Dead Cats: Chicago by Greg Hunter

Martin Comstock was cast as Boo Radley in the Evanston Township High School players’ production of “To Kill a Mockingbird”, in what was easily the highlight of his senior year. His face’s fixed look of naïveté and the baby-like heft of his cheeks had made him a natural choice. He affected a slurred, baritonal southern drawl for the role.

The Boo Radley voice became a favorite among cast members and Martin was frequently asked to shout obscenities in it after rehearsals: “Hay thurr, mmmmmmother-fucker.” In the last hour of the ETHS senior prom, Martin approached Becca Sellers, who had played the role of Scout, from behind and murmured, “Well hay thurr, Bbbbbbbbbbbbecca” in her ear. The adopted baritone startled her so severely that Becca lost control over the punch ladle and spilled down the front of her dress. She began to weep and Martin did not ask her to dance. Until recently, this had been the most terrible moment of Martin’s life.

#

“Car a bust? Call the best. Car a bust? Call the best!”

Martin was scheduled to record a radio promo for Naperville Auto Repair and Body Shop later and hadn’t decided the appropriate inflection. Chicago was the third largest market for voice acting in the U.S., but one of the most competitive, and Martin was luck to have as much work as he did. He had Anders to thank for this. Anders Spelman, Martin’s agent, had connections with ad agencies that did work not just locally but with businesses across the state. Anders liked Martin, or at least found his benignness refreshing, and Martin liked that Anders did most of the talking during meetings. It was an excellent working relationship.

“Marty? Marty, get in here.”

The door to Anders’ office had opened and Martin walked inside. Anders was blond, angularly featured, and fit for his late thirties, regularly looking like he was prepared to leap, or pounce, or bolt from his office. He was a functioning cocaine user and today he wore a golf shirt.

“Are you pumped about the Naperville Auto recording? You pumped?”

“I feel pretty good about it.”

Martin took a seat.

“All right. Well Marty, I think we’ve got some more stuff in the pipeline for you—the Macy’s on State Street is having a ‘Spring Into Summer’ event again, and you know they’ll be on radio for that—but while you’re hear I wanted to ask you something. I’ve told you about how I, ah. I like to take a few days when summer comes around and WaveRunner on Lake Michigan? Family’s had a cabin up there for a while, it’s great.”

“Sounds great.”

“Well, thing is, you remember last summer, I leave for three days—three days—and I guess I’d left the fridge door open on my way out. I come back, obviously, and the whole place is practically flooded!”

“That sounds awful.”

“I guess what I’m getting at, Marty, is I’d like for you to apartment-sit for me, Thursday to Sunday, end of next week. You’ll have full run of the place.”

“Um…sure. Yeah Anders, I think I can do that.”

“Great! Great. I’ll get you the keys.”

Later that afternoon, Martin went with his gut and used “Call the best.” The owner of Naperville Auto Repair, after hearing the recording, said he had nailed it.

#

The following Thursday, Martin arrived at Anders’ apartment and let himself inside. On the counter of the kitchenette was a bottle of Grey Goose vodka with a thank you note and instructions on how to open and close the balcony’s screen doors. Martin, who drank rarely, put the bottle near his shoes at the front door and began to look around. The apartment suggested a person of disproportionate means and taste; Martin sat on an Italian leather couch in the large living area and stared for a few moments at the framed print of a Lamborghini on the sidewall.

#

Later that evening, Martin was seated on the couch reading Entertainment Weekly when a knock came from the hallway.

“Anders?”

Martin undid the latch. When he opened the door, he looked down and saw a thin, bald man with dark eyes and a heavy brow. He looked vaguely like Abe Vigoda.

“You’re not Anders.”

“No, my name is Martin. Anders asked me to housesit for him.”

The man squinted.

“One of our tenants, Mrs. Titus, lost her cat. Happens every few weeks. She’s in 342, down the hall.”

“Oh. Is there anything I can do?”

The man looked at Martin and tiled his head slightly to the side, then began walking to the next door.

“Well…great. I’ll keep an eye out.”

“…Nice night,” the man muttered back.

