Valentines Day (finished)

February 7th

Matt walked by the corner. Nothing was there. This, was every day ever.

*

Matt walked by the corner. There was a cardboard box there now. Inside the cardboard box was a family. He tried to give what he could. This, was November 8th.

*

Matt walked by the corner. There was an empty cardboard box there now. This, was every day after November 8th.

*

However, it was February 7th, now, and Matthew was walking home again when he noticed that the box had changed. On it, read; "Please Take This F*****g Monstrosity Off My Hands." The asterix were written in blue ink, instead of the black that the words were written in, and the brunette found it hard to believe that someone took the time to censor someone else, but skipped over whatever was inside. It was easier to believe than the writer all of a sudden having a change of heart and trying to censor himself with another marker because the first one ran out of ink.

Yet Matt was busy too, and wouldn't have looked if it weren't for the sound. As he walked by, a sound came out. A sound that tugged on some sort of primal instinct. It came again. It was extremely soft, but audible. Matt walked over to the box and stared down at the poor little thing inside which so many had decided to skip because it wasn't important to them. It was struggling to move. Someone had tied a very small and short rope to its leg to keep it next to a pipe. He took pity.

*

"Matthew, is there something you're hiding?" accused Steph. When she came in, Matt was giggling his head off, but the moment she came near their room there was a scrambling of feet and she found him sitting up nice and tall with his hands behind his back.

"No," he lied, but was betrayed by a soft 'mew' from behind him. "Yes," he quickly backpedaled. Matt put his arms around and revealed the small kitten laying in his palms. The cat had sat up, annoyed that it couldn't contently snuggled into his hands anymore.

Stephanie leaned down cautiously and extended out her arm to pet it. "Why do you have a cat?" she asked, knowing the most likely answer.

"Well, someone had just thrown it out in a box, and everyone else just skipped it when they came to it on the sidewalk. So I took it to the animal shelter, but when they told me its breed, I realized it was one of a non-allergenic cat. Like we've always wanted. They were so pumped to hear that I might want to take it home, they offered to pay for the medical bills and the first year of food. It's very tame and I'll have a job by the time we actually need to start paying for him. I was hoping to give him as a Valentine's day present. Can we keep it pleeeese?"

Matthew said this all at a mile a minute, making Stephanie's head spin. "I dunno," she responded. She looked at the little kitten nuzzling up against her hand. "Have you thought of a name?"

"We're keeping it?"

"I'm willing to consider it," she compromised, "but not calling it 'kitten' the whole time."

"Well, I've been referring to him as Skipped because no one looked at him."

"Skip?"

"Skipped."

"I like Skip," she answered. Skip began crawling up her arm. "What is he doing?"

"Oh, he does this. Don't worry, he's declawed. It won't hurt."

Stephanie stood still as the small animal padded up her arms and began walking around on her shoulders. It licked on her ear and rubbed her face. Steph giggled. "He is really cute." She rolled back her shoulders and let Skip walk across them. The cat moved onto her other shoulder and balanced itself by her arm.

Stephanie extended out her arm and the little creature went sliding down her arm. The humans laughed, but Skip managed to apply the brakes by the time he got to her upturned hand. The little cat steadied itself on her palm and got ready to pounce. He wasn't able to jump as far as he thought, though. So the cat sailed through the air and tried to land on Matthew's shoulder, and failed. The kitten flailed its arms, but slipped down as it went along. The upset animal landed belly up in Matt's cradled arms.

"C'mere," coaxed Matt, holding the animal closer to his chest.

The kitten yawned and didn't complain. It cuddled up to Matthew happily. Matt shifted back and laid on their neatly made bed. Stephanie climbed on next to him. "I like this kitten," she muttered. "Did you seriously get it for me?"

"Well, that and it's super cute and wore me down."

Stephanie laughed quietly and gave her husband a kiss. "What should we do if it gets in trouble?" she asked.

"We'll scold it and give it a punishment," he responded. "Animals are really similar to children that way."

"What if it knocks something over?"

"We'll fix it."

"Matthew..."

The man leaned in and gave her a kiss to make her shut up. "Steph, you're worrying about nothing. Seriously, it'll be fine."

She sighed and cuddled up to him. "This is a wonderful Valentine's day present."

They spent the next few hours just enjoying the cat. They snuggled up with him, gave him a bath, tried to pull him out from under the bed while swearing that they wouldn't give him another bath for a very long time, lured him out with some string, played with him and some string, and fed him dinner.

The couple made themselves dinner, but found a cat curled up on their pillow when they came in for bed. Thus a difficult choice was presented. Wake up the cat and risk its wrath, or sleep somewhere else.

Matt came up with a compromise. He lifted off the pillow and set it on the floor, not waking the kitten. The couple climbed into bed and worked on sharing the pillow. And thus, ended their first day with a cat.