noorie

my cat has passed away

the song she is named after

Grief will have you looking up things like how old was that racist writer’s cat when he died. Grief will have you looking at photos on your phone while in public, waiting for your food, and suddenly you want to turn into the dust that rests on her grave. Grief will make you walk a mile, and then some, to just sit by her, and put flowers all over her tender, gentle, dead body that you cannot believe is dead, even though you saw it all happen. Grief will ask you whom to pin the blame on, and you will turn inwards. You will think of all the things you could have done differently that day, to feel even worse than you did before. You will think about all the stages, and wonder if they could all just coalesce into one and melt off your back like this unpredictable and wretched heat. You were planning to buy a cooler; you were going to fix the table fan. All to make it better for her. You wonder when you will get the other, messyweirdgirlfiction grief experience – the one where you feel horny, and messy, and miserable, and hot. But none of it comes in the way it was promised on paper. It arrives as a personal design, a specific pain curated just for you.

Last year, the first adult “purchase” was her – a kitten for free, attached to another. A pair of babies, our own. The first investment of my youth and my romantic endeavour that was set for life. I thought she too, was set in stone, in my life. Now all I feel is the same stone choosing different parts of my body to nest in, making it hurt at times and places that are inappropriate. But when has death arrived with an RSVP? When do you chalk out time in your calendar for mourning?

I used to be a teacher a couple of years ago, and I insisted that the love I felt for those children was the purest kind. But kids are still within the realm of human understanding, still have the power to wield their words in a manner that can be ugly, demeaning, and hurtful.

Cats don’t. They sit by the door and wait for you. They hold on to your jeans to ask you not to leave for work. They sit on the kitchen sill while you cut onions, and now you’re both crying.

And then there was one – just me, crying. No onions, no cat.

Noorie was her name, is her name, will always be her name. Light. Where does light go? It doesn’t. You do. You go. You go everywhere and find her. A small pink dress. A little girl swinging her feet. A small tomato. A cloud shaped like her sleeping. A garden. Everything was Noorie for us. We would be away and still find her with us. Now we are trying to convince each other, Chin Chin and Muck Muck, that she is still here. In us. In Heera.

She was Heera’s soulmate. They came as a pair. Now he is looking for her under the table where she napped all day. He is jumping on shelves and sniffing my purse on which she had her alone time. We did not let him see her body hardening up. We hid her in one of the numerous paper bags the working population accumulates in a Tier 1 city. I ordered her cat food a lot, many of these delivery bhaiyyas knew me now, as the lady with three cats.

I am not religious. I am not superstitious. Until.

Maybe we shouldn’t have gone walking that day. Maybe we should have eaten at that specific place. We should have paid heed when two cats turned up dead in our neighbourhood. Maybe the news I told you over our evening coffee about a person I know was a warning sign. Maybe we shouldn’t have gone on the terrace that night, something I never do, but that day I asked for. Maybe, maybe, maybe.

All freezing and hard between us, our differences, all melted away. Now it feels like nothing matters. Every moment feels like it is bringing us closer to when she will pop her head in the room and be like, did you guys seriously leave me out there? But the truth is, every moment is turning her body colder than ever, in the soft, damp earth, chosen with care despite being under the influence of numbing grief. I had taken a fork from one of these fancy hotels a while ago, something I tend to do – we all have a house to run, guys. It was used to dig up her final bed. You said, even in death, she was pretty. Even in death, she held her grace.

Noorie had become a nominal adjective for us. Whatever pleased us, whatever was the most beautiful was/is Noorie. She was/is everything on her own.

We had plans for her. We were going to take her to the city that gave us each other, we were going to take her to Vietnam. I had a silly dream that if I ever publish a book, I would put Heera and her as my author’s photo. I pictured her on my shoulder, as I walked through the world, both of us curious, but not scared, because we had/have each other.

I have lost people in my life, but death arrived as a phone call, a text message, an afterthought from my mother. There was always a distance. This time it was right on my doorstep, quite literally too. This time it is a double edged sword; this time, there was collateral damage.

Misery loves company. In a weird way, I was glad that I did not face her death alone. I was also scared that I would be blamed for it, had I been the bearer of the news over a phone call, a text, or on your doorstep. I am relieved we both witnessed it together. I wouldn’t have been able to walk that night, with a paper bag full of life that once was, alone. I wouldn’t have found the right soil, and I would have simply collapsed next to her.

What angers me is how sudden it was. What angers me is how divine this punishment feels. I don’t know whom to turn to for answers, and I don’t know what to ask. Is she okay? Is there an afterlife? Did she know we did our best for her?

I have spent alternate hours crying. I have gone to the office, and will continue to do so tomorrow, and then after. As soon as I return home and climb the stairs where I would stand calling her back home, the tears start. I have always loved a routine, but I don’t like what this one entails. It hurts. Physically too.

With each passing moment, Heera is morphing into her. Suddenly, he is sleeping like she used to. He is grinning like she used to. How do you console a beast of nature, an element so free and untainted? How do you explain grief to a cat who only understands that something important is amiss? But this is where all Translation Theory fails, this is where all dissertations on Language do a disservice to the field itself. Of course he knows, of course he understands. Why else would he hold my face? Why else would he sleep a little closer to us? Why else would he imitate everything she used to do? Don’t we all form rituals, don’t we all pay our respects?

There’s so much to say, but I feel like the more I put down here, the more this delicate fabric of life gets torn. This isn’t enough. But I don’t want to let anything else come loose from within, lest I forget.

The point is, I had a cat. I loved her to death. I love her beyond that, too. Noorie was my first love, in the way love explains itself to you when you are still a child, boundless. This grief is not going anywhere, but I have to.

Oh baby, baby, it’s a wild world

It’s hard to get by just upon a smile

Oh baby, baby, it’s a wild world

I’ll always remember you like a child, girl

You know I’ve seen a lot of what the world can do

And it’s breaking my heart in two

Because I never want to see you sad, girl

Don’t be a bad girl

But if you want to leave, take good care

Hope you make a lot of nice friends out there

But just remember there’s a lot of bad and beware (wild world, cat stevens)