Free Black Cat Crossing by Kay Finch

hand for me to keep it down. “I’m not planning to hurt the cat, if that’s what you’re worried about. I just want that thing far away from Lavender.”
    I didn’t want to think about any kind of trap. I could only hope the cat I’d met would lay low and never show himself in Thomas’s presence.
    “Why not find the poor thing a good home instead?” I said.
    “No one would want that critter.”
    I already felt a kinship with the black cat who seemed to have the odds stacked against him. Thomas would never understand how I felt, so I changed the subject.
    “I see someone’s in the Venice cottage.”
    “Yeah, fella checked in alone and spent hours doing nothin’ but sitting on the porch.” He shrugged. “Something strange about the dude.”
    “The fact that he’s sitting there doing nothing doesn’t mean he’s strange,” I said.
    Thomas didn’t argue the fact. He took a step back. “I’ll keep looking for the gosh-darned cat. Let you know if I get him.”
    I cringed at the thought. “If you do, please tell me before you make any rash decisions.”
    He stared at me for a few seconds, maybe reminding himself that I was the boss’s niece, which would be silly given that Aunt Rowe helped raise him and he was practically as close to her as I was. Finally, he answered, “If you say so.”
    I drove the rest of the way to my cottage, praying that the black cat had found a nice and unobtrusive place to hang out in town—a place where superstitious people like Thomas would never be able to get their hands on him.
    Inside my cottage, I did my best to put the issue out of my mind. My first instinct was to rush to Aunt Rowe and discuss the cat with her, but she’d be smack in the middle of her physical therapy session now. Besides, I’d promised myself that I would focus on work. I changed into my most comfy and probably least flattering knit shorts and T-shirt, then pulled my hair back and used the neon green band to secure it into a tight ponytail.
    I started a pot of coffee, then opened the window overlooking the back porch a few inches to enjoy the river air before the stifling heat of summer set in. I booted up my laptop and pulled out my collection of flash drives. Everything from my first attempt at writing a short story to prior drafts of the current work in progress lurked somewhere on these gadgets. I flexed my fingers and stuck in the flash drive that I hoped held my early attempts at writing a synopsis for this book. The first file I opened was only two paragraphs long—a failed attempt.
    For the next several minutes, I opened and rejected drafts that weren’t worth using as a starting point. It didn’t help that worry for the cat was foremost on my mind. Maybe I could wage some sort of campaign to support the love of black cats. According to Daisy, Lavender had a population of strays. Odds were plenty of those homeless cats were black, not only the one that I’d seen. Could I convince people to jump on my bandwagon? Maybe. I needed to write a mission statement and enlist volunteers who thought superstitions were ridiculous.
    Save that thought. Write the synopsis.
    I stared at the laptop screen and sighed. Went to the kitchen and poured myself a cup of coffee. Returned to the computer and plopped into my chair. I decided to wing it with the synopsis and started typing from scratch.
    Hours later, I had three pages of an extremely sketchy first draft, nowhere near the length I’d need to tell the whole story. What I’d written seemed hopelessly out of order, similar to the thoughts running through my head. I also had a seriously numb butt from sitting far too long.
    I stood, stretched, and checked the clock. I could take a short break, go talk with Aunt Rowe about the cat, among other things, and pray that some epiphany would come over me before I got back to writing.
    Sounded like a great idea, but I knew leaving the cottage now would destroy my focus for the day. Better to grab a quick snack