Free Cat Found by Ingrid Lee

“People will see us.”
    “Nah,” Paul snorted. “I live over that way. There’s a high fence around the place. The junk shop next door is closed on Mondays. And the folks behind the chapel are ancient. The two of them are deaf as doorknobs. Their backyard is full of trees. Nobody will know.”
    Johnny couldn’t make up his mind.
    That riled Paul and he started to leave again. “I don’t have all day to stand around while you wuss around. I guess you don’t have any ammo anyway. No way your folks trust you that much.”
    Bingo! Johnny got mad. His friend was right. His parents kept the pellets tucked away. But he knew where they were.
    “Course I know where they are,” he bragged.
    “Well, come on, then,” Paul urged. “You said that your folks were out all day. Stick the gun in your duffel bag and let’s get some cat.”
    The more Johnny thought about it, the more it seemed like a good idea. He put a shirt around his gun and shoved it in a bag. Then he showed his friend where the pellets were hidden. “Don’t take too many,” he warned. “My mom will notice.”
    They headed out with the bag. Anybody walking down Main Street would think they were just going to shoot hoops.
    Billy was coming along from the other direction. When he got closer, he recognized the boys. They were in his class at school. “Hi,” he said.
    Johnny pretended to be confused. “Hey, you know this guy?” he said to his friend.
    “Nah,” Paul snorted again. “He looks a bit like our old buddy Billy. You probably don’t remember him. He’s too busy to hang out with his friends anymore. I guess he stays home with his mommy instead.” He turned around and called after Billy. “Hey, if you see Billy, tell him I left a Coke bottle down by the supermarket dumpsters. He’d better hurry on over there before someone else gets it.”
    Billy kept on walking. He never looked back.
    “Loser!” Johnny jeered.
    “Shut up,” Paul said. “He’s all right. His dad and mine are friends.”
    When the boys got to the chapel yard, they thought there was some mistake. They didn’t see any cats. They didn’t see the ears or tails. They didn’t see an eye staring through a knothole. It looked more like a split blue glass in a gray storm.
    Those two wouldn’t notice a cat waving a red flag.
    “Someone piled up the crates by that old stable,” Paul said after a while. “There’s even a bit of rope. Let’s climb up on the chapel roof and look around. We’ll see better from up there.”
    They clambered over the stable roof and used Billy’s bathrobe belt to get up to the little balcony. From there,they peered through the branches of the mulberry tree. Nothing in the yard moved.
    Johnny was nervous. Once his folks got home, it wouldn’t take them long to spot the space in the gun cabinet. “We’re wasting our time,” he said. “There aren’t any cats down there.”
    Paul turned around and tried the doorknob. “Hey,” he said. “This door’s not locked. Let’s go in and look around.” He pushed open the door and squinted into the dim interior of the chapel. Something by the far wall shied away from the light.
    Johnny grabbed his friend’s sleeve and pulled him from the doorway. “Look!” he cried. He fumbled in his duffel bag and pulled out the air gun. “There
is
a cat down there — a white one. It’s by that little house thing.”
    It was Snowflake. She had come out of her home in the plant pot to drink some water. Her body cramped. The kittens were on their way. As soon as she heard the boys, she saw her mistake and whipped around.
    She didn’t stand a chance.
    The shot sounded like a dull thud. Snowflake felt the pellet cut into her flank, tunnel deep through the taut string of muscle. Her leg stopped working but she keptmoving. She limped back toward her pot, dragging the dead weight.
    “My turn!” yelled Paul. He snatched the gun and fired. The pellet went wide.
    Snowflake kept going. She made the shade. She had