Living Things

Instance 7: Lap Cat

Kitten stood over KevCan, leaning in so her inappropriately buttoned shirt’s lapel skimmed KevCan’s shoulder. “That looks great, Kevin. Really good work,” she said commenting on his coding of a Web site that Kitten was designing. “Can you put that on the laptop for me?”

“Uh, sure. Um, Huffy could you put that on the laptop for her?”

Huffy, his back to their backs, annoyed at the interruption, turned, and asked, “What? When do you need that?”

“When do you need that, Kit?” KevCan asked Kitten.

She turned to Huffy, “I’ll need it for tomorrow morning, if that’s all right?”

“Wow. That’s kinda short notice, there,” complained Huffy.

“I know, sorry,” she said. Kitten took a large portion of her hair and flipped it back. She tipped her head slightly so she was now showing Huffy part of her neck. “I just have to show the client something by tomorrow.”

“Okay,” said Huffy. “Whatever. I'll get it on there for you.”

“Thanks again, Kevin,” Kitten said as she left the little corner. Her heels clicked on the tile floor, sharply, each step an invitation to look at the little girl making such loud noises.

“For someone who prides herself on such small hips, she certainly swings them around enough,” muttered Huffy. KevCan heard him and let out a quick noise, indicating that he found it amusing. “Let me get the laptop,” Huffy exhaled as he stood up.

“Yo, K-balls!” KevCan yelled to Kevin McK not ten feet away. “What’s up?”

Kevin McK turned around and smiled, said nothing, then went back to work.

Huffy entered the room where they kept the laptop computer stored under lock and key. It was not there. The briefest image of Huffy getting blamed for losing the computer flashed through his head, but he knew that he was not the last to have it. In fact, if he remembered correctly, Kitten had taken the laptop out the week before. Did she still have it? he wondered.

As he walked towards Kitten’s office, he was stopped several times by people with techinical problems. All in all, it took him twenty minutes to walk twenty yards. When he finally did enter Kitten’s office, she was on a phone call. Propped up against the front of her desk, on the floor, much to Huffy’s indignation, sat the laptop in it’s carrying case. She glanced at him, but didn’t seem too interested in his arrival. With a heavy sigh, Huffy grabbed the laptop and asked, “When were you planning on telling me that this was here?” Kitten, focused on her phone conversation, brushed him off with a wave of her hand.