Abnormal

The cat walked into the room and everybody froze. Gremlin was mostly white with a few black splotches. He meowed softly as if asking a question. Mo gripped the couch cushion as he sat up straight, alert. Jen, sitting next to Mo, pulled her feet up onto the couch and hugged her knees. I sat in a rather uncomfortable chair across from the two. Why did I even have that chair? I hated it. It was probably the cause of my back pain. To sit it requires one to slouch and twist the spine. Hours and hours and days and months and years really messes up your back. Yet, I sat in the chair and shifted my gaze from my friends on the couch back to Gremlin and then back and forth a few more times, as if watching a tennis match.

“Meow?” Gremlin said again as he took a couple more steps into the room.

Mo and Jen burst out laughing, eyeing one another to make sure it was ok to laugh.

“The spot is like moving. Like it’s breathing!” He exclaimed, pointing at Gremlin’s biggest back splotch on his right side.

It was that moment during a mushroom trip when everything seems connected. That moment when all the conversations and actions from that day appear to converge. That moment when I was telling my friends how my cat’s spot is actually a portal and then the cat just so happened to walk into the room, as if he knew I was talking about him.

“Yeah,” Jen said slowly and methodically. She had stopped laughing and was back to taking in all the feelings. “I mean, the wood floors kinda look like centipedes and the plants are like dancing. But that spot–it’s different somehow.”

“It’s a portal,” I said, trying not to laugh. A snicker came out and it felt disingenuous. Not that I was joking or trying to trick them. But my high had me excited about everything and laughing was the only way to express the sheer joy of discovery.

“Yeah but,” she continued. “It’s not normal.”

“Would you say it’s abnormal?” Mo offered, serious at first but then overtaken by chuckles.

“Yeah, it’s abnormal.” Jen droned, in a trance. As she spoke, she slowly got off the couch and walked over the Gremlin who sat on the floor, looking at her.

“Meow?”

Jen slowly extended her hand over his head. She gently brushed his fur. He closed his eyes and purred. She guided her hand down his side and hovered over the black splotch. She froze. It felt like hours passed by, all of us frozen.

“It’s a portal.” I said in a monotone.

She softly pet the fur on the black spot and Gremlin purred louder. She transitioned into a more hearty petting motion, almost scratching. Her fingers burrowed into the fur. Deeper and deeper. Her fingers were gone. Her knuckles, her hand, her wrist disappeared into the fur. Mo and I watched, holding our breath, trying not to make a sound.

Jen was halfway to her elbow and Gremlin was still purring. Then she yanked her arm out. Mo and I jumped back in our seats. She held her hand. She massaged her fingers. Everything was still intact.

“It’s cold,” she said.

“It’s a portal,” I replied.