Ann's cat, Hunter, died this morning. He was 14.
He always had an enlarged heart. Our vet said that one day he would just fall over, and that would be it. I guess today was that day.
He must have gotten out of our bed sometime in the night, and headed for the food dish in the bathroom. I found him just inside the door, next to the radiator. To me, it seemed he had a surprised look on his face. Our other cat, Henry, was standing there looking at him. I wondered how long things had been fucked up like this, while we slept barely ten feet away.
There was no warning for this at all. Yesterday, he was his usual self. He cried for about ten minutes after I got home, which was the usual routine. He sat on the couch with Ann while we watched television, and hopped into bed with Ann when she went in there to read. Another perfectly normal day here, which made today's events all the more surreal.
We freaked out a little bit at first, and then we found a box and gently placed him in it. Ann called the veterinarian, and I got in the shower to get ready to start this very bad day. And I was fine until I went to turn the water on, and then I came unglued for a few minutes.
Hunter hated me. This was very clear from the beginning. He threw up on me stuff. He rubbed his ass in my face while I was sleeping. He cried and cried for no reason, and wouldn't stop no matter what we did. He was kind of a dick, and I told him that all the time. Okay, specifically I told him he was "some kind of asshole kitty." And I would tell other people about how I hated him.
Today, and I am eating those words plenty. I will be for a very, very long time.
We took him downstairs and into the car. He seemed to weigh about a hundred pounds as I sat with the box on my lap on the drive to the vet. I alternated between trying to hold it together and openly bawling the entire trip. Ann was amazingly composed throughout. Later tonight, she will come home and it will be my turn to be amazingly composed while she loses it. This is part of what makes us a good team.
I like our vet. When we got up to the counter, all of the paperwork was already filled in. All we had to do was sign, choose an urn, and pay. I don't think I was able to even say a word the entire time we were in there. They took the box into a back room, and that was it. He was gone.
I went to work, but there was no point in it. I spent the whole morning thinking about him, and Ann, and Henry. I left around one this afternoon, and followed Henry around the house as he looked and sniffed and walked very low and scared.
Henry has been sitting on my lap for the last hour. And when he gets up, I'll follow him around again while he investigate every corner of the house looking for Hunter, and failing. My throat hurts. My eyes hurt. I don't know what to do.