Old Friends

“I hate cats”, bemoaned Shane as he attempted to shoo the stray from his truck.

“Shane, it’s me, cut it out already. You know I’m not leaving this seat.”

“Whatever man, I don’t want whatever it is you’re selling. I learned my lesson that time you made me think I was rescuing that hitchhiker while you were reporting her as kidnapped. I hate you! You suck, so get out of my truck before I have to throw you out.”

“Chill Shane, I have a proposal and we both know you lack the huevos necessary to throw me out. I’m a talking cat for goodness sakes, do you have any idea what I could do to you?”

Hugo wasn’t bluffing. While he was currently in a rather benevolent phase of his life, in the past he had killed, pillaged, destroyed. He was the one who inspired the Vikings, he was the first plague rat in Europe and he taught Nero the song to play while Rome burned. His threat, while vague, was certainly not idle.

“Alright! Fine! Let’s hear it. Spit it out and get out of my truck. I have to get to the city Penny is in bad shape. She was hit by a bus.”

“Penny is in trouble you say? Interesting…well as a talking cat there are certain things I can and cannot do. For instance I could save Penny’s life if you would like, but I could not…well actually I would not do that unless you did something for me.”

“I got it! You’re a cat that can talk. Now stop wasting my time. What do you want?”

“I want you to……..scratch my belly. No that was a cat joke. Really I want you to kill me. I’m sick and tired of being a cat. I need a change. Unfortunately I cannot do the job myself so I need to enlist your help. Will you help me?”

“Really dude I don’t want to kill some cat. But I guess if you’ll save Penny first I’d do much worse than that.”

“Great! Alright let’s get started.”

With all the traffic the drive into the city was fairly lengthy but Shane’s new found hope for Penny made it go quickly. When they arrived Shane shoved Hugo into a backpack and entered the hospital. He was immediately stopped by the security guard who found it odd that a backpack was purring. Shane quickly made up a story about animal therapy and how it was far less stressful for the cat to be transported in the backpack because it reminds animals of being in the womb, and he was ushered past the guard. Once in Penny’s room Shane opened the bag and Hugo leapt up onto the comatose Penny’s chest.

Only to relieve himself

“What the hell dude, you can’t just pee on Penny”

“Don’t worry Shane I’m helping her” He wasn’t “it’s time for you to uphold your end of the bargain. Break into the drug cabinet and get me some hydrocodone. Opiates are my only weakness” they aren’t “make sure to crush it up really fine, I have a sensitive nose”

Shane was still busy crushing when security arrived. They immediately grabbed him and watched as the Hugo sniffed up all the drugs.

“When will Penny get better?” Shane yelled through the tussle

“Oh dude I don’t actually help people. I’m a cat, I just peed on her while you got me high. Man you sound like an idiot.”

The presence of a talking cat threw off the security guards enough that the now stoned Hugo strolled out of the hospital and made his way back outside to find a taxi.

“It’s always a good day to be a cat”