Heavy Cream - "John Johnny"

With Edmund, there is a cat. It is not his cat, but it is often in his house, he often leaves food out for it, in warm months they make eye contact while it walks on top the fence, they are connected. Technically, legally, it is his neighbour John Johnny's cat, but in reality, the kind of reality that doesn't exist in courtrooms, but rather face-to-face-this-is-it-no-one's-watching, it is no one's cat. It is orange, short-haired, confident, and dusty. It does not hesitate the way some cats do, it does not consider its actions, it simply performs. John Johnny's cat, let us call him John Johnny since it has no other name (there is no room for diminutives with JJ's personality) has seen fights, and eaten garbage, and dodged train cars on the tracks. John Johnny is a great and straight-faced cat, a fearless and autonomous cat.

With Edmund, there is also an ant problem. Now that April is here, the cloudy warmth has given way to little moving lines in the kitchen cracks. Little lines that point to old spills or a piece of food that fell between the oven and the counter. Edmund laid the corners with ant poison and left the house as usual. But still left, forgetting what he'd done, the screen door open just a crack for John Johnny to get in. And as JJ did most days, he came by around 1:30 and there was still old food left in the bowl, and a bit of stale water left to drink. But as he drank he too saw the lines, and followed them a little. He saw what they were taking, the bait, and tried some himself. John Johnny was not prepared for this. He hopped up on the fence and walked its length, his feet slipping off a time or two, his travel slow and woozy. He saw the grass like stretching caves, he saw crickets making the sounds of jet planes and the trains were always right inside his brain. His feet now mud, his lower jaw a senseless drool, the cloudy sun seemed to be chasing him, burning him, singeing him like a hot element. He ran, scoop-footed, drool-mouthed, wide-eyed, panting through the drainage ditch, and made it scrambling to the junkyard, where he curled up in a trailer's tailpipe, the tunnel vision calming him, focusing him, protecting him. John Johnny could not connect this experience with visiting Edmund's house, for he was not even, and you cannot blame him, self-aware. [Out May 8th on Infinity Cat]