Shmoology

Three weeks.

It has now been three weeks since my brother went missing. I have doubled over all my regular patrol routes, pulled extended recons and perimeter sweeps, even conducted thorough forensic investigations of all his usual cushions and shrubs and crannies. My brother, Fabio, is simply gone.

It seems like I should be sharpening my claws and going after the bastards that did this. But the trail is cold, and to tell the truth, I have no suspects. Strange as it may sound, Fabio had no enemies. Not a one. The crows never bothered him, the Rodent adored him, and for all I know, given their uncanny resemblance, that mask-wearing outfit of giant, fingered cats might have made him an honorary member of their horde.

Which possibly explains his blithe, careless demeanor. As I recall, he never really got that rattled by last year's Cani-Corvine Wars, nor even by the Apocalypse of the previous summer. Panic was not much in his blood, at least not since the early days, when he was constantly falling out of third-story windows, getting stranded in trees, and generally getting himself stuck anywhere he could stick. Then, soon after Year One, he began to bloat, and his girth conspired with gravity to settle him down and keep his stupidity in check. Nature's a funny thing.

It wasn't long after that, after his enplumpment effectively ended his era of misadventure, that he took up the arts. First came the art of floral arrangement, in which he carefully selected petals and leaves from outside and brought them in, arranging them ever-so-precisely upon the floor into meticulous patterns, trails, and glyphs. Soon also came the singing — he would warble even with a mouthful of petals, then break into full aria as his masterwork was completed. Many a summer night was punctuated by his trill-and-chirp as he worked tirelessly on his art, and many a morning by the stunned gasps of the Man and the Woman as they beheld his night's industry, strewn throughout the fortress.

In close quarters and good light, he never fully lost his killer instinct. More than once, I would move stealthily and obliquely in for the kill on an exposed rat, crouched and coiled and silent, only to have Fabio waddle right up and just chomp the target without ceremony or fanfare. What he lacked in subtlety he made up in cheek, and for a while the population of hesitant vermin suffered greatly for it.

In the end, though, he was all belly. He eventually left the art behind, and the singing, and the killing, and the mischief, and devoted himself to repose. He pursued only sunshine and open laps, worked only at grooming — and not only his grooming, but mine, the Rodent's, the Man's, the floor's. He rarely ventured far, and even enlisted the services of a personal doorman to expedite his comings and goings.

And he seemed, even in that last week, to be happy about it all. Even when we were crated and hauled before Dr. Fingerer to be prodded and squeezed, he was, I remember, purring the whole time. To him, all this poking and manipulation was just another in a long series of belly rubs.

Without him, the fortress does seem too empty, the corridors too broad, the available cushions too numerous. The Rodent seems to want to spend more time near me, seems to seek in me something he once found in my brother. And, truth be told, I am finding myself more tolerant in that regard, finding stores of patience that weren't there before — perhaps a last bequeathal from my late littermate. I even allowed the Man to give me a belly rub today.

And I am giving serious thought to hiring a doorman. As it happens, I know one that comes with very good references.