The Emperor's Doppelganger.

Immortalizing one of the loves of my life.

I pulled the black plastic lid off of the large red bucket of ground coffee. It was maybe a quarter full but the scent sailed out with rooty splendour all the same. I took a deep gratifying breath of it and bent down to the small, wide-cheeked, feral-ish cat that sat next to me on the kitchen carpet, kneading with his forepaws ready to explore whatever mysticisms in-house living had to offer. I held the bucket under his face, and dutifully he took a deep sniff himself at the flaky material, and backed up w/ a glance up at my face as if to say 'no wonder you crazy.' The offense at my morning drug did not linger, he kept on kneading until he caught the side-long glare of that other cat; the one that had been staring at him earlier from the black shiny surface of the washing machine. This time the other rippling bobcat face was staring at him from the stove. His shoulders raised and his head moved back and forth in gestures just as inquisitively as the other had, and he did as well, in perfect cadence.

“That's you, handsome. “ I reassured him, although he was not nervous, just on peak and curious. “Damn humans and their reflective surfaces.” I crouched and scratched his head, just as the mystery fingers in the stove-face scratched the frowning stranger cat. His lidless eyes deepened with shadow as his brow fell into a 'v' shape and momentarily doused his Sphinx-ish serenity. Any unimaginative human would have called it evil, a demonic haze that had crept over his features.

The kitty in the stove began to wash it's black-padded paw delicately. Then Genghis, the furry, coffee-repulsed gentleman did too. Did I see..that? Did the stove kitty move first..?

The coffee gurgled into the carafe behind me on the counter. I leaned back into the white and gold speckled formica niche and folded my arms. I wondered about space, time and cats. And magick.

“Humans and their reflective surfaces.” I mumbled, again. “Sometimes it's all we have.”

Reviews

[Lola Nevius]

This reads like a screenplay. Very detailed.

[G.GabrielPen]

Thank you very much!