I REMEMBER MISI



BRITTANY CARLISLE

ILLUSTRATED BY AUTHOR.



	“No!” I moaned. “This can’t be happening. Noohohohoho!”

	We had just come home from my brother’s baseball game on that dreadful night to find my three-year-old cat, Misi, on the side of our driveway.

	It was the summer of 2002, May 31st. Well, maybe she’s just playing a game. I had thought. Misi used to play a game with me where she would lay down and wait for me. She would just lie there. When I got about six inches from her, she would jump up and run to a door. But this time, the cards revealed a horrifying fact. I would never see my beloved pet again. For three weeks I slept a total of 16 hours per weekend. Ate about one thing a day, and would not be consoled, though I did get another orange and white striped tabby three days after her death.

	This was only the beginning of a three-year nightmare. Sure, grades were good, and I was beginning to eat and sleep more, but nothing was good enough anymore. My cat was too quiet, too delicate. And besides, he was speckled. Not the pure white under-belly, paws, and face Misi had. She was cream in some places, orange in some, white in others.

	I used to also have an undestroyed love for the horse species. Since she died, though, I was a wreck. Horses didn’t matter, chores didn’t matter, and family had no meaning. She was my family, feeding her was my chore, and she was my undestroyed loveable “kitter-kat” (another nickname). When she died it was a living tormenting world for me. My other cat, Mickey, had to be put down in February of that same year for an ear tumor. He was a family cat of 12 years, though. He was so incredibly sacred to me, but it hurt more when she died. 

	About three days later I got Rili, my new orange kitten. Eventually I grew to love him but no thing could ever, ever, ever replace my Misi.