. He purred between bites, vibrating with simple, uncomplicated pleasure. No one had ever looked at her the way Barnaby looked at tuna—absolute devotion, zero conditions.

Her phone buzzed. A text from Julian: *Saw something that reminded me of you. Hope you're well.*

Mara stared at the screen until it went dark. The papaya sat half-eaten on a paper towel. The cat licked his whiskers clean. And in the mirror, her hair fell in silver waves around a face that was slowly, painfully, becoming her own again.

She picked up the scissors and put them away in the drawer. Some things could be cut away. Others you had to let grow, even when you didn't recognize them anymore. Barnaby rubbed against her ankle, and for the first time in three years, she didn't flinch at the touch of something that stayed.