An Unexpected Encounter

Atreus straightened and cleared his throat and he was trying with a glimmer of hope to keep the words in his mind. The weather was warm with never-ending puffy clouds, suggesting rain later in the day. He slipped his hands on his coat pocket, And despite the crowdness of the passers and the hustle and bustle, he found in a glimpse a poor cat going in a painful walk and his head was low and his tail hung lifelessly. As weakness and jellification seemed to opiate and hypnosis his tired aching muscles like a jellyfish. He diminished and dwindled in size and his fur becomes dirty no longer soft or fluffy. But he was moving fearless uncaring about the passers like a captain marching through the dim sea or an emperor with his own majesty, going straight to the Trash container with an unbowed head. Atreus was well-renowned for his magnanimity and pride, he narrowed his eyes and moved cautiously and his voice trails off along with his gaze asking about the cat's life clenching his yellow teeth and pressing his cracked lips. 

He said "It seems your majesty has spoken well fighter." The cat replied "Get away from me because the rats are watching me and they are using spying devices. I fear a hit from the broom or a bone to silence my meows and purrs. My problem isn't about time or era or kitchens. The frank truth is that anytime I stumble out of the room or walk in the underground or next to the bushes, I hardly ever see merriment. I only see the shining tears everywhere and I smell the stench of blood in every corner. A red blood like the edge of Hephaestus’ sword and the Valentine's day roses. It strikes at night then vanish without a trace uncaring about the student's effort or the farmer's perspiration or the poet's alienation or the gladiator's struggle. And then there is no decency or prudery in clothes or merriment in discussion. We cats used to be loved by the needy people as they loved the taleteller and the radio presenter. We used to move from a sofa to another, from an armchair to another but now I am yawning in a Trash container and my stomach is whimpering and howling like Minor Scale Explosion or a volcano eruption. Even in the past the street vendors and merchants used to treat me in a respectful way full of joy and tenderness. They missed me when I am absent or chilling with the fishermen as if I were one of their friends. They welcomed me with open arms and suggestive winks. But now each time I pass in front of the cobbler or the barber or the old carpenter, they welcome me with stones and insults until my bones ache and my dignity vanish. As life slowly ebbed away I don't know what happened to ethics. My children and grand children pass everyday on the road as I am strained to listen to any form of greetings but they are callous about my fate like a bunch of monkeys swinging off the rear-view mirrors in safari. Frankly, I no longer have a decent amount of energy for controversy or reproach with this generation because everything changed and the way of thinking is pathetically linear. That's why when I listen to memories by Om Kalthoum at night everything screeches like lamentation banshees and rumors and panic spread faster than the plague itself. Then I recall the sad and miserable day I lost my plate of milk and my beloved heater. I am not digging up the past or overcome by a cascade of memories and gloomy losses or contemplating the ramifications of my solid harsh actions or am I a puritanical upbringing cat. As you can see with your limited human mind, my exterior appearance has not changed regardless of my tormented life that is darker than Dante's Inferno. Don't add anything to ruin my good opinion about you any further. I am not an extraterrestrial being or an Anunnaki or a Saqqara Bird. I am a normal cat Looking for humanity and ethics and I adore every new invent and every morning dew. I hope from the bottom of my aching heart to buy a small ringing bell in every festival or feast. Most of my dreams are merely shadows and dust in a world full of calamities and trepidations. I want to glance at the open bedroom door, then into the front room, after that into the tiny kitchen, and then I smell the coffee and saw the automatic coffee maker in the counter near the refrigerator. Look at the pedestrian crossing and the traffic lights, Jump in the overstuffed glutted chair and watch my beloved babies sleeping and yawning in the bed and not on the solitary streets. Yikes, stood in the evening near the window watching the line of people carrying umbrellas and not a broom to strike me like Cú Chulainn or Airavata. Could you please warm me with your coat, everything changed frankly and there is an everlasting frost on my bones, an eternal defeat on my claws and a never-ending hunger on my stomach.

Atreus looked with great compassion and pity to the cat that stood alone, exposed and vulnerable like a defenseless citizen. He said in a croaky manner "I have suffered all kinds of hunger during my life without exception: The hunger to love, freedom and stabilization and above them all the hunger to the loaf of bread which become like a heavenly being carrying the purest of gold and preventing everyone to touch it as if it was a forbidden fruit. To be honest and true I didn't feel the bitterness and harshness of starvation and the luster of its tusks before reading The Drunkard by Émile Zola. I read a page and eat a loaf of bread and after reading the novel I started working as a baker without salary or nagging. He analysis in a style that raises fear and panic from the future and the coming days. Without shrugging the cat replied "Your noble kindness in these short words permits as brief an answer. Let me first start by thanking you for your honesty without unbowing my head because he who is covered with other people's clothes is naked and he who spends a night with a chicken will cackle in the morning and What has aunty fortune teller told you about the mixed aroma of coal-smoke and baking bread.?