Christmas Landing on Its Feet

A Landlord Scare, a Cat Just Being a Cat, and a Meet...Something

Eddie walks towards his apartment,  shopping bag over his arm, when out of nowhere, someone turns the corner and nearly bumps into him.

“Hey!” Eddie exclaims, then upon seeing it’s his landlady, he greets, “Mr. Brubaker!”

Mr. Brubaker nods a greeting back, “Mr. Diaz.”

Eddie takes a breath to calm down, then accuses goodnaturedly, “You scared me!”

But it appears his landlord has something more pressing on his mind than startling his tenants, “Liz McIntire has been talking about how she heard a cat in the building this morning. Know anything about that?”

Eddie feigns confusion, “A cat? In our building? Not at all.”, then points above them, “But we’re in a big neighborhood. Could’ve been coming from anywhere.

Mr. Brubaker shakes his head, “Oh no. She was pretty adamant she thought it was coming from your place.”, and points towards the building in question.

Eddie gives an Oscar worthy performance still pretending to be clueless, and shrugs, “Wow. Yikes. Then I’d better keep my eyes peeled, in case I see anything, huh? I mean really. What idiot would be dumb enough to break their apartment comolex’s strict no pet policy?”

Mr. Brubaker oh so helpfully supplies, “Someone who likely doesn’t know it would mean immediate eviction .”, pointedly looking at Eddie as he emphasizes the last two words.

Eddie doesn’t break his composure, “Oh of course. Absolutely.”, then hurries inside before Mr. Brubaker can grill him any further.

The second his apartment door is shut, and he’s had a chance to take off his jacket and set his groceries down, he goes to the window to make sure Mr. Brubaker is gone, and of course, that’s right when his orange tabby decides to walk over to him, meowing to be picked up.

Hearing her, Eddie looks down, smiling, “Hello, Jonesy.”, and picks her up for a hug.

“Did you miss me? What did you do all day?”

The cat meows again, and Eddie plays along, “Wow! Fascinating!”, and carries her over to the dining area as he tells her, 

“My day was about as uneventful as the rest of them. I fell asleep during class. A fire truck almost hit me. ” Eddie scratches Jonesy under the chin, to make her purr. “And then a dog decided to drool all over me.”

Eddie kisses the top of Jonesy’s furry head, and admits, “So in short, quite a disappointing way to kick off the holiday season.”

“Hey, it’s Evan Buckley calling again.” Buck says the next morning, as he holds Norman with one arm, and holds his phone to his ear with the other. “I called last night too, and left a message. I found your cat, Norman, and this was the number I found on his caller.”

In the background, the other members of the 118 are looking for a set of keys, but Buck pays it no mind as he listens to the person on the other line.

“Oh no. I didn’t know. I’m sorry.” Buck apologizes, then says, “Thanks for telling me.”, and hangs up.

“What was that about?” Chim asks, making Buck turn towards him, still holding the cat as he tells Chim,

“So, I rescued this cat from a dog barking at it outside my house, right?” The entire time, Buck keeps petting Norman’s head, to keep him calm. “And then he suddenly decides that he’s gonna follow me inside. So I just called the number on his caller, and apparently his owner just passed away about a week ago. No family to speak of, or at least no family that’s coming to collect her things, or her cat.”