Martin had stopped at the grocery store before he’d reached Anders’ apartment and decided to eat cheese and Triscuts on the balcony before the sun really started to set. The balcony went out about five feet and was separated from the balconies next to it by a locked waist-level gate on each side. He sat down in a lawn chair in the balcony’s east corner. Shortly thereafter, Martin heard a quiet murmur coming from behind him. He peered over the gate that had been to his back and saw a stringy orange tabby cat. The cat looked up at him and yawned.

“Uh-shusssssshhhhhhhhhhhhhh,” Martin hummed to the cat, trying to hold its attention as he decided what to do. When it became clear the cat was not going anywhere, Martin walked back inside and then out into the floor's main hallway. He knocked on the front of the next-door apartment and received no response. When he came back, the cat was in the same place.

Martin got on his knees and looked under the gate. There were five or six inches between the bottom of the gate and the floor, and he began to tap the ground.

“Uhhh-shush-shush-shush. C’mere! Cuhhhhhh-mme here.”

The cat murmured again but did not move. Martin tried this several times more to the same effect. Then, he looked at his cheese and Triscut plate and decided on a new tactic. He lined up small cubes of cheese, beginning at the gate and ending inside the apartment, past the open balcony doorway. Martin waited at the opposite end of the balcony for the better part of ten minutes before bringing his empty plate to the kitchenette.

#

“But Honey, the game’s on!”

Martin rehearsed for the Macy’s promo while he grilled cod.

“Honeyyyyyyyyyyyyyy…!”

Droplets of lemon juice fell—drip, drip, drip—onto the fish every few seconds. Martin glanced to his side and saw the cat sitting on the kitchenette counter, watching him squeeze the plastic lemon. Startled, Martin lurched backwards. His back elbow hit the olive oil bottle, which tilted over top-first and spilled over onto the tile floor.

“Oh, shit!”

When Martin cursed in his normal voice, the words grew higher in pitch with each syllable, as if to clear a hedge his mind had set in front of them. The cat hopped down from the counter and trotted to the puddle of olive oil and beginning to sniff. It put in a paw only to quickly withdraw it, then licked at the puddle’s edge.

“Shhhhhhh! No no!”

Martin bent over and made a sweep with his arm. The cat jumped to the corner of the puddle farthest from Martin and continued to lick the oil. Martin swung both arms down to grab the cat but it ran through his legs, slipping and bumping up against the oven frame. As Martin turned to keep up with it, he lost his footing in the oil, and his toes, then knees, suddenly slipped behind him. He clung onto the edge of the counter but couldn't use his legs to get upright; his feet back again, right then left. The cat sat in front of the oven, cleaning its arms and legs. With one arm he held himself steady against the counter and with the other he reached for the microwave above the stovetop. Martin grabbed hold of the microwave handle and briefly steadied himself before his legs gave out again. He heard a quiet "dunk" and looked up. The microwave had moved several inches past the edge of its stand. Martin let go of the handle and watched as the machine tilted forward, further and further. Clinging to the counter, he stretched upward to push it back in place, and watched it topple off the stand, falling on the cat and killing it instantly.

#

Time had ceased, briefly, while Martin watched the microwave tilt and drop and now it was overcompensating: his movements outpaced his thoughts, governed by animal panic and the rapid thud of his pulse. He'd lifted the microwave off the cat and its body made the radius of an olive oil pool. The paper towels he'd used when lifting it clung to the cat's body and it looked like a botched mummification. His arms were coated in the oil past the elbows.

Martin gently pressed the cat into a shoebox he'd found in Anders' closest. He set the box on the counter, unsure what to do with it now that there was a dead cat inside. After wiping up the rest of the olive oil, Martin scraped the burnt cod off of Anders' frying pan and put it on a plate. He scraped off the blackened surface as he ate. His eyes stayed fixed on the shoebox.

Once Martin had finished eating it was nighttime. He pulled a white garbage bag out from under Anders' sink, put the shoebox in the bag and tied it closed. Martin then cleared the toiletries and pre-made lunches out of the backpack he’d brought them in and stuffed the garbage bag within it. With the backpack on, he walked down several flights of stairs until he reached the complex basement.

There were several rooms on the basement level: a laundry space with washer and drier, a locked supply closet, a storage space for the building’s heating and cooling units, and a few unmarked others. The room that housed the heaters was doorless, but less public than the laundry space, and he stepped inside. Brushing off stray cobwebs with his hand, he pushed up slightly one of the textured ceiling panels and moved it over.

The day after the cat died Martin stayed inside the apartment watching television. He shook whenever a door shut in the hallway.

#

Martin was a lazy husband who didn’t know he wanted to go to the Macy’s on State Street Spring Into Summer sale—yet. He and Amanda Walton, a voice actress who was also managed by Anders, were in separate booths but could hear each other through their headphones.

“Honey, the game’s on!”

“But they’ve got sales on a range of dresses in all brands and sizes, as well as swim- and kids-wear!

“Won’t they have a sale next year?”

“And great savings on men’s suits and active-wear! Plus, for a limited time, each active-wear purchase qualifies shoppers for a raffle offering free season tickets to the Chicago Cubs!”

“Free season tickets!? Honey, let’s get in the car!”

“But Ben, you haven’t finished your breakfast!”

“No time—let’s get to Macy’s!”

“I know you killed that cat, Martin.”

Martin looked through the glass that separated him from Amanda, silent and in disbelief.

“Amanda…what?”

“The Macy’s on State Street Spring Into Summer sale will last from now until June 5^th. Discounts may vary on the basis of item and brand. Shoppers without a Macy’s Preferred Saver card are not eligible for discounts on watches, jewelry and eyewear. I know what happened, Martin, and it’s going to come straight back to you.”

Martin’s eyes met Amanda’s and hers were yellow, feline. With a thud, the neon light fixture came loose and took off her head, cleanly. As Martin continued to stare, mouth agape, orange fur began to sprout from Amanda’s headless neckline, trailing down her body in vine-like formations. The fur grew out and moved in every direction, blanketing the window Martin peered through in a sheet of orange. One crack appeared in the glass, then another, before the pane shattered entire and Martin was enveloped in cat hair. He awoke, ran to the living room, and flipped furiously through Anders’ address book, searching for Mrs. Titus’ listing.

#

Martin stayed awake through the morning, and by 10 a.m. decided it was time to call. He was afraid of implicating Anders in the cat’s death, and thus unwilling to give his name or use the phone in the apartment. He would call in anonymously, apologize profusely, and respectfully offer compensation. Martin walked for several blocks to find a working payphone, picked up and put down the receiver twice, and then dialed.

“Hello?”

Martin opened his mouth to speak and was able to say nothing.

“Hello? Who is this?”

Martin shut down the receiver and took a walking lap around the block, taking measured, anxious breaths. He returned to the phone and dialed again.

“Hello, who’s this?

Martin cleared his throat, and found himself speaking in the Boo Radley voice.

“Hello…Misses Titus?”

“Ah, yes? Who’s this?

“Misses Titus, ah need to speak with you about yo’ cat.”

“Alexander? Who is this?”

“Now, uh, Misses Titus, ahm sho’ you miss Alexanduh very much…”
On the other line Martin heard Mrs. Titus inhale, deeply and rapidly.

“Misses Titus?”

“What have you done with him?”

“Ma’am—“

“WHAT HAVE YOU DONE WITH HIM?”

“Misses Titus, please calm down—“

“WHAT. HAVE. YOU. DONE. WITH. ALEXANDER!?”

Martin pulled the receiver away from his ear and looked around, floundering, for something that would put their conversation in a context that was reasonable and familiar.

“Ma’am, ah would like to handle this as calmly as we can…”

Mrs. Titus was in tears on the other line.

“All right. You animal. You bastard. Whatever you’re asking for.”

“Look, you don’t understand—“

She continued to sob.

“Oh, I understand. I’ll give you anything. Just don’t hurt him. Bastard.”

It was with the second “bastard” that Martin grasped completely the course their conversation had taken, that she understood him to be holding for ransom the cat he had already executed with a microwave.

“Ah—we—we’ll contact you. We—ah’ll be in touch.”

Martin set the phone down before Mrs. Titus had time to reply, sweating biblically. He walked directly back to Anders’ apartment, taking the same anxious breaths, opened the vodka bottle and drank directly from the lid.

#

On the one week anniversary of Martin burning the cod, he sat outside Anders' office sitting straight up with his legs crossed, rhythmically moving his knees closer together and father apart while his hands lay still on his lap. It would be the first time the two had seen one another since the start of Anders' Michigonian vacation.

“Marty? Marty, get in here.”

Martin had felt, by his count, four new and distinct different forms of terror since he began apartment-sitting for Anders: when he knew the cat was dead, when he knew he’d have to dispose of it, when he knew he had to tell Mrs. Titus, and when he knew she thought he was ransoming it. Entering Anders’ office, he felt yet another.

“Marty, before we begin, I wanted to ask how the apartment-sitting went. I got the keys back just fine.”

Martin had left the keys in Anders’ mailbox on the apartment complex’s ground floor before he left for good the previous Sunday night.

“Great. Everything went great, Anders.”

Though Martin was afraid, his lies came less from fear than from a lack of imagination. He was unable to conceive of how he would inform Anders that he had murdered a cat, much less how Anders would react. He felt a tremor in his stomach.

“Good to hear. No problems?”

“Um, nope. Everything was great. Went great.”

A vague nausea began to spread through Martin, from his abdomen upwards.

“None at all?”

For a moment, Martin said nothing.

“Anders, I—“

Martin was silent again in his chair and then, in an instant, was doubled over the waste bin at the side of Anders’ desk. He vomited slightly and began to cry.

“I didn’t---I didn’t mean to kill the cat!”

A client had cried once before in Anders office but no one had ever vomited and Anders’ repulsion, like Martin’s terror, was new and distinct.

“Martin, what?”

“Anders you know I wouldn’t—I didn’t mean to kill the cat!”

“Martin, what the fuck are you talking about? I was asking about the crack in the front of my microwave.”

Martin stopped crying and both men were quiet now. He looked at Anders with a childlike confusion underscored by the tears and food pieces clinging to his chin.

“Martin, get the fuck out of my office.”

After moving past the reception area in a half-run, Martin stepped into a nearby bathroom to clean himself before leaving the building. As he pulled paper towels from a dispenser near the sinks, his cell phone started to vibrate. It was Anders.

“Martin, get back in here.”

Martin hung up without responding. He tried to think of options other than returning to see Anders and could think of none, so he walked back into the office.

“You killed the cat?”

“I didn’t mean to!”

“But you killed it.”

“Yes.”

Anders paused.

“Are you sure?”

“Yes!”

“Martin, how the fuck do you kill a cat? Why did you do that?”

“It was an accident! …There was an oil spill.”

“Is that a fucking joke?”

“No. I was cooking.”

“What?”

“There’s more.”

“What do you mean, there’s more?”

“Well, I wasn’t going to say anything. To her.”

“Her?”

“But I called Mrs. Titus.”

“Jesus, Martin, the fuck did you do that for?”

“I don’t know, I felt bad! I feel terrible.”

“Am I in trouble? Because this is your ass, Marty, it’s not mine.”

“No, no, that’s the thing. She doesn’t know it’s me, she doesn’t know it’s you, I—Anders, she thinks I’m holding the cat for ransom. I did a voice.”

“You did a voice.”

“And she thinks I’m from the South, and she thinks I’m ransoming her cat.”

Anders paused again. He cradled his large chin in his palm and furrowed his blond eyebrows.

“How much does she think you’re asking?”

“What?”

“This doesn’t have to be anything extravagant. One thousand dollars, two thousand. That’s how much a new cat is anyway, right? A nice one?”

“Anders, I don’t want to do this!”

“Think about it—think about it. We can keep it really small in scale. Just pad our wallets.”

“It’s already dead! The cat died.”

“Is that the point? --That’s not the point. These things don’t get returned half the time anyway.”

“You’re out of your mind.”

“So you want to go big?”

"Jesus, Anders, I'm not doing it! I just want to explain what happened."

“You'll get Bloomingdale Coat Factory."

"I already have that job. We do a recording every three months."

"Right. And you'll continue to have that job."

"What?"

“No, that's where you say, 'Are you threatening me?' Because I'm threatening you."

Martin’s eyes welled up again, and he felt like he had lost the argument.

#

Anders had written lines for Martin but told him he was free to improvise. The call was made from a free public telephone in the Harold Washington Library.

“Misses Titus?”

“Hello?”

“Misses Titus, do you know who this is?”

She replied “yes” faintly on the other end.

“Misses Titus, mah associates and ah have reached a consensus.”

"I've told you already, I'll do whatever you ask. Please, let me have my cat."

Anders was leaning in too closely trying to listen to Mrs. Titus' responses and Martin gave him a glare.

"We'll return yo' cat to you in time, if you give us your utmost cooperashun."

Anders made an okay sign with his hand and nodded encouragingly.

"All I want is--," Mrs. Titus began, and yelped to stop herself from crying like the time before. Martin looked at Anders for direction, as if this yelp was reason enough to end the charade. Anders waved his hands, 'continue.'

"Mrs. Titus, we're demanding five thousand dollars in retuhn for Alexanduh. Do not try to trace us. Do not try to find us. His life depends on it."

Like the time before, Martin heard sobs through the receiver.

"Five--," she choked out. Mrs. Titus said nothing further and Martin began to take liberties.

"Four thousand?" Martin was sweating again. "What about four thousand. How would you be willing to pay?"

A vein through the center of Anders' forehead was visible during moments of anger. He poked Martin in the shoulder, hard, and mouthed 'What?' before pouncing on the phone.

"Five thousand dollars--not negotiable,” Anders said. "We'll contact you again for the drop-off.”

He hung up and threw down his arms.

"Jesus, Marty…"

"Four thousand is still a lot of money."

"Well, goddamn it."

The two left the library walking several paces apart.

#

"Weeeeeeeeeeeeeee've got fur coats leather coats raaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaain jackets aaaaaaaand more! At Bloomingdale Coat Factory, we've got the best selection of outerwear in northern Illinois at prrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrremium values! Bloomingdale Coat Factory: the superior coat outlet."

Martin was glad, at least, that he'd kept the coat factory gig. He did three takes and heard the sound engineer say thank you, I think we got it. The soft white noise in Martin's headphones stopped suddenly as the engineer turned his mic off in the other room. The engineer waved goodbye, pressed a few more switches, hit the lights and walked out. Martin's hands were clasped behind his back, a trick he used to keep his chest expanded so his voice would project. He did not unlink his fingers and left the soundproof headphones on for several minutes, staring through the glass divider into the empty, unlit room.

#

Anders had passed Mrs. Titus in the hallway several times in the hallway and said she looked worn out.

“We’ve got her on the ropes.”

The drop-off was to take place the next weekend, downtown, at the Macy’s on State Street, underneath a large clock that extended from an outer corner of the building.

“You’ll leave the money underneath the clock in a sealed cahdboard box at six pee-ehm, then entuh the store. You wull wait there fo’ ten minutes, meanwhile one of my associates or ah wull pick up the package. In its place, we wull leave a crate containing Alexanduh. No police, come alone.”

Martin ended the call by saying that it was only business, you undahstand.

“Yes,” she replied faintly.

#

"So here's a question I've wanted to ask one of you voice guys. If you can decide who gets to narrate your life—narrate the book on tape about your life—who's it gonna be? Patrick Stewart or Morgan Freeman?"

Martin and Anders were at lunch.

“I don't want to talk about this."

“But it's a good question, right?"

“Anders, I think this is stupid and I'm very scared."

“Hmm. Well. Think of it like this: if we were caught, just on the basis of what we've already done, we'd still probably be in a lot of trouble. So when you think about it, whatever happens now doesn't matter that much. And we're going to get the money. None of that shit's going to happen anyway."

Martin pushed the remainder of his salad to his plate's far side with a fork.

"Does it have to be one of the two?"

“Huh?”

“Stewart or Freeman.”

“That's the spirit.”

#

Martin arrived disheveled, stains on his shirt and his hair pasted down to his head. He carried a red backpack on his shoulders.

“It’s the big day, Marty, are you pumped?”

“I—sure.”

“Great, you look like hell. It’s gonna be clean and simple today, the best decision we ever made. Twenty-five hundred each ain’t bad, my friend, not bad at all. Now when we get down there, I—what’s with the backpack, Marty?”

“It’s nothing.”

“Yeah, but what’s in it? You’re twenty-nine, now, man.”

“It’s nothing. It’s just a backpack.”

Anders lowered his brow.

“Let me see it.”

“Why do you want to see it?”

“Marty, what’s in the fucking backpack?”

“I—I went back for it.”

“What?”

“It was still in the basement. I went back for it.”

Anders was silent for a moment and then began to shout.

“The fucking cat is in my office!? Marty, why would you do that?”

“I’m going to give it to her. For the drop-off.”

“No you’re not. She’s expecting a live cat. We’re going to give her nothing. That’s the arrangement.”

“She deserves something. She needs some closure.”

“So what, you’re going to give her the cat’s corpse in a bag? This isn’t gonna make her feel better, Marty.”

“She deserves to get something.”

“No fucking way. They can trace that shit back to us for all I know! Forensic science.”

“I’ve made up my mind, Anders, you can’t stop me.”

“The hell I can’t, Marty. Give me the fucking bag.”

“No.”

“Marty, give me the bag.”

Martin got out of his chair.

“I’m not going to give you the bag, Anders.”

Anders stood up from behind his desk and started moving toward Martin. Martin turned to exit the office but turned the door handle the wrong way and then Anders was on him. He wrapped his arms around Martin from behind, trying to peel the straps off his shoulders. Martin bit Anders’ hand and ran out the door.

“This is really, really dumb, Marty!”

Martin was scared but had enough presence of mind to appreciate that he was in a place of work and sprint-walked through the reception area, taking short strides but brisk ones so as not to arouse the suspicion that he was escaping from his agent with a dead animal in his backpack. Anders burst after him. Martin saw him coming and began to run himself.

“Anders, leave me alone!”

“I can’t do that Marty, can’t do it!”

Martin ducked into Stafford Printing and Design business headquarters at the end of the main hallway. Anders followed.

Inside the Stafford office area there were six desks, arranged three each on the right- and left-hand sides. Martin and Anders weaved between the left desks. Anders’ superior athleticism was mediated by the mugs and staplers Martin slung behind him.

“You’re really embarrassing us now, Marty, you’re acting like a jackass!”

Martin was near hyperventilation and could not reply. When the two reached the clearing between the two columns of desks, Anders reached for the backpack again and held firmly to one strap. Martin wrapped both arms around the other and squeezed. Anders was stronger but Martin was heavier; fixed in a tug-of-war in the center of a unfamiliar office, they found themselves in equilibrium.

Martin wheezed:

“You can take—the money. This is important to me.”

“It isn’t an option, Marty. Give me the bag or I’m going to hurt you.”

“--No.”

“This is about your job, too, Marty. I’m your fucking agent!”

“I don’t—like it—I think I’m going to vomit.”

Four desks had been inhabited by accounts-managers and a regional business representative, all of whom now stood against the far walls in awed perplexity.

Anders put a second hand on the backpack strap, closed his eyes, and pulled with renewed intensity. Martin’s breaths were strained, guttural. Beneath the breaths, a brief zzzp escaped from the bag. Both men pulled and it happened again, for longer and more audibly. Zzzzzzzzzp. Martin noticed first and eased his grip. Anders yanked hard and the backpack ruptured at the zipper, expelling the cat-filled garbage bag. Martin had been sent to the floor with force of Anders’ last tug and hurled himself on top of Alexander’s remains like a solider over a grenade. Anders fell to his knees, trying to push Martin off the cat bag with the force of his shoulder. Martin slapped him in the eye. Anders pushed Martin hard enough to expose the bag and grabbed hold, but as he pulled back a piece of the bag’s weathered plastic came off in his hand. Martin braced himself and tackled Anders into one of the desks, leaving the bag visible in the center of the office floor.

“Fuck, Marty, my shoulder!”

Martin looked at Anders with momentary sympathy before pawing at the bag himself. He seized hold but fell forward as Anders clutched the other end from behind him. The plastic came free in the hands of both men, stretching and then ripping. Alexander’s body landed between them.

Martin stood up and then collapsed forward. Anders rested back against the desk. The looked at each other, and then the body, and back to each other again. Both panted and said nothing. The cat’s fur was discolored, its oranges muted or browned.

“Mmmmmmotherfucker,” Martin muttered, and laughed quietly to himself between heaves.

“I’m going to call the police,” said one of the accounts-mangers, delicately and with hesitation